The Bose Lifestyle V35 and Bose Lifestyle V25 just had an official unveiling in London. They’re Bose’s newest surround sound systems, bringing ultra-easy 5.1 surround sound to your living room. We settled down at Bose’s flagship store in London’s Regent Street for the world’s first look at home cinema so simple your granny could set it up.
The Bose Lifestyle V35 and V25 are the home cinema stalwart’s latest attempts to make surround sound easier to add to your living room, following previous attempts with its range of barely-there setups. This time Bose thinks it has really cracked it with what it’s calling its easiest to use system yet.
As well as top-notch sound, simplicity is the watchword for Bose here. The Lifestyle V35 and V25 sport Bose Unify Intelligent System to literally walk users through every stage of the setup.
At today’s secret preview, Bose told us how more and more customers are put off by fiddly home cinema systems, confusing wires, ports and remotes. According to Bose, its Unify system will make setting it all up as easy as a few button presses with on-screen menus replacing paper instruction manuals.
We were shown how to set up a Blu-ray system with just two button presses using the supplied Bose remote.You won’t need another controller after that. Bose also spoke of the V35 and V25 being able to pass the “babysitter” test. “Someone unfamiliar can walk in and know how to use it”, Bose told us.
Personalised menus also let you see at a glance which devices are connected to the V35 and V25. Instead of confusing menus a drop down list is displayed listing your Blu-Ray player, PS3, iPod and all your other tech.
Both the Lifestyle V35 and V25 feature iPod connectors to play music and video off your ‘Pod and Bose Link tech to let you share music throughout the home. Naturally Bose is all about the sound. Both V-Class systems include Bose’s space saving Jewel Cube or Direct Reflecting speakers.
But are they any good? We only got to listen to the Lifestyle V35, but from our brief listen we were impressed with its ability to hit those low deep notes and higher pitched tones to near perfection. We noticed no distortion at all from it. From the magnified sound of someone scribbling on a notepad to bumps, thuds and explosions in the cartoon and movie trailers we watched, we were impressed. It was just as capable with video playback from an iPod on a huge LCD TV to do your iTunes-bought music videos justice. Whether it’s just as capable in our homes is another question. Be sure to check back for a full review once we get our hands all over it.
The Bose Lifestyle V35 and V25 are available from today. Expect to pay top whack, mind. The V35 costs £4,499, with the V25 costing £3,499.
Also, with slightly less fanfare was the announcement of new T-Series surround sound systems – the T20 and T10 with all the features of the V35 and V25 minus iPod support and a different universal remote.
The T20 is out from today costing £2,999 with Bose’s Acoustimass speakers. The T10 is also out today and will cost £1,999 with Bose’s Virtually Invisible speakers.
Out now | £1,999-£4,449 | Bose
