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Eden Amps No More?
- Thread starter WestyBassBob
- Start date
So who was making the cabinets in England in the past few years?
Last year, I took this photo of a Speakon cable I made for my mini stack. Note the 'Made in England' sticker on the box.
Last year, I took this photo of a Speakon cable I made for my mini stack. Note the 'Made in England' sticker on the box.
I'll send you a couple Eagles stickers to replace them!
You do realize the Steelers are really the original Eagles?
Yes, that's a weird piece of Eagles/Steelers history. IIRC, the owners swapped franchises. All the Steeler players moved to Philly and the Eagles players moved to Pittsburgh (or something like that!). And during WWII there was the Steagles.
Sorry for the little thread hijack - back to our regularly scheduled thread!
I travelled for 3+ years in the mid 90’s with a WT-500 bridged into a D410T cab. That coupled with my MM Stingray 5 was a glorious sound. I’ve also had a WT-800, WT-550, D410XLT, D210XLT and D210XST in the arsenal at one point. Even though I moved in long ago I too have a soft spot for the Eden brand. I hope whoever bought the brand is able to bring them back….
Would be kind-of amusing if Ashdown/Gooday bought it to finally try and make a reliable/useful Class-D amp that anyone wanted. hehehe.
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Interested to learn of your impressions of the DNA 800. Also, how it does it compare to any of the current product offerings of Aguilar, Bergantino, GK, or Mesa, if you have experienced any of them?
I finally got mine about a week or two ago. Took it out on the back deck (we live on a hill in Washington state) and set it up with my DNS-210 on its amp-stand to put it through its paces. After plugging it in and leaving everything flat, it sounded like I needed to boost the bass a bit. I just moved the bass EQ (adjusts everything from 35Hz down) up to 1 o'clock and there was that full sound I expected. There are no corners or back walls or anything else to influence the sound, so I may not need to do that indoors, we'll see.
I also ran the low-mids up to 1'clock, which is what I do with my Eden amps too, and there was the sound I was looking for. With my passive Jazz and most basses (also do this with my 5-string), a slight boost anywhere between 250Hz and 500Hz gives my bass definition and presence in the mix when playing with a group. The low-mids on this amp are centered at 500hz. So BOOM! - there was the sound I was looking for with the same power as my big Eden amp but weighing 31-lbs. less. Tried out the mute button and that worked great too.
I'd heard that the shape control worked over a much wider range than the Enhance Control that David put into his Eden amps, so I thought I'd try that out. Put everything back to flat and then just turned on the shape a bit. It quickly went to that same fullness of sound that I got by boosting the bass EQ. I boosted the low mids just a touch higher than I had set them without the shape control on and there was that sound again. Makes sense that adding more low-mids was necessary because the shape button scoops out the low-mids out. That scoop always sounds good when playing by yourself or at low levels. However, if you scoop too much of the mids out of your sound when playing in a group, you scoop yourself right out of the mix. Those low-mids are what give your bass the definition and presence your bass needs in a group.
So now I had two approaches to getting the sound I want, but I hadn't played with the compressor yet. The compressor has both a Threshold control, and a Ratio control. Threshold determines how quickly the compressor clamps on and Ratio determines how many decibels input it takes to raise the output 1db. Typical for most bass use is anywhere between a 4 to 1 and an 8 to one ratio. A 4 to 1 (4:1) ratio means you have to put in a 4db increase in your sound to actually raise the output level by 1db; 8:1 means an increase of 8db input to output 1db of added level. The rest of the energy from that initial attack is spread out as sustain. If you turn it way up, the attack on your note disappears and the note sounds like you are holding down a note on an organ. That is no initial attack and sustain that lasts almost forever. So the higher the ratio you use, the less dynamic control your hands have over what you are playing.
Anyhow, I turned up the threshold control until the little purple "compressor engaged" LED started to flash. Didn't make much difference at first. I continued turning it up and could get extra sustain without killing the attack on the note, and finding that balance is usually what you want to do with a compressor. As I continued turning up the ratio that initial attack got to be less and less and the difference between the start of the note and the end of the note became less and less. I finally turned that puppy all the way up and just started beating on the strings with thumb slaps. That purple light stayed on longer and longer and the sound as a slapped it never really increased in volume. I had achieved that Farfisa Organ effect where there is no attack and there is no end to the note. As I mentioned I don't often use compression because my bass has such good sustain.
As you turn up the Ratio and the attack gets to be less and less, it allows you to turn up your master a fair amount because that compressor is just squashing the peaks. So you can turn up the overall sound because squashing those peaks prevents you from driving your amp into clipping. I have a hard time imagining I would ever have to use the compressor on this amp to prevent clipping with my gear though and I prefer to have all the dynamic control I want at my beck and call (thump and pluck?).
So I won't be using it as a normal piece of my sound but will use it as an effect when needed. For instance if you listen to the song "Time After Time" by Cyndi Lauper,which we covered in one of my bands, that sounds like it has a huge amount of compression on the bass. I've run the compressor on my WTDI when using it for that song and I would use this compressor on that song too. But that's not a sound I would use all the time. Anyhow, I was impressed with the different things I could do with those two controls on the built-in compressor.
Just for fun and games, I also unplugged my wireless from the input on the front and plugged it into the input on the back, which worked great but was strange because you could hear the bass coming out the cab, but couldn't see anything plugged into the front of the amp. It's back there specifically so you can keep a clean looking front and it's an either/or input. You can use one or the other but not both at once. I moved my wireless behind the amp, plugging it into that rear input, and it was pretty well hidden from the front. I'll probably go ahead and use the front jack at gigs though.
Since both my DNS-210 and my DNS-410 are 8 ohm cabs, I can drive them both at once with this amp (800-watts rms into 4 ohms). Actually if they were both 4 ohm cabs I could still run both at once. It will handle 2Ω at "almost" full power, as noted in the manual. Anyhow since my DNS cabs have such great sensitivity running one 8Ω cab with just 400-watts is still crazy loud. With the DNS-210 it's about 128db. With my DNS-410 that's enough to drive it over 130db. If I really need either cab louder than that, I can always pull out my heavy Eden WT500/800 which bridged at 800-watts into 8Ω. Or I could just bring my other cab and run both at once with my DNA-800. That looks impressive, but my back wouldn't like it much.
So it's a really nice amp and I'm dying to gig with it. Hopefully soon.
Here's a video where you can get an idea of the sound of the amp. It's from Bass Musician Magazine.com and is a review of all the features of it. They are running it through the DNS-210 cab, which is the one used when playing around with mine the other day and is the only cab I use for all indoor venues. I use my DNS-410 for outdoor venues and Festivals.
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Any update? It’s been a month since the first post. All I can find is a website that says, “coming soon.”
Gear4Music? Its on-line presence suggests it is a retailer, not a manufacturer/distributor.
In any event, these kinds of acquisitions are typically surrounded by hyped-up announcements about how the new owner is ready to take things to the next level. Unless I'm missing something, whoever bought Eden certainly isn't acting like they acquired something special.
This is indeed odd. Gear4Music already have Redsub as an in-house brand, albeit they are 220VAC only. They are an Eden distributer already and still have some stock on hand. Maybe they want to cash in on name recognition, like Guitar Center did with Acoustic.
You know, I don't remember there ever being a two-channel version of the Terra Nova head, yet on Gear4Music they're advertising something called the TN502.
Did I miss a product launch?
Did I miss a product launch?
I think it’s been around for a while. 2 preamps pretty cool for doublers. 1 DI / channel is an interesting idea. I have to assume the “Flip” switch chooses the channel. Neat design and quite a bargain if it works!
