Al Krow

@stewblack here you go - what it looks like on my home board set up. The Smoothhound is on bottom right of the board. Also illustrates why I'm such a fan of compact - definitely no space for anything G75 sized to fit comfortably! And no guitar leads whatsoever(!!) which I'll have to admit kinda feels incredibly decadent for home use, but definitely better than sitting in a drawer as a back up for my gigging SH

Actually no schadenfreude on my part, matey - I'm very sorry to hear it didn't work out. But I think I'm due to get bought a couple of pints from you by default though, right? Whilst you're at BD please let us have your thoughts on the Mesa WD-800 - a number of us are really interested to hear whether this is living up to the hype and feature set.

Yamahas are the biz. They Stomp on a lot of other gear IMHO. And great for rock (just to get this thread vaguely back on track) 😄

Yes right answer, but to the wrong question. I'm sure you can work out quite easily what the correct question to that answer was? 😂

Yeah, I don't see anyone disagreeing! So come on then, what's the answer? 😁 I hate to say this, but we need someone to really drill down into this and get us out of a hole. Ok at this point, I'd best Geddy up on my Hi-Q horse and...

Haha - it's not easy, I totally agree. How about: "Music inspired by the creation of the electric bass that still manages to sell out tiny venues all the way to football stadiums". I give away no clue as to what my favourite instrument is from that, do I? 😂

Go on then - I'm sure your definition is going to be as good as anyone's!

👍 Yup - if it's working for you and you're loving it, what's not to like?

Happy to go with 10ms if that's the better number. But it's not a choice of deliberately adding latency for the sake of it. It's about what your live sound & performance priorities are. Compact and ease of use are right up there for me e.g. taking up minimal pedal board space is a big plus factor which more than offsets any latency concerns for me (I don't have any latency concerns with the SH btw). It's a bit like saying why would anyone choose a D class over a full blooded valve amp or AB class amp when the latter sound better? Well actually the answer is the same, compact (lightweight) and ease of use...

My pics now uploaded for comparison immediately below yours. Can't fault your choice of amp, though...😂

I have no idea what that is either! But, then, I'm on the wrong side of 50... 😁

Funnily enough Gillespie having just called Madonna a prostitute ("no offence to prostitutes" he went on to say on the tv interview - lol!), he clearly does have a fair bit still to say himself 😂

“Rock is like Latin, it’s a dying language, it's old, it’s finished, and it really has nothing more to say. The spirit of rock is passing to rap, grime and drill music..." Bobby Gillespie, Primal Scream The guy has a point, right?

Wireless receiver at start of pedal board (takes the place of the lead from the bass). Lead from final pedal in the chain --> amp in the normal way.

@hiram.k.hackenbacker - love it! Responding in kind shortly...

Sadly my experience of the Xvive too. I was really hoping it was going to be a runner given what a compact design it is.

You and I differ on this (as we know!) But I wonder if that is just down to our different set ups? We're both agreed that latency doesn't really get noticed until around 20ms. So if my SH has an 8ms latency it won't be an issue when used alone and it certainly has not been in the couple of years I've been happily using one (even more so since Chris just sent me a completely free of charge (including no P&P!) replacement battery cover, which arrived this morning! ). But even with a pedal board, it seems to me that latency is only really an issue if there is some syncing going on with another signal that is being triggered at exactly the same time (so you end up with an unwanted slap back). Otherwise human reaction time from taking a decision to play, to our fingers actually hitting the strings is way slower than 30ms and yet we somehow all manage to keep in time with our bandmates - so we are all clearly very capable of managing to compensate in real time for this human latency. Another few ms from a pedal board will just be absorbed into that real time processing we are all clearly capable of doing. However my bands are using good old fashioned bass and lead guitar backline, with vocals and acoustic going separately through the PA. I wonder if your latency concern is something that impacts IEM users much more, which is where you are coming from, and therefore is an additional factor for them to particularly consider / be aware of?

+1 ^^ I see what you mean about room for that bass unit! Defo not for me...

@Vinny - thanks for that. Reverse polarity - yup, what was Chris smoking when he decided to do that? 😂 He sells these polarity reversers for £1.99 (or can be had from Amazon etc) In terms of being light being a 'problem' - well I've dealt with that with a bit of velcro on top of my amp if I'm using the SH with no other pedals (and obviously the same solution if it's going on a pedal board). So if you're not saying that the G75 is significantly better in terms of connectivity or latency, then I can rest easy with my SH gear

If you're loving bass, get the best gear you can comfortably and want to afford! A good cab is perhaps the single most important bit of kit in terms of the sound you're hearing, and if you aren't having to worry about neighbours IMO playing through a decent bass rig is much more satisfying than playing through headphones or a 15W practice rig. If you buy good condition used, your downside risk is pretty low i.e. if you decide it's not for you and you look after it, should be able to move it on for close to what you paid for it. So have a think about what you might want to reasonably fork out and I'm sure there will be plenty of very good suggestions coming that will be a step up from your current rig and potentially something you can also use when rehearsing and playing with a full band in the near future.

Interesting! I'm a massive fan of Smoothhound and have just bought a back up set from a fellow BCer. But always interested to hear about great quality gear. What are you finding is better about the G75 and how does it compare in price to the £149 new of the Smoothhound?

Indeed, and most amps don't have a DI volume for that very reason. I would put in the "nice to have" category alongside parametric mids and hpf control on an amp. All features that provide additional appeal to me about the Mesa M6 and Mesa WD-800. Again, a lot of amps don't offer these extra features, but they are a nice touch if they are available. And particularly where you don't have a sound engineer, on site monitoring the desk (as per @Jack's post earlier), it does allow you to vary the volume of the amp on stage whilst keeping the post EQ volume going through your PA unchanged. But not being able to offer a clean pre EQ is defo a bigger issue.

Tbf, very few amps seem to have a separate volume control for the DI. The Mesa M6 is an exception to the rule, but it's an exceptional class AB amp that is not really appropriate to compare with D class heads we are discussing here. The weird thing that Quilter have done is to not offer a pre EQ DI switch. I doubt it would have cost much to add, so definitely a bit of an oversight.

You and me both. Guess that's why the Low-Q is so popular.

Apologies for the thread sidetrack. Tbf a Mesa M6 at 25 lbs, whilst undoubtedly mighty, can in no way be considered small! As you were, back to playing nicely with the little ones now then 😂 Speaking of which... Substitute AG 700 for DG M900 in my case, but otherwise I'm in exactly the same boat as Chris: