A Stereo with a Brain

The stereo in my living room knows too much about me. It knows that I listen to cheesy love songs by Rod Stewart and that I am hooked on show tunes from the Mamma Mia! original-cast recording. It remembers which songs I play five times in a row and which ones I skip altogether. The Bose Lifestyle 48available in Britain next month for $7,094understands all this because it comes with uMusic, an "intelligent playback system" that stores hundreds of CDs on a hard drive and can learn its owner's musical tastes.

The Lifestyle system is aimed at...