Bose "Premium" Audio

[metlfan2003]

Greetings everyone! I recently purchased a used 2013 Buick Verano T and am in love with nearly every aspect of the car. One thing I can't bring myself to love is the Bose sound system. To put it plainly, it sounds terrible. The stock stereo in my 2003 Chevy Cavalier run circles around this much more expensive, supposed "premium" audio system.

The highs are fine, and the midrange is fairly good, but the bass is essentially nonexistent; and that's with it turned up to maximum. I'm not one to want a booming, overly saturated bass sound from my stereo, but I find the amount of adjustment on this stereo to be severely lacking. Bass, Mid and Treble only? Where's the full EQ? The Equalizer menu option only has "Custom" and "Talk". That's simply pathetic, and I don't know how they didn't see it necessary to include a full equalizer on this stereo system. The Bose media release pamphlet for the Verano boasts having "A Bose digital amplifier with sevenchannels of custom equalization andproprietary digital signal processinglocated in the rear quarter panel" while offering no control over the "seven channels of custom equalization". I suppose they mean it has seven outputs and not so much "equalization" as I would refer to it.

I've tried everything I can think of to improve the sound to no avail. I've tried putting it more to the back where the supposed "woofers" are, and it does improve it a touch, but still nothing close to what I would consider acceptable. If I turn the stereo up to ear blasting levels, it does sound better, but the car is so quiet, I rarely need to turn it up beyond a quarter of it's full potential.

I checked the amp in the trunk just to be sure everything was plugged in and found nothing out of sorts there. Is there seriously nothing I can do to crank the bass up on this system? I've tried it with multiple inputs (knowing full and well that the highly compressed XM radio signal I'm receiving is not what anyone should consider "quality") and there's simply nothing I can do to improve the sound. Honestly, at this point I miss the stereo in my 03 Cavalier.

I guess to summarize, I have two questions for the fine people of this forum:

1) Has anyone been able to get acceptable levels of bass from the Bose audio system?
and/or
2) Has anyone had luck installing a subwoofer in the trunk of the car and have it connected to the stock radio/amp/speakers?

Could something be wrong with my stereo? Am I the only one that has this opinion of the system? My wife concurs with me that it doesn't really impress given the overall premium nature of the vehicle, and even commented that the stereo in her 2002 Mitsubishi Lancer sounds better than the stereo in the Verano.

Please help!

Thanks!

 

[LCromwell]

Yeah I was disapointed with the base. I wouldn't call a (treble, mid and bass an equalizer) I was so looking forward to a really great sound system like Cadillac had with the BOSE.
You found an amp in the trunk? Where? I assumed my sub was under the back seat. At louder than my wife could take I get pretty good bass on Pink Floyd but I have to listen to it without her. Oh well.

 

[metlfan2003]

The amp is in the trunk behind the carpet on the passenger side, mounted to the inside of the fender. If you remove the plastic pull clips on that side and take the cargo net hanger off, you can pull the carpet back enough to see it. I didn't see anything out of sorts or unplugged or anything so I just put it all back together.

The only reason I knew that was from this Bose PDF listed on the Buick website :http://media.buick.com/content/Pages/news/us/en/2011/Nov/1128_BuickVerano/_jcr_content/iconrow/textfile/file.res/Buick_Verano_Bose%20System%20Illustration.pdf

I agree, the only way to get the bass to even show up is to turn it up to above half maximum volume, which is entirely too loud to listen to in this car since it's so quiet inside. The thing I don't understand is that I believe that the system has the potential to sound really good, but they didn't give enough adjustment in the stereo to bring it out. For some reason, I was expecting a full range of audio adjustment and controls for a "premium" audio system and not the standard "Treble, Midrange, Bass" adjustment like you get on a car from the 1980's. Since everything is done electronically through the touch screen display, there's absolutely no reason why they couldn't have programmed in a full EQ, or simply offered enough adjustment through the three audio controls they provided to turn everything up. I had a $20 MP3 player 10 years ago that offered a full EQ, but a $30k car doesn't?

I feel like the midpoint on my bass adjustment should essentially be the bottom and the top should be the midpoint. I'm JUST about able to hear the bass when it's maxed out. If they would have just made the slider move up another 25-50%, I could probably have worked with that. Maybe a software update could fix this later on, but I don't anticipate one coming.

 

[LCromwell]

I found something out the other day, every source has to have the treble,mid and bass set for it. Its like the SONY XBR TV's,every video you had to set for the color,contrast treble and bass. My son was riding with me and we were listening to my BB phones music from cars bluetooth and it was flat sounding and when he went into the tune selection it was if I hadn't set it. Most of the time I'm playing a CD so the tune was set there and when he set the treble,mid and bass, the bass came alive so check your tune under every source like Sirrus if you are using that,CD,radio bluetooth from your phone. If you already knew this then please excuse me.

 

[Michael121]

I have a 2015 Turbo with the Bose sound system. LCromwell's point about adjusting the (limited) EQ for each source is true - you can customize it for CD, Sirius-XM, Bluetooth audio, etc.

If you find that the bass isn't turned way down as you try different inputs, then you may have a real problem with your audio system as I found that I have to turn the bass setting DOWN (to about 25% or less) or I get over-pumped with bass. And I love bass. I found that CDs and USB-connected media (my iPhone) sound better (crisper/tighter/better stereo imaging) than Sirius-XM or bluetooth audio. Headphone-jack audio sounds in-between.

Just for fun, open the trunk while the system is playing, stick your head in and make sure you're hearing music from the speakers mounted on the deck (you may be able to gently touch the speaker fabric from below). You could also try to listen from above. Perhaps those speakers are either dead or not getting their signals properly. I believe these are responsible for the deeper bass. If it's a Bose system problem (and not just easily-replaceable speakers or simply loose connections), it may be very pricey to fix.

Michael

 

[stoopid]

Just for fun, open the trunk while the system is playing, stick your head in and make sure you're hearing music from the speakers mounted on the deck (you may be able to gently touch the speaker fabric from below). You could also try to listen from above. Perhaps those speakers are either dead or not getting their signals properly. I believe these are responsible for the deeper bass. If it's a Bose system problem (and not just easily-replaceable speakers or simply loose connections), it may be very pricey to fix.

Michael

Have you turned the mid and treble all the way down and located the sub woofer as described above? Crank the volume if you need to, but see if you can physically find it. There's a chance a wire is loose and it's not getting a signal, which would obviously impact the amount of total bass output if the sub (possibly the rear deck mounted speakers?) wasn't generating bass.

IF the woofer is working, bring up the mid and treble to a satisfactory level from zero, and see if it's a matter of just tuning the EQ more 'dramatically' with the bass setting much higher than mid/treble. Also check for a 'bass boost' setting is one exists, and a line-level setting dedicated for just the sub (multi-channel systems sometimes have gain settings for each individual speaker or at the very least a separate gain for the sub).

Worse case - bring it to the dealer and have one of their younger 'tech' friendly guys come out (maybe even someone from the detailing or sales team) to take a look at the system. If it's not a loose wire, then it's likely just a setting being overlooked.

It should also be noted that where you sit in the car can have dramatic effects on what the stereo sounds like. I find the back seat gets more bass with a trunk-driven bass system (like the one in your car), or systems with a sub box in the trunk. Often that bass wave emanating from the trunk area passes by the front seats to such an extent you have to *really* crank the bass for it to be more felt than heard. That's just an unfortunate consequence of trying to generate low frequency sound in an enclosed tin can. Some people mount their subs where their rear passenger seats are to help mitigate that effect.

 

[Michael121]

Metfan,

Did you ever figure out the problem with your bass?

 

[shawngw]

My solution 2 years ago :

I drive with the left backseat down.
Wired sub+amp off of the Bose amp.
There was a post a while back about wiring diagrams

 

[someone else]

My solution 2 years ago :
View attachment 10627
I drive with the left backseat down.
Wired sub+amp off of the Bose amp.
There was a post a while back about wiring diagrams

Dude... PLEASE... more info about this... pleeeease. 🙂

 

[KevinJ]

Interesting.... I think the bass is ok on my 2013 2.0T...
True , it's not going to rattle any windows, but then again I prefer a balanced sound field with my listening.
I don't want or need the bass to overwhelm any vocals or guitar leads.

I will agree that I do find myself having to tweak the bass, mid, and treble settings as I jump from different sources and even different songs/music from the same source. But I attribute most of that to inconsistencies in the broadcasts/recordings. And satellite radio inherently sucks on sound quality anyway.

I jump a lot between FM Radio, CD, and 320k MP3 on a USB Drive, and I am always tweaking the sound.
But I don't find myself wishing for more bass.
Personal preference I guess.

And yes, a Premium Sounds system should have a Full EQ.

 

[someone else]

Interesting.... I think the bass is ok on my 2013 2.0T...
True , it's not going to rattle any windows, but then again I prefer a balanced sound field with my listening.
I don't want or need the bass to overwhelm any vocals or guitar leads.

I will agree that I do find myself having to tweak the bass, mid, and treble settings as I jump from different sources and even different songs/music from the same source. But I attribute most of that to inconsistencies in the broadcasts/recordings. And satellite radio inherently sucks on sound quality anyway.

I jump a lot between FM Radio, CD, and 320k MP3 on a USB Drive, and I am always tweaking the sound.
But I don't find myself wishing for more bass.
Personal preference I guess.

And yes, a Premium Sounds system should have a Full EQ.

It does sound good enough... but, I'm coming from a 2002 Buick Regal GS with stock Monsoon sound system and Infinity Reference 6.5 decklip speakers, no sub, and the bass just kills the 9speaker Bose system in the Verano.

I think adding simply adding a 10" sub to the Verano will solve all those problems and then some.

That said I do agree it's good enough as is... but would be AMAZING with a 10" sub.

 

[G-127789]

I just recently got a 2016 Buick Verano Leather Group and I've ran into the same problem. I asked around many places and pretty much all of them suggested that I get new speakers and subwoofer system and an amp for those speakers. Of course this is really expensive and might end up costing more than what I bought the car for. For the time being, I've settled with buying a JBL GT-Basspro12. So far it's been good and it's self contained due to having a built in amp. It's not overly powerful and gives just the right amount of bass punch. Only thing I've noticed that is that you need to pull the left seat down to get the full effect. Also it's pretty big compared to trunk space. I've had it for about two months and I must say, it's perfect for now! I now think that the door woofers, tweeters, and back subs could use a swap out, due to not feel crisp or full like the bass is. I've attached a link to the subwoofer that I bought.

Sites-JB-US-Site

JBL brand

www.jbl.com