woolz Posted October 12, 2009 Share Posted October 12, 2009 does anyone here do this? to me it sounds better- dont know if its just the huge increase in db but it sounds clearer to me. not sure on the damages either to the amp by doing this? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chris_b Posted October 12, 2009 Share Posted October 12, 2009 Sure you can do this, but if it's too loud, turn it down! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
iamapirate Posted October 12, 2009 Share Posted October 12, 2009 [quote name='woolz' post='624560' date='Oct 12 2009, 10:16 PM']putting active bass into high gain[/quote] =man accident. Love the sound of active bass into the high on any ashdown. luuuuv it! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
woolz Posted October 13, 2009 Author Share Posted October 13, 2009 im not saying its too loud. i was just saying i dont quite understand the point in having a low gain if active basses sound better through the high gain? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
crez5150 Posted October 13, 2009 Share Posted October 13, 2009 Just don't do it with an 18v Status....... like some twonk did Sunday.... I nearly knocked my pint over I was laughing so much.... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cheddatom Posted October 13, 2009 Share Posted October 13, 2009 I have high and low on my peavey combo. My 18v schecter sounds good through high but better through low! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
woolz Posted October 13, 2009 Author Share Posted October 13, 2009 what do u mean 18v status? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
alexclaber Posted October 13, 2009 Share Posted October 13, 2009 "High gain / high impedance / low voltage / passive" inputs should always be used for passive basses unless you prefer the way the "low gain / low impedance / high voltage / active" input rolls off the highs (like a passive tone control does). HOWEVER, most active basses are sufficiently low in output that they too can be used in the "high gain / passive / etc" input without clipping. If your bass has a very hot output (like an 18V Status, or a Spector Tonepump, etc) then it will clip the passive input so you'll need to use the active input (or engage the pad). If you're someone that plucks hard you may need to use the active input whilst someone else with a lighter touch using the same bass and amp might be able to use the passive input. Also, with an active bass using the EQ makes it louder or quieter - in particular using the bass boost knob will significantly increase the output. When you plug your bass into your amp, check that the most extreme onboard EQ settings you use (don't just crank up all the knobs because you'll probably never do that on the gig) will not clip the passive input - if they do then switch over to the active input. So in summary - always start with the passive input but check that it doesn't clip with your hardest plucking and most extreme EQ. If it does then use the active input. Alex Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
alexclaber Posted October 13, 2009 Share Posted October 13, 2009 One other thing - clipping the input won't damage anything. And if you like the sound of it clipping (especially if it's a valve input stage so you can get some nice overdrive) then feel free to let it distort as much as you like! Alex Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
waynepunkdude Posted October 13, 2009 Share Posted October 13, 2009 [quote name='alexclaber' post='624778' date='Oct 13 2009, 10:37 AM']One other thing - clipping the input won't damage anything. And if you like the sound of it clipping (especially if it's a valve input stage so you can get some nice overdrive) then feel free to let it distort as much as you like! Alex[/quote] Good to know, I love the sound of mine but it worries me. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tinman Posted October 13, 2009 Share Posted October 13, 2009 [quote name='alexclaber' post='624778' date='Oct 13 2009, 10:37 AM']One other thing - clipping the input won't damage anything. And if you like the sound of it clipping (especially if it's a valve input stage so you can get some nice overdrive) then feel free to let it distort as much as you like! Alex[/quote] Sorry Alex, you're going to have to explain that one. If what you're saying is true, why does the manual for my Trace say that you should have the input gain set so that the red (clip) light only comes on rarely if at all. The manual takes great pains to point out that red is bad. Cheers Pete Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
alexclaber Posted October 13, 2009 Share Posted October 13, 2009 [quote name='Tinman' post='624795' date='Oct 13 2009, 10:57 AM']Sorry Alex, you're going to have to explain that one. If what you're saying is true, why does the manual for my Trace say that you should have the input gain set so that the red (clip) light only comes on rarely if at all. The manual takes great pains to point out that red is bad.[/quote] Red is bad if you want a squeaky clean tone - they should have gone a step further and explained that you can choose to overdrive the preamp if you wish. There's nothing wrong with overdriving solidstate preamps if it gets you the sound you want - bear in mind that most distortion pedals are entirely solidstate. If clipping damaged preamps (or power amps come to that) then guitarists would be forever killing their amps. Alex Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tinman Posted October 13, 2009 Share Posted October 13, 2009 [quote name='alexclaber' post='624799' date='Oct 13 2009, 11:03 AM']Red is bad if you want a squeaky clean tone - they should have gone a step further and explained that you can choose to overdrive the preamp if you wish. There's nothing wrong with overdriving solidstate preamps if it gets you the sound you want - bear in mind that most distortion pedals are entirely solidstate. If clipping damaged preamps (or power amps come to that) then guitarists would be forever killing their amps. Alex[/quote] Cheers Alex. That clears that up quite nicely. I'll have a go with that when I get home (at the outlaws) and see what sort of sounds I get out of it. Thanks Pete Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mateybass Posted October 14, 2009 Share Posted October 14, 2009 (edited) Never clip a solid state preamp... it won't hurt the amp, but apart from it sounding horrible it's likely to shorten speaker life if not instantly kill it. Instead of a nice clean sine wave from an unclipped source, what you get is akin to a square wave which at high levels of amplification provide enough "alternating" dc current to melt the windings of your speakers. BTDT and I won't do it again. On the other hand, clipping a valve is fine because you don't get a square wave type of clipping, the sine wave just goes sort of wobbly.... which is nice Incidentally, guitarists get away with it because their notes are higher frequencies, which means the duration of that dc current at the clipped peak of the wave is much shorter. Edited October 14, 2009 by Mateybass Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
alexclaber Posted October 14, 2009 Share Posted October 14, 2009 [quote name='Mateybass' post='625681' date='Oct 14 2009, 02:37 AM']Never clip a solid state preamp... it won't hurt the amp, but apart from it sounding horrible it's likely to shorten speaker life if not instantly kill it. Instead of a nice clean sine wave from an unclipped source, what you get is akin to a square wave which at high levels of amplification provide enough "alternating" dc current to melt the windings of your speakers. BTDT and I won't do it again. On the other hand, clipping a valve is fine because you don't get a square wave type of clipping, the sine wave just goes sort of wobbly.... which is nice Incidentally, guitarists get away with it because their notes are higher frequencies, which means the duration of that dc current at the clipped peak of the wave is much shorter.[/quote] Unfortunately this is entirely incorrect. Sorry. Or should we all get rid of every overdrive/distortion/fuzz pedal we own that doesn't have a valve in it? Alex Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Les Posted October 14, 2009 Share Posted October 14, 2009 I'm gonna have to try this. Always had Trace amps, active switch, set the gain as per the instructions and away. Now got the LH500 and that doesn't have a gain just active and passive inputs. I assume from the comments above I'm safe straying away from the norm ? mind you I can't see my old Ray being as hot as some of the more modern active basses. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ou7shined Posted October 14, 2009 Share Posted October 14, 2009 At our rehearsal rooms there's an old Ashdown 1x15 combo and the only time I get a nice sound out of is is if I go active into the high gain and crank it. I never knew it wasn't doing it any harm though. I feel much better about it now. Thanks. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cheddatom Posted October 14, 2009 Share Posted October 14, 2009 lol, you b*stard! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mateybass Posted October 14, 2009 Share Posted October 14, 2009 (edited) [quote name='alexclaber' post='625708' date='Oct 14 2009, 08:05 AM']Unfortunately this is entirely incorrect. Sorry. Or should we all get rid of every overdrive/distortion/fuzz pedal we own that doesn't have a valve in it? Alex[/quote] OK, it was late and my brain wasn't fully in gear so my explanation was a little misleading. However, if you have a clipping preamp and high master vol levels (which I did mention but maybe should have emphasised), you will damage or kill your speakers... and that goes for a valve amp too (although that then opens a discussion on THD and odd or even harmonic distortion, output tranformer compression etc... let's not go there, it hurts my brain). At power levels close to the speaker design, there is an awful lot of heat generated in the voice coil and too much current at cone excursion will produce enough heat to melt the varnish on the coil or the coil wiring itself, and bass energy is the most disrespecting of amplification costs. Introducing clipping to the signal just makes things worse. Distortion pedals were made to get that overdriven sound at lower power levels, thereby saving ears and speakers. Anyway, [url="http://www.colomar.com/Shavano/power_rating_speakers.html"]read this[/url], it explains it much better than I did. Edited October 14, 2009 by Mateybass Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cheddatom Posted October 14, 2009 Share Posted October 14, 2009 Distortion pedals are exactly the same as an overdriven preamp, surely. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mateybass Posted October 14, 2009 Share Posted October 14, 2009 [quote name='cheddatom' post='626185' date='Oct 14 2009, 04:55 PM']Distortion pedals are exactly the same as an overdriven preamp, surely.[/quote] Yes, pretty much so. The problem comes when you turn the master volume up whilst feeding it with a bass guitar being clipped. Speakers have an RMS rating for wattage. This presumes a sinewave. Let's look at a simplified example: Amplifier with 50 volt dual rail DC supply (not uncommon) into 4 ohm speaker. With the amp at full power, a sine wave with a peak voltage of + or - 50 volts (100 volts peak to peak) is presented to the speaker coil but the useable voltage from this sine wave is calculated as RMS which is roughly 70% less than peak, or +-35 volts. (35 x 35) / 4 = 306.25 watts. A 300w RMS 4 ohm cab could handle that. The amp manufacturer probably sold this as a 300w amp. Now let's fully clip the signal and your peak voltage is still + or - 50 volts but because the signal is now square wave, the useable voltage is the same as the peak voltage. So thats (50 x 50) / 4 = 625 watts = melted voice coils in your 300w RMS cab. So you can see, as presented to the speakers, a clipped signal at half master vol would be similar to an unclipped signal at full master vol. Whilst the speakers could probably handle that as being within their tolerances, turning the master vol up from there and you are risking it. OK, the upshot here is that I'm only trying to save someone the expense of making the mistakes that I've made in the past. Hey, if you want to find out the hard way, go ahead. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
alexclaber Posted October 14, 2009 Share Posted October 14, 2009 Your sums aren't quite right, which means you're exaggerating the issue. You've also failed to take account the lowpass filtering caused by the voice coil inductance, which makes the problem less severe. Anyway, the fundamental issue is not one of whether the waveform is clipped or not, it's how much power is being continuously delivered to the voice coils. If you prefer to run dirtier and more compressed sounds then it makes sense to have more thermal power handling than if you like a clean uncompressed sound. The main issue with any harsh fuzzy distortion, especially power amp clipping, is the increasing energy in the high frequencies. Woofers will filter this out but if you have tweeters they will get much more power and thus will be more likely to blow, hence the advice given on that site regarding amp:cab power ratios. Not so relevant with bass guitar cabs. Alex Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mrcrow Posted October 14, 2009 Share Posted October 14, 2009 [quote name='woolz' post='624560' date='Oct 12 2009, 11:16 PM']does anyone here do this? to me it sounds better- dont know if its just the huge increase in db but it sounds clearer to me. not sure on the damages either to the amp by doing this?[/quote] there seems to be only a few basses which need to go into my active input...really hot i always use the passive input and then cut the gain on the preamp i also did this with EMG actives and onboard active pre amp...like the stingray Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mateybass Posted October 14, 2009 Share Posted October 14, 2009 (edited) [quote name='alexclaber' post='626286' date='Oct 14 2009, 06:57 PM']Your sums aren't quite right, which means you're exaggerating the issue. You've also failed to take account the lowpass filtering caused by the voice coil inductance, which makes the problem less severe.[/quote] I did say it was a simplified example but regarding lowpass filtering, I would suggest that it would make it more severe when we are talking about the open A string of a bass guitar at 55Hz with severe clipping. As that is the fundamental frequency being reproduced, lowpass filtering won't have any attenuative effect on it. [quote name='alexclaber' post='626286' date='Oct 14 2009, 06:57 PM']Anyway, the fundamental issue is not one of whether the waveform is clipped or not, it's how much power is being continuously delivered to the voice coils. If you prefer to run dirtier and more compressed sounds then it makes sense to have more thermal power handling than if you like a clean uncompressed sound.[/quote] I didn't mention compression and as you know, compression provides a different audio function than clipping/distortion. You're absolutely right about it being a question of power delivery to the speakers, as I previously mentioned, and possibly the reason why most bass amp manuals tell you not to exceed input gain to the point of excessive clipping. [quote name='alexclaber' post='626286' date='Oct 14 2009, 06:57 PM']The main issue with any harsh fuzzy distortion, especially power amp clipping, is the increasing energy in the high frequencies. Woofers will filter this out but if you have tweeters they will get much more power and thus will be more likely to blow, hence the advice given on that site regarding amp:cab power ratios. Not so relevant with bass guitar cabs. Alex[/quote] Thanks, I'll disconnect the tweeters from my bass cabs immediately Ok, if you're still not convinced you could try a little experiment though I will add the disclaimer that if you follow these instructions, I take no responsibility for any damage whatsoever caused to your equipment or hearing.... try turning all your gain/EQ controls to max so you get a nice clipped sound... then whilst striking the open A string, gradually turn up your master volume control until you've reached full volume and see how far you get before your speakers/tweeters start rattling. Edited October 14, 2009 by Mateybass Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
alexclaber Posted October 15, 2009 Share Posted October 15, 2009 [quote name='Mateybass' post='626588' date='Oct 15 2009, 12:21 AM']I did say it was a simplified example but regarding lowpass filtering, I would suggest that it would make it more severe when we are talking about the open A string of a bass guitar at 55Hz with severe clipping. As that is the fundamental frequency being reproduced, lowpass filtering won't have any attenuative effect on it.[/quote] The extra energy in a 55Hz sine-wave which has been subjected to full clipping to thus produce a 55Hz square-wave is all contained in the overtones. There is no more power in the fundamental than with an equal magnitude sinewave. The voicecoil inductance acts as a lowpass filter by increasing the impedance and thus reducing current flow at higher frequencies so the square wave becomes less square and thus the energy content is reduced. [quote name='Mateybass' post='626588' date='Oct 15 2009, 12:21 AM']I didn't mention compression and as you know, compression provides a different audio function than clipping/distortion. You're absolutely right about it being a question of power delivery to the speakers, as I previously mentioned, and possibly the reason why most bass amp manuals tell you not to exceed input gain to the point of excessive clipping.[/quote] They recommend this because it sounds better on many s/s preamps. They do not recommend this to protect your speakers - and when manufacturers do recommend avoiding clipping it is power amp clipping they want you to avoid! [quote name='Mateybass' post='626588' date='Oct 15 2009, 12:21 AM']Thanks, I'll disconnect the tweeters from my bass cabs immediately [/quote] There is much less energy in a bass guitar signal, even when heavily clipped, in the treble than in a fullrange PA mix. Also the tweeters in bass cabs are crossed over much higher than in a PA, hence they're at less risk of damage. But plenty of bass cabs have protection circuitry to prevent tweeter damage when an amp is pushed too hard. [quote name='Mateybass' post='626588' date='Oct 15 2009, 12:21 AM']Ok, if you're still not convinced you could try a little experiment though I will add the disclaimer that if you follow these instructions, I take no responsibility for any damage whatsoever caused to your equipment or hearing.... try turning all your gain/EQ controls to max so you get a nice clipped sound... then whilst striking the open A string, gradually turn up your master volume control until you've reached full volume and see how far you get before your speakers/tweeters start rattling. [/quote] For starters if you turn everything to maximum you're unlikely to get a nice sound due to the many stages all clipping - the probably of every gain stage clipping in a sonically satisfying manner is minimal. Secondly, 'rattling' noises are no indication of speaker overload - farting noises are but they are indicative of over-excursion, not of thermal overload. In fact, thermal overload as you suggest will happen doesn't have an obvious sound - the speakers will get gradually less efficient, it'll get boomier in the high-bass as its T/S specs shift and then it'll die. Alex Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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