Jack

Buenos, You know when a company is just really, really good at a certain thing? Well, I never miss the chance to recommend Bright Onion Pedals to anyone who wants any kind of pedal that isn't a pedal. They do amazing work with buffers, loopers, AB switches, killswitches, amp footswitches, all of that kind of stuff. I've had a few of their products over the years, including two micro buffers and an ab switch. Anyway, I wanted the AB Pedal with Loop, Buffer and Tuner Mute as I thought it was about 90% of what I wanted in a pedalboard hub/brain/router thing. Don't get me wrong, it would've been great as was, but I would have preferred it slightly differently. Just before I ordered, I got in touch with James and asked if was possible to make some changes to the pedal. I wanted the switches rearranged, I wanted the tuner output always active, and I didn't see the point in turning the buffer off. Just personal preference stuff. After a few emails we came up with this. Please excuse my shocking photography. The bottom right switch controls the A/B input, then the signal goes to a buffer, then the top right switch controls an effects loop on the top. After that the signal is split, with both the output on the side and the one on the top being turned on or off by a switch each. I'm using this to have an always-on tuner, all I have to do is turn 'Output A' off and I can tune silently but obviously there's all sort of cool setups like dual amps or whatever. And the extra cost of my custom options? £0. That's right, James redesigned the labels, changed the internal layout and everything, all for free. So that's a grand total of £85 for a central pedalboard router that's hand made in England with customisable LED colours all round, all as standard. Please, I can't recommend BrightOnion enough, go buy something cool from them! (Standard disclaimers, not an employee, no financial gain, etc etc.)

I have to put one on for 'Come Together' by The Beatles as the open strings ring a lot at stage volume. They work well. I bought an off brand on ebay for a few pounds.

High pass filter at either 30 or 35Hz. I don't mean it's selectable I just mean I can't remember. Great little boxes, I had one for years.

Yes it occurs to me that I currently own 8. And I bet I'm not the only one on basschat with more than I'll ever need. They are stupidly convenient though, and very versatile. And, like it or not, amps are getting less and less relevant so I'm sure preamp use will increase.

I like the way they quote that the maximum power is "independent of limiters and driver protection circuits". I wonder why they feel the need? That looks like an epic head. For the price, size and weight of a decent DI box you can get a DI box with a free 3 band eq and >=200W amp. Thats a win.

Over the course of many years I've developed a fool proof system. What you do is: you turn all of the knobs until they sound good. To be slightly more specific, that looks like it's quite a lot of bass boost going on between the ODB and eq pedal. I'd be surprised if you really needed that much. Try starting with the EQ in a sad face and set the eq on the other two flat and tweak from there.

Thanks man, but any chance you could add this to the thread in my signature? Thanks! Do you have a thread?

Where are you? A local basschatter might be able to hook you up.

If you just want to record bass guitar well, use Helix native. It'll blow your mind on guitar too. If it has to be an actual amp then I'd be hunting down an Ampeg B100R, or, with more money, a B15.

It is my experience that most professional musicians have extremely well-maintained and perfectly set up, but ultimately dreary and average, equipment. It's the lawyers and doctors playing pub gigs to 12 people that have Foderas and Sadowskys. As for famous professionals, that's a mixture of things IMO. Firstly, being a gear nerd and being a good musician are not correlated. You need only look at some PG Rig Rundowns to prove that. Tom Araya and Glen Danzig spring to mind as people who don't even understand their own live rig. Secondly, once one reaches a certain level of fame companies start knocking on your door making sponsorship offers and Fender and Gibson have more money to spend on you than Schecter or Ibanez. The end result is the same, Fender after Fender after Ampeg after Gibson after Marshall on a festival stage. Look at some of the sidemen though and you'll see gear nerds who aren't famous enough to get mainstream sponsorship deals. I remember seeing a bassist play with Tom Jones using a Sadowsky into a Thunderfunk/Accugroove rig. The house bassist with Jools Holland uses Aquilar. They exist, they're just not that dude from Biffy Clyro, who will invariably use a Fender and Ashdown.

I use a 5dB cut over the whole level when moving from fingers to a pick, There's not actually 5dB in it but I find that the sound a pick stands out way more whilst fingers are more subtle, so a 5dB cut is perfect. I used to mess on with a graphic eq that was set to boost the low mids and cut the treble and such when I switched to a pick, but then I wondered why I was bothering switching technique when I'd equalised the differences so now I just account for the (apparent) level.

The cab is heavy and quiet by modern standards but it'll be fine. The head is probably the best mass-produced amp that there is. Any possible issues would be turning up loud enough that the cab starts to struggle, as has been mentioned that head is more than capable melting the drivers in the cab. If you're rock band loud I'd buy the rig and hunt down another RBX cab, they do 2x10", 4x10" and 1x15"" designs. Another cab to pair with that one will be a marvellous rig.

If you're looking at budget PA stuff then the answer is Alto. You can find the truesonic series for peanuts second hand. A TS115A or even TS112A would be good.