neepheid

Try wading through this for starters? http://mycoolguitars.com/mij/yamaha-guitars/yamaha-guitar-serial-numbers-dating-your-guitar/

[quote name='FinnDave' timestamp='1510311962' post='3405476'] Pick ups look the same as on my EB4, they sound good and have coil taps built in (at least, mine does!) so they are quite versatile. Shame they've gone for the crappy 3 point bridge, though, the EB4 comes with Babicz as standard, a far better option. [/quote] They haven't - it's a Babicz 3 point replacement bridge on the new ones. The picture of the old one had a 3 point bridge on it, perhaps that's what you were thinking of.

Funnily enough, I was playing my '79 RD Artist at band rehearsal on Tuesday night. Is it an "Artist"? Well, the way I see it, it's more "Artist" than "Standard" and that's more than I expected so happy days. Agree with the comments about fingerboard material - would have been nice to have the option of maple for the natural one and ebony for the black like in olden times.

Ooft, shiny. Confirms what I thought, that black is the new black.

Maybe the EB was waiting for the right finish, looks a lot better in the black compared to the natural or sunburst. Also, if the RD they're planning on releasing is really an Artist (ie. with active electronics and Moog compression/expansion/bright shenanigans) instead of a funny shaped T-Bird with TB+ pickups then I'll be pleasantly surprised!

[quote name='Al Krow' timestamp='1508945597' post='3395539'] Thanks for looking. Shame. I really appreciated my little Promethean 3110 for its [i]portability [/i]to rehearsals and having an extra 200W headroom in the Red Sub in something with a similar size was potentially very appealing. Out of interest how decent / rough(!) was the 10" speaker and driver, and did you get the full 500W through this or only with an extension speaker? (Apologies if these questions have been previously been dealt with earlier in this mega thread!) [/quote] I find the sound of the combo to be pretty pleasing - in a rehearsal room situation against a drums, keys, sax, trombone and vocals it makes itself heard pretty well (it does need to be pushed quite hard to do this (7 or 8 out of 10 on the master volume, gain set appropriately - as much as I can without significant clip), but it's taken over 5 years of this weekly). Sure it's a little boxy sounding, but it has a very usable tone which works well in the live environment, right amount/type of mids I guess. 500W only possible with the use of an extension (or removing the head and using it with a 4 ohm cab or combination of cabs). The speaker in the combo is 8 ohms, so it's 250W in the combo by itself. I used to remove the head and use it with a 4 ohm 4x10 but these days I keep the combo together and stack the whole thing on top of an 8 ohm 1x10 cab to yield the full 500W. I've been very happy with the sound that comes out of this. Used it recently at a small pub gig and the bassist in the other band borrowed it so I had the opportunity to hear it being played by someone else and it sounded great.

[quote name='Al Krow' timestamp='1508878591' post='3395139'] Are these still being made and sold anywhere? [/quote] They still come up on the Beta Aivin (manufacturer) website (BT2510 - http://www.beta-aivin.com/English/Products/Bass/BT/English_205.html) but I can't see them available anywhere I looked. I had a quick look for the Red Sub, the Harley Benton and the Beta Aivin badged variants and all came up blank. Where found, always shown as no longer in stock.

Time to trot this one out again, I guess: BWB pickguard, GFS Lipstick Strat pickup, thumbrest, full size tuners, bridge from a Vista Series Musicmaster, bored through for through body stringing.

Chunky? The G&L Tribute L-2000 neck is a half baseball bat. I know chunky, these aren't it.

I feel I must retract a statement I made a few times in this thread. These EB basses do indeed have the coil splitting option, despite it not being mentioned in any of the blurb. I checked a 5 string when I was in Guitar Guitar in Glasgow recently and I can confirm that it has push pull knobs which would suggest that the coil splits are still there. Still not interested in it though

The body shape is one of my favourite ones, familiar yet different at the same time. Thanks for confirming the passive tone control, I thought I had read that somewhere but I wasn't sure.

Also, I had a try of a 434 in a music shop recently and despite really wanting a 734A I must say I was impressed. It was one of the teal blue ones and I thought it was quite "vintage" looking in terms of use of cream pickguard and dots. Felt really nice to play, comfortable neck (that sort of inbetweeny size/profile neither Jazz nor Precision), was playing sitting down and no strap so can't comment on weight but didn't seem overly heavy when I was looking it over. What surprised me the most was how bright it sounded for a passive bass. Yes, the blurb says "Alnico magnet pickups tuned to deliver the classic BB vintage tone, slightly updated to provide a brighter sound that cuts through in live performance situations" but you know, you don't actually believe that stuff, right? I hadn't cut my fingernails and it was super sensitive to them if I caught the strings with them. I actually preferred the sound with the tone control about 1/3 rolled off. That's the first passive bass I can think of when I've felt the need to do that. The tone control actually did something in a reasonably graded fashion instead of being either all or nothing or achieving very little at all, so kudos to Yamaha for that. I really like the new, sleeker, simplified look. Some of the more recent BBs have been a bit garish and fussy looking for me with far too much extraneous chrome (like pickup rings) and I'm glad to see them gone. Pickguard's a nice shape and doesn't cover too much of the body. As a Gibson man, really appreciated the black headstock The 434 gave me serious cause to consider whether or not the 734A is worth the extra 300ish notes or not, simply because of the brightness of the tone of this passive bass. The 734A has different pickups (with a larger number, so they must be better, right?), active EQ, a sandwich body construction (alder/maple/alder) and more luxurious fingerboard inlays but I have to ask myself how much I care about these things. Also, you can't get the 734 in teal blue, which I think is the pick of the new colours. I haven't bought a new bass in ages. GAS is escaping...

The 734/5 is passive/active switchable. Don't know if there are any passive tone controls or not.

Get 'em while you can...

[quote name='FinnDave' timestamp='1501577789' post='3345574'] The delivery date for my Vintage Pro T Bird at Gear 4 Music has been pushed back to 30th December overnight. I thought the 1st of September was a bit optimistic! [/quote] The day before my birthday! It's surely fate

[quote name='Grahambythesea' timestamp='1501458123' post='3344832'] yes, that's what I meant. I'm surprised Gibson/Epiphone haven't sued! They stopped everyone else from producing lookalikes. [/quote] Sure they may have nods to each other but I don't think it's similar enough to cry "copy!". The pickguards are similar in how they swoop across the body but the ends are very different. Body shape is different enough to my eyes - the Dimension is a bit more offset feeling at the bottom whereas the Embassy is very round and straight and the bottom horns differ significantly between the two basses. Also, the Dimension not being a Precision or a Jazz means it will probably get cancelled in a few years - and I mean that in no way as a slight against the bass itself, it's more a comment on the majority of bass players having conservative tastes. Perhaps Gibson/Epiphone aren't really that concerned as a result.

[quote name='Happy Jack' timestamp='1501487553' post='3344883'] Who writes this stuff? Andertons or Gibson? [i][color=#231F20]"You have 2 volume controls for each pickup so that you can blend the pickups however you want to with a master tone control."[/color][/i] [color=#231F20]Ignoring the fact that this sentence barely passes (or parses) muster as English, that could imply that the bass has four volume controls, or in fact five. In practice, it has three knobs, and presumably at least one of them is a tone control.[/color] It's a pig-ugly bass anyway. [/quote] I believe that's Andertons' own words. Not that inventing extra volume controls and non-existent coil taps or dropping the price through the floor is going to help this bass. I can honestly say that if I was given a Gibson "New" EB bass for free I'd probably sell it on (if I could) then buy one of those new Epiphone Vintage Pro Thunderbirds instead. Now *that's* a pretty bass, I don't care what anyone says

[quote name='NancyJohnson' timestamp='1501403086' post='3344409'] Shouldn't that be the other way round? [/quote] Indeed, the Embassy predates the Dimension by about 5 decades

By the way, if you can get over the lack of batwing headstock, have you seen the price of the Embassy? £329 new? That's a mistake, surely? For using a little less glue? It's got funcy special knobs too.

Oh my, that price is better than anticipated. That is highly unfortunate, said my wallet

[quote name='Burrito' timestamp='1499979492' post='3335000'] The new Epiphone Thunderbird is coming to retailers in October 2017 according to my email today. http://www.epiphone.com/Products/Electrics/Bass/Thunderbird-Vintage-PRO-Bass.aspx [/quote] Unacceptable! Not soon enough! Said everything except my wallet

[quote name='bazztard' timestamp='1499145026' post='3329451'] a switch won't give you 100% Neck and 80% bridge, if you don't understand how a Jazz bass works don't try and tell us how [/quote] Really? Can a switch not do that? My mind is blown! Well aware of how a Jazz bass works, thank you very much. You seem to not understand that a smiley face after a comment signifies at the very least an attempt at humour, if you're going to be like that about it. Why don't you get back into bed then try exiting from the other side?

Three way switch FTW