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Active DI for Active Bass??

S

sucho2000

Nov 19, 2009
61
0
#1
Hello,

I have done some search on the this matter,
however I could not find the exact answer for my case..

I play bass in a small church service and I have been using an EBS Microbass II (an active DI) to connect my Fender Passive Jazz into the main PA. We are not using a bass amp.

But recently I have just scored a Sadowsky active jazz..
So I was wondering since I got an active bass now
do I still need to use the Microbass?

I just don't wanna carry another equipment and there are many spare passive DIs. :smug:

Anybody have a similar experience or suggestion?

Cheers

sucho
 
#2
Well, what passive DI's do they have? It's more of an issue on the quality of direct box, not active vs. passive.

For example, Reddi's are active and make every bass sound better than any other DI...

You'll probably be fine either way. I play a [active] Stingray and I use a JDI in a couple of venuse, but one sound guy puts me on a J48 to get more gain. The JDI works fine for the other rooms, but this environment for some reasons works better with the J48. You could always experiment.
 
#6
listen, this hooha about active bass needs passive di and passive bass needs active di is all an invention by the di makers to sell more di's. just use your microbass. it's got a great di...used to have one.
 
#8
Yeah, don't want to throw out the back carrying a DI :p I don't trust DIs not owned by myself, especially those Behringer ones. They seem to work fine up until you really need them to. I carry my trusty Sansamp on my pedal board, or I have an old Boss DI that works great too if I'm going direct direct. Then there's always the DI on the back of my bass amp too.

Any way I go, I usually am "over prepared," but I hate the uncertainty of if it's going to work or not.
 
#9
JimmyM said:
listen, this hooha about active bass needs passive di and passive bass needs active di is all an invention by the di makers to sell more di's. just use your microbass. it's got a great di...used to have one.
Click to expand...

Totally untrue. If you have an active bass, you are correct, it doesn't matter, you can use anything and be fine.

If you have a passive bass running into a passive DI, you can really impact the top end of your tone, depending on the length of the cable run and the input impedance of the DI, etc.

So, to the OP, as long as the passive DI sounds good to you and your front of house people, you should be fine leaving your active DI at home at this point. If the tone doesn't work out for you, you can bring your active DI back!
 
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#10
KJung said:
Totally untrue. If you have an active bass, you are correct, it doesn't matter, you can use anything and be fine.

If you have a passive bass running into a passive DI, you can really impact the top end of your tone, depending on the length of the cable run and the input impedance of the DI, etc.

So, to the OP, as long as the passive DI sounds good to you and your front of house people, you should be fine leaving your active DI at home at this point. If the tone doesn't work out for you, you can bring your active DI back!
Click to expand...

Except, that it is a Behringer. Bring your EBS, those Behringer DIs suck (tone) IME.
 
#12
KJung said:
Totally untrue. If you have an active bass, you are correct, it doesn't matter, you can use anything and be fine.

If you have a passive bass running into a passive DI, you can really impact the top end of your tone, depending on the length of the cable run and the input impedance of the DI, etc.

So, to the OP, as long as the passive DI sounds good to you and your front of house people, you should be fine leaving your active DI at home at this point. If the tone doesn't work out for you, you can bring your active DI back!
Click to expand...

It's not the DI causing loss of top end it is the cable run
 
#15
synaesthesia said:
It's not the DI causing loss of top end it is the cable run
Click to expand...

You are making my point. A passive DI will result in the cable run impacting the top end of a passive instrument. Once you get a buffer into the signal chain (whether from an active preamp in a bass or an active DI), the impact of cable capacitance and DI input impedance virtually disappears.

So again, active bass... doesn't matter what you use. I love the simplicity of my JDI, and since my basses all have preamps, that works wonderfully for me.

Passive bass.... a buffered, active DI will result in some positives to your tone running to the front of house, especially if you have any sort of upper mid or treble in your tone. If I was using a passive bass live on occasion, I would get rid of my JDI and purchase a Countryman for use with both types of instruments.
 
#19
allright... I get it. Thanks a lot. I'm interested on the subject :).

And amp DI-outs? are they considered active or passive? Or does it differ depending on the amp?

I had someone tell me that these Radials passive ones have better signal quality than the active ones (ebs, countryman, tone hammer), which in turn would be better than the amp DI-outs... Seems like over-generalization to me now that I have learned the above :p.
 
#20
MNAirHead said:
I've successfully broke the rules and was paid to do studio recordings....

The reality is there is a flood of semi-truths of what sounds best...

OVERALL.. I've had best luck with active tone shaping DIs... the passive ones seem to work best mated to the the exact bass
Click to expand...

I would assume that the shorter cable runs in a studio situation would result in less of an issue between passive DI's and passive basses, and that some mild top end roll-off could actually be a 'positive' in some situations, etc.

My comments were directed toward live sound/front of house applications, since that is the context that I understand the OP is asking about.
 

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