Bass amps.

[sydsbluesky]

Forced re-entry into the bass community... but now I'm five years older, and all of a sudden I care about how things sound!

I'm considering a few names in bass amps. I don't know much ABOUT bass amps though, and I seek guidance!

My budget is $750 (.......ish)

I'm looking for something in the 300 wattish range.
I want 10s... Either 4 of them or 2.
I would LOVE a tube preamp. I know it makes a huge difference in my Marshall AVT when compared to the Marshall MG.
I don't care if it's head+cab or a combo.
I want something reliable.

So far I'm looking at a few names, such as Ampeg, Ashdown, Fender, Hartke, G&K, Peavey...

If you guys have any nuggets of wisdom they would be greatly appreciated.

[sumgai]

syd,

Keeping in mind the age difference between us, I have to state that when it comes to bass, my tired old ears can NOT notice any difference between a tube or a solid-state bass amp and speaker setup. The only notable sonic differences between the two are a subtle kind of distortion (and if you're into it, a certain "lag" that is often confused with sustain), and that's about it. Pound for pound, for a guitar amp, it's a matter of personal taste, but never one of necessity.

Now, in the bass region of the audio spectrum, and unless you are imitating a guitar player who's "down an octave", then you want clean, clean, and more clean. You don't want mush, mud, or flabbiness, period. Tight comes from high power, and that's the end of the story. Well, speakers that can accurately handle that high power are also necessary, but I'm sure that was obvious.

To my ears, you can play a $1,000 Mesa amp, and match your guitar player in both looks and sound (distorted), or you can spend between $400 and $700 for a Gallien-Krueger (new), and much less for one, used. Peavey's are excellent, but finding a combo 4x10 is not gonna be easy. (However, Peavey made a 2x10 bass cab, and it's real nice.)

Fenders are good, but again, 10"er's are not as common. For that, you need to go to the big boys, and this arena is filled with both new and used, so watch the whole field, and bargain for all you're worth.

My own setup is a G-K RB700 MkIV, topping an Ampeg 410HLF. This will not only fluff the pillows in the neighbor's bedroom, it will also force-start diesel truck engines at 300 paces! I had to have it, once I saw a fella get up on stage with one of these, and an old dog-house (a contra-bass), and the first time he hit a note, damn near everyone in the house puked - the punch in the gut was that strong! Used, I shelled out $450 for the cab and $225 for the head, about 60% of the new price.

(Make sure it's the 410HLF, that's the one that can go down to 28Hz!! Ampeg's regular 410HF can only go down to 38Hz.)

HTH



sumgai

[sydsbluesky]

Jan 24, 2010 21:53:11 GMT -5 sumgai said:

I had to have it, once I saw a fella get up on stage with one of these, and an old dog-house (a contra-bass), and the first time he hit a note, damn near everyone in the house puked - the punch in the gut was that strong!

sumgai

That's possibly the most beautiful thing I've ever heard.

Luckily, I've had the chance to play through quite a few bass amps in the last few years... mostly as our (ex) bassist bought/sold/traded/...found... them and brought them to practice.

As far as sound quality goes, they're all in the same ballpark... His latest was a rather nice Hartke hybrid, and it did, without a doubt, sound better than the solid staters he was lugging to practice before that. Might just be better all round tech inside it, or maybe just that tube... I highly doubt if I'd believe anyone who said they could tell the specific make and model of your average amp after it's been pumped through a house PA...

Biggest issue I'm having, is that I like my cabs to out-watt my heads by a good margin, and it's looking expensive to do that with bass rigs.

And what IS a necessity is something that's gonna last... I guess a lot of that is a bit of a crap shoot, eh? I'll strive for warranty haha.


410HLF you say, huh... I'll check into it. Good stuff, Gai.

[ashcatlt]

We've had this discussion before, and I don't remember if we ever came to a consensus on it, but I'm going to ask here just for fun:

Why do you prefer more power handling in your speakers than your amps? Especially when you're dealing with what will likely be a solid state power amp? The speakers will generally warn you (by sounding like heck) well before they shake themselves to pieces from having too much wattage pumped into them. On the other hand, if the power amp runs out of headroom it's going to clip the wave off to something very close to a square wave, which is essentially a DC pulse. This sort of thing kills speakers like a ninja - you never new it was there till you were dead.

Perhaps the right answer is to have sooooo much power in both head and cab that you'll never need to turn it all the way up?

[sydsbluesky]

Well, in guitar amps I make sure to do this because I use a big multi pedal with a master volume knob, among other things, on it. I know when I crank my 5 watt head I get one amount of sound... I can get that to be a much higher level of sound if I accidentally forget to check those knobs for movement while it's in my backpack on the way to practice.

My practice stack is 65 watts mated to a 5 watt tube head, and the gig stack is 320 watts mated to 100 watts of a solid state power section.

Oh, and I also played an AC30 long ago and decided that I didn't like it. Sometimes I want to be able to get a very loud, clean tone.. sometimes I want break up... I don't like pushing my speakers to their limits. Don't think it's necessary to get that sound I'm after, I guess. But that's just me... so I guess it just carries over from my guitar rig building habits.

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EDIT: yikes, I almost missed that. I should add that I LOVED the AC30 with the Celestion blues, but it wasn't versatile enough for me. I'd get one in a heartbeat if I had some cash to burn, but they're almost a one trick pony if you turn the dials too far to the right.

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And yeah, having 5000 watts on each would be amazing, but... *sigh* Alas, it's beyond my price point... I know behringers have ridiculous power handling, but my friend in high school got one of their cabs and it fell apart on him.

Right now I'm leaning toward Ampeg. The local Brick and Mortars have plenty of their product (unlike ashdown) and I need the thing by... well, tomorrow. They have one that matches my needs perfectly. Even has the tube preamp... and even if that doesn't make it actually SOUND any better then it will at least make me THINK it sounds better, which will, of course, boost my level of confidence. A boosted level of confidence will likely lead to an overall increase of mojo, magic and mystery.

And isn't live music just about mojo, magic and mystery anyway?

[sumgai]

ash,

You're correct about underpowered amps driving high-capacity cabinets, but in the case of a bass rig, things might be different.

First, a bass amp means lower requencies, and that translates to longer wavelengths. Second, a longer wavelength means that the cone would like to travel further from it's center, in order to reproduce said long wavelength. (This is why bass speakers have a longer "excursion" dimension.)

Taken together, the longer a cone is "out" away from center, the longer the time that power is being applied to said speaker. This power has to be "transduced" into something, and it's not all going into the cone's motion. In fact, speakers get hot, and it's easy to see why some of the more powerful units have vents, or even fins to help cool them.

Higher power ratings usually denote the level of power that can be fed to the speaker before it self-implodes. Part of that rating is the ability to soak up and safely dissipate the heat generated by the longer cone excursion.

That's it in a nutshell, HTH.




sumgai

[sydsbluesky]

So... I found a pretty good price on a new (but discontinued) solid state ampeg ba 500 2x10

Unlike the BA 300 I was looking at, it doesn't have a tube preamp... but it CAN be hooked to an external speaker, so it keeps an HLF in the realm of the plausible.

*shrugs* The sticker says 900, but he's willing to give it to me for 750. I think I may go for it.

We'll see if a trip to GC today changes my mind.

[newey]

Probably not as much wattage as Syd seeks, but G-K has a new-from-NAMM 200 watt (4Ω) bass head for $250. It weighs a mere 2 pounds:

www.rmcaudiodirect.com/Gallien-Krueger-MB200-200-Watt-Bass-Amp-p/mb-200.htm



I find myself wondering if this might not also make a nice guitar head . . .

[sydsbluesky]

Well... I got the Ampeg BA (badass?) 500 2x10.

Amazing. Head and shoulders above the hartke rig our old bassist was using. (actually his rig was more than twice the size... so not in size, just sound.) I got it right before practice today, and I didn't get into the 9 band EQ yet, as we were a bit busy, but I got great tones for both a low end sound to stay behind the guitars and a middy tone for slap.

Pleased. Give me 6-12 months and You'll get the full review.

[sumgai]

Jesse,

Ampeg's BA designates, what else.... Bass Amp. (Remember, they used to do regular guitar stuff, and even amps for other instruments like accordians and such.)

The 500 2x10 is a nice rig, I should think about it, if only because the 410HLF weighs just over 100 lbs.!

I've heard the new G-K Class D stuff, my local GC already has 'em. Sounds very good, to my ears.... will have to go back and plug in a Strat to see if that combination might make newey salivate. ;D




sumgai

[sydsbluesky]

BASS AMP?!?!

Come on, Gai! That's no fun! ... I mean, it's obviously not supposed to mean BADASS... but...

Hey, you! Get off of my cloud!

And yeah, even this thing weighs 95 pounds according the the spec sheet, but it does at least fit easily into my Camry. Front seat or back. Spring loaded handles and what appear to be very well built casters helps, too.

Tomorrow I'll be plugging a guitar into it to see how it sounds, since I'm going to be using it to amp my guitar for one song this weekend... I mean, this is going to be a gritty A$$ song with an ESP chugging through SD actives and a boss metal zone pedal... I doubt that's the tone that tickles Newey's nethers, but I'll make sure to add it into my future review.

[ashcatlt]

95#?!?

That's like 2/3 of me! Not going to happen. I have 128 amps, 80 cabs (including several 2 x 18s), plus dual vocal paths in a rack that weighs about that. I offer to help the guys cart it in and out of the gigs, but they want to show...something...

I've got nothing to prove.

[sydsbluesky]

Yeah, I was shocked when I picked it up.

[sumgai]

Jesse,

Ya know, the VG-88 (and it's a priori unit, the VG-8) comes with several stock bass sounds. I didn't particularly care for them, too distorted for my tastes, but there's room to twiddle, or you can build your own. That's what I did, and now I can do "double duty" with one axe.


But newey, during those 'special moments', I still have to use my genuine Fender outboard Reverb Unit - there just ain't nothing quite like it on the market. (Although I hear that Roland/Boss is building a "better mousetrap" that will imitate the "fwip" of a spring reverb. Can't wait to try that one out!)




sumgai

[newey]

genuine Fender outboard Reverb Unit

SG knows that all he has to do is mention that he has one of these and I start salivating . . .