I'm a seasoned musician but brand new to bass guitar. My first bass is ordered but not yet received. I have guitar amps but want to get a proper bass amp. I have an ElectroVoice PA speaker system that features a 15" bass driver and mid/high frequency horn. I think the 15" driver is good enough to handle a bass. I'd like to get an affordable amp head to drive it. Affordable for me means $500 or less. What do you recommend I consider?
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Looking for some amp suggestions.
- Thread starter Fico
- Start date
Welcome!
It would be helpful to know how you intend to use a bass amp in order to give good advice. Is it for gigging ? Large venues or small ?, what kind of volume needs do you have. Answers to those kinds of questions will help you get better advice.
Having said that, depending on the model of EV PA speaker, you may be fine using it, at least to start. You may want to use a preamp into the EV as IMO/IME they tend to sound kind of "dry/sterile" for bass.
For your $500 budget you're going to be limited to the used market for the most part, or look at the Fender Rumble or Ampeg RB combos. There are models from those makers that are around your budget.
good luck!
It would be helpful to know how you intend to use a bass amp in order to give good advice. Is it for gigging ? Large venues or small ?, what kind of volume needs do you have. Answers to those kinds of questions will help you get better advice.
Having said that, depending on the model of EV PA speaker, you may be fine using it, at least to start. You may want to use a preamp into the EV as IMO/IME they tend to sound kind of "dry/sterile" for bass.
For your $500 budget you're going to be limited to the used market for the most part, or look at the Fender Rumble or Ampeg RB combos. There are models from those makers that are around your budget.
good luck!
For now I have no intention of gigging with it. First I have to be a student of it. I can play the 4 bass strings on a guitar but it isn't the same thing as you know. So I don't need a lot of power. Ampeg has a 250 watt small head. TC Electronics has something similar both for $500. I just don't know what I am doing as I would with guitar amps. I tend to like modelling amps for guitar and I have a small tube head that feeds the EV speaker system. No need for a combo. A head will do for now. If necessary I can ad a cab in the future.
My suggestion would be to search the classifieds here at Talk Bass. There are quite a few great amps available for $500 or under. These three sellers have a positive feedback rating. Here are a few links:
For sale FS: Markbass 58R
Mint condition Markbass 58R amp.
Great Markbass tone with great flexibility.
Made in. Italy.
Buyer pass shipping.
- Type-55 (+174 /1 /-0)
- Views: 104
- Reaction score: 1
- Category: For Sale: Amps, Preamps, and Cabinets
$475.00
For sale Markbass Little Marcus 800
Up for sale is a Markbass Little Marcus 800. $500 shipped continental USA. Amp works and sounds great. Comes with Markbass bag. Continental USA shipping only. No trades.
- LBSCATL (+44 /0 /-0)
- Updated
- Views: 1K
- Reaction score: 3
- Comments: 2
- Category: For Sale: Amps, Preamps, and Cabinets
$500.00
10 watching
For sale Genzler Magellan 350 (PENDING)
Genzler Magellan 350 Bass Amplifier
- VS (+19 /0 /-0)
- Updated
- Views: 344
- Reaction score: 2
- Comments: 6
- Category: For Sale: Amps, Preamps, and Cabinets
$350.00
4 watching
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A Traynor SB 500H should be within your budget but I’m not sure it’s available in your area.
Another good option is the Peavy Mini Max. Don’t let it fool you by its size, it’s a very capable amp and really built to last :
Another good option is the Peavy Mini Max. Don’t let it fool you by its size, it’s a very capable amp and really built to last :
If you’re on the Sweetwater site, you can look at the GK MB 200. The other suggestions so far are good also.
https://www.sweetwater.com/store/de...er-mb200-200-watt-ultra-light-micro-bass-head
https://www.sweetwater.com/store/de...er-mb200-200-watt-ultra-light-micro-bass-head
Just to add, if you want ”new” with warranty you’ll be hard-pressed to find anything better than the Peavey Mini Max.
Do you already have something driving your PA speaker? If so, why not just run your bass through that? And if not, you better do your homework to make sure that speaker is compatible with whatever heads you are looking at. You might be safer looking at a combo amp than trying to match a bass head to your PA speaker.
Since you aren't planning to gig with it you could just look at the local classifieds and find something cheap and of an appropriate size for your space. I even had an old Peavey keyboard combo amp in my apartment for years that was perfect for playing at home and teaching lessons. You don't need anything fancy or a lot of bells and whistles, especially when you're first starting out.
Since you aren't planning to gig with it you could just look at the local classifieds and find something cheap and of an appropriate size for your space. I even had an old Peavey keyboard combo amp in my apartment for years that was perfect for playing at home and teaching lessons. You don't need anything fancy or a lot of bells and whistles, especially when you're first starting out.
There are two elements in a speaker that make it appropriate for bass frequencies. Size and excursion. the PA speaker has the size but not the excursion like a subwoofer would have. It also has an 8 ohm impedance which is very comfortable for any amp. I wouldn't recommend it for a very high wattage and loud performance at bass frequencies but it is more than enough to make my music room uncomfortably loud.
The amp head that is driving it currently is a 5 watt tube amp. I run it in the 1 watt mode with electric guitars. Who knows, it may work just fine in full power mode with a bass. I'll know in less than a week when my bass guitar arrives. It may do the trick. Whether the tone will be appropriate is still a guess.
Eventually I will have to get a real bass amp like the ones the group is recommending. If the speaker doesn't do the job, there are all kinds of bass cabs available. My requirements are modest compared to those of a gigging bass guitarist. I know very little about bass guitars but I'm pretty good on the guitar technology in general.
I have a subwoofer with a 15" high excursion driver for my home theater. It is flat down to 18hz and goes further. That's well below what a bass guitar generates. It has a 300 watt class IV amp. I can test the guitar with it and probably will.
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It’s the best value in new bass amps plus if you buy it from Sweetwater you get their 2 year warranty.
I suppose it really depends on how loud you are playing at home. If you want to rattle the walls and piss of your neighbors then sure, buy a massive gig rig to keep in your basement.
If you want to practice and play along to records you don't need all that, and you actually want far less low end when you are playing solo than you'd need or want on stage with a band. Sure, a real bass amp is going to sound better on stage, but you aren't going on stage, and at practice volume the tone difference between a PA, bass amp, keyboard amp, or even a small guitar amp (at low volumes) is often negligible.
High-gain guitar amps are probably not a good choice, but for practice there is a good chance a regular guitar amp will work fine. FYI I actually learned to play through a blackface era Fender Twin Reverb pushing an Traynor YC810 cab. Guitar speakers don't typically handle bass very well, unless you keep the volume really low.
For tube amps, match the impedance of the amp to the impedance of your bass cab. For solid state amps, makes sure the bass cab's impedance is equal to or higher than the minimum impedance the amp can push.
How well the EV PA cab work depends upon what tier it is. If it's a high quality 15 + horn it should do pretty well as long as you want a full-range, HiFi type of sound. Lower tier PA cabs may incur damage if pushed with bass. You may damage both the horn driver and woofer.
For tube amps, match the impedance of the amp to the impedance of your bass cab. For solid state amps, makes sure the bass cab's impedance is equal to or higher than the minimum impedance the amp can push.
How well the EV PA cab work depends upon what tier it is. If it's a high quality 15 + horn it should do pretty well as long as you want a full-range, HiFi type of sound. Lower tier PA cabs may incur damage if pushed with bass. You may damage both the horn driver and woofer.
Go for the nicest used head you can get.
Mesa
Genzler
Gallien Krueger
You sound like a bit of a gear head, it won’t take you long to figure out the available brands and sounds they have on tap.
Hanging out around here will turn you into a proper snob.
(Also, you are gonna hear/read some heretical crap about something called a “P” bass with “flats” being the best thing ever. Don’t drink the kool aid. And watch out for carrots around here…)
Mesa
Genzler
Gallien Krueger
You sound like a bit of a gear head, it won’t take you long to figure out the available brands and sounds they have on tap.
Hanging out around here will turn you into a proper snob.
(Also, you are gonna hear/read some heretical crap about something called a “P” bass with “flats” being the best thing ever. Don’t drink the kool aid. And watch out for carrots around here…)
What I have learned from some of the expert people that post here , some of them are actually bass amp and bass cabinet designers and owners of these companies that the approach in the guitar world of putting any speaker in a baffle and shoving that in a box, the same approach will fail miserably in bass amplification. The box has to be tuned, the driver/speaker carefully chosen, crossover calculated, Everything needs to be stouter. And yes car audio knowledge does not transfer easily.
In short it is just easier to get a bass amp and cabinet or a combo than roiling your own. It is interesting that although the instruments may be similar just just a few hertz down, the acoustical physics changes dramatically. No I don not know , I probably could learn but I stop at making my own guitar cabs from a kit. I even doubt that it was all of that hundred of dollars later.
In short it is just easier to get a bass amp and cabinet or a combo than roiling your own. It is interesting that although the instruments may be similar just just a few hertz down, the acoustical physics changes dramatically. No I don not know , I probably could learn but I stop at making my own guitar cabs from a kit. I even doubt that it was all of that hundred of dollars later.
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I agree to a point but if your budget is $500, why not (1) buy a new amp with warranty and (2) buy something that you can not only rehearse with, but gig with as well when the time comes. JMHO
I would agree if OP knew what they want and need. Given their lack of experience, what sounds like a great set of features or specs without owning a bass may turn out to not be what they want or need 6 months from now when they start to get some control over the sounds that come out. I think beginners are best served with cheap options early that are seen as stepping stones, so when they buy a "real" amp they know what they're getting into. Buying a cheap used amp as a starter means it's unlikely to depreciate further unless you trash it, and your investment is low so when you outgrow it you aren't in trouble, budget-wise.
