Anyone want to share their experience with a 1979 Ibanez MC 900 bass and given the active electronics, is this near 40 year old model, opening up an electrical can of warms? Are they known to be noisy in active mode, and if they require some work, even if not immediately, assuming parts can be found to fix the preamp or replace pickups, might the sound of the original been lost? Assuming one is available in very good/excellent condition, anyone know fair market value? Thanks.
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Ibanez MC 900 1979
- Thread starter dougbaker13
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- ibanez
Musician basses are known to be reliable, mosdt of them still are in use today and highly sought after. If you can live with the weight, they're pure gold.
Electronics are very simply laid out, with pots offboard and visible components on an open pcb. It makes them easy to fix or modify , would the preamp show signs of weakness.
Genuine replacement parts are next to impossible to find, as is typical with Ibanez.
A 3band EQ was something rare back then, settings tend to be extreme so if you push hard you will get noise, no more than with modern preamps though.
Electronics are very simply laid out, with pots offboard and visible components on an open pcb. It makes them easy to fix or modify , would the preamp show signs of weakness.
Genuine replacement parts are next to impossible to find, as is typical with Ibanez.
A 3band EQ was something rare back then, settings tend to be extreme so if you push hard you will get noise, no more than with modern preamps though.
I don't know about the musician specifically, but at this point, I wouldn't be too worried about preamps. They may well burn out or what have you, but there are a huge number of easy to install replacements that should fit about anything. It won't be stock, but you won't find an original, and it would be less of a sin than stripping and routing a 62 Jazz or something. Heck, it might even be better. Again, I don't know the early Ibanez pres, but a lot of early active systems were not that great in the first place. The bigger concern I would have would be the pickups. If they work, they work (and it is nothing for a pickup to be fine for 60 years or more if it was decently made in the first place and not abused). The issue would be, if a pickup were to fail, I'm not sure that the musician pickups are any sort of standard size, and you won't find an original, so you would have some challenges (pay to get it rewound, get something custom made, use something that doesn't fit right).
Yes, my MC900 was noisy in active mode, but not something you heard onstage in a club setting.
Stock pickups don't exist, but as JazzAd pointed out, the pcb is laid out where you can see everything.
Stock pickups don't exist, but as JazzAd pointed out, the pcb is laid out where you can see everything.
Thanks everyone. Caca since you had one, did you get it new and were the pickups working when you parted ways?
