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Is a SansAmp Bass Driver all I need?

#41
Duke21 said:
As I mentioned on the other thread, you guys should really update the Bass Driver. It is about time to add the mids feature from the RBI into the Bass Driver. Many of us wants both presence AND mids control on the Bass Driver.
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The Bass Driver has been and remains to be one of our most popular pedals. Many like it for the ease of getting "that sound" with a minimum of control tweaking. Changing it might possibly satisfy some but would ultimately alienate the users that like it as is.

If you want more mids and presence then the VT Bass would be the way to go.
 
#43
Jazz Ad said:
There are three main bass tones : boom boom, cling cling and grrr grrrr.
The Sansamp does boom boom very well, it's not very good at cling cling and while able to deliver an honest grrr grrr is rarely used this way because other boxes do it way better.
Hope it helps.
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So, what do you think about this?
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PBDDI + Oxford
 
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#48
audiorep2 said:
Which Sansamp would drive a Bergantino IP112 active cab, without a preamp ?
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I like the ParaDriver DI pedal because it can do gain with no EQ changes by setting the three EQ band to 0. It is also magnetic, piezo pickup, and microphone friendly—and handles active or passive instruments. Parametric mids and drive/blend make it very flexible. :cool:

I've used it for upright (piezo), passive '55 P-bass, '71 P-bass, active Sadowsky, passive Jazz, violin with an on board condenser mic, and acoustic guitar. Tons of full-range EQ if you need it. :ninja:
 
#49
This is a great thread. I hope to get a bass for myself in the near term, mainly for recording purposes. I'm a big fan on Duff Rose McKagan's tone on Guns & Roses' Appetite for Destruction album. He uses a Fender PJ bass with Gallien Kruger amps.

But there's no way I'll be able to get such an awesome amp for a long time, so I was considering recording through a DI, with maybe another out into my Fireface and using some or the other parameter within VST Amp Rack on Cubase.

Which DI pedal would be able to achieve something close to this sound? I think it's a bit of a thunk thunk sound rather than a grr or clink or boom, but I could be wrong.

- Arvind Jayaram
 
#50
ArvindJayaram said:
This is a great thread. I hope to get a bass for myself in the near term, mainly for recording purposes. I'm a big fan on Duff Rose McKagan's tone on Guns & Roses' Appetite for Destruction album. He uses a Fender PJ bass with Gallien Kruger amps.

But there's no way I'll be able to get such an awesome amp for a long time, so I was considering recording through a DI, with maybe another out into my Fireface and using some or the other parameter within VST Amp Rack on Cubase.

Which DI pedal would be able to achieve something close to this sound? I think it's a bit of a thunk thunk sound rather than a grr or clink or boom, but I could be wrong.

- Arvind Jayaram
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GK MB200 will be your best "pedal".... Well it is not a pedal but it is a real GK and it cost just a bit more then a pedal. The MB200 is so small and you do not need a cab to use it. If you want the GK tone I think it's your beat option.
 
#51
The BDDI is a great pedal if you're looking for a simple, direct solution. But as you've probably read, it can also be very divisive. I keep going back to it myself because I usually just miss what it does. And I've now owned two, silly me.
It really does have an inherent voice - generally a mid-scooped, lightweight, monster of sound. But conversely, if you like anything about Geddy Lee's tone, just get it. It's the easiest path towards that certain midrange quality as well. Love it.
 
#52
silky smoove said:
That mid knob is Tech 21's biggest failing. The thing is centered at 1khz, and to my ears (which don't agree with the specs in this case), there's a ton of overlap between that control and the presence control. When the gain knob is pushed higher, the overlap seems to get worse. Still capable of achieving great tones with that pre, but they should have done something different with the midrange control.
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Worth noting - and completely subjective (vs. the RBI).
I've owned Sansamp products and Phil Jones products. I find a 630Hz midrange boost in PJB's preamps sounds terrific for cleans but I also love the sound of overdriven rickenbacker basses, which are apparently centered around 1.2kHz. Dig 'em both for different purposes. Just listen to them all & see what speaks to you.
 
#54
I got my BDDI back when I ran a Hartke and it did absolute wonders for my tone, now I have an SVT3 I don't tend to run it in front of it (why use SVT emulation in front of an SVT?), but I still swear by it for touring and quick demo recording. I also keep a GT2 in the top drawer of my desk for recording guitar ideas, sounds 1000 times better than any plug (or POD) that I've tried!
 
#55
Agreed I sold my BDDI and kept my Para driver for more control. That being said I still use a rig with the PRDI
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knowles said:
Worth noting - and completely subjective (vs. the RBI).
I've owned Sansamp products and Phil Jones products. I find a 630Hz midrange boost in PJB's preamps sounds terrific for cleans but I also love the sound of overdriven rickenbacker basses, which are apparently centered around 1.2kHz. Dig 'em both for different purposes. Just listen to them all & see what speaks to you.
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What do you think about the tone of my PBDDI in my sig. ? It is a Rickenbacker 4003. Note: I've my Oxford pedal in front of my PBDDI to add mids into the tone.

Over a long time I considered buying a VT Bass or Paradrive, but I like my PBDDI just that it lack this little something in the mids. So finally I tried to mix my Oxford and my PBDDI together to get the best of both. If you find my tone interesting I can post a picture of my settings on both of my units.
 
#56
That thing looks sick, thanks for the heads up Duke21. Haven't heard of those before. I read a thread on the GK MB200 where Bob Gallien states that none of the GK heads needs to be connected to a speaker to operate. If so, that makes it doubly sick.

A question: a lot of people on that thread were complaining about a hissing sound from their speakers and the DI as well. Is it just bad earthing or a design flaw somewhere? These seem extremely popular too. Neat!

@Knowles: A friend has a Sansamp, a BDDI deluxe I think. It's got a nice driving sound, I agree. Will try to get my hands on one for a test run. Lots of people with good things to say about Tech 21 stuff. Now, I figured that the difference between the BDDI and PDDI was the contour/mid knob. Does the Sansamp RBI successfully bridge the two pedals?

- Jimmy
 
#57
ArvindJayaram said:
That thing looks sick, thanks for the heads up Duke21. Haven't heard of those before. I read a thread on the GK MB200 where Bob Gallien states that none of the GK heads needs to be connected to a speaker to operate. If so, that makes it doubly sick.

A question: a lot of people on that thread were complaining about a hissing sound from their speakers and the DI as well. Is it just bad earthing or a design flaw somewhere? These seem extremely popular too. Neat!

@Knowles: A friend has a Sansamp, a BDDI deluxe I think. It's got a nice driving sound, I agree. Will try to get my hands on one for a test run. Lots of people with good things to say about Tech 21 stuff. Now, I figured that the difference between the BDDI and PDDI was the contour/mid knob. Does the Sansamp RBI successfully bridge the two pedals?

- Jimmy
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An amp with a solid state power section do not need a cab connected when turned on.

Regarding the RBI, good question, maybe partially.
 
#59
NordLead said:
This is where you guys can help me out: tone. I don't know how to describe it well since I'm not a bassist. I like just a clean bass sound that fills out the low end. I've never liked any of the slappy/poppy type playing, and I don't intend on using the high frets either.

Maybe I should find some youtube samples and post them but you may get the point already. Just a non-distorted bass sound that's thick to fill out the low end is all I need.
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I used to think that I wanted a clean low end bass sound. Until I discovered how much better I sound in the mix with a mid rangy slightly overdriven bass tone.
 
#60
I have no experience playing through either the ParaDriver or the RBI, so I certainly wouldn't want to speculate on their respective tones by reading the knobs listed on the front. I figure that if Tech21 had put out a BDDI with a simple midrange addition, it would still be called a BDDIsomething. I believe the rackmount version is the only real comparison there.
Going back to my manuals, the midrange for the BD is centered around 750Hz which is very close to the 700 that Ampeg uses as a boost frequency in their Ultra-mid controls. And you can dial in a relatively boosted midrange with these but it will always have a certain flavour.

I also haven't played any of the character series pedals personally (VT, Oxford, liverpool, etc) but I've heard only good things. It's all down to taste and that's the beauty of having all this junk available. I've stuck to the BDDI - now the programmable version - because it does just what I need. If you like that basic sound, I'd try the programmable because it's only a few bucks more for the three presets. And they both now have a boost switch for driving a power amp directly - something the character series doesn't offer.

To go back to the op - when recording, an engineer will almost always want just a bit of hair added around the bass. Even on great recordings that have a very clean sounding bass line in the mix, you can bet they've used a good tube preamp to add body and midrange presence, sometimes just by re-routing the same passage on top of the cleans. That's pretty much the same sort of thing you'll get with the sansamp series pedals. You can get very close to neutral or crank it but they're full of usable tones.
 

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