Reverend

Sorry, gotta cut in here - PEDANT ALERT! With reference to 'analog amplifiers'. Class D amps are analog amplifiers. Class D amps do not by definition convert analog audio into digital audio and back again. They still contains transistors, just like your big old GK 800RB or your EBS HD350 etc, the difference is a clever way of turning the transistors on and off to increase efficiency (hence the loss in weight!). Class D amps ARE NOT BY DEFINITION 'DIGITAL AMPLIFIERS'. It's just a name that people have come up with, just like Class A, Class B, class A/B etc which categorises a particular design philosophy. I've had conversations with guys from Crown recently who've been telling me about their new Class I and Class J amps which can fit multiple hugely powerful amps onto tiny chips. But they don't contain any A-D or D-A conversion to do the amplification. So in terms of Class D amps having no design philosophy, that's not true, otherwise all Class D amps would be the same, right? And clearly they aren't, and clearly some are crap and some are unbelievable. It's just that the parts are all very small, because the efficiency gain means that they can be small. Some class D amps do have built in digital EQ and effects, but there's no reason these couldn't be put into the audio path of a huge tube amplifier at the input stage. It's just a question of whether that would tarnish the perceived 'purity' of the brand or not. You'd never see a Matamp with a digital amp sim built in, but there's no reason why they couldn't do it. Anyway. As you were :-)

I imagine it wouldn't sound that great. Acoustic guitar and vox need need an extra bit of sparkle, and the Compact lacks a tweeter. Give it a try though. A Super Midget or Midget would probably work better.

I got a gen3 BF Super Midget as an addition to my gen 2 Compact. Great pairing. I wrote a thing on how they match up if you want to read it: http://basschat.co.uk/topic/219758-super-midget-1-intense-first-week/page__p__2245828__hl__first%20week__fromsearch__1#entry2245828

A fine chap to deal with. Bought a VT-Bass pedal from him. Reciprocated my speedy payment with very speedy delivery. Excellent stuff.

Sorry to seem confused here, but why are you asking the opinions of others on MB gear if you already like it yourself? Other people's opinions aren't going to make the cabs sound any different, surely?

Did a little thing about my experiences with some BF bits a couple of months ago. Some people have found it helpful. [url="http://basschat.co.uk/topic/219758-super-midget-1-intense-first-week/page__p__2245828__hl__first%20week__fromsearch__1#entry2245828"]http://basschat.co.uk/topic/219758-super-midget-1-intense-first-week/page__p__2245828__hl__first%20week__fromsearch__1#entry2245828[/url] The Compact (I have gen 1/2) is a good cab. It's got plenty of mid range bite for plectrum work and pumpy fingerstyle stuff, but it doesn't have much going on in the top end if you like a sizzly sound.

Here's a lovely video with some great bass technique and some vocals to die for. This was recorded at a festival that some friends of mine run. Performers at the festival can do a backstage acoustic session in a barn if they want to. This is a special one. Lianne is a friend of the festival, and her bassist Chris is an absolute beast. I love how tasteful and simple his arrangement for bass guitar is. Enjoy. [media]http://youtu.be/WoT8sYBorsQ[/media]

If you are not spending very much on audio equipment, the ones with cheap 'analog' meters, loads of knobs and a lot of IO, and say PRO on the front are likely to be less good. It just shows where the manufacturer has prioritised the spending on the product development. Flashy things that look nice, or decent components (for the money) that sound good and will last. Focusrite are a heritage brand who go back decades in making excellent gear. A lot of their cheap stuff in the past (OctoPre and Platinum ranges) has become pretty well regarded for the money you paid for them. I haven't tried the Scarlett range - I have a Saffire, and it's everything I'd want a cheap audio interface to be - quiet, low noise inputs, decent headroom on the mic amps, good clean loud headphone amplifier, and robust drivers. I'd recommend going for the Focusrite. Good, innovative British company as well. The only thing I'd say is that if you want 'future proof' you might want a few more inputs in case you want to record a little jam session with guitar and keys etc. The AKAI does have more inputs - maybe look at the Focusrite Scarlett 6i6, which has a few more ins and outs. Looks like that comes in under £200 if you shop around.

Yep I'm running it with no tweeter dialled in. I did enquire about a tweeter-less version when I ordered it (as used to be an option with the old Midget) but apparently they aren't doing that any more. To be fair, I did try the tweeter out in rehearsal out of interest, and it wasn't as offensive as some of the tweeters in my previous cabs, but still didn't feel like it added anything that I personally needed. I do use a fair bit of overdrive currently and the tweeter just.... Well, no.

I used a 210 rbh with a neo115 and 700 rb for a long time and it was a great rig. But you're right, the rbh cabs weigh about as much as a house (used to have a 410rbh - crikey).

So I'm actually a bit afraid to even write this as there's probably going to be a fight between some total idiot who can't appreciate that some people like these cabs and absolutely MUST cut in on every single thread to add some totally lame put down, and some weird fan-boy who won't hear a word said against them. Anyway despite the inevitable, here we go, as I know a few people would like to hear about the new Barefaced Super Midget and how it pairs up with a previous generation Compact (which I like - for the record). As first weeks for the first Super Midget go, this probably couldn't have gotten much more intense. The first 10 days contained 3 long rehearsals, 5 gigs and over 1100 miles in the back of an Astra, largely with 4 people and all their gear. 4 of the gigs were medium/large 'support tour' gigs in 1500-2000 capacity venues with very substantial PA support, and so my rig was mainly for my monitoring pleasure. The last was a medium size marquee style wedding function gig with a small PA mainly for vocals and keys etc, so my rig was kicking out a large proportion of the low end for the gig. Two very different situations for a rig to have to deal with. My current gigging setup consists of: Am Dlx Jazz/Am P-Bass --> EBS Valve Drive --> GK MB500 --> BF Compact (2nd Gen) and BF Super Midget. I run the EQ pretty much flat, and the EBS adds all the colour with a low gain setting for a teeny bit of crunch when I dig in. I use the amp EQ largely to EQ for each room I take the amp into rather than to get 'my sound'. I have quite a lot of experience with many GK cabs and newer Trace cabs, older Peavey and very old Ampeg cabs. Other than that, I haven't tried any nice new Berg, Schroeder, MB, Aguilar etc so I can't and won't try and compare to any of these. [b]Weight[/b] The first thing I'll say about my relatively new rig is that I can carry it ALL AT ONCE. That's a bass and an amp in a gig bag and a cab in each hand. It's easy. I don't really feel the need to do this, but I can. And that's just brilliant. Anyway, that's pretty much all I'll say about the weight, we all know these cabs are light because that's the big marketing point, and I will admit that this is 100% why I chose my first BF cab because my back was having huge problems at the time. So I guess here are the main points I think people will want to know about: [b]Fit and Finish (compared to G2)[/b] I have a G2 Compact, and the finish has never bothered me, I've always thought it looks cool and very retro, but I can 100% see how many people think they looked rubbish/cheap compared to other cabs. Well, the bad news for those guys is that from a distance they look on the whole pretty similar, but I think the things that really bugged people have been taken care of. The cheap handles that were prone to falling apart have been replaced by something that feels a whole lot sturdier and looks classier. The rubber feet that were prone to falling off (this happened on my Compact after 2 gigs) have been replaced by bigger, more substantial feet, with bigger more substantial screws. After a lot of loading in and out of cars and venues, I'm quite confident they won't let me down any more. The metal grill has been changed so that the edge is non perforated, thus hiding the foam that sits underneath it that some thought looked ugly (lots of cabs don't have any foam at all and thus the grill starts to rattle over time as the screw holes work loose). This does look a lot tidier. You also now have a decent removable metal back plate with a nice big knob to adjust the tweeter and also your Speakon/jack connectors (this isn't really a massive plus because this wasn't there before and should have been). I will add that no other musician or client has EVER commented on the look of my Compact. It's just a plain black box! I have however seen a player not get a reasonably decent gig with a touring band because his Eden cabs looked a bit 'too slick' (I know this is pretty lame but it does prove a point). Personally I think it's safe to stay retro looking. Silver cones and chrome trim seem to make musicians laugh at you :-) (JOKE!) To summarise, the look is still plain and simple but the main problem points with the finishing of the previous cabs have been looked into and addressed. [b]Tone[/b] My criteria for adding a second cab to my Compact were: a bit more volume, and a bit more presence/top end sheen (without a tweeter - I hate tweeters). Simple enough. I'm a simple person, and on the whole so is my playing. The Super Midget fitted the bill perfectly, adding a nice bit a growly honkiness in the upper mids for my Jazz bass that I was missing a bit with my Compact, and a little more bite when I layed in with a pick on my P-Bass. In terms of pairing it with the Compact, it matched it for level admirably. I cranked the MB500 further than I ever have for these larger gigs to hear it above the very powerful PA systems we were going through and it cut through fantastically. On stage I cut a bit of the bass on the amp (I was stood by the subs and I didn't need any more) and the sound from the amp was full and present and very very clean throughout the range of the bass. In other words, everything was really bloody loud and I could hear my bass really really well without any farting. Win. I mean for an amp/cab setup that I can carry all at once, that is impressive, you have to say! At the function gig, I wasn't able to cut any bass on stage as I was providing it all, so I had to just crank it up and hope for the best. And it delivered! The low end from this setup is not bowel shaking like you'd get from larger cabs, so I won't pretend you could use these cabs for a huge dubstep setup and expect to be satisfied. But for your average rock/pop/funk 4-string bass guitar type stuff you will be fine for pretty much any gig (haven't tried with a 5-string sorry). The low end should stay clean right up at the top end of what an MB500 can kick out if that helps anyone. On it's own the Super Midget probably sounds (subjectively) 'better' than the Compact at low volumes especially. The low end/low mid is a bit cleaner, the mids seem smoother, and there 'is some' top end now with this new driver :-) The compact didn't really have much going on in the top end although I still maintain the Compact was the best recording cab I'd ever used when I bought it! For high volume situations the Compact now makes a good addition to the Super Midget - just adding the support in the low end and low mids where you need it. These two cabs make a great pair. I'll probably use the Super Midget for rehearsal and small gigs and add the Compact for 'proper' gigs. So in summary, it's well balanced, it's clean, it's loud, and it's clean when it's loud (for a small cab). You're not going to make people lose their lunch with the low end, but you'll make them rock the f**k out without too much trouble. What sealed the deal for me was that this was a wedding for a pretty successful session drummer, so the room was filled with people he'd played with over the last five or so years, and 2 drummers and another bassist (prominent players themselves) commented on how good the rig sounded. I won't say this setup sounds better than any other setup. That's silly. I haven't tried every rig - no one has. It works for me. And the fact that I get equal volume to my previous 'big GK rig' at a fraction of the weight with very little compromise in tone at all (if any) makes me and my back very happy indeed.

In case you are wondering what a 3rd Gen BF Super Midget looks like paired with a G1/2 Compact: Happy bunny thus far after rehearsal. We'll see what it sounds like on a bigger stage tomorrow evening.

[quote name='richardd' timestamp='1380184921' post='2221867'] Whils't you are all singing the praises of The BF cabs , nobody seems to mention the poor materials used in there construction. I think if you hit a door frame carrying one it through the cab would fall to pieces ,IMO, [/quote] Any and all considerations about build quality of these cabs are redundant as soon as you a) pick it up listen to it. Seriously, I'm only 32 and my back was starting to give me a lot of grief from carrying cabs and amps about. Barefaced Cabs are a god send for me. And they sound just as nice if not nicer than the GK RBH and NEO cabs that I sold to pay for them. Not saying they're light years ahead of the competition - I haven't tried that many others, but I'm very pleased with the sound, and certainly the Compact is the best recording cab I've used myself. I too was a little concerned about how fragile they FEEL (surely something that light can't be tough!), but I bought a Hotrox padded cover, and after about 18 months of gigging I pleased to say I've had no issues except for the same rubber feet/handles ones that Alex has (hopefully successfully) addressed in the new cabs. I do take good care of my stuff, so I can't say it's taken a huge beating, but I am no longer overly concerned about the strength of these cabs. I have a 2G 15" Compact and a 3G Super Midget on the way. Very excited! If it gets here on time I'll take some pics of it on tour in early Oct.

I have a 2008 Precision into an MB500 going into a Barefaced Compact. I've found the MB500 to be a little bit unforgiving on the input gain. Doesn't sound great when you push it too hard. I usually stick the -10dB pad in and have the gain around 12o'clock, seems fine and there's plenty of volume to spare. I used to have a GK 700RB and found I could run the input gain stage pretty hot all the time without too much bother, but I think you've just got to be a bit more careful with the MB500. Hope that helps.

Not quite sure how people can say that these cabs 'look bad'. It has no real 'features' not to like, surely. They're just plain black boxes. I can see how some people love/hate the slightly 'toy like' look of the garish yellow Mark Bass stuff (a good marketing trick though, which they've nicked off KRK), and some people love/hate the distinctive aluminium cones on Hartke etc, but in my experience I've never had anyone ever comment (negatively or otherwise) on the aesthetics of my BF cab, and have certainly never had clients or other players (high profile or otherwise) think less of me because of it. You could say they look plain, but I think it's pretty far fetched to say they look bad or ugly to the point where you'd lose work!

If you go for any of that Muse distortion then a tweeter will sound absolutely awful. Hartke cabs are quite bright anyway, don't worry about lack of tweeter. On any of those records by those bands, the recording engineer will pay no notice of the tweeters and ony mic up the cones, so a tweeter will not give you the sound you're after.