I'll relay my recent realist experience just in case it's of help to others:
I had been reasonably happy with the sound of the Realist, particularly when compared to the BassMax that it replaced, until about a month ago when it suddenly got very nasal, and would feedback uncontrollably. I assumed that it was 'donald ducked' and re-fitted the BassMax until I could get to change it.
When I finally got around to taking it off I found that the bridge was tilted very slightly towards the neck. Hard to see, but you could have slid a peice of paper under the tailpeice side of the foot. I took the bass to my Luthier, who hit it back into vertical position (it takes a lot of training to know exactly where and how hard to hit it, mind
). Voila - clearly the Realist had only been making contact at the front edge, because now it's back to the way it was, which with a little eq in the pre-amp is very useable.
The bridge foot is still not sitting on the Realist quite as flush as the other foot does to the top, so while the bass is in the shop this week for a little fingerboard and soundpost work I'm going to have Lisa try to shape the bridge foot to fit a little more closely.
I expect to get a little more tone and less 'peizo' out of this - I shouldn't have been surprised at how much the installation affects the sound, I suppose.
