Anybody tried a BBE BMax pre-amp

[Steve Bennett]

Oh, okay...

So Steve, do use the DI on your BMax to FOH and if so how does that work out for you?

Yes I do, and it works great. I just set a level (for my P-Bass, 5 on both the Gain and Master) and leave it alone. Then I control my stage volume with my power amp's gain controls. Not having a pre-EQ signal hasn't been an issue for me yet, but I always have another DI on hand just in case.

 

[RSalvador]

Yes I do, and it works great. I just set a level (for my P-Bass, 5 on both the Gain and Master) and leave it alone. Then I control my stage volume with my power amp's gain controls. Not having a pre-EQ signal hasn't been an issue for me yet, but I always have another DI on hand just in case.

That's so simple, and make perfect sense. I think I tend to make thing too complicated. Thank you very much.

 

[Gearhead43]

I love the sound of the Bmax pre. I was thinking about finding a used one and run it through the biggest power amp I can find.

I seem to be in the minority on the forum here though in that I like an extremely clean heavy punchy bass sound (good low end and low mids) with a nice crisp top end, but mellow center-upper mids. Not a fan of nasal middy tones. Hi-fi is not a dirty word to me.

I just figure if you're going for an ultra heavy hi-fi tone, you gotta have some mass power and speakers behind it to be heard (actually more like felt) live. That means an 8-10, two 2-12s, or two 4-10s. (or 2-15s and a 4-10 )

Different strokes, I like alot of other players sounds and styles too, but for me scooped is OK (within reason).

 

[judd levison]

The tube version has the Jensen, the SS version does not.

exactly, and, fwiw, the di circuit in the solid-state BMAX is identical to the BBE DI100X direct box.

further, because it's that Jensen cookbook circuit i mentioned before, the BMAX-T uses the identical circuit to the BBE DI1000

 

[Mr. Chuffey]

I love the sound of the Bmax pre. I was thinking about finding a used one and run it through the biggest power amp I can find.

I seem to be in the minority on the forum here though in that I like an extremely clean heavy punchy bass sound (good low end and low mids) with a nice crisp top end, but mellow center-upper mids. Not a fan of nasal middy tones. Hi-fi is not a dirty word to me.

I just figure if you're going for an ultra heavy hi-fi tone, you gotta have some mass power and speakers behind it to be heard (actually more like felt) live. That means an 8-10, two 2-12s, or two 4-10s. (or 2-15s and a 4-10 )

Different strokes, I like alot of other players sounds and styles too, but for me scooped is OK (within reason).

I'm not sure you need the huge power amp. I originally bought the BMax for use with my QSC 2450 and a Mesa 4x10 cabinet. The output from the BMax is so hot, I tried it with my QSC 850, bridged. With the BMax turned up to about 2 it's blowin' me out of the room. I'm going to try it single channel, to see if I can throttle down a little bit. You don't need a huge amp with the BMax.

 

[twinfallsbass]

Hi. I just got a Bmax-T from Bassmodder ( thanks again ) and LOVE it. I have it running through a Crown Vs 1500 to my Schroeder 410L and 21012R cabs. Like stated earlier, it has HUGE low end and I have not heard my Schroeder cabs sound better than with this setup.

 

[Tom Howland]

Have used a BBE-MaxT live.
Very nice unit.
Big, low end, nice compression.

 

[RSalvador]

Because of vacations I've been waiting, looking forward to the 2nd opportunity to gig with my rig now knowing how the eq controls work. Last night we played a private party. Outside on a big covered deck, about 60 people.

I started out with my passive eq at 2, 10, 2, and the para mid at 12 o’clock. Immediately recognized the tone of my bass. The sound I've heard others get sometimes through their amp but I normally get that sound when I plug direct into the board in the studio, my raw bass sound, but then it was coming out of my cab which was interesting.

I turned the bass up to 4 and backed the para mid off to about 10 or 11 o’clock. Didn’t need the Sonic Maximizer. The tone was warm, plenty of lows, but with lots of punch. The rest I was able to control with my two volume knobs on the bass. I ran my volumes on the bass starting at about 6 or 7 and control cutting through for solos with cranking up the bridge pickup volume, add more bottom by turning up the neck pickup volume or dime’ing them both out if we got loud. I did end up turning the master on the BBE up when we got louder and the party was kicked in. I had the Gain at about 10 o’clock, and the Master at 12 with my QSC bridged volume set at about 3 or 9 o’clock.

I feel like I have so many tonal options available to me now. I can’t believe I was ready to dump this rig for something else, because I was too dumb to know how to work it. I’m very happy with it right now.

The only thing I’m feeling is how nice it would be to have the cabinet higher up. I dream about having a second Schroeder cab to stack, not for more volume but more presence and feel. But the cost and the effort to haul it are two downers for that, when I really don’t NEED it. The Schroeder is loud and now that it's eq'd I can fill the room.

But gassing for gear isn't about needing it is it? When I can swing it I'll probably add the 2nd cab just for my own enjoyment.

Thanks again everyone especially to Judd, Steve and 4Mal for taking time to explain things.

Rick

 

[judd levison]

perfect, Rick.

sounds like you found your instruments voice.

if you're looking for just that extra touch of presence, i would really encourage you to engage the sonic maximizer, leave the "low contour" off and add some of the "process" between 9o'clock and 11o'clock.

just give it a chance. if you hate it or feel it doesnt bring anything positive to the party, by all means crank it out.



enjoy!

 

[bassmodder]

Hi. I just got a Bmax-T from Bassmodder ( thanks again ) and LOVE it. I have it running through a Crown Vs 1500 to my Schroeder 410L and 21012R cabs. Like stated earlier, it has HUGE low end and I have not heard my Schroeder cabs sound better than with this setup.

Glad to hear you are happy! I have a little schroeder 1X12 (no horn) that really came to life with that preamp.

 

[gaijinking]

Hello everyone,
This is my first time posting here. I stumbled across this thread while searching for BMax vs. BMax-T opinions. With that said, does anyone really feel that the T is far superior to the standard BMax version?
A little about me- I've been playing on and off for 15 or so years, and a few years back I sold off my cherished SWR SM400S. I loved the sound of that amp, and really dug how easy it was to dial in my sound using the parametric eq or using the 5 band graphic sliders. And the built in tube preamp out was just perfect for studio recording. However, now I'm living in a smaller apartment with no way to play through a rig without complaints; I just don't have any need for a huge amp right now. So I'm trying to setup a small Logic recording station so that I can still get my bass fix without making alot of noise. And since I'll be going straight into Digital (through an M-audio firewire solo), I must have some kind of preamp to color and give warmth to my tone. Which has led me to the BBE BMax-t preamp as my top choice. But to make a long story short, after the one that I purchased from Ebay got lost in the mail, the solid state BMax is looking more and more attractive. Should I wait and save my pennies to buy another BMax-T, or is the standard BMax going to be enough to impress? given that I'm a bit spoiled from the tube preamp sound of my old sm400s. Any opinions would greatly be appreciated?

 

[gaijinking]

Anyone please??

 

[lbanks]

I'd say wait and get the Bmax-t.

 

[JazzbassArt]

Mine just arrived. The para pot is scratchy and inop. The send to the power amp in on a Peavey Mark IV sounds like the output isn't hot enough, even though the Peavey is 1 Vrms input sensitivity. There is distortion when you reef on the lower strings, and the volume is wimpy. I guess I need to send it back for exchange and try another one. Typical for my luck.

 

[doctec]

Can you elaborate on this please? If adjusting any of the three EQ knobs interacts or affects the other EQ bands, then how should one understand the controls while trying to adjust? I read in the manual that flat was 2 10 2 but I kept forgetting that when I got in front of it and ended up with a way more scooped mid tone than I wanted. I finally got a starting point after reading it again from a TB'er and felt I had much more control of my tone at the gig.

I've used the Fender/Alembic/BBE tone stack for a long time as a player and also used it (and variations of it) in several designs that I've done. When you look at the actual circuit, the interactions make more sense -- to me anyway

There are really two separate sections in the circuit. The first section involves the BASS and MID pots, two caps and a fixed resistor. When the BASS control is at 0, the MID control is essentially a level control for all frequencies for this section of the circuit. When the BASS control is turned up, more low frequencies are *added* to the output of this section, increasing the overall level.

The second section consists of the TREBLE pot and a cap. One side of the cap connects directly to the input of the tone stack. The value of this cap is such that only high frequencies will pass through it. The TREBLE pot provides the final output from the tone stack and is connected such that at one extreme setting it passes *only* the output from the treble cap and at the other extreme setting it passes *only* the output from the BASS/MID section.

Now here's the observation I haven't seen anyone else make...

The TREBLE knob is actually a *blend* control between the output of BASS/MID section and the output of the treble cap !

So when you turn up the TREBLE, you're actually *reducing* the level that's coming from the BASS/MID section at the same time you're *increasing* the amount of signal coming from the treble cap.

Realizing this made it easier for me to think about how the knobs work. For example, if you want to add more highs and keep the lows and mids the same, you need to not only turn up the TREBLE knob, but also turn up the BASS and MID knob to compensate. I've seen descriptions of this circuit that say the BASS and TREBLE controls are "boost only" and the MID control is "cut only", but that's somewhat misleading. I tend to think of the MID control as a "direct" level, the BASS as a low-frequency boost and the TREBLE knob as a "blend" control as described above.

Hope this is helpful and not too confusing

 

[tallboybass]

Hi, I just wanted to drag this thread out again since I got a BMax preamp this last week. Fascinating info here, featuring Judd Levison who designed the thing!

I'm still finding my way around on this unit, so far it's pretty cool. I like the compressor and am still trying to figure out why they didn't just call the Sonic Maximizer knobs Bass2 and Treble2. There's supposed to be some magic there but I haven't used it in a band setting yet, maybe that's where the magic happens? Anyway, a real solid piece of gear with a lot of options at a reasonable price....nice work Judd!

Anybody have problems with overdriving the front end on this thing?

 

[IbanezATK]

im the guy who specified the BMAX, and the BMAX-T, and produced it with BBE's chief engineer, who, by the way, is a well-known, well-respected tube and analog maven.

when we had the idea to resurrect the bass preamp idea, BBE had the ill-fated 383 some years earlier, i went on a quest to see what bass players loved sonically. two things were generally apparent, metal grungers aside (sorry guys), everyone wanted deep warm tones...tight, but warm and down in the 30Hz to 60 Hz range to match the fundamental of a kick drum, but, also, fast transient response and hard top end.

with respect to the deep and warm, almost universally bass players pointed me to Don Wickersham's Dual Showman-preamp-on-steroids inspired Alembic F2-B. i sought out players and friends that owned them and listened...what a mind-**** the low end of these things is. like nothing i'd ever heard before.

with respect to the fast, tight and hard, i had two friends using Glockenklang Soul-Os and even before this project i was amazed at the crystal clarity of these things. transient response so fast it could give you whiplash and a hard top that you could bounce a quarter off of.

with these two tonalities in my head i went back to Paul and said it has to have the depth of the Alembic and the attack of the Glock...and off we went.

the BMAX being the solid state version and the BMAX-T having an identical front-end as the Alembic/Dual-Showman, they are both fantastic but, as you can imagine, the solid-state version was more versatile and not as round-sounding as the T.

the T uses a top-grade Groove Tubes 12AX7 in a Groove Tubes supplied socket and is wired to the circuit board using solid silver, teflon-coated leads. it has a custom made toroidal transformer in it's power supply and Jensen's top DI transformer in it's direct out on the back (the same transformer used in Record Plant's, Radial's and BBE's Jensen transformer DI's).

the compressor in both is an optical compressor, known for their fast but relatively soft-knee response. actually, as you crank it up the threshold goes down and the ratio goes up. it gets pretty radical after about 2 o'clock.

the passive eq is flat at 2-10-2, at least that's what the Audio Precision told us...always use your ears though!

the solid-state version, for the price, IMHO is the best sounding preamp you can own for under $1500.00.

the front-ends of both were pretty sensitive in the beginning...we didn't consider the very hot output of some of the 18v active electronics basses, the 9v active G&L L-2000s were what we were using primarily to demo and voice these things (after all, BBE owns G&L and these were readily available).

funny though, our graphic artist friend is a bass player and he brought his '65 P-Bass around a couple of times and that thing just massacred the front-end, we sort of wrote it off as an anomaly at the the time cuz it sounded so good with the L-2000s and the SB-2s.

we mod'd the ones people had a problem with free of charge with 24 hour turn around and freight paid and made a running change after the first production to pad down the input.

the crackle was a production problem in part of one run...the supplier had not connected a ground lead...about 100 units went out this way. we, of course, fixed for free everyone we knew about. sorry if you got one, BBE will always fix this for you for free if you just call them and let them know.

that's it, everything you ever wanted to know about the BMAX and a few things you didn't give a **** about.

btw, the original working name for the BMAX was FREEBASS...they just wouldn't let me do it no matter how hard i pushed!!!


peace

Judd,

I just got mine today... thanks for creating the base for my bass sound... if you will pardon the pun

This thing is GORGEOUS!

 

[AMJBASS]

My BMax came in today and I am very impressed so far. It is one of the most musical sounding preamps I have owned(compared with SWR Grand Prix, IOD, Aguilar DB680). While it doesn't allow for extreme tonal variation other than with the parametric mids, it sounds very very good set "flat" or 2-10-2. Extremely clear yet warm sounding. It is also one of the only preamps I have had where every feature on the front panel I can actually find a use for on the gig. I primarily bought it for gigs where I go direct to the board. For the price its pretty sweet. I haven't played through the Bmax-T yet.

 

[tallboybass]

Finally got to use mine (SS version) in a band setting and it sounds great! I just set it to 2-10-2 and use my on-board bass preamp to taste. Really like the way the compressor works. Turned on but dialed all the way down it just knocks the huge hits down to a reasonable level. Still not sure about the 'sonic maximizer', it sounds best to me with that turned off. I wish Judd would come back on here and do some more 'splainin'!

 

[Bob Lee (QSC)]

Judd doesn't work for BBE any more. The last time I saw him was last year at NAMM, and he was working for Guitar Center.