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Maple or rosewood and why?

Maple or rosewood

  • Maple

    Votes: 46 37.7%

  • Rosewood

    Votes: 76 62.3%
  • Total voters
    122
  • Poll closed .
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#21
It depends on the bass. My main bass for the past 15 or so years is a EBMM stingray 5 with maple. I picked it up used in a town that didn't have a EBMM dealer, so I didn't have the option to compare it to a similar (but with rosewood fretboard) bass... but that didn't matter to me. It was love at first sight, and every time I play it I like it more and more.

My number two bass is an unlined fretless jazz with rosewood. Again... used, nothing comparable to try it against, love at first sight... I'm happy.

Both maple and rosewood fretboards can be good, but there are also some real turds out there, both with maple and rosewood. It's all about the bass. To the whole "better" thing... the only one who can decide what is better is you.
 
#23
I have a Vigier Excess Indus and a Dean Z bass with rosewood fingerboards, I have a LTD B405 with an ebony fingerboard. I would like a maple fingerboard on my next bass, with a black body, I think that combination looks good. :)
As far as sound goes, I think the maple is suppose to sound brighter, how that works I'm not sure. :s
 
#25
Neither. Ebony gives you the crispness of Maple with the darkness of Ebony, and it also seems to nicely eliminate the more unpleasant string noise while leaving the more "musical" noise present (i.e. the noise that enhances the note, rather than interfere with it). I also have a Warwick Thumb (Pro Series) with a Wenge board, and they're great, similar to Ebony in that they're crisp but slightly less dark.

But to answer your question, I prefer Rosewood because it's darker, even though the last bass I had which had one (Ibanez SR506) ended up being a disappointment, but that was more to do with quality of fretwork and neck flimsy-ness than anything else.
 
#32
aussiebasshero said:
Hardly makes a difference - to me it's purely an aesthetically-motivated decision. Plus, I like that rosewood is unfinished.
Click to expand...

I definitely hear a difference - especially when I switch basses during a gig or rehearsal, because I often have to adjust EQ to sound the same on basses with different boards...

IMAG0589.jpg


IMAG0578.jpg
 
#36
OP, you did a search? Really? And didn't get enough opinion? I mean, there really have to be hundreds of posts on this topic.

Oh well, no matter. I have maple, I have rosewood, I have ebony, and they all sound great. They all look great. I have no preference. IMO, the small difference the fretboard wood makes is too small to worry about compared to the pickups, pickup placement, strings, and the rig you play through.
 
#37
It's more of a visual difference, very little to no sonic difference, IME. I used to prefer maple's look and feel over rosewood, and the whiter the better. Now I like rosewood on tinted maple. My SR has the only maple board in my stash of instruments, and it has turned to a dirty grey color over the years...
 
#39
FretlessMainly said:
This has been debated here ad infinitum
Click to expand...

YES!!! And no-one's opinion EVER seems to be swayed by someone else's input.

You'd be more likely to convince someone that you saw Bigfoot, than to get them to believe you can hear a difference when switching fretboard woods.

Bassman7PM said:
Define "sounds Better?" Quite honestly try to get a hold of similar basses but both with different fretboards. I've had one Lakland 55-01 with a rosewood board and one with a maple board. Same MK1 setup and both with Alder bodies and they sounded nothing the same. I also use the same S.I.T. Power Wound Nickels and again totally different tone. But that's just my opinion. To me the rosewound has a rounder darker tonality when in the Maple has this piano very vibrant attack. But again like I said its my opinion.
Click to expand...

That mirrors my experience: same strings, same bass design, same rig etc etc... but for me, the deciding factor is when I go into the higher register, a maple fretboard cuts thru a loud band better, where w/ RW it's like someone unplugged me. YES, I can get warm and mellow out of RW easier if that's the sound I want, but I like to play all over the fretboard and still be heard. So MAPLE is my preference.
 
#40
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