Made Entertaiment on Your Car

I have this sub installed in my 2008 Tacoma Access cab. I have an aftermarket stereo with high quality component speakers, but was lacking the low end only a sub can provide. The BOSS 1200 unit is exactly as advertised and does a great job of providing the low end I was lacking.

Pros:

-Compact – if installed properly it will take up zero space in your vehicle and will likely be unseen

-Plenty of tuning options

-Tight sounding low end performance

-Good value

Cons:

- Just a little too “high” to fit under my truck seat w/o some minor modifications

- Instruction manual lacking info on how to properly tune

-The “gain” control allows the box to be ridiculously over powered. It is unusable beyond about 1/2 power if you want decent sound.

I have and will continue recommend this product to fellow Tacoma owners.

Rating: 5 / 5

I just bought a Toyota Tacoma 4 door p’up. First modification was replacing the stock head unit with an iPod/USB compatible unit. I was lucky getting the truck without the more expensive (200) 6-CD changer OR the JBL audio system (a $2,000 upgrade I had in a Sienna years ago and found lacking in many regards).

Okay. Short of ripping out the storage paneling behind the rear seats – which I didn’t want to do – and putting in a mondo amp, 12+ inch subwoofers and sound box for hundreds of dollars, all I wanted was more bottom in my audio.

Over at the [...] forum I found the Boss system discussed, pros and cons laid out fairly clearly, and after looking at several other (more expensive) options, I bought the Boss Bass1200 unit (not, unfortunately, on sale, but $110 was a good price in retrospect).

Getting the unit under the passenger seat (I keep a personal protection device under the driver’s seat, it’s 2010) was a little time-consuming, but there is definitely room there with about 1 CM clearance from the top edges.

I was blown away by the first song I played (I recommend just about anything Chris Squire plays his ‘65 Ric on). I’m still playing around with settings. No it’s NOT a 12 or 14 inch subwoofer box with an 1800 watt amp behind it, but it’s more than adequate. I’ve got several years’ experience running high-power PA systems for rock bands (hobby and roadie jobs over the decades) and again, this isn’t an earschplittenloudenboomer rock the car next to you a stoplights box, but you WILL feel the low notes in your back and butt. Kind of makes you tingly all over. My ears ring already, I don’t need LOUD, I just needed to feel the bass. Drums are equally impressive.

How good is the bass output really? It makes my wife (a long-time Simon and Garfunkle, Josh Groban fan) nauseus. There is a remote output/volume control which is handy when she’s in the car, just as easy to crank up and rock out when she’s not or when I’m out with my 16 yr old (musician) son.

I gave it five stars. For what it is, which is substantial, it’s a great deal and probably the best of the options available.

Buy one. And buy the wiring kit too, unless you already have the components lying around, you’ll spend twice as much and much time tracking down the parts.

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THAT was THEN, THIS IS NOW

March 29th, still playing email/phone tag with service trying to get a return authorization.

DO NOT BUY ONE OF THESE. Unless you like gambling. Do your online homework. Just about as many people are having problems with these units as are happy with them. I thought it was great, for the reasons mentioned. Then it died. About ten days after installation. Tech dept is VERY hard to reach by phone. Would NOT just issue an RMA. Insisted I return the amp to AMazon, who wouldn’t take it without all original packaging (tossed w/ Christmas stuff, mistakenly). Did try a SECOND amp. Even stupider, it died in 3 days. New truck, new audio head unit. BOSS wants $15 to return the unit after repair. Which is fine. I’ll try this once. $109 plus $30 (round trip) for a gamble that may or may not pay off. Might be good money after bad, just a fluke, I don’t know.

I’ve done worse. But this is just stupid.

DON”T BUY ONE.

May 3d, 2010.

Sent unit out April 15th – what took so long was email/voicemail and delays from BOSS and trying to decide whether to use it as a doorstop or give it to a tech friend of mine to play with. I sent it back, with all hardware/cables.

Just got the unit back from BOSS. No notes, invoice, just a sticker on the bottom of the unit with several lines of print of things that could be wrong with the unit, highlighted in yellow is “Power supply.”

Chomping at the bit to put it back in my car, I couldn’t help noticing what wasn’t in the box. The audio control cable I’d sent back with the unit.

Sent an email to customer service, phone wait times are long and more often than not I’ve only gotten voice mailboxes.

I’ll keep you posted.

Definitely throwing good money after bad. Do not buy, do not buy, do not buy.

June 5, 2010. Got it back, got around to reinstalling, never did work. At all. No volume from box. Started out with all settings on minimum, tinkered around for about an hour. Three days later, little blue light on remote is dead.

Unit was installed with a Boss installation kit, and while I’m not a “professional” I know my way around electrons, grounds, gain, etc. I’ve done this before, folks, have rebuilt several guitar/bass amplifiers, do home wiring, wired a homebuilt airplane, this unit is crap. I’m tempted, tempted now, to just gut it, add a subwoofer amp and use the speaker alone. Tempted even more to contact my credit card company and ask them to refund my money, I have the emails, and other information to submit.

Don’t buy this, or any boss product. Customer service is the pits, you can spend days playing phone tag, they charge you to return a unit THEY should be paying YOU to return (what is this with so many units dying? In the 7 months since I bought this, I have searched the web a half dozen times for problems with this amp, this company, and the list is getting longer.

Good luck.
Rating: 1 / 5