Fellow bassists and effects-heads, lend me your eyes balls. I have one of these:
It is an EF86 tube-based preamp/overdrive. Nothing fancy, there are others on the market. But I don't own those. I did an experiment tonight that is making me second guess my decision to try and sell -- despite needing the money for car repairs. I plugged the Hi Output into the FX Return on my Backline210 (now with 210BLX extension cab-age). The Hi Output connect is for going direct to power amps. It is much hotter than the lo output, designed for lowly effects pedals.
The sound was simply...awesome!
I have been using this pedal with my tele to warm it up, create a small bit of breakup with my previous solid state amp. Given it's size -- it casts a shadow over muffs -- it wasn't very convenient to put in my pedal case.
I turned up the volume and was shocked at the beautiful sound of a tube-enhanced DEAN EVO XM bass could have. Dean humbuckers. Not exactly a name on everyone's lips, ya know.
Jer at de Lisle Guitars is a great guy and went so far as to paint mine John Deere Green with yellow knobs. Great guy, and stands by his product. I burned out two tubes in two weeks, and he deduced it was a bad batch, fixed everything at no cost to me.
For you solid state amp folks looking for a tube preamp, I would highly recommend checking out this monster pedal.
Now, if you will excuse me, the ringing in my ears says it is time to and have some quiet time with my acoustic guitar.
