Fraktal

I used to cover PIB and almost nailed both sounds (verse and chorus) with a Line6 POD Live XT. You should have seen my bandmates' "WTF??!!" faces the first day we reharsed that song. Those Line6 gadgets go dirty cheap these days second hand (got mine for 150 € inc. gigbag).

Have you ever tried Noctua fans? I am a freak when it comes to silence and my computer has a total of 5 Noctua fans inside. It is my DAW, so it HAS to be really quiet. It also gets very hot, happens when you abuse of CPU heavy audio plugins inside a 3 layer plastic computer case for acoustic isolation. 1 fan for intake, 2 for exhaust, 1 for CPU heatsink and the last one for the power supply. I tried almost every brand out there (including PAPST, of course) and Noctua were the quietest ones by far. It was not so evident comparing 1vs1, but the sound of 5 fans at the same time was obviously louder, making it much easier to pick up a winner. Sitting 50cm away with my computer on the table I need 3AM countryside silence to notice a very quiet whoosh of air coming from it. Try them if you ever have the chance. They are anything but cheap, worth every penny, though.

Check the Ibanez Promethean, it ticks all your boxes. Extremely light and small, great clean tone plus very powerful tone shaping capabilities, ipod input and cheap as chips. Several reviews on youtube, also.

+1 for second hand markbass combos. They pack quite a punch. Lightweight also. Overall best amp I have ever had.

I had a ESP custom shop several years ago. The quality of the finish was absolutely impressive, mirror-like paintjob, perfect fretwork and a body-neck joint so good that we (me and my bassist friends) used to think it was a neck-through instead of a bolt on. It had a SD humbucker and had a veeery good tone, but if plucked really hard the preamp clipped. It was overpriced IMO, but I bought it new very cheap since the guy that ordered it changed his mind. Ultimately it had to go because I moved to 5 strings, and this one was 4.

Dont worry about the piezo tweeter: If you dont like its sound, you can turn it useless effectively with a slight adjustment of your VLE filter and you wont notice the difference compared to your Jeff Berlin combo. If I am right here, surely you can't notice the first one or two dots when upping your VLE pot, since you are using a single 15" driver that cant reproduce such high frequencies being dampened with the lowpass filter*. I can clearly notice the effect with my 102P combo, because of the piezo tweeter. Actually I like the sound of mine. Ok, ok, it isnt a silk dome tweeter, thats for sure, but I have heard MUCH worse piezos before. This one is gentler to my ears compared to most other piezos, in my limited experience. And again, it is easy to tame it with the VLE pot. *VLE or "Vintage Loudspeaker Emulation" is just marketing blabling for what is actually a simple frequency adjustable low pass filter... Meh! Cant we just call things by their name? Its hard enough already to learn a few technical words about my job without every damn brand calling things their own way! o_O'

[quote name='Mr. Foxen' post='765280' date='Mar 5 2010, 04:45 PM']Fairly curious as to why there.[/quote] Partly because of the fun and partly because a very good local sound engineer was showing me there was no risk of blowing my 2x15 with a QSC power amp after I asked him. I was obviously very concerned about driving my dear 600w cab with a 2400w amp at full power, I always thought that was the quickest way to build up totally justified GAS for a new cab! To be completely honest here, I still cant understand what happened there. Maybe those amps monitor the speaker displacement somehow and limit themselves accordingly? The sound guy insisted it was safe to drive any given speaker with a goop pro PA amp several times the wattage as long as there is a "lack of square-wavy distortion", but I have heard equally respected professionals stating that is all bullshit. It would be great if Bill Fitzmaurice or Alex show some light on this subject (If you all can excuse this "off-topicness").

+1000 for QSC brand. Those PA amps are decades ahead in technology when compared to ANY bass amp. Ask any self-respecting sound engineer and they will drool as soon as they hear QSC. I used a bridged QSC PLX 2402 for 3 years driving a 2x15" 4Ohms. So that was a 2400w RMS power amp into a 600w RMS cab. Smells like burnt speakers, you say? Nope. They never failed, even though I drove them extremely hard (all gain/master knobs at full power), giving out earthshattering lows and I never heard distortion. I also wired my sennheisser headphones to the output of a QSC PLX 3002 to try to blow them up the hardcore way... And I failed. In fact, those are the ones Im using at this precise moment. There arent many brands out there offering such reliability. Serious stuff! If you buy QSC you will never regret, I swear.

This: [url="http://www.musik-produktiv.co.uk/%28s%28y7pyhyk37wu860mwfos87a5l%29%29/rockbass-by-warwick-streamer-blackhawk-5-10018966.aspx"]http://www.musik-produktiv.co.uk/%28s%28y7...5-10018966.aspx[/url]

At the risk of getting a lifetime ban from these forums I have to confess I use an old sock... Dont worry, it went to the laundry first!

[quote name='velvetkevorkian' post='752655' date='Feb 21 2010, 12:31 PM']Considered a multi effects? Both the Boss GT-10b and the Line6 Pod X3 range can run two tones at once, so you can have one dirty and one clean. Probably less hassle than running two separate amps.[/quote] +1 That solution would be way cheaper, incredibly easy to lug around, much more versatile... I love my Line6 bass pod XT live and the X3 is even better IME.

[quote name='fatback' post='735907' date='Feb 5 2010, 11:51 AM']Does the praise above apply to the 5 string as well? I've no idea about Ibanez[/quote] Indeed, mine is a 505 (5stringer). If you havent yet, please get to your music shop and try one, its the best bang for bucks out there, almost too good to be true.

[quote name='Born 2B Mild' post='735902' date='Feb 5 2010, 11:38 AM']Maybe new strings and a check on intonation and all points touched by the strings.[/quote] Thanks a lot, but Im afraid that isn't the problem at all. My strings are always pristine and zingy, never more than 2 weeks old, precisely because of that. I need fresh new strings or else my sustain goes the way of the dodo, and I have a feeling that effect is much more prominent on my 505 than my other basses. Intonation is also perfect since I always adjust it when changing strings and recheck it 2-3 days after. Thank you very much, though. Keep the ideas coming! Edit: Now that I think of, does anybody know if those Bartolini MKI soapbar pickups are humbuckers? If so, maybe the magnetic drag on the strings is too strong and I should lower them, specially the neck pickup.

I love my 505, and I wouldnt play any other bass live because of its weight and ergonomics, my weak back approves. Lately Im wondering if it lacks some sustain though (at least compared to my other basses) and would like to hear opinions from other users out there.

[quote name='Lfalex v1.1' post='715201' date='Jan 16 2010, 10:10 PM']And after all that, they put MECs in it AGAIN! There must be better pick-ups to put in some mega-expensive Warwick beast?[/quote] A matter of taste, IMO. I would never replace my MEC humbuckers, really love their sound.

[quote name='Kev' post='652099' date='Nov 12 2009, 12:06 AM']i can't think of many genuine reasons why somebody [i]wouldn't[/i] want tone control options on their bass? I currently only own 1 passive bass, and i miss actives sorely. Out of interest, do you passive bassists run your amps eq flat as well? If not, then i ask what is the difference between altering eq on the amp and on the bass, apart from the obvious conveniance of being able to change your eq on the fly?[/quote] No, I dont run my amp EQ flat. There isnt much difference, but since you cant bypass the EQ section on most amplifiers, why not use that one and get rid of your bass preamp? Everytime your signal goes through a microchip your signal loses a little something and gains some hiss, harmonic distortion, phase issues and general crap. Thats why we prefer passive basses: Less crap in the signal path, cleaner sound.

When speaking of warwicks, it doesnt get any lighter than this one: [url="http://www.warwickbass.com/modules/produkte/produkt.php?katID=14452&cl=EN"]http://www.warwickbass.com/modules/produkt...14452&cl=EN[/url] Those basses sound as good as they look. I've tried 2 of them, 5 stringers, the weight is laughable, action was perfect and the tone was incredible. Avalable as 4 or 5 strings, birdseye or flamed maple top. They are expensive, but worht every penny IME.

Do you hear any noises/strange artifacts coming from your amp when the clip light happens? If not, I would just ignore it.

I have been using the bass pod xt live for a year and I have never had such volume problems. This might sound stupid, but have you checked the expression pedal? It is usually assigned to volume by default, and if the expression pedal receives vibrations from the board when you stomp it then you have a volume problem. What I do is program the expression pedal to control a parameter of a pedal I am not using in that patch, so its accidental movement wont affect the sound. PD: I also upgraded my pod's firmware to the latest version, surely that fixed a few glitches.

When an analog signal enters a chip something is lost, no matter how good that circuit is. This is the reason several quality effect units are designed with a true bypass. Without a true bypass, your signal will go through an integrated circuit that will suck up your tone even if the effect is turned off, and this can be dramatically perceived if you run your signal through several effect units. You cant bypass the EQ section on most amplifiers, so since your signal is already being shaped (and harmed) by your amp equalizer, why not to rely on that one and remove every other? It makes sense to me to keep the signal path as clean and simple as possible. Most of my basses have been/are passive and for a good reason: They frequently sound better to my ears, even years before I knew the electronical explanation. So yes, I am also a non believer xD

My markbass combo has an internal jumper to switch between american/european voltages. Opening it is really easy and fast, you only need an allen wrench. Considering the LMII head and the combo head have identical specs and electronics, I wouldn't rule out Markbass... There are several jumpers there inside, I remember another one to switch the DI XLR output between pre or post. Surely you can find pics and info if you google for it, I saw it all a few months ago. It is easy enough to "uncolor" it if you wish so, the 4 band EQ and the 2 filters working together deliver a surprisingly powerful shaping tool. It is small, light and gives you enough headroom with 500w. Im biased, of course, but obviously I love mine.

Epic fail. Assuming your amp projects a good tone, the "engineer" has no excuse.

Buy a [url="http://www.noctua.at/"]Noctua[/url] fan and replace yours, they are the quietest fans available in the market.