Al Krow

Thanks very much agedhorse and I, for one, wasn't aware of that. Are you able to provide a high level of summary of how the voicing differs (or simply point me to the relevant bit of thread on TB, if easier)?

Guys - those of that have strung your BBs with flats (particularly 5ers), what brands are you using. I've had a strong recommendation to try out TI flats, but would be interested in what else folk are liking a lot and work well with the BB PJ set up?

Ridiculous defeatism. Get a bigger house.

This is interesting through headphones. I can see why 10 ms latency could potentially be an issue for IEM. However when playing live don't we simply adjust our technique and play things a fraction of a second (thousandths to be precise) "ahead" so that we are in time?

Fair - I don't use IEMs but conceptually that makes sense.

Ok I've just re-read this thread from start to finish (hence my random posts and comments above during the course of today! 😀) What surprised me is that not one of us BC bass synth pedal lovers suggested / recommended the Digitech Dirty Robot It's in the same budget price bracket as the EHX Bass Mono Synth and like the EHX (and HX Stomp) would seem to be a digital synth 'emulation' pedal rather than having actual synth oscillators (e.g. in the way that the FI does). But for the money it does look to be good and has a good reputation, from comments on the net, for both tracking and for providing a couple of gigable sounds. The Dirty Robot has been out since 2016 (same year as the FI) - anyone had / got one?

If you're after a compact poly synth capability with great tracking then check out the Boss SY-1. I've sold my FI to make way for this on my board. Yup.

Folk who worry about 8ms latency clearly have too much time on their hands 😉

Just had a very anodyne response from Fender (who acquired the Jackson brand along with its 2002 purchase of Charvel) along the lines of "not saying 'cos weights vary"... Can't believe I'm potentially heading back to a Fender bass, if I end up getting one of these 😁 But I need to wait for the weight.

We've just been asked to play a follow up gig at Wembley Box Park on the 17th Dave, so if you and the missus want to come over to that, I'll make sure to give the F112 a spin then. If it ends up being as good as I think it will be, I may struggle to justify holding onto my BF SC! 😎

Comment above was in relation to the SY-300, which I'm pretty sure is polyphonic?

Ahhh if only... 🙄

A little bit of synth history (well my sawtooth take it on it anyway ) ... Started delving into this side topic when finding myself surprised that retailers can still price the 2004 released Boss SYB-5 for between £120 and £150 new, when the vastly more capable new SY-1 model is about to hit the shelves at £175. It's predecessor, the SYB-3, was released in 1996. I'm a little tempted to pick up a SYB-5 (used of course!) just to compare how the tech has improved in the intervening 11 years. Yup that's not me being bad at sums - but based on the assumption that the SY-1 is a repackaged and cut down version of the polyphonic SY-300 which came out in Autumn 2015 as a belated response to the much admired 2011 Roland GR 55. Moving into more recent times, the Panda Future Impact came out hard on the heels of the Boss SY-300 in the summer of 2016, as a successor to the 9 preset Akai Deep Impact. The Akai was released and pulled relatively quickly in the mid 1990s but got itself a bit of a cult following resulting in stratospheric prices which are belatedly coming back down to earth. The FI with its synthesized blocks of oscillators, filters and envelope generators and 99 presets pretty much became top dog until...last month and the July 2019 release of the Source Audio C4. Along the way we have had the initially popular Markbass SuperSynth which was released in 2009 with minor cosmetic changes made in a v2 released in 2015, but was somewhat done for by the arrival of the FI; the quirky 2017 Bananana Matryoshka which we loved but found hard to get many gigable sounds from and two 2018 releases: the Pigtronix Mothership 2 which provided us with a small footprint and attractive form factor analog synth but never really captured the hearts of us bassists; and the 2018 Meris Enzo which seemed to hold a fair bit of promise but requires midi to get the best out of and seems already at risk of being eclipsed by the C4. In hindsight 2015, with the arrival of the Boss SY-300, heralded a new era of development and competition between pedal makers in the synth arena and without doubt now is a great time to be getting into bass synths!

👍👍👍

We weren't being that quiet in the bass-ment last night Dave 😁 Bear in mind that the Mesa M6 is pretty non-linear in its response i.e. it gets loud pretty quickly. We had the gain and master at between 3 and 4 out of 10 and I'd likely not go that much louder with a full band, maybe to typically 5 / 10 (or poss 6 if I was really pushing it). After Sat's gig when the SC was feeling a little bit 'scratchy' at higher volumes in a large venue, the next large venue we do I defo need to give the F112 an outing to see how it compares. My gut instinct is that it will do very well.

That's a very Sad quip, Dave 😂

Whereas I love having access to 3 band EQ rather than just bass and treble on my active basses. If you think it could provide a back up to a Sadowsky, then that would seem to me to be high praise indeed! Well I moved my BB 735A on earlier in the year, and this indeed could be a tasty replacement for it! Even has a striking similarity to the Yammy headstock

Sooo much going for this bass, as you guys above have also spotted! But your last point could be the killer one and not in a good way! I've been trawling the net for some idea on weight and not found anything that looks accurate / sensible. I took the liberty of emailing Jackson last night - hope to hear back within a couple of days. If anyone beats me to it, please do post.

You're welcome 😁 I would also have potentially thought about getting the C4 if you hadn't started this thread (or more likely kept my FI), so I guess one good turn and all that...

I think synth lends itself to polyphonic use perhaps more so than many other effects. And if polyphony is available that seems a really nice plus to me and in Woody's case a "must have" which I can understand. There were some nice, albeit brief, examples of polyphony on the most recent short clip of the SY-1 I posted last night on this thread.

Fair enough, Dave. Fyi - the F112 isn't much bigger than the SC and has a wedge corner to enable it to be used as a monitor:

Just a thought - but why not dispense with the ST, not bother getting the SC and just get a BB2 as a one stop shop that will cater for all your needs? Or if you want something outstanding, a Fearless F112 which, as much as I love my SC for its lightness and general capability, just deals with the whole sonic spectrum (lows, mids and highs) with more authority than either the SC or even the BB2. It is IMO the best 1x12 cab I've ever come across - had a fellow BCer over last night @dave_bass5 buying a pedal back off me and I suspect he's a convert to the Fearless F112 too

Harry - I think you are spot on. It seems to me that Boss have taken the SY-300 and packaged it into something that is 1/5 the size and 1/3 the price and without the program-ability with their new SY-1. My expectation is that the FI and C4 will almost certainly edge it over the SY-1 in terms of quality of synth engine, but the SY-1 wins on price and for many of us (me included) on work-flow and is also polyphonic which the other two aren't. Once I have incorporated synth as a staple sound into our sets and got my bandmates used to it, I don't rule out returning to the FI, or joining the C4, fold. Particularly if FI release a more compact Mk II (there's a a lot of empty space in the FI shell!) with polphony to refresh their offering.

@Osiris Yup indeedy! That's exactly why I've sold my FI and this will be arriving shortly to take its place (starting to land in the UK) I'm afraid that as @HazBeen confirmed, the Stomp isn't much cop a synth machine. You won't get anything close to even the SY-1, let alone the C4 or FI with the Stomp. The Stomp's filter sims are pretty decent though and its drive effects seem to me to be very good indeed. Looking forward to you posting your recommended settings for multi-band compression, which I am sure a lot of your fellow BC'ers will be interested in.