is it worth me upgrading this?

[Mikeg]

When I first started playing bass I bought this
[url="http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/LINDO-BLACK-RED-ELECTRIC-TIGER-BASS-GUITAR-FREE-LEAD-/220615169915?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_3&var=&hash=item7912d721bb"]http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/LINDO-BLACK-RED-ELEC...=item7912d721bb[/url]
I bought it because it was cheap and it looked shiny. I put some new strings on it and it sounded great. But i'm thinking off upgrading pretty much everything because all the hardware seems tacky. Its made out of spruce, which I have never heard about for bass. Do you guys think its worth upgrading?

[Al Heeley]

get yerself to a good music shop and try out some higher spec basses for yourself. If you can feel a difference in tone and playability then I think you have your answer.

[Mikeg]

Oh sorry wrong impression
I have a much better bass (ibanez btb670) im just thinking of doing it up for fun and for a backup

[chris_b]

[quote name='Mikeg' post='1030200' date='Nov 20 2010, 10:22 AM']....I have a much better bass (ibanez btb670) im just thinking of doing it up for fun and for a backup....[/quote]
If you have the cash to spend then OK, but AH is right, you'll get much more fun from playing a better bass, better than the Ibanez even! Then you can use the Ibanez as the backup.

[Mikeg]

I would love a higher spec bass but alas with my student budget that would be ridiculous

[thisnameistaken]

[quote name='Mikeg' post='1030200' date='Nov 20 2010, 10:22 AM']Oh sorry wrong impression
I have a much better bass (ibanez btb670) im just thinking of doing it up for fun and for a backup[/quote]

So you're asking us if it will be [i]fun[/i] to modify it? That is difficult question to answer.

[stingrayPete1977]

Modding is always fun! Do it.

[Cat Burrito]

To be honest only you can really answer that. I wouldn't be against the idea personally but the risk is that you wind up spending more on upgrades than the original bass. It becomes the equivilant of the £400 Vauxhall Nova with £4k worth of body kit! I'd scour EBay for bits and focus on the weaker areas of the bass rather than a complete overhaul.

[Bassassin]

If it plays well & you like it, then why not make it sound better? What are you considering upgrading? Unless the tuners & bridge don't actually work properly, changing these would probably be a waste of money, but if the existing pickups don't sound great, then replacing these (& possibly the pots & cap) is a worthwhile upgrade if you want to hang on to the bass.

There's plenty of choice of decent, well-priced Jazz pups out there, you'll probably find some decent, well-priced sets for sale on here if you're patient.

Jon.

[Mikeg]

The bridge and tuners seem reasonable, the pots and pick-ups however are terrible, the tone knob doesn't work and they're very very noisy, I like the look of emg's because you dont have to do any soldering, Do they ever pop up in the for sale section?

[mcnach]

[quote name='Bassassin' post='1030241' date='Nov 20 2010, 11:03 AM']If it plays well & you like it, then why not make it sound better? What are you considering upgrading? Unless the tuners & bridge don't actually work properly, changing these would probably be a waste of money, but if the existing pickups don't sound great, then replacing these (& possibly the pots & cap) is a worthwhile upgrade if you want to hang on to the bass.

There's plenty of choice of decent, well-priced Jazz pups out there, you'll probably find some decent, well-priced sets for sale on here if you're patient.

Jon.[/quote]


what this wise man says.


If the bass feels good enough to you, why not improve it?
But I wouldn't spend money on things that are unlikely to have a serious effect: tuners (unless they're malfunctioning), and bridge in particular.
Pickups are the obvious bit. Lots of choice in your case.
I personally love preamps... so I'd even consider that (depending on how much you like your bass).
A good set up (by someone else if you are not sure you can do a good job yourself, including fret levelling when needed) should be the first port of call.

How much the bass cost you is irrelevant, I think. I often hear this "oh, it is just a cheap bass, I'm not going to spend much on a good set of pickups". I don't get that train of thought. Is the bass nice enough for you to keep and play? If the answer is yes, then make it better by all means. If you "upgrade" it to cheap not-so-good pickups etc... what's the point? you end up with a "meh" bass. And why upgrade to a "meh" bass? that makes little sense to me.

Earlier this year I bought a cheap Westfield B4000, a Jazz bass clone. It only cost me £40 + £10 delivery (eBay). Apart from being an ugly colour (which I knew, of course ) it turned out to be a great bass. I even liked the pickups. Powerful, deep sound. Just needed a set up initially and I was very happy with it. After a few months I decided that this bass was definitely a great bass and was staying with me, regardless what the headstock says. I gigged it a couple of times and I was very happy with it.
So I spent £135 on a used John East J-retro01 preamp. It sounds crazy to some, to spend nearly 3x on an upgrade. But the result is this bass now sounds HUGE and I'm just as happy playing it as when I play my Warwick or my Stingray or my modded OLP... in other words... it's a good bass that sounds good, feels good, and is well equipped to do the job I require it to do. So what if the upgrade cost 3x what the bass cost? The bottom line is that for around £180 I have a hell of a Jazz bass.
If my proposed upgrade put me in the £500 region, then I'd say "hmmm, maybe I should look into buying another bass at that price range that already does what I want it to do", but when talking pickups etc... don't skimp. If you like the bass enough to want to upgrade it rather than selling it, then it deserves quality components, or you'll be cheating yourself.
I could have spent £40 on another preamp on eBay for my Westfield... but would it sound as good as it does now? No way. I've bought my share of cheap preamps to realise that there's a reason why some sell for a lot more.

[icastle]

[quote name='Mikeg' post='1030190' date='Nov 20 2010, 10:12 AM']When I first started playing bass I bought this
[url="http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/LINDO-BLACK-RED-ELECTRIC-TIGER-BASS-GUITAR-FREE-LEAD-/220615169915?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_3&var=&hash=item7912d721bb"]http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/LINDO-BLACK-RED-ELEC...=item7912d721bb[/url]
I bought it because it was cheap and it looked shiny. I put some new strings on it and it sounded great. But i'm thinking off upgrading pretty much everything because all the hardware seems tacky. Its made out of spruce, which I have never heard about for bass. Do you guys think its worth upgrading?[/quote]

Be careful.
Given that the RRP on this bass is only £89 it would be very easy to spend another £150 replacing the hardware and electronics on it.
After doing that you would have a Lindo that has cost you the best part of £240 and would probably still only fetch £50 on ebay.

If you put that £150 in a jar on the shelf and sold the bass on ebay for £50 you could go out and buy a new Squier or a used MIM - both of which would be better instruments than the Lindo could ever be.

[Happy Jack]

Plenty of excellent advice above.

Lindo make uber-cheap instruments and have no resale value worth mentioning. If you eBay that bass, I think you'd be very lucky to get anywhere near the £50 mentioned earlier.

I'd suggest you keep it as an emergency backup, or as something to lend to friends (or maybe enemies ) and think about trading up the Ibanez for something better.

Assuming you actually need to upgrade, of course. Apart from the real bottom-of-the-barrel stuff, most modern basses seem to be really quite playable and usually more in need of a set-up than a Badass.

[icastle]

[quote name='Happy Jack' post='1030733' date='Nov 20 2010, 07:12 PM']If you eBay that bass, I think you'd be very lucky to get anywhere near the £50 mentioned earlier.[/quote]

I was tryin' to be nice...

[Mr. Foxen]

Get second hand hardware, keep the originals, if you want money, take off the hardware, sell it, put the original stuff back on, same as any other gear, except more screwdriver work. It is what I started doing, and sometimes I get paid to do it to peoples instruments now.

[The Burpster]

Awwwwwwww how sweet, an unashamed PRS EBIV rip off - even with birds on the fretboard !

Well I suppose mimickry is the highest form of flattery.

If you like it of course its worth pimping, will it turn it into a real PRS ? Sadly no!

Play it and enjoy it, but save your money and invest in some better wood to start your pimping career on, maybe Ibanez or Squire or Fender. (INMHO of course)

[Ou7shined]

Modding and tinkering our basses isn't always about getting your money back. It's a little sub genre that comes with the territory. Sometimes I think that I'm more in to modding than I am of actually playing basses. The first thing I think when I get my hands on a bass is "right what can I do to change/improve it". How often do we spend more than we need to on our actual playing hobby - then why is this wee aspect of it seen as pointless unless we can make a profit from it? There is an immense amount of enjoyment and self satisfaction to be had from experimenting with and creating a look, a feel, a sound all of your own. Go for it... if you make a good job if it you probably won't want to sell you first project bass anyway.

[Mikeg]

i think im gona start pimping it out next week, maybe buy a stick on PRS badge
Oh and by the way i do have much better bass's, this ones just lying around.

[The Burpster]

[quote name='Mikeg' post='1031215' date='Nov 21 2010, 10:44 AM']i think im gona start pimping it out next week, maybe buy a stick on PRS badge
Oh and by the way i do have much better bass's, this ones just lying around.[/quote]

Badge, BADGE...? Paul would reduce himslef to putting a badge on his basses......

Have you pimped any of your other basses then?

Come on fess up!

[kerley]

I have recently upgraded a starter pack bass. Picked up a Crafter Cruiser 32" scale for £60 and have spent another £60 on pickups (got a pait of Kent Armstrong on eBay for £16, new tuners, new bridge, knobs and pots). As others have said, I would still be lucky to get the £60 initial purchase price back!

It plays and sounds as good as any other bass I have owned (Warwick Corvette, MIM P, MIM Jazz etc,) that could be down to the scale, maybe that slightly shorter neck just suits me?.
But it still bugs me that I am playing what is essentially a £60 bass and I will no doubt be getting a higher priced one again soon in the full knowledge that the higher priced one will probably be no better to actually play.

I guess the shallow part of me just likes to be playing a higher priced instrument for no reason other than branding!

Edited November 23, 2010 by kerley

[mcnach]

[quote name='kerley' post='1033510' date='Nov 23 2010, 08:34 AM']I have recently upgraded a starter pack bass. Picked up a Crafter Cruiser 32" scale for £60 and have spent another £60 on pickups (got a pait of Kent Armstrong on eBay for £16, new tuners, new bridge, knobs and pots). As others have said, I would still be lucky to get the £60 initial purchase price back!

It plays and sounds as good as any other bass I have owned (Warwick Corvette, MIM P, MIM Jazz etc,) that could be down to the scale, maybe that slightly shorter neck just suits me?.
But it still bugs me that I am playing what is essentially a £60 bass and I will no doubt be getting a higher priced one again soon in the full knowledge that the higher priced one will probably be no better to actually play.

I guess the shallow part of me just likes to be playing a higher priced instrument for no reason other than branding![/quote]



The "rebellious" part of me loves to play a cheap bass that sounds great, and shut up snobs in the audience simply by how good the whole thing works.

That adds enjoyment for me, when I've played an OLP MM2 Stingray clone (upgraded pickup and added a preamp) or a Westfield B4000 Jazz (initially stock, now with a John East preamp).
But, my favourite bass? Well, thats my 2002 MM Stingray (with a John East preamp) (I sound like an advert! )
I play the Stingray now 85% of the time, because it just feels fantastic and sounds great, everytime. It is not the cheapest I own... maybe there's a link
However, that Westfield Jazz is lovely and it doesn't bug me at all to play a cheap bass, because the bass feels right and it sounds right. And as I said, I do derive a certain amount of enjoyment when I take it out and notice a dismissive gesture from some headstock worshipper in the audience... because whether they admit it to me or not, they're going to notice it sounds great.

But, who knows... I used to think I would not change my favourite OLP for a Stingray, having tried them before... and look at me now. That OLP has never been gigged again and itjust gets some sporadic use at home. Maybe it'll be the same story with the Jazz someday, but I doubt it'll be soon, and if I change it'll be because of finding a bass that without looking at the headstock it works substantially better. Maybe it won't be a Sadowsky, but a Squier! Who knows