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Fender Rumble Club

#4,385
My Rumble 200 arrived on Fri and I haven't had a chance to test it out until today. Just played at home for about an hour, but the experience was even better than in the couple of stores a few weeks ago! It was so easy to quickly dial in a variety of good settings. I even tried what someone here posted a while back, which is to cut all the tone knobs, turn the master up higher (noon), and then turn up the tone knobs with nothing going above noon. Very interesting that way, different but really quite good--might have brought out some hollow body nature of the violin bass. Anyway, I was just messing around and trying to just use my ears and not worry about a "correct" setting, and found that so many things sounded great. Now I'm not experienced enough with bass yet to know which things are going to mix best with the band, but knowing that so many things sound so good to my ear gives me confidence that whatever setting works with others I'll be pleased with!

By the way, speaking of blend pots recently: with the Hofner violin bass style switches and vol knobs, you basically get that both ways. I like it.

So you know, I'm a guitar player who has a bass...well:
On the guitar, it was again even better than I recalled. So satisfying. I ended up with bass at 9:00, low mid at 2:00, high mid cranked, treble at 4:00. Vintage button in, overdrive on (drive low, level maxed). So good. Try that with a Les Paul and it's hard to stop playing. Cleans up well, retains dynamics with picking. The od character seemed extremely similar to a high quality Marshall Plexi pedal I have (Lumpy's Liquid Lead--which is based on Jimmy Page's live Marshall tones). I compared it back to back at the same settings and overdrive button off for the pedal. My Lumpy's Lemon Drop (Vox 7120 amp tones: think Revolver, Zeppelin II) was awesome, cranked gain it gets pretty fuzzy and sounded fantastic even without tubes in the amp with which to interact. And my Tech21 Roto Choir sounded better than I've ever heard it--and this is running straight into the amp, not in the loop. All pedals set to unity volume--not boosting the amp. Anyway, I'm beyond impressed.

Since it is meant to be my birthday present, it went back in the box until March 16. Now I wait...
 
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#4,387
MN_Bass said:
I assume pretty much in the same realm. Any input or examples by chance?
Click to expand...

I'm not really sure what I can tell you that would help...

I can say this, the amp, and the instrument can FAR outstrip my skills at this time, I have had friends I have been jamming with that are FAR better players than I, not quite Geddy Lee, but regional pro level players none the less, that have played my rig while I kept time on drums... No I don't consider myself a drummer, but I can keep a kick, snare, hi hat going in ssequence in my sleep... The sound is just freaking amazing out of that Ibanez, into the Rumble and in turn, into my ears...

I CAN run the gain all the way up without distortion problems unlike my old Crate and most Ampegs I have played through... There seems to be some sort of limiter built in I am guessing..... There seems to be no change from 12:00 on with my gain, I typically keep it around 9 - 9:30 though as I like the tone I get from there.

Depending on what I am playing, but say doing some old Motown stuff, I tent to go with...

Vintage on.
Lows rolled back to about 10
Mid low and mid high bumped just off of 12:00
High bumped to about 1:30
Horn on.
The rest of the adjustments are all on the bass. Typically P rolled all the way up, and tone leaned just behind 12:00, J about 1/3 and tone leaned just forward of 12:00, fine tune from there....
 
#4,393
Arvin said:
NAD -- Rumble 200 combo. :woot: Bought it as a practice amp, but I'll use it for small gigs and jam sessions, for sure. This thing sounds great! (and gets plenty loud).

This thing is leaps and bounds better sounding than the old Peavey I was practicing through. Makes me want to go practice some more... :D
Click to expand...
Welcome to the Fender Rumble Club, Arvin! :woot: You are member #377 :hyper:
:D Rumbles Rule! :D
 
#4,394
Linnin said:
Happy Birthday, but really now back in the box??? o_O
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Haha--yeah, all packed back up safe and sound. Waiting is not always bad--and when consider my daily life, I don't have to wait for much. Plus, it being Lent I found it a good opportunity to not indulge just because I can. So I got it because I didn't want to miss the 20% off deal, but since it's for my birthday when it arrived I said, "I need to test it and have a look to make sure everything's working and in proper order, etc. And then I'll pack it back up till the 16th." On that day the unveiling will make it that much more exciting!
 
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#4,396
Lync said:
Nice write up. I had a 500 and I personally didn't like the way it handled the low B-maybe I too just didn't dig the overtones on the lowest notes...I probably should have played around with it more experimenting with the low end before I returned it.

So...I have a 200 on the way now. I love my 100 but there are times when I need just a little more and of course I want to add a 1x12 for a Rumbleicious stack. :cool:
Click to expand...

Yeah, overtones. Maybe that was what I heard with the 500 on the lowest notes. Or maybe interference between the two 10" speakers? Trying out a 5 string would have been nice to go even lower, but there were not any. Although I was happy that I got to try out some things like typical J and P basses.

Interestingly enough, the Fender Deluxe P Bass Special has a lot of EQ knobs and it's powered. You know what all those knobs did to the bass sound? Exactly the same thing as the tone knobs on the amp. At least that's what I heard. It all sounded very similar when knobs were twiddled, be they on the bass or on the amp. I found that to be interesting.

The 200 sounds great. Nothing to complain about there. It seems as though you should like it a lot. Have fun with it! :)
 
#4,397
Sold my Carvin rig this morning and then took a road trip with my daughter. Our stops were the GC in Greenwood and the one in Indy.
We came home with a set of twins; one from each store. LOL
Can I have a number?

FenderRumbleV3100Twins.jpg
 
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