xgsjx

I've had my Markbass combo since 2008 & I couldn't tell you if the fan is always on as I never hear it.

It's not how many watts an amp is, it's how good it is at making speakers move. Would the head section from the Orange be loud through some decent cabs?

^ What he says. I have the same & do the same too (don't have a double bass though).

From what I've been told on here & other places in the past, a good compressor needs good metering to be used effectively as a transparent compressor. Unfortunately, there's only a select few that fit that criteria & the only one I remember the name of is the MarkBass Compressore. But it might be a little too large for you.

How much are you spending? It would probably make more sense to buy a decent cab that's been designed for the driver in it rather than trying to source a driver to suit the specs of some cab made in the 70s. No point sticking a good driver in the cab if the cab hasn't had some thought put into its design.

Having the gain at 2/3 means little in itself. If it was past clipping, then you could have done some damage. Whether the bass is into the passive input may not make any difference. Or it could be driver damage. The driver may have run out of travel due to you getting those extra lows, causing it to bottom out. Watts has nothing to do with the volume, that's SPL & it sounds like it may have been the drivers that's the limiting factor & not your amp. Have a try of several rigs & see what you like. I'll suggest Markbass as a starting point as Lozz says they're similar sounding in a live situ to Ampeg.

Why new? There's a lot of excellent amps in your price range if you go 2nd hand.

First... Ignore the you need X amount of watts to get volume. Volume is decibels, watts is heat. Watts play a factor in it, but it's a small one. TCE heads prove this in the respect that their amps are as loud as most others & yet rated at much lower watts. I use a Markbass 2x10 combo. I use it in my 1st floor flat & it'll go low enough that even the Mrs can watch TV in the same room. I also used to use it with a shed building drummer & 2 guitarists & had no issues at gig volume (I'm now in an electronic band, so volumes are defined by a dial on the PA & not someone's ego). I'd put it on your list, but the best advice I can give is to go & try/listen to as many bits of gear as you can, both in shop & at gigs/rehearsals.

Nope... I'd want 2 so I can stack em!

[quote name='geoffbyrne' timestamp='1399760333' post='2447479'] Have you tried turning the gain down a bit & turning up the master? G. [/quote] This was my first thought. My understanding of setting up your gain is to have the master fairly low, play your bass & keep increasing the gain until the clip light comes on, then back off a touch. Use the master to control how loud you want to be.

[quote name='Mr.T' timestamp='1400288577' post='2452709'] I am envious of those of you that have a Guitard that has an interest in the overall sound of the band. Seriously.... The Guitard in my current band takes offense and makes sarcastic comments when either myself of our Roadie/Soundman makes any suggestions regarding his levels or tone! At tonights gig he was apparently completely drowning out our singer in some of the numbers. We only put vocals through the PA and it is often a bit of a battle. [/quote] I feel for you. Sack him. Prior to my current band, I was trying to form a band. I spent over a year trying to get folk & finally ended up with a drummer, a singer & 2 guitar owners. They cared so little about the sound that they never once fetched their own rigs. At rehearsal they'd go straight for the biggest thing they could, usually a 4x12 (in a 5x6 mitre room!). Most of the time was spent asking them to turn down so we could hear the singer & the drummer. I'd advertised to start an acid jazz/funk/house/breakbeat inspired originals band, ended up playing pop rock, so I left the band. They had one meeting & never played again. My new band is completely different, there's one guitarist & he's playing keys more than guitar.

Here's what goes to & from my board... An extension cable with a 2 gang socket (one for the Moog LPF & one for the daisy wart that powers the rest). The audio lead and a CV control lead in a loom of 2 from my bass to the board, and the audio lead from the board to the bass. The loom from my bass goes down to the right rear of the board. The audio lead from the board to the amp goes from the rear, round the right & to the rig behind me. The mains goes to the rear just off of the board & heads either left or right to the nearest power socket. So far, I've not had any noticeable hum or buzz at any gigs, though when I was sitting at the mac recording a bassline last week, I had some buzzing in the background. My keys player said it may be due to something being too close to the mac. I'll find out on Monday, as I'm going to his studio to lay down some basslines. It depends on how many pedals your having & how good your wiring is. Shep spent a small fortune on getting his power & patch leads perfect (& I'm sure there's a few others on here that have done so too).

[quote name='Lozz196' timestamp='1400170167' post='2451432'] Yep, you more than likely won`t notice the extra power in terms of volume, but you will notice it in terms of the size and depth of the sound, which will be a lot fuller. Unless you`re playing mahoosive stages/venues, I can`t see how a LMiii into two 410s wouldn`t be loud enough. [/quote] I usually play my LMII into 2 10s & it's loud enough! Though I never say no to having more drivers.

[quote name='NancyJohnson' timestamp='1400265401' post='2452495'] OK, perhaps I didn't put that right, so let me put things into perspective. The guitarist in Nancy Johnson plays with a tone at the very phat end of the frequency - so much so that live there appears (to my ears) to be significant crossover from both our instruments. I have tried to go the route of 'owning your frequency', but we always tend to be to differ...I've twiddled with the knobs on his amp (SG/Bugera head and 4x12), but there's s fine line between full on rawk \m/ and AM radio coming out of his set up. If anything, my desired tone (a kind of Geddy Lee/Jean Jacques Burnel grunt/fuzz hybrid), sits in a higher and wider range than the guitar. I can hear everything without issue, but find the guitar muddies a lot of the nuances of my technique/sounds. Incidentally, the official technical spec of the cabinets (Hartke Hydrive 1x15 and 4x10 enclosures) gives that the 4x10 potentially delivers 10Hz more low end than the 1x15, which i find a little unfathomable, but I suppose reflects why the 4x10 gets nights out and the 1x15 tends to stay home alone. P [/quote] My observations, I see 2 things here. 1- Your guitarist is playing through a 4x12. Why? A 1x12 should be more than ample for the majority of gigs unless he's playing outdoors with no PA support. 2- It appears like you want to sound like the guitarist & he wants to sound like the bassist. Have you thought about swapping instruments for a song? I hope that didn't come across as having a dig. It most certainly wasn't meant to & as it is, having your bass with a more mid to high tone & the guitar with a bassy tone may work really well & give your band it's sound. At the end of the day, it's how the whole band sounds that is important, & if the audience think you sound great, then that's a good thing. Edited to say, I prefer 10s. They have a nicer, more aesthetically pleasing curve to the diameter than all other sizes.

That's a nice set up. If I had the funds to get keys, I'd definitely have the Moog & the Gaia. I'm in an electronic band, but I play bass. The keys player has a Mininova, a Tetra & a Virus Snow (& a couple of controller keyboards). No pics for you though.

In my old acoustic band, the guitarist had one. It was called a "Logdrum" or something like that. Plug it in & it gives a low thud. Doesn't sound anything like a kick drum, but it fitted the style of stuff we did.

That's a very tidy wee board you have there.

[quote name='flunkie' timestamp='1399886890' post='2448535'] ... [b]An important point is that this venue has only just started having bands. There are only two power outlets, so we were daisy chaining extension cables. I've heard that LMiii amps have a self-protection cut-out for voltage variations, but I assume that would turn the amp off, rather than leaving the power light on?[/b] Luckily, the band was very understanding, but I don't want it happening again. I have a spare amp (LH500), but really like the LMiii sound and have it well set-up with a VT Character pedal. Does anyone have any ideas how to proceed? I'm not particularly knowledgeable on the technical side of gear and power supply etc. Thanks [/quote] You'll only get so many amps (as in amperes) from 2 power sockets. Your amp isn't getting fed enough power & will cut out. If the venue want to put on bands, they're gonna need some proper power supply before there's a fire due to the 2 supplies being overloaded.

Cheap ones are not very good. Hand muting a cymbal on most kits results in a double hit. My band use an e-kit & an acoustic kit, but as we're an electronica band the e-kit has more advantages than the acoustic one.

If your bass is going through the PA, then he should do the same. If you're using your own rig, he could get his own rig. It really depends on how the PA & backline is spread & how much you want to spend. The DM10 seems a rather good kit.

[quote name='KingBollock' timestamp='1399843457' post='2448331'] I will never forget the time a mate of mine, a ridiculously naturally talented guitarist, picked up my Bass for the first time and had a go. A few minutes later he handed it back, shaking the pain out of his hands... "Not as easy as it looks, is it?". I had no idea he even thought it was easy in the first place. [/quote] I had a similar thing from a previous drummer (who played guitar & keys pretty well too). Had an instrument swap & said "How can you play that thing. The strings are like curtain rails & you have to push hard to get a note."

Bass is certainly an easier instrument to get started on, but I found that it progressively gets harder. It's easier to make a solo guitar sound good than it is a solo bass to the untrained ear. There's many can strum a few chords on the guitar & get folk singing along for an entire evening, but if you're not skilled on bass, you try doing that on bass & see how many folk still enjoy it after the 2nd song. I'd encourage your son to learn as many instruments as he can. Get him on keys, strings & brass too if you can, the more he learns, the more of a musician he becomes. I wouldn't discourage him from picking up the bass, he'd probably pick up the guitar again as he gets more comfortable. Alternatively, you could show him some Victor Wooten or Billy Sheehan & ask him if he still thinks is an easy instrument.

[quote name='bassman7755' timestamp='1399807500' post='2447810'] Well the point I'm trying to make (possibly badly) is that if the amp is properly designed then the theoretical extra thermal degradation wont be of any practical consequence to the vast majority of users - they are simply sacrificing power output and getting nothing tangible in return. You also have to bear in mind that bass amps are reaping the advances in amp design which is mostly driven by the PA market where its common place to thrash the amps at rated minimum loads at or near maximum power for thousands of hours - most bass amps don't see anywhere near that level of abuse. [/quote] There's plenty of folk who have no trouble, but there's also a fair few who do have failures due to overheating. Look at the Ashdown Superfly or the Ampeg PF500 for 2 prime examples of amps not properly designed to deal with the extra heat.

My Ibby has a little shim in the pocket too. Mines came straight from the factory 20 odd years ago. I reckon it's to align the neck up with the body. They maybe thought it needed a little taken out & discovered that it needed more the other way. With a bass that age, it might be hard to find out if this was done at factory or by someone else. As for price, I've no idea. It's certainly tatty enough to warrant £2k.