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Double Bass Heads Up: QSC K-10 $589.00 shipped

#22
My K10 arrived yesterday, and I've spent a few hours playing through it.

My set up was my Heil PR-40 mic on my H-Clamp close to the top between the bridge and the G side F hole, pointed parallel to the top. That was running into my Schertler PreA III into the K10 mounted on a speaker pole.

The Schertler preamp works great with the mic, a discovery I wish I'd made years ago. The Resonance knob, which is a notch filter designed to clean up a nasty hump on the Dyn B worked great when I pushed the speaker hard enough to get feedback starting....just a little of the filter cleaned it up without affecting the sound too much

I have a pretty big living room so I was able to get away and listen from a distance. My only concern is if the sound will penetrate very far into the room. Up close it is very loud and full, much more immediate than through the Bose system or my Markbass amp. Out a little ways the sound is good and clear and seems to be rattling windows, but just doesn't seem to have the same "punch" that the K12 did from a distance. However, it is much better than the K12 at hearing when you are set up close to the speaker but off to the side, so there is something to that sound dispersion theory.

I still think it is plenty loud for just about everything I do that requires an amp and doesn't have a PA available, and I love the light weight. If I was driving a big band I'd go with the K12, but I think the K10 is just great!

As an aside, even though I've been mostly a mic only player on and off for a few years now, I took the plunge this week and sold my last hold out, my trusty Dyn B. I just never find a situation anymore I can't make my mic work in, and I have gotten to the point where for me a mic is just easier to use than anything else for me.
 
#23
Monte said:
As an aside, even though I've been mostly a mic only player on and off for a few years now, I took the plunge this week and sold my last hold out, my trusty Dyn B. I just never find a situation anymore I can't make my mic work in, and I have gotten to the point where for me a mic is just easier to use than anything else for me.
Click to expand...

I find that very encouraging and is the way I seem to be heading. With a mic you need a 'good' bass though because the mic picks up the bad with the good. Or, put another way, it won't pick up what isn't there.

I wonder how the bass/amp landscape will look in 5-10 years?
 
#25
I'm jealous of you guys using your mics. I have a Heil PR-40 and a DPA 4099, both of which are great; but I can only use them in large (concert hall) situations as a signal to send to the FOH. The sound is incredible in those situations, but the vast majority of my performances find me sandwiched, almost literally touching, a drumset on one side and a grand piano on the other. In those cases there is always way too much extra stuff bleeding into the mic to make it usable, especially as something to send to an amp onstage.

The QSC stuff sounds great for pickup-only players as well...but then, so does the new GK MB112 ($339). I've been shocked at how good it sounds, and every bassist who's heard it has hurried over to find out what the new boutique, expensive amp is. It's cheap and super light.
 
#26
I hear you. I am almost never cramped up in the drum kit. If I have drums it usually means it's a big show as I play quite a bit in drummerless groups. I don't think the Realist sounds terrible in the QSC just not that transparent. I'm sure I'll use it and I'm sure I'll go through an exploratory pick up phase to find what I like the best. I never really experience those little combos but I did have the big GK800 back in the day and it sounded great...
 
#28
In my recent experience, described in post number 20, I was cramped in between a drummer and a keyboard, and got very good off-axis rejection with the Beyer M88 microphone.

I set myself up sort of facing the drummer, so that the back of the mic was pointing at the drums.

I'd imagine the DPA would be even better.
 
#29
I wind up in a lot of cramped stages but usually the place is small enough for me to go without amplification of any kind.

In the other cases I usually use the bulk of my bass by setting up just in front and on the drummers non-hi hat (right) side. Then with my natural playing position the back of the bass is facing the cymbals and bleed is very little problem even right up against the drums. If I have to set up on the other side, I try to get behind a parallel line from hi-hat to floor tom.

Then again, take what I say with a grain of salt. I've never really found the directional mics I've used from my former AKG C3000 to my current Heil to be all that problematic in terms of bleed. The bass gets most of the signal, and if there is a little drum bleed, I don't think it's a big deal.
 
#30
Jeremy Allen said:
The QSC stuff sounds great for pickup-only players as well...but then, so does the new GK MB112 ($339). I've been shocked at how good it sounds, and every bassist who's heard it has hurried over to find out what the new boutique, expensive amp is. It's cheap and super light.
Click to expand...

well Jeremy, sounds like you went from went one of the priciest rigs (the Berg IP) to the one of the more affordable ones.

My question to you is this: Can you test the polarity of the GK?

I know for the older amp models like the GK400RB the phase was flipped so that the speaker moved in rather than out. I think this is part of the reason why it's so popular with the 4-stringed-feedback-generator.

You could check with a battery or with Fdecks preamp (it has a phase flip switch)


In other news, my K10 should arrive next Tuesday. I'll post a full report
 
#31
Tonight is my first gig with the new rig.... you will get a full report in the morning....
It's a little trio gig in a medium sized club with no PA. I did it a few weeks ago acoustic and it was fine, except I was really over-working my hands to get that kind of volume and felt like I was missing things because I was trying too hard to be all things at once. I'm going to put it on the stand and see what I get....
 
#32
Jason Sypher said:
Tonight is my first gig with the new rig.... you will get a full report in the morning....
It's a little trio gig in a medium sized club with no PA. I did it a few weeks ago acoustic and it was fine, except I was really over-working my hands to get that kind of volume and felt like I was missing things because I was trying too hard to be all things at once. I'm going to put it on the stand and see what I get....
Click to expand...

Could you record it with a little digital pocket recorder set somewhere in the audience?
 
#33
adbass said:
well Jeremy, sounds like you went from went one of the priciest rigs (the Berg IP) to the one of the more affordable ones.
Click to expand...

Actually, the MB112 belongs to the school where I teach, so it stays on campus. (Most of the time ;)) I do get to use it quite a bit, and I used it on an outdoor gig last night and it was great.

Nothing sounds as good at ridiculously high volume levels, in my experience, as the IP112. You know how most amps sound good when things are quiet but then things go south as the volume goes up? That doesn't seem to happen with the IP112. But because most of my gigs don't get there, the MB112 is great. It feels silly to lug around the IP112 and the rack when I just need a touch of boost, and that's what the MB112 does so well.
 
#34
The gig was interesting. I had the unit on the floor but I did get a sense of it. It's different than playing an amp. It will take a little getting used to. The sound IS the bass only louder. It's odd because the volume is almost imperceptible. I was loud, but I didn't "feel" loud. I played the bass exactly as I do acoustically, there is no inclination to back off and let the amp do the heavy lifting. I knew we had gotten too loud when I couldn't hear the piano anymore. It's a great sound, really amazing but very different than anything I've experienced before. It's diffuse and omnipresent. Very interesting.
 
#35
Jason Sypher said:
The gig was interesting. I had the unit on the floor but I did get a sense of it. It's different than playing an amp. It will take a little getting used to. The sound IS the bass only louder. It's odd because the volume is almost imperceptible. I was loud, but I didn't "feel" loud. I played the bass exactly as I do acoustically, there is no inclination to back off and let the amp do the heavy lifting. I knew we had gotten too loud when I couldn't hear the piano anymore. It's a great sound, really amazing but very different than anything I've experienced before. It's diffuse and omnipresent. Very interesting.
Click to expand...

I had the same experience using my little mini PA system last weekend. It's a whole different animal, but it's amazing.
 
#36
Jason Sypher said:
The gig was interesting. I had the unit on the floor but I did get a sense of it. It's different than playing an amp. It will take a little getting used to. The sound IS the bass only louder. It's odd because the volume is almost imperceptible. I was loud, but I didn't "feel" loud. I played the bass exactly as I do acoustically, there is no inclination to back off and let the amp do the heavy lifting. I knew we had gotten too loud when I couldn't hear the piano anymore. It's a great sound, really amazing but very different than anything I've experienced before. It's diffuse and omnipresent. Very interesting.
Click to expand...
Hmmn. Compelling. Ever since you posted buying this I've been considering it. I gotta find one to try.

Were you using the Realist into the Headway and no mic or a mic or what?
 
#37
PHil,
I was just using the mic into the Headway. I might could have dialed in a little Realist but I never got around to it. I've still got the thing on the floor which feels a mile away when I'm playing a gig, I don't know why. This was a unique situation where the QSC was kind of to the side of the piano, on the floor, vertical. Not the best sound situation for any amp but it's just where it fit. I didn't bring the stand just to sort of see how this would work. I imagine this is a bit like the AI contra vibe because it's not "pushing air" like an amp does, you know, where you get close and feel the bass pumping. The strangest sensation is that, at lower volumes, you're not sure it's on...then you turn it down and you realize that it really IS on. I can't quite explain the feeling, kind of baffling. A little unsettling even. We, as bass player, just don't ever experience this. There were no drums and when I walked in the gig I thought 'oh, I don't need an amp here, it's quite and it's just us...this is probably overkill'. But once we got rolling I was so glad to have it as the guitarist got significantly louder as the night went on and I realize how much I actually do need this set up. I think, though it makes more of a spectacle, I will use the stand and see how that goes. I also might try to dial in some more mids next time just to see if I can get some more "duh" and "attack" to my sound. I could easily get that little "click" in my pluck if I pushed the string a certain way and that was a nice time keeper for the band to latch onto and give me some more definition. But that was just like playing acoustic, as I would with no amp. I am so used to having an amp do it's thing rather than just make my bass louder. It's just that transparent. Some people may not like this as you don't get that sense of "amp cushion" and still have to dig in for your sound. For me I think it's great because the whole palette that I work with is still in tact, right there to use.
 
#38
That's great feedback, Jason (actually no pun intended). I think that with a mic and QSC we may have to get used to the audience enjoying our bass sound a bit more than we do. We must also remember, of course, that our band mates need to hear us well too. I'm out tonight in a pub with quite a challenging boomy acoustic and it'll be a real test. I'm going to use a DPA/headway/K10 combination but I had already decided to put the speaker on a pole so it'll be no further than 3ft from my head - and we'll see. I'm going to use a small amount of bleed from my Underwood if necessary but I'll try to get away with just the mic. I'll keep you posted. How interesting that soon many of us will have to get used to a significantly new bass delivery system.
 

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