biro

[quote name='Lucien' timestamp='1410821280' post='2553667'] it's also very heavy (14Kg). [/quote] Did you get the uraniumburst version?

Ok, I am going to chime in to give the community some news about my most recent purchase. Today I received a Harley Benton JB-75 too, the sunburst version with a rosewood fingerboard and fancy blocks and binding. What can I say? I was genuinely surprised a bass so cheap could play that well. I am, unfortunately, still unable to record it because I am temporarily sans audio interface, but I am quite sure I am not going to have surprises -- I am familiar with the pups, as I had installed them on a SX jazz bass I had. The PUs might not be your thing if what you're after is supervintage tone -- I am after a decent sounding Jazz Bass, which is the epitome of the concept of "good enough" in bass world. Sounds good in a crappy built in input, so I guess it works well enough. Speaking of which, I must say that I found the build quite better compared to the SX. Except for the pickguard, which truly is astonishingly ugly (and will, in due course, nay, immediately, replaced with a black one), the bass is reasonably well made. The sunburst looks more or less the same as the SX. The body is, I think, two pieces, reasonably well matched. The neck has a satin finish, unlike the SX, which may or may not entice you. It does feel excellent. The neck is, perhaps, a bit bulkier than a regular J, but then again, I like it this way (I'd very much have a P neck on every four stringer). The nut is low and the fret job is excellent. I am playing with basically no relief and my action on the G string is a hair less than 1.5 mm at the 20th fret, perhaps 2 on the E string. I have a reasonably light touch, but I must say that of all the basses I had only my Peavey TL-Six could handle something like it. My Status S-1 just couldn't, to name a classic name. I don't know what they do to these new guitars, but when I think to my first crappy bass around the year 2000, I am just baffled. The bass arrived well packed, in tune and was definitely playable out of the box (I only set it up because I need something to tinker with, and I prefer a lower action). Finally, I don't know if anyone noticed yet, but the saddles on the bridge are look like brass. It reminds me of the Squier Classic Vibe series bridge. The bass does have a lot of sustain, albeit with the usual dead spot at the 5th fret of the G string -- not worse than that on much more expensive counterparts. Bottom line, I would use it in serious live or recording situations, no doubts on that. I will, however, have to replace the pickguard, or better yet cover it with something. Hope this helps!

[quote name='Mornats' timestamp='1409769525' post='2543183'] Nanyo-made Bass Collections tend to go for the criminally low price of £150-200 or so second hand and I've heard that the later models aren't as good as the original Japanese ones so I'd not want to pay as much as one of those. However, saying that... the ultimate decider is how much you think it's worth yourself (which I know doesn't help!). Every bass feels different to someone else and if this one is spot on for you then you'd pay more for it than others would. Personally, I'd not want to pay more than £100 or so for one. [/quote] Thanks a lot Mornats. The price I've been asked is actually lower than that, so I might give it a go and see how it behaves!

Update. Seen the bass and looks and plays nice. It's in good condition and I cannot locate any "made in" label. It's a normal black four-stringer. Anybody has an idea how much I should pay for it, if I go through with the purchase? Thanks a lot!

[quote name='Mornats' timestamp='1409689918' post='2542350'] I don't think these are the Japanese Nanyo-made ones. They may be the Korean reissues that came out after the original company went bust. [/quote] Thank you very much Mornats! Have you ever happened to get your hands on one?

Hello guys, quick question. A friend of mine wants to get rid of this four stringer. I don't know why, but I generally like these kind of basses. Are these any good? I read that there is some sort of a cult following, but I sorta got lost with all the various series and I couldn't really fetch any info on the SB100 model/ series. Any generous soul who could give me any info? I really wouldn't want to deal with a massive lemon faulty truss rods and the likes. That would be massively appreciated.

[quote name='charic' timestamp='1379074779' post='2208388'] I really like the second one very nice stuff [/quote] Thank you charic! I will have to work on my intonation using a bottleneck: I've been trying to tame that little piece of metal, but to little avail.

Hey guys, here is a couple of new videos in which I tried to make the most of my newly acquired Ibanez BTB705DX. I'm very happy with the sound and overall feel of the bass. I went straight into my trusty Focusrite Scarlett 2i2 and then recorded with Logic Pro X, which so far has surprised me in terms of ease of use. The drummer function truly is a nice addition. I am far less happy with my playing technique and timing, but still the videos might be helpful to someone who is curious about the bass. So, here we go: [media]http://youtu.be/EUtMzt-s1uw[/media] [media]http://youtu.be/PEDiCy6v2iY[/media]

Ok, I think I finally found the culprit. In some monorail bridges such as mine, which looks more or less like this one, the actual string saddle is enclosed in a somewhat bigger structure. It's a nice design and, if everything is crafted properly, there will be a tight fit between the inner and outer parts of each monorail bridge. That is exactly what I found to be lacking: the saddle is a tiny bit too narrow and, as a consequence, when the string vibrates, the saddle vibrates too and starts "bouncing" onto the outer part enclosing it. This produces the buzz whereof I have been speaking... As usual, thank you guys for helping me out with this problem!

Thank you very much! I think your comment is spot on, the resulting noise is quite similar to that caused by a nut which has not been cut properly. However, this affects fretted notes and thus cannot be due to the nut. On the other hand, a bass bridge always makes contact with the strings and is the most likely cause. I wonder if there is anything I can do to improve the saddle. The point is: the D and G strings vibrate wonderfully, and the B string ain't bad either. Short of replacing the strings, I think this might have something to do with the size of the strings slots on the bridge.

Hello everyone, I was wondering if any of you tech-savvy gearheads could help me sort this issue out. I have recently bought an Ibanez BTB705DX, which is by far one of the best instruments I ever played in terms of playability and tone--which is hardly surprising, as it is loaded with some EMG goodness. However, I am experiencing an issue that really bothers me. While the sustain on the treble side is just plain awesome, the same does not appear to apply to the same extent to the bass side. Well, the B string sounds remarkably clear, loud and for a long time. Nevertheless it appears that something is choking the proper vibration of the E and A strings. The phenomenon appears to mainly affect the E string when I am fretting notes and to result in a buzzing sitar-like sound that seems to originate from the bridge area. I have attached a video in order to avoid splitting hairs. http://youtu.be/0KBv2_vw0sE I am not talking about the normal string buzz, which I am used to, and I like to a certain extent. The noise to which I am referring is lower in pitch and has a different nature. I tend to exclude the truss rods from being potential causes of the noise at issue (hitting the back of the neck results in no noise whatsoever). They also work fine, and I don't think they are responsible for that noise. I tried removing the bridge springs on the E and A strings and the noise appeared to diminish, but did not disappear. I put on a "fairly new" E string, but it didn't really solve the problem. I took it from another bass, tough, so it may well have been subject to weird torsion and stuff. I also tried to put on an exposed core E string (LaBella Supersteps) but, besides the usual chorus effect, there was little improvement. I've come to the conclusion that the most likely cause is that horrible bridge, but I am not quite sure about what I should do -- short of buying and fitting new strings on the bass. Any thoughts? Thank you so much, mateys!

i get your point. however, since I got this little piece of software, i've rarely found myself using the ampeg svx plugin. it sounds killer, that's true. but it's also pretty refined and needs a little bit of tweaking in order to perform well. i believe it's just me, maybe i prefer a more direct approach.

i had the opportunity to try a couple of sandbergs. one was a special model made for the italian site megabass.it, and was a well-playing simple instrument. kind of a no frill bass, with just a single sopabar pickup (delano, i suppose) in the sweet spot position. as far as I am concerned, it was a good instrument, but nothing really special. I also played a 5 string active jazz clone (ash/maple/maple) with delano pick ups: in that particular case I was kind of disappointed. It was, of course, a beautiful bass, great looks and excellent finish. It was also a joy to play, but I ended up thinking that it was kind of lacking in personality.

hey fellas, I've had a sansamp clone by behringer for a long time, and eventually, it died in some misterious circumstances. I've thought about replacing it, but since I'm kind of a nerdy gearhead and I usually yield to my natural inclination I decided to check for some VSTs. apparently, this fits the needs I had just right. this said, I recorded a very short sample (perhaps the shortest ever). It's just a short bassline on a power rock groove, but you should be able to get an idea of how it sounds. [url="http://soundcloud.com/ballpointmusic/sansamp"]http://soundcloud.com/ballpointmusic/sansamp[/url] post scriptum: the bass is an SX JB. posterius scriptum: how stoned am I? I completely forgot to add the link to the download page: [url="http://www.theserinaexperiment.net/forum/viewtopic.php?f=9&t=68"]http://www.theserinaexperiment.net/forum/v...hp?f=9&t=68[/url]

My 2 cents: I've had the io2 for two days, then I simply could jot stand the incredible latency issues anymore and promptly returned it.

[quote name='Chris2112' post='1359895' date='Sep 2 2011, 03:14 PM']They are better than the equivalent jazz bass, or any jazz bass save for the big money ones. You'd have to spend some cash to get a jazz bass with similar spec (ebony board, flamed maple top, etc etc). They are essentially very different to the usuL choices of Musicman and Fender. The mk1 models are easily as well built. If a 6 string is what you want you may struggle to do better for the price. I'd go for a big money TRB if I wanted N6 string, but you could get two Myung basses and change for the price of a TRB. I doubt you'd be disappointed with a mk1 model, put it that way.[/quote] i'll have to disagree with that: i don't really think trb's are better built. I do believe, on the contrary, that the yamaha myung is a conceptually simpler bass and the simplicity of its design entails some consequences one could consider "rough edges". EDIT: sorry, I've mistaken your words. I now see you were referring to the higher priced trb's, and I actually agree with everything you said.

fun fact (oh, boy: here we go again) about the sound: in order to get the "overdub" effect, I've decided to develop a guitar rig patch that basically works like this: the signal is split in two channel, one panned full R and the other full L. the I add an extremely short delay (about 15ms) with as little feedback as possible and set it to be completely wet. this way, however, one track is always 15ms ahead of the other, and it still sounds very different from an actual overdubbed recording. to achieve this effect, I use the guitar rig modifier, basically an LFO you can assign to whatever guitar rig parameter. I set it to control the "time" parameter on the delay with a slow sine wave and with very little depth. this way, the time parameter constantly varies between around 10ms and 20 ms, allowing you record just one track. it really works for most purposes. here is a screenshot of my guitar rig settings: [url="http://postimage.org/image/2gw7ekaqs/"][/url]

thanks a lot fellas, it's good to have some feedback. I'm still considering selling this bass, but everytime I listen to some recording I've made with it I start fearing that I would deeply regret doing so. and TL-6's are hard to find nowadays. mh.

hey, this is my latest tapping video. I'm in some kind of recording spree this week, so I'm constantly producing stuff - and I am not so sure whether it's a good thing or not, to be honest. therefore, I hereby submit to your attention the attached video.

where do you hear the buzz? the rule of thumb in this cases is that to check the exact location of the rattle/buzz. if it's on the first 4-5 frets, the neck is too straight, otherwise it's just a matter of frets/touch. can you adjust the string spacing on your bridge? that might be an additional tweak, if the rattle is located on a determined spot. shimming the neck always helps if you want to lower the action, as it provides more room to do so. I am aware of some theories about the effects of a shim as far as sound vibrations are concerned, but I've never experienced any problem even when using with the most unsuitable materials. btw, I've always heard wonders about Sads' fretwork, so I take it that you could easily get a relief as low as a 0.20 mm gap between the bottom of the string and the 8th fret (while, obviously, pressing the first and last fret).