Sparky Mark

Bought a bass from Tom today. He's a busy chap (just back from Germany) but was still happy to drive and meet halfway to do the deal at a great price. Another trustworthy Basschatter. Cheers Tom; safe travels.

Not without swapping out the 4 ohm speaker in your combo for an 8 ohm one; then you can.

Which head are you using? I ask because the dimensions of that cab are to suit the Ampeg full width heads including the SVT and V4 etc. Which cabs have you tried out that didn't work for you? Could be that a single 12 or 15 might not give you that full precision thump (if that's what's lacking?) on its own and a second cab (or a 212 or 410) would get you there.

If you want additional tone options something like a Tech 21 VT Bass pedal would be a lot cheaper and possibly easier to use.

You have an option to replace the internal 4 ohm speaker with a suitable 8 ohm version, then you can add another 8 ohm cab. Two 8 ohm cabs will be significantly louder than the single 4 ohm internal speaker.

If the speaker in your combo is marked as 8 ohms then you will be okay to connect another 8 ohm extension cab giving the total impedance of 4 ohms.

Does the amp in your combo have two or three speaker outlets?

You're welcome. Although it's very lightweight for a 410 cab having slot ports at both front top and bottom makes it fairly tall and it's quite deep too. But those dimensions allow it to go deep as well as very loud. I'd recommend that you get a 4 ohm version if possible as you can utilise your amplifier's full output as I can't imagine needing to add another cab. It's that loud with a genuine 500 watt head.

I used to have a 4 ohm STD104HF which I used with either a LM3, SA450 or TA503 head. It was absolutely the best cab for larger or outside venues. Too big physically for my latest car and small pubs so it had to go. I don't know if the current version is as good as my earlier version loaded with B&C speakers. At £400 for secondhand it's a brilliant 410.

An amp doesn't deliver an impedance, it sees that load which means it can deliver up to its maximum output. A 212 cab may be able to utilize more than the 300 watts if it isn't hitting its limits/maximum output already. Thermal ratings have little to do with volume, just how much heat the speaker can dissipate. A high sensitivity/efficient speaker will get loud with less power and then have to dissipate excess input energy as heat. A larger speaker should be able to move more air and dissipate more heat.

Noon for the EQ controls on all the Markbass heads I'm aware of is nominally flat. The VLE and VPF filters should be fully counter clockwise for nominally flat. You may be thinking of amps that have passive tone stacks where the noon position for bass, middle and high gives a mid scoop.

VLE= Vintage Loudspeaker Emulator which cuts the high frequencies more as you turn it up. The VPF may give you a slightly smoother mid presentation whilst boosting the lows and highs. A little of this might help if the mids are too present. With everything at noon and filters off the amp will be pretty flat but as Lozz said the speaker is designed to assist bass to cut through the mix. An outboard graphic eq might help.

A 300 watt solid state amplifier has the same power output as a 300 watt valve amp, it's the way that valve amps start to break up at their limit which makes them appear louder. A watt is a watt is a watt whether it's from a class A, AB or D or any other type of amp. If you EQ a 250 watt amp with lots of lows (and hi if you want to blow the tweeter too) and push the volume too high you will hear what is best described as a farting/distorted sound. You may also hear a clicking sound as the voice coil bottoms out on the yoke (back plate) of the speaker. Square wave clipped distorted output from amps can damage speakers capable of handling many times more powerful clean (sine wave) signals. If you hear farting or hard clicks from your speaker then immediately back off the lows and some volume. Once you've blown your first speaker it'll become common sense. My first (and last) was when I destroyed an 18" PA sub with a Sound City 120 and my Shergold Marathon bass back in 1977. Lesson learned.

You could easily blow a 400 watt cab with a 250 watt amplifier if you don't listen for distress.

I assume you mean that each individual speaker gets equal power, i.e., 66% going to the 410 cab and 33% to the 210 cab?