dannybuoy

A tube amp with a power soak sounds like a different scenario though, they're designed to push the amp harder at lower volume levels for a start. Strange how some Class D heads have no fan at all and manage just fine. Neither did my Orange AD200B which put out a lot of heat but no fan needed. Makes me wonder how many of these amps would survive just fine with the fan ripped out as long as there was a decent heatsink!

I've returned an Aguilar TH500 for the same issue. Kicked in after 10-15 minutes of low volume usage, at maximum speed when the amp was still cool to the touch. Even worse is that you can hear a pop sent to the speaker cab when it kicks in. On my Orange Terror Bass, I've replaced the fan with a much quieter one - much less air flow than the original, I knew I was taking a risk in doing so but it turned out just fine. It has a massive heatsink and more air flow than most amps though, and larger fans can be quieter since they can get good airflow at low RPM. Most fan systems on amps are under-engineered - low-volume usage seems not to be a primary design consideration, and variable fan speed controllers too much effort to design it seems.

I like a light overdrive into a blended muff... ends up giving the fuzz a nice boost and making the clean side less, er, clean! Also give fuzz into octave a go! It doesn't make much difference to tracking (with a muff at least, YMMV) and you end up with clean lows under the fuzz rather than too much low end making the fuzz crap out.

What's the 1st string, E or G?! If E, you can try a tapered set. Using a tapered B dropped the height considerably for me, I need to adjust it but so far have been really enjoying the grindy sound it produces due to the fret buzz so might have to lower the others to suit!

I found the B too floppy on the Super Brights. Currently have some NYXLs with a tapered B string fitted and like them very much! I might try a few more sets outs but can see myself sticking with these.

II got the expression version mainly for the wahs, but didn't actually find a bass wah sound I liked so it just ended up costing me £10 more for something I didn't use and took up more space. You may find more usage out of it than I did though! But if it's literally a couple of quid, and you don't envisage putting it on a board where you might regret the extra space it takes up, go for it!

The drive on the Terror is pretty mushy, I only have it set to very mild settings. It can't replicate what a lot of distortion/fuzz pedals can do. I haven't tried the revised preamp on the new OTBs, but on the original, flat EQ according to BassGearMag who measured it, is achieved with bass/treble at minimum and mids at maximum. Sounds odd, but it's common with passive tonestacks. So don't be afraid to whck the mids up and the bass down! There are plenty of pedals that don't need a blend to retain lows. Many even boost lows, like the Sovtek Muff reissue, SolidgoldFX Beta and IdiotBox Blower Box. But if the issue is not low end but cutting through the mix, adding clean blend might make you cut through even less! A Big Muff for example can sound really distorted soloed, but mix it with the band and it just sounds like bass with mega sustain! I don't know what pedals you're using but I like various Tech21 pedals like the VTDI / YYZ / DP3X that have really agressive upper midrange to cut through.

Will laugh if someone else bids £120 and it sells for that as there's no longer any other bidders (i.e. you) to compete against!

Sounds like they haven’t quite grasped how eBay works!

I should've stuck with my 1st list, I ended up changing it all around after each listen - at least I might have got 1 right! 4 was the other one that sounded a bit distorted on the low notes, so that could be the Joshwah also. Curious to know what 1 is!

Very tough! C4 Microtron Joshwah Chromatron Only one I'm reasonably certain about is the Joshwah, as it's impossible to dial out the distortion on that sucker! 1 is my favourite by far.

It's not a good thing, no. But amazingly lots of amps are this way including the 1st generation Darkglass M900!

I use EXL 170-5 (long scale, 45-130), and I believe that's what they fit as stock. Perfect fit stringing though the bridge on my BB1025X. No need for super long, as you say you might end up trying to wrap a thick string around the post if you did!

Dunlops dont have coloured ball ends, only D'Addario (as far as I know) plus a few brands that D'Addario manufacture for like Fender. D'Addario nickels are quite lively sounding, when new at least.

I don't know much about the nuances of the SVT4, but this is good for a small board:

Maybe some kind of prosthetic?

Always used D’Addario nickels as they were the brightest sounding nickels I’ve used. However I just tried their NYXLs and they seem even brighter and are keeping that brightness for longer to boot.

Never heard of this guy, but I can't work out ihe's a comedy genius or just unintentionally funny!

Cioks DC5 is great, but since its release it's had competition in the form of the Truetone CS6 and Strymon Ojai R30. Both premium options though, I'm sure there are some good low profile budget options about these days, just watch out as lots of the cheap ones don't have isolated outputs. This looks interesting though if you might be tempted by a USB rechargeable one: https://m.thomann.de/gb/mission_engineering_529_usb_pedal_power_supply.htm

75 RI sounds way better to me.

That was my first ever bass, I still have it!

They get better. I have a fretless that came with them stock and thought they were too grabby at first but they're slick now.

Budget option if the amp has an XLR out is a Behringer MA400. Great bit of kit, a simple XLR + aux input + headphone amp for not much dough. There are plenty of iOS interfaces like the iRig and Sonic Port, they’l also let you run amp sims and effects on the iDevice too. The cheap Zoom multis combine everything you would need including amps, fx, tuner, looper etc. The Bighead beats them all for clean pristine sound quality though, and is capable of driving higher impedance headphones that the iOS and Zoom devices struggle to push enough volume into.