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D.I. Speaker Simulator

R

RyanBass8

Jan 4, 2011
16
0
www.lynyrdskynyrdexperience.com
#1
Hey guys,

So I always hate the tinny and brittle top end of taking the DI signal from an amp directly, especially when I use distortion. It always sounds way nasty with any overdrive. Are there any DI solutions that have a speaker simulator or a way to make this sound any better so I can send it to front of house without the brittle sound??



Thanks,
Ryan
 
#9
RyanBass8 said:
So I always hate the tinny and brittle top end of taking the DI signal from an amp directly, especially when I use distortion. It always sounds way nasty with any overdrive. Are there any DI solutions that have a speaker simulator or a way to make this sound any better so I can send it to front of house without the brittle sound??
Click to expand...

The above answers are good, but unless you are really set on getting your amp's tone into the FOH, a speaker sim isn't necessary. After much trial and error with different products, for me the best solution to the same problem was to simply bring my own passive DI box. I have a Radial JDI, though less expensive DI boxes will work fine and be better than most amp DIs (crappy amp DI most likely being your issue). The JDI and its Jensen transformer reacts very well even to fuzz and warms up the bass tone by rolling off a touch of highs IME. It can actually be used in between your amp and speaker as a speaker sim if you still wanted that; I like the way it sounds direct just fine.

If you can convince the soundguy to actually mic your rig and then have him actually use that in the house ("I'm going to run one from the amp, too, just as a backup..."), then great. But for me it's just a lot easier to set my JDI on the amp and go on.
 
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#10
I found the JDI to be pretty neutral and still pass through the highs when fed fuzz. It does roll off the highs when plugging in a passive bass direct as it doesn't have a very high input impedance, and I believe when you engage the -30dB pad that allows you to hook it up between the amp and cab, it adds its own speaker sim to the signal but I never tried that feature when I had one.

Amp sims, or preamps with a built in top end rolloff to simulate a speaker are plentiful:

VT Bass DI / Sansamp BDDI / Behringer BDI21
EBS Microbass
Darkglass Vintage Deluxe
Aguilar Tonehammer (with AGS switched on)
Line6 POD X3 / Zoom B3

There are also simple DIs with a filter to simulate the speaker like the Palmer mentioned before. There's the H&K Redbox, Radial JDX, and a cheap one made by Mooer for example.
 
#13
I have a Behringer DI box which is active and can be powered by phantom power. Nominally it is a 4x12 guitar speaker simulation, but to be honest it sounds fine on bass. The main criticism is the 9v battery compartment is a pain in the butt to open. It's a solid metal unit. However, with amp sims on effects units mostly it's not required.

A caveat is that I haven't tried to use it on a 5 string or anything with sub bass as those sort of sounds I've been producing from either effects units with their own speaker sims (or VST plugins if recording). So there might be a low frequency roll off that would make the Behringer unsuitable. I'd need to either check the specs or stick a generated signal through and FFT effected against uneffected to check it. For standard bass sounds (classic rock sounds much like an 8x10 which has a roll off under 100Hz) it's fine.
 
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#14
I like micing a lot and used to do it, but unless you have your own soundman on every gig, be prepared to get resistance occasionally and always have a DI backup plan. For me, it's a Tech 21 VT Deluxe. If you get a straight up DI with a speaker sim on it, make sure it can do bass first. I made the mistake of getting a Hughes and Kettner Red Box once, and it cut all my lows. That's why I dig the VT. Doesn't cut the lows any lower than an Ampeg 810e, can be set near flat so it doesn't step all over my sound when I use it, and it makes some cool sounding dirt. A Palmer is really high end, but most of their products are built for guitar. They do have one that's very well suited to bass, but I forget which one.
 
#15
Palmer has good ones. I used the PDI-05 and was very happy with it. You may also try out the Behringer GI-100, but I'm not sure what they're doing to the lows.

Or the VT DI... it has the speaker simulation (basically a steep dropoff at 4,5kHz) that is not combined with a huge resonance bump like it is in the VT Bass v2.
I'm much happier with a speaker sim DI than with actually micing the cab. No hassle, always the same sound, no bleeding into the mic, no problem with someone knocking down the mic stand etc.
 

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