About to Buy a Practice Amp

I own the Ampeg ba 108. It is a killer amp. The tone is nice and full, but I warn you, it may be a little too quiet for your liking. I can honestly say that I wished it was a little louder, but for $100 you cannot go wrong!

 

try looking out for the warwick b20. i think its relatively new, might not be out in all stores. the ba108 pales in contrast

 

I use a small Mackie mixer and a set of Yamaha headphones for a practice amp. To me, $100 bass amps a re a waste of money.

 

Headphones get old fast with me. Ear fatigue, and I miss the wife yelling at me to turn it down.

I say look for a used little combo with a 10 inch speaker.

$50 and some patience on Craigs list will make you a winner.

 

Haha.

I get ear fatigue, but I don't miss the wife telling me to turn it down.

 

If you want it to be new have you checked out the Behringer amps? They make some good gear for the money. Some bash on Behringer, but if you're only using it for a practice amp then what do you have to lose?

 

There is the old behringer, like 10 or 15 years ago, doing poor quality clones. They broke all the time.

There is also the behringer of today. Very different company.

But why not buy used? Killer deals out there dying to be had.

 

I have the Ampeg BA-108. Its pretty nice, can get a nice sound out of it. I will warn you though if you consider getting it, I occasionally get static when playing past the 9th fret on the A,D,and G strings of my bass.

 

The BA108 is a great amp with very nice tone for the size. I keep mine beside my computer to practice along to songs or with Songsterr etc. and use it for smaller jams.
It has some great features usually not found on practice amps, including effects send and return and a line out. Perhaps the best feature is the volume control on the CD/Computer input. It saves me from having to adjust the volume on the computer all the time. Much easier to just adjust the dial on the amp.

 

fret buzz, you need to do a setup on your bass. Look in the basses forum stickies.

 

Best way to go used is local Craigslist. There is stuff on my local one all the time for $50-100, and no shipping or tax. We all know the story - " I bought this thinking I (or my son/daughter) was going to learn bass, and never did."

I sometimes see entire rigs (Squier bass, practice amp, cords) for $100-150. If you have the time to wait a bit, you can probably score a great deal.

 

Exactly as another post said above, that was the old Behringer. I have a Behringer Amp head and a 4x10 cabinet I bought last year and they are both very well built. I upgraded to another cabinet, but the amp head I still use. Very solid and dependable. You also just need to know how to take care of your gear.

 

Roland makes some nice practice amps. I picked up a Roland Cube 30 from CL for $100.

 

Where are you located? May need to wait for a bit.....

 

That's what I have - the 4 channel Mackie 402-VLZ3. It's a great mixer and I use it not just for practicing but also when I teach to have both the student and I in the same amp where I can control the mix. It also comes in handy for recording.

As far as headphone / ear fatigue... I felt like that too until I bought I nice set of Sennheiser headphones.

When I want to use an amp I just use my full rig at tiny volumes.

Another practice setup that I used recently when traveling is my Digitech Jamman. I ran my bass in to my VT pedal into the Jamman and worked really well. The Jamman has a built in metronome with different sounds so I'd put the bass / snare sound on, set it to 2/4 and think of the bass on counts 1 & 3. Easy, portable and I can record my myself instantly for feedback.