Wow, If you lived next door, I'd suggest whipping up a pitcher or margaritas and let's both go through this thing piece by piece. That not being the case (I'll have to drink the pitcher myself) I would suggest that you go through the manual to see if you have set the crossovers properly and that your subwoofer is working correctly (if you have one hooked up). Barring the unlikely problem that the tweeters in your speakers are blown, about the only thing I can think of is perhaps you have your speakers placed in non-ideal locations, with objects in their path which are absorbing the sound. The sound of Bose speakers in my experience has been very much on the bright side, so is it possible that she's used to that sound? This is a very difficult problem to diagnose by distance.

As for the operational problems of the equipment by your wife, I've never been able to figure that one out, except for the time I jettisoned the wife and kept the equipment If you're not ready to do that, perhaps creating a "cheat sheet" that's kept by the receiver with the necessary steps for each program source might help. I've also seen setups with colored dots next to the input and setup buttons that were color coded for each source.

Hope this is of some help!

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The Soundhound Theater