Are on board active preamps really necessary ?

[rohi]

I keep my preamp on my pedalboard, that way I get a certain level of consistency across all my basses.

I was gonna say “Passive for life!” But we’ll keep it at “passive for the foreseeable future!”

 

[TheLowDown33]

Passive is fine if you have the time/patience to tweak at your amp or feet. I love being able to tweak on my instrument, especially since my cover band rolls one song into the next without stopping. It also helps me control my overdrives and distortion much better by allowing me to saturate the lows or to roll them back slightly to cut a bit more.

 

[Crater]

Does a piezo pickup rely on an active system?

Yes, always.

 

[Medicine Man]

I play variety covers of the rock, funk, pop, country or whatever variety. I have like 2 seconds on a good day to dial up the next song's tone, so I appreciate the flexibility of active preamps. No one seems to complain about my sound. Don't get me wrong, I love passive basses, they just aren't as good for what I need on stage right now.

 

[Pulverizor]

18volts onboard for any form of heavy music is essential, it really is about power!
Otherwise passive electronics for the sweet dynamics.

 

[39-Bassist]

I have played both for years. But when it comes down to it I really prefer passive. I feel my overall tones seem better.
Of course there are exceptions but it mostly comes down to personal taste, IMHO

 

[el murdoque]

In my case, that depends on the pedals I use.
When I go with no pedals, I use the onboard preamp excessively.
I set my stage volume with the vol pot only at about 3/4, so I have a boost right there - either to drive the amp into saturation or to get more volume when needed. Same for the EQ. Flat for normal, sometimes a bit of added bass and for big, dubby sounds the bass wide open and a massive treble cut.

All that, however does not really work when I have a touch sensitive dirt pedal and/or compressor on my board. When the threshold is set, I can't really boost anything without messing with the pedals.
I even had a booster pedal on my board as first pedal in the chain with all my basses marked on it to compensate for the different output levels.

 

[mcnach]

I'm beginning to notice more & more people saying they have stopped using their on board preamps,because they prefer the sound in passive mode. I have used numerous on board pre amps for many years but always end up switching them off & going passive. To my ears, I have yet to hear any benefit whatsoever over & above what my main amp EQ can achieve. IMO, they are an interesting gimmick & toy, which colors the sound & finer subtleties of good pickups & strings. They are a waste of money, which could be better spent on other parts of the signal chain. If you are not happy with the sound you are getting it's probably your amp, speakers,pickups or strings. I'm sorry to say this, as I sincerely do not wish to offend anyone who is of a sensitive nature but that
is what I hear & I also understand , that others can disagree.
I am interested in why they might be considered necessary ? Your thoughts, please.

Of course it's not *needed* but a lot of us like to have that 'tweakability' at our fingertips. They're only a waste of money if you buy one and don't use it

Do they colour things? Sure, most do although some are very transparent. However, isn't that just what we want? To colour the sound of a bass? Or do you play it unamplified?

I admit to smiling when I hear all this 'pure' sound of bass BS. Whatever you do, your signal will be processed. A lot.

If you get a sound that you like, then whatever you are doing is fine. Some find it with and some without onboard preamps. So what?

When I hear about people preferring the sound of their passive bass... I wonder how much of that is 1) having the wrong preamp or 2) missing the passive tone control. Some preamps are just not a good fit in a particular bass. Especially when they're simple 2-band affairs. I personally love passive tone controls, but with an additional semiparametric mids EQ controls to give it extra versatility. I could just use a passive bass with an external preamp. Sure. But if I can tweak it from my own bass, then all the better.

Then it comes to the separation between backline and instrument EQ.
In a LOT of gigs, my amplifier onstage is merely my monitor. That means that I prefer to get 'my sound' before it reaches my amplifier. Then that will be send to FOH. With the DI set to PRE, I'm free to tune my amplifier to get the right balance onstage, which is typically very different from my sound overall (for starters, I often turn down bass a lot if it's loud, and make the low mids richer)... So having some kind of preamp, either onboard or as a pedal, is very useful.

It doesn't mean it's the only way, but it's one way, and I like this way.

If you don't accept that other people have different preferences, dismissing them as a 'gimmick and a toy', you just come across as pretty narrowminded, my friend.

edit: and I didn't even get into how different preamps give you very different ways to alter your sound...

 

[Perrygoround]

I found my bass has more punch on active mode, which I prefer. Also, in active mode there is more tone tweakability available.
On the other hand, when I am just practising at home, not recording or gigging, I use to play on passive mode just to save battery.
I think having a preamp with the active/passive switch offers you the best of both worlds.

 

[ClassicJazz]

Definitely active being in the bass or on my pedal board. I generally run all my amps flat, so having the ability to shape my tone from the bass is a big advantage...for me that is. I find being able to just my tone standing away from my amp is very important. Also the ability to tweak it on the fly during a performance.

My favorite preamp in a bass is the Mike Pope that is in my Fodera. Very versatile in regards to shaping tone. When I use my passive basses ('72 Jazz and a custom P-Bass) I always run them through a Sadowsky preamp on my pedal board.

I have experienced basses which sounded better passive in passive mode rather then active. G&L for example, they sound awesome in passive mode, never liked how they sound in active mode. Funny thing, I know a number of players who removed the preamp from their G&L basses.

 

[Andy Daventry]

Yes, always.

If you want to be pedantic about it, you can use a piezo without a preamp but it will sound absolutely appalling. But the preamp does not need to be in the bass.

 

[chadhargis]

As others have said, you don't "need" an onboard preamp. I have both passive and active instruments. All of my active instruments have the ability to turn the preamp off and go totally passive. My preamp of choice is John East. I've tried many, and his is the easiest to use, most flexible, and easy to use that I've found. High quality too and great support. John is always responsive to emails.

My process for getting great tone is simple. I use pedals sparingly. I start with my least flexible bass....my passive P bass with flats. I plug it in to my board, make sure my FX pedal has the input going straight to my Shaw Tube Injection preamp DI on my board. I tweak the settings to get the tone I want. Then I bring in the rest of the pedals by engaging the FX pedal. I make sure to run all the pedals at unity gain so there is no change in volume from disengaging any pedal. I set my compressor to a very low ratio and use it to "fatten" the bottom end. I have a Creation Audio Labs Grizzly Bass that is an excellent tone shaper. I add in a little overdrive...but just barely. I also use the Griz to do low pass duty and shelve off highs. Under my board I have a [sfx]microThumpinator that does high pass duties. I have a octave and a drive if the song requires it, but they are off most of the time.

Now that my rig sounds great, I can plug in a active bass and if it sounds too thin, I can roll back highs on the EQ or flip the switch to passive mode. Of if I'm playing my 5 string jazz and I need a picked P tone for a song, I can solo the neck pickup, add in some 1000hz mids, lower the highs and bump the lows a bit. Bam! It's a P bass. I can do the same with my Dingwall. If I want a slap tone (which I rarely do), I can use the EQ to scoop the mids. If I want a Motown thump I can go passive and use the passive tone control to darken it, or stay active...roll off the highs and some upper mid (John East has sweepable mids), and bump the lows a bit.

I normally don't use an amp as I go direct. I don't have multiple basses on stage, so I pick the bass that can best serve the set I'm playing. Having an active preamp onboard makes quick changes between songs a lot easier, but I use the pre in the bass to effect my basic overall tone set by the board.

 

[Andy Daventry]

I have never found an active bass that I liked. However, I always use a Sadowsky outboard. Somehow I live quite peacefully with the resulting cognitive dissonance.

 

[ArtechnikA]

I don't buy parts, I buy instruments.
If I don't like the sound the builder has built into the bass, I won't buy it.
I don't care about methods - only results.

I do like the pickup independence on basses with isolated inputs for their multiple pickups - no interaction.
I like a wide EQ range with the ability to boost or cut multiple bands.

 

[Stevorebob]

This all just seems passive aggressive to me. Play what works for you and stop concerning yourself about whether what works for others is a waste of money or not.

 

[filwitheneff]

I'm beginning to notice more & more people saying they have stopped using their on board preamps,because they prefer the sound in passive mode. I have used numerous on board pre amps for many years but always end up switching them off & going passive. To my ears, I have yet to hear any benefit whatsoever over & above what my main amp EQ can achieve. IMO, they are an interesting gimmick & toy, which colors the sound & finer subtleties of good pickups & strings. They are a waste of money, which could be better spent on other parts of the signal chain. If you are not happy with the sound you are getting it's probably your amp, speakers,pickups or strings. I'm sorry to say this, as I sincerely do not wish to offend anyone who is of a sensitive nature but that
is what I hear & I also understand , that others can disagree.
I am interested in why they might be considered necessary ? Your thoughts, please.

I absolutely use an on-board active preamp (Yamaha BBNE2). I play in a variety-cover band, and use a few different tones throughout the night. Since we go from one song to the next without any downtime, I don't have time to change settings on an amp, or change instruments. So I use my on-board preamp to change the tones. I can get old-school P-Bass thump, Geddy-type Jazz tone, scooped-mids slap tone, Freddie Washington slap tone, P-Bass rock tone, Jaco Jazz tone, and more. If I played an entire night of classic country, or an entire night of Motown, I'd use my P-Bass with flats. But in a variety band, the on-board preamp makes all the difference.

 

[lokikallas]

I play in a few cover bands, with songs from all over the radio. I could just find one tone and stick with it, but a quick twiddle of the knobs and I can go from RHCP to U2 and the bass can sound similar to what people are used to hearing.

 

[mrcbass]

Up until very recently, all of my basses save one, had active controls. I really didn't understand that when I bought my first bass - what do you men my battery is dead? What battery? But I learned on them and because my only passive bass didn't feel like it put out like the actives, I just thought it was needed. I got my sound where I liked it, and basically never adjusted anything because it was to difficult to dial it back in - got a multi-effect peddle board so I could easily stomp to a new sound.

Fast forward three years and I "got" the P bass. Now that's all I want to use. I love the ease of being able to quickly and easily modify my tone on the fly and not have to remember where three or more knobs need to be set to get back to my baseline. I can (and sometimes do) easily change my tone mid-song. Only pedal in my chain is a DI with compression and EQ - it never gets adjusted.

Wish I'd have figured this out about 5 basses ago....

 

[mantaraya]

So according to this, should Fodera, Sadowsky, Pedulla, Alembic, Roscoe, EBMM take this in consideration to close all their Active department and start doing Passive basses?
I am myself better playing my Passive Fender bass than a EBMM for instance.
But call my Sadowsky active Preamp "Gimmick and toy" is very unlikely....

 

[mcnach]

I play in a few cover bands, with songs from all over the radio. I could just find one tone and stick with it, but a quick twiddle of the knobs and I can go from RHCP to U2 and the bass can sound similar to what people are used to hearing.

all most people hear is dum dum dedum dummm