Interesting comment from Kingfrog... He SELLS them, is a keyboard player, and wouldn't recommend them. Yet many remain happy as sandboys. What makes this so?

Personally, I put it down to the RADICAL differences in volume that many of us play at. 100 pensioners need a completely different level of volume and especially low end (they grew up in an age before subwoofers!) than 100 hiphop dancers. Playing background to 200 people at a snooty country club affair isn't the same as playing foreground to 200 drunk Cajuns at a fais do do! Some like their sound at roughly the same volume a live band would play at, some play at volumes no more than the Muzak plays at.

One size does NOT fit all... But you'll rarely hear that from the Bose evangelists. It works for THEM, how could it POSSIBLY not work for everyone else? If YOU can't get a good clean sound out of a Compact, OF COURSE it must be something you have done wrong...

Give it a break! 130W RMS out of what, four tiny speakers and a TINY subwoofer. You were expecting a Vertec line array? OF COURSE it's going to break up and get muddy as you get loud. And anyone that hasn't YET heard the Compact get dirty has by definition not got it loud, yet! It's what they DO....