Is There Life After the Zoom B3?

[4Mal]

Long time B3 user. I am very much influence by classic synth bass tones. Herbie’s Chameleon. Kinda sent me... For me, the B3 is the one pedal, desert island choice... but... I got Source Audio Disease and the B3 made me SAD.... ( yuck, yuck). I have like 5x the money in SA and I have some very dialed, highly affected patches. If you aren’t really into the synth thing... honestly the B3 is really frigging good and there is probably some undiscovered country in there for you...

 

[stingray69]

I started with B3, then MS-60B and now the Zoom B1-Four as of a couple of days ago. I would describe the order as Liked, Loved, & Floored in that order. Zoom has seriously improved the sound quality and seems to have listened to feedback and addressed the weakest aspect where people thought it lacked (in the OD/Dist area & the Tuner operation). Granted, I would have rather seen them stay with a metal case like the MS-60B, but inside there is a whole lotta new & a whole lot to like.

The B1-Four has KILLER distortions as compared to previous versions - and not just because they've modeled some newer pedals, they've even made some the older, familiar ones x1000 times more useful by adding new parameters to tweak (like a Filter characteristic to control the bite of the tone, and a Dry/Mix control on the ProCo Rat) among others.

The Cab sims have a lot more tweakable parameters like two types of mic placements (for cabs with tweeters) and Dry Mix, etc., in order to get your tone just right. In fact, almost all of the effects I'd mentally written off as "not so good" on the older units are greatly improved and highly surprising me and this applies to the Filter effects as well. So it's been awesome re-discovering the improved effects.

The Tuner is hugely improved upon - there is no "hold time" before it kicks in anymore - thank goodness. It's an instantaneous on, and it uses much easier to see Red/Green LED lights in addition to the note showing in the LCD panel. It also it tracks blazingly fast, even when you're moving & playing fretted notes up and down the neck - like on par with my Turbo Tuner ST-200. With the latest processor sounding this good and the addressed OD's & Tuner, this latest Zoom is a solid piece of gear worth looking at. Kudos to Zoom for listening to and addressing user feedback.

I can't think of a multi better suited for me to just throw it in my bass case and have the confidence that it's gonna sound excellent for the gig than the B1-Four. So for me and my needs, the B1-Four is the next step in life after the B3. I don't see myself needing to go down the route of +$500 processors anytime soon, but I know they're out there if I ever want to take that path.

 

[lat]

I started with B3, then MS-60B and now the Zoom B1-Four as of a couple of days ago. I would describe the order as Liked, Loved, & Floored in that order. Zoom has seriously improved the sound quality and seems to have listened to feedback and addressed the weakest aspect where people thought it lacked (in the OD/Dist area & the Tuner operation). Granted, I would have rather seen them stay with a metal case like the MS-60B, but inside there is a whole lotta new & a whole lot to like.

The B1-Four has KILLER distortions as compared to previous versions - and not just because they've modeled some newer pedals, they've even made some the older, familiar ones x1000 times more useful by adding new parameters to tweak (like a Filter characteristic to control the bite of the tone, and a Dry/Mix control on the ProCo Rat) among others.

The Cab sims have a lot more tweakable parameters like two types of mic placements (for cabs with tweeters) and Dry Mix, etc., in order to get your tone just right. In fact, almost all of the effects I'd mentally written off as "not so good" on the older units are greatly improved and highly surprising me and this applies to the Filter effects as well. So it's been awesome re-discovering the improved effects.

The Tuner is hugely improved upon - there is no "hold time" before it kicks in anymore - thank goodness. It's an instantaneous on, and it uses much easier to see Red/Green LED lights in addition to the note showing in the LCD panel. It also it tracks blazingly fast, even when you're moving & playing fretted notes up and down the neck - like on par with my Turbo Tuner ST-200. With the latest processor sounding this good and the addressed OD's & Tuner, this latest Zoom is a solid piece of gear worth looking at. Kudos to Zoom for listening to and addressing user feedback.

I can't think of a multi better suited for me to just throw it in my bass case and have the confidence that it's gonna sound excellent for the gig than the B1-Four. So for me and my needs, the B1-Four is the next step in life after the B3. I don't see myself needing to go down the route of +$500 processors anytime soon, but I know they're out there if I ever want to take that path.

Cool, thanks @stingray69 . Will have to check it out!

 

[stingray69]

Cool, thanks @stingray69 . Will have to check it out!

No problem - there's a whole lotta new to check out if you're jumping from the MS-60B to the B1 Four like I did. Maybe not so much if you're coming off the B3n? I dunno.

Even the cab sims have 1 or 2 microphone placement parameters that are new (to me) to play with - they represent the mics you would have on the main speaker of the cab and the tweeter of the cab (if the cab sim is a tweeter equipped cabinet) to really tweak things to your taste. Worth a look at the very least! I know I'm pretty stoked about this latest model.

 

[lat]

No problem - there's a whole lotta new to check out if you're jumping from the MS-60B to the B1 Four like I did. Maybe not so much if you're coming off the B3n? I dunno.

Even the cab sims have 1 or 2 microphone placement parameters that are new (to me) to play with - they represent the mics you would have on the main speaker of the cab and the tweeter of the cab (if the cab sim is a tweeter equipped cabinet) to really tweak things to your taste. Worth a look at the very least! I know I'm pretty stoked about this latest model.

I'm coming off the B3, so will be leap-frogging an iteration of technology, it sounds like. The Boss GT-1B looks interesting too, though...

 

[stingray69]

I'm coming off the B3, so will be leap-frogging an iteration of technology, it sounds like. The Boss GT-1B looks interesting too, though...

Should be a great experience for you then, I'm thinking. I'd not heard of the Boss GT-1B before, looks pretty slick and compact - but the Boss website doesn't seem to make it easy to tell what the effects and amp models are in that unit.

But I think I'll be very happy with the B1 Four for quite some time - especially with the latest processor sound quality, 5-effect capability and the ease of programming that is inherent in all the Zoom multis.

 

[pbass74]

Get a second B3 and chain them together.

--^@

And/Or add a MS-60B (or two or three).

 

[GMC]

I had a B3 for a while and it opened up the whole world of effects for me. It also underlined the limitations of the B3 too. I found some of the models amazing and others were pretty weak. I never found any of the dirt or amp models particularly good. The Hall verb, delays and chorus models were very nice. Very quickly, I was supplementing a dedicated dirt box and compressor...then came the octaver. So I sold the B3 and bought a MS-70CDR, which covered more of what the B3 excelled at and took a lot less board space. I've still got that pedal and it's an amazingly versatile multi. It holds its own against a lot of the bigger boxes available. The SA Aftershock shows what top tier digital dirt models can sound like, plus all the benefits of digital control, memory slots and midi.
These days I'm rocking a pair of H9's, a Mobius, Hog2, SA Aftershock, SA C4....all controlled by a Boss ES-5. So I'm mostly digital and Midi. I have an analogue compressor and a zfex Mastotron in there too. Which I'd love to flip out once digital / midi versions become available.