Al Krow

Look well featured - be very interested if any of you have come across or used on your travels and have any views on how they compare to e.g. the well liked Audient iD14 Mk2? The front panel metering display for both input and output looks as though it could be particularly helpful, and is a stand out feature for audio interfaces in this price bracket.

Hi @Baloney Balderdash- the mechanism is not the same on all the HB boards. Here's the underneath of mine with washers fitted, for reference:

One of the little things that make a difference with the HB Spaceship is that with their non angled boards, like my little HB Spaceship 50M, it's possible to unscrew the feet and insert washers to raise the feet height sufficient to get e.g. a Thumpinator underneath. Almost impossible to do that with the PT Metro series, although you can glue on some larger over-feet as the "hack" with those.

Cheers fella, some good thoughts there. The Ricochet does look like a great little pedal but is limited in pitch shift options, as you noted; the Whammy isn't limited in the same way - but it's a bit of a beast in terms of size and doesn't do basic stuff like up and down a semitone or tone, which can be useful for when guitarists are unable / unwilling to use a capo. Maybe worth mentioning that my approach to using pitch shift is to use it as little as I can, due to the tone suck and latency on both the Drop and and B1-4 - more pronounced on the B1-4, plus potential volume drop issues - Drop only here; can very easily adjust patch volume levels on the B1-4. If you tuned up, as per your suggestion, you would then need to be pitch shifting every song - the polar opposite of what I would be wanting to do. The B1-4 proved its mettle on the two songs I needed to use it for pitch shifting in a two hour set on Saturday night. It also has the advantage of being able to use foot-pedals to scroll through to the pitch shift you've set / need for a song rather than needing to dial in by hand, which you need to do on the Digitech pedal. As a complete aside the drummer and audience loved the DG B7K sim on the B1-4 when I kicked that in for a couple of the songs!

All makes sense! (I'm actually a big fan of the J pup on the Yamaha BBs FWIW!) Go to the very first post on this humongous thread...

Congrats! Added you to the OP "wall". So is the PH too similar to the 734A to justify having both, or does it blow the 734A out the water and hence why you're moving the 734A on...or none of the above? 😄

That is super helpful, thanks!

Sounds like a really neat solution for neck dive, which I totally agree seems to impact how comfortably a bass sits. One of the features of the BB2005 which makes it so comfortable to wear is just how well it's balanced with zero noticeable neck dive. Cosmetically - do the Ultralites end up leaving visible holes on the back of the head stock?

So you've managed to replace your guitarist with your pedal board!

Some fantastic kit you've got on there! Do you have any clips of the sounds you are creating with your boards?

Completely relate to the muscle memory point! We can usually twist our guitarists arm to use a capo, other than when they "need" to be using open strings for particular songs; it's switching the same song between male and female vox with different bands that tends to be the bigger issue for me. I really was pleasantly surprised at how well the B1-4 pitch shift matches up to the Drop - I don't generally expect a multi fx patch to stand up to a dedicated pedal. The B1-4 isn't amazing at pitch shift, don't get me wrong, but for me the Drop isn't sufficiently better to warrant keeping and is going back to the store and the B1-4 pitch-shift sim being gigged tomorrow night; with an extra space now available for something else on my board!

Pitch-shift on the B1-4 I recently bought a Digitech Drop to more easily change song key for a new project. But it only goes down 7 semis and not up, so it's pretty useless for going up a semi-tone or tone; I also found it a little bit warbly, which echoed a comment from @NoirBass when I met up with him recently to watch his duo playing in central London, and there's a volume drop on it when you kick it in. So all in all... Although for the sake of balance, I should mention @bassfan has not had any similar issues with his and prefers his to the pitch-shift on his Stomp. I previously thought the pitch shift on the B1-4 was just only "ok" hence getting the Drop, but given my disappointment with the Drop I thought I'd try the B1-4 out at full band rehearsal and it did the job fine on both -1 semi and +1 semi. There is a very slight latency on the B1-4 and it doesn't cope with slap too well, but nevertheless provides a decent and very usable pitch-shifted bass line in a band mix.

@scannermanwhat a tasty bass!

Just checked and this thing is 18" x 8" in size. Considerably wider than an HX Effects, so it's not exactly pedal board friendly. I personally would be wanting something this size to be a standalone multifx that I could grab and go. Zoom have paid very careful attention to how their multi fx might actually be used by gigging bass players with their B6 and have provided some excellent DI out options. The Line 6 Pod Go, which this seems to be being pitched at, also has a balanced out. I agree with the comment that it was a very obvious missed opportunity for players who want to go directly into their PA or FOH. For me the biggest omission, however, is Boss leaving out some of their most attractive fx from this and the GT 1000 Core e.g. OC5, SY-1 etc.

Well yes, obviously. But then you no longer have a standalone multi fx if you need a DI box. Zoom B6 and most of Helix multis have balanced out. Heck, even the Hotone Ampero has one...

Because it might not be going to an amp.

I can live without a dedicated XLR, provided the 1/4" out is balanced. Maybe the manual will give us clarity on that? But if it doesn't have any form of balanced out that's a pretty glaring omission for a standalone multi fx.

Had the pleasure of hearing @Paul S's blues band in action last night through their RCF Evox 8 PA system. Was a really good night out! Bass, vox and kick-drum were through the PA. Loved the way it can be set up as backline with no need for monitors or IEMs, relatively tiny stage footprint, and ZERO feedback with mics in front of it. It's got me completely re-thinking the plans we were about to embark on. Paul told me today that the PA was just ticking over last night, and has plenty of headroom. Here's a bit of classic Jimi H from last night, so you can hear the set-up for yourselves:

Sadly, no.

Our drummer had a Ford Focus Estate previously before it conked out. It was bloody marvellous for loading up a ton of gear.

This^^ I think comb filtering tends to be more of an issue with digital fx in parallel and less so with analogue, which typically have lower latency, so that might assist in identifying the culprit.

Sweet!

^^This. Still loving my VTDI - particularly having discovered the additional fuller low-end sound with the cab sim engaged. It can also deliver a whole range of tone shaping in particular both SVT and warm valve grit; must admit I've not heard anything on the Origin YT clips so far that would make me want to jump ship - particularly given the price jump from a readily available used VTDI to the new Origin alternative. Nice first impressions review, thanks! Wanted to pick up on one of your comments on your A/B - when making the comparison was the cab-sim engaged on the VTDI? Be quite interested in whether having a "lot more bottom end" will actually be a good thing or not in a band-mix?

Zoom multi-fx, Ashdown rig, Yammy BB 5 string. What's not to like?!

That's very interesting - the current series Yamaha passive PJs have gone for a volume blend knob rather than the 3 way switch which is on older models. How does having a switch deal with this "insertion loss" that a blend knob doesn't? It's not really a term I've seen used much on BC before - I guess I've always thought of it as being more simply as a phase cancellation.