Nobatron

Fair enough. I'll get in touch with the retailer I bought it from then. It does get quite warm to the touch even when being used at a very low volume which doesn't surprise me in such a compact package. Does yours do the same?

That's interesting. There's definitely a fan, it's tiny and under the vent on the top of the case. You can see it by shining a torch into the vent. This is definitely louder than the fan on my Markbass LM 250 Black Line. Sounds like there may be something wrong with my unit if others are almost silent.

I bought a TC Electronic BAM200 last week to replace my broken Markbass Black Line 250. I rarely use an amp these days to I went for the most basic amp which should satisfy my needs. However the fan is quite noisy and makes some sounds that make me a bit uneasy. It seems fine when it's first turned on and then after a while starts making this noise, which seems to stop after a bit. Does anyone else have any experience with this amp and know if the fan usually sounds like this before I get in touch with the retailer I bought it from.

I have noticed a rise in the availability of used Trace Elliot stuff going for decent prices recently. It would mean you'd have to lug around a heavy TE rig but they do sound great.

I'm sure you could absolutely put together a useable rig with PA components but I think it comes down to what you're going for. A QSC K12.2 is currently £795 from Thomann. Within the same budget you could get a really nice combo or head / cab setup from Markbass, EBS, GK, etc. K12s are great but they're not going to give you as good a bass response as the dedicated rig which is specifically voiced for bass guitar. Also you wouldn't be able to plug a bass direct into a K12 so you'd need to buy a preamp of some kind to put in front of it so that's another expense unless you have one already. However if what you actually want is a stage monitor for you to monitor the band as well as yourself then the K12 is going to be the better option. That way you would DI into your sound desk which would handle the preamp duties and output that to the monitor. But for me a wedge instead of an amp is a compromise, on the gigs I've done with wedges and no amp I've been left wanting. In ears is a different kettle of fish though. Another use case for the monitor would be if you wanted something you could use for keys or other instruments as well.

It depends on the PA speaker really. You see a lot of PA speakers, usually 15", aimed at DJs which boast a decent low end extension but really when you hear them they have a couple of notes that resonate low down so they'll push out a kick drum to punch you in the chest but don't do much in terms of intelligible low end that you'd need for a bass guitar. Brands like QSC, EV and on the upper end d&b, L-Acoustics, Nexo, etc make speakers that would do a better job but if you look at the specs of their 12" speakers they tend to publish more realistic ratings which don't rate them down as low as the cheaper ones. Really you'd expect to use these with a sub for the low end. Most gigs I do these days I have PA support for bass. Typically if the system has subwoofers I'll go through the PA and if not I won't. I'd apply the same thinking to a bass amp. I'd rather use a system which I know will replicate the frequencies I need and a bass amp is designed for this so I know it will.