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Does Active Preamp automatically mean...

M

mchljhn90

Dec 26, 2009
27
0
#1
that the bass has active pickups?

was at GC yesterday and i was talking to the guy who sells guitars and i asked him about active preamp and passive pickups he said with active preamp you get active pickups?

can anyone clarify?

so active means all the electronics are active or what?

thanks for the input
 
#4
mchljhn90 said:
that the bass has active pickups?

was at GC yesterday and i was talking to the guy who sells guitars and i asked him about active preamp and passive pickups he said with active preamp you get active pickups?

can anyone clarify?

so active means all the electronics are active or what?

thanks for the input
Click to expand...


Like usual, the guy at GC is clueless. There are very few basses with true active pickups (i.e., with circuitry contained in the pickup shell that requires a battery for the bass to even work at all). The USA MTD's, for example, have active pickups, and many of the EMG pickups (used in Modulus basses, etc.) are active.

The vast majority of basses with an active preamp use passive pickups, and most of these have an active/passive switch that bypasses the preamp, allowing to use the bass in passive mode, as if the preamp wasn't even there.

So, you can have passive pickups with or without an active preamp, and you can have active pickups with or without the 'extra' preamp (but those basses will always need a battery and will not have a 'passive' mode).


An 'active' bass means either a preamp, or active pickups, or both.
 
#9
Active pickups are very very rare and 99% of all basses that are active have passive pickups and an active preamp. And you could debate whether those active pickups are really active because it's just a passive pickup with an active "preamp" of some sort inside. (At least I think that they like that, a passive pickup with a really low output that is amplified by a built in preamp).
 
#10
mchljhn90 said:
so if a bass has both active pickups and preamp get ready to get raped on battery bills?
Click to expand...

I never really noticed the drain being any more in my active pickup bass (MTD) versus my others. The pickup pre must be a very low draw sort of thing. Really not an issue.

The bigger issue is to never be able to switch to passive mode, for both tone and 'safety' just in case the battery goes down or the preamp goes down, or it is a particularly noisy type room (RF, etc.) that is being amplified by the active electronics.
 
#12
SpamBot said:
"Active pickup" is a misnomer in the first place. All an active pickup is is a low-impedance passive pickup and a preamp with set level and equalization in the same casing.
Click to expand...

I don't agree. If the pickup won't work without a battery, consider it an active pickup.


Roger
 
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#15
Jazz Ad said:
The bass is active if any part of electronics requires power. It may be any or all of pickup, gain and EQ.
Reading Link Removed should clear up things for you.
Click to expand...

So what is an active EQ bass with passive pickups when it is switched into passive mode? That article is unnecessarily confusing.

If a bass has pickups or circuits that requires a battery and cannot be bypassed, it is active.

If a bass has active electronics that can be bypassed, it is active/passive.

If a bass requires no battery for anything, it is passive.

Roger
 
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#16
Sadowsky said:
So what is an active EQ bass with passive pickups when it is switched into passive mode? That article is unnecessarily confusing.

If a bass has pickups or circuits that requires a battery and cannot be bypassed, it is active.

If a bass has active electronics that can be bypassed, it is active/passive.

If a bass requires no battery for anything, it is passive.

Roger
Click to expand...

It's active/passive.
 
#17
Sadowsky said:
So what is an active EQ bass with passive pickups when it is switched into passive mode? That article is unnecessarily confusing.

If a bass has pickups or circuits that requires a battery and cannot be bypassed, it is active.

If a bass has active electronics that can be bypassed, it is active/passive.

If a bass requires no battery for anything, it is passive.

Roger
Click to expand...

One minor nit pic point. All this active/passive talk is about the SIGNAL circuits. A bass with passive pickups and signal wiring could have a battery for fingerboard LEDs or some other non-signal related purposes and still would be called passive.

Another point of interest is that if you have an active/passive bass that can be bypassed, usually (there are a few exceptions to this rule) you lose any ability to control your tone when you bypass. Exceptions include some aftermarket preamps that have an extra knob that is a passive-style tone control that works in bypassed mode and the G&L L-2000 series where the EQ controls are passive and always work even when the bass is in passive mode.
 
#20
Gerald quantae said:
So can you have an active bass which doesn't use a preamp?
Click to expand...
Yes. Active EMG pickups and a few others can be purchased and installed as a pickup only, either direct to jack, or with a matching EMG volume and/or tone knob only. As set forth above, for an active EMG pickup, it is epoxy sealed, with only hot, ground and battery + leads, and you cannot run the pickup without a battery. So by definition it is an active pickup. I run mine with a volume, balance, EXB and tone, not a separate preamp with bass, mid, or treble controls. I could, but for my playing style, current repertoire, and setup, this does fine for me.
 

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