Markbass Megathread PART 3

[vision]

It's not that I ever drove the LMII or F1 to clip at all, but I could tell I was pushing them a bit on occasion... that little bit of tightness in the deep bass. I never came close to that in the same rooms with the SD800, and the nature of the low end seems to extend at least 5-10 hz below both the F1 and the LMII when you really start wumping it, at least when you are using a large cab that can reproduce the wump at volume.

+1...that 5-10 hz may be it, abd why the SD800 just seems to reproduce notes on the E and B string without breaking a sweat at all...

I'm like you with the low end though, I love the slight compression that I get with the LMII. I never play a gig and wish that I had "more" lows!

 

[GCool]

I want to play some mark bass at GC in Nashville....... The f1 head was DEAD on the floor. hmmmm I was a lill scared about that. so I put my $ in to a GK head!

 

[KJung]

I want to play some mark bass at GC in Nashville....... The f1 head was DEAD on the floor. hmmmm I was a lill scared about that. so I put my $ in to a GK head!

Your loss

Edit: Just doggin' ya... GK's are wonderful.

 

[vision]

I want to play some mark bass at GC in Nashville....... The f1 head was DEAD on the floor. hmmmm I was a lill scared about that. so I put my $ in to a GK head!

That sucks, but I wouldn't let that one experience scare you away from Markbass...considering the ramp up in production to get product in the GC's across the country, there have been suprisingly few reports of malfunctions with these...and I know there's a ton of MB gear out there now!

 

[phat daddy]

Not to get off topic, because I'm very interested in the differences between the MB heads, but is anyone using an LMII to drive a 6x10 rig? I was reluctant but I just bought a 104HF to go with my CMD 102P. I'm very pleased with the result. I know people drive 2x10, 3x10, and 4x10 rigs with the LMII, but with 6x10s you can really see that amp flex it's muscle. It's truly a thing to behold. I thought it might be a little too much surface area for that head to cover convincingly, but the low end is immense and the volumes capable are astounding. I think the 500 watt specification is very conservative compared to other amp manufacturer's ratings.

 

[Brad Johnson]

I want to play some mark bass at GC in Nashville....... The f1 head was DEAD on the floor. hmmmm I was a lill scared about that. so I put my $ in to a GK head!

And if a GK was dead on the floor of GC, then what?



Just asking... I've never based a purchase on what was not working on the floor of a busy store. IMO it makes no sense.

I bought a pair of Eden D210XLT cabs from GC. I had seen Eden cabs in stores with blown tweeters before, yet amazingly enough mine never blew.

 

[KJung]

Not to get off topic, because I'm very interested in the differences between the MB heads, but is anyone using an LMII to drive a 6x10 rig? I was reluctant but I just bought a 104HF to go with my CMD 102P. I'm very pleased with the result. I know people drive 2x10, 3x10, and 4x10 rigs with the LMII, but with 6x10s you can really see that amp flex it's muscle. It's truly a thing to behold. I thought it might be a little too much surface area for that head to cover convincingly, but the low end is immense and the volumes capable are astounding. I think the 500 watt specification is very conservative compared to other amp manufacturer's ratings.

It really does wump. I think the wattage is very honest, and my guess is, the Markbass cabs, similar to the Epifani's, are very efficient. An amp putting out a true 500 watts that isn't voiced to go super deep can push the heck out of tightly voiced and efficient cab or cabs...even six 10's IMO and IME.

I bet that's a nice sounding rig!

 

[bugbass]

+1...that 5-10 hz may be it, abd why the SD800 just seems to reproduce notes on the E and B string without breaking a sweat at all...

I'm like you with the low end though, I love the slight compression that I get with the LMII. I never play a gig and wish that I had "more" lows!

When I hit the low C on my Sadowsky at a loud gig, I know for shure I don`t regret replacing the LMII with a SD800. Lots of headroom there. My current cab is 6 ohm, but I have also tried the SD800 into 4 ohms(410+115 MB), and that was really something!

 

[DavidRavenMoon]

I've been reading this thread for a while now, but I hadn't gotten a chace to play a MarkBass... until today!

I tried a LMII though a 151HR, F1 though a CL 108, and a MINI CMD 121P. Wow, great amps! I played with the F1 the most, but I liked all of them. I didn't get to use a 5 string, or my bass for that matter, but I was quit impressed.

Time to sell the Mesa 400+ and my Trace Combo!

 

[JimmyM]

Not to get off topic, because I'm very interested in the differences between the MB heads, but is anyone using an LMII to drive a 6x10 rig? I was reluctant but I just bought a 104HF to go with my CMD 102P. I'm very pleased with the result. I know people drive 2x10, 3x10, and 4x10 rigs with the LMII, but with 6x10s you can really see that amp flex it's muscle. It's truly a thing to behold. I thought it might be a little too much surface area for that head to cover convincingly, but the low end is immense and the volumes capable are astounding. I think the 500 watt specification is very conservative compared to other amp manufacturer's ratings.

You know, I really want to like that 6-10" cab and that 3-10" combo, but 6 ohms runs me off every time. Cabinet impedance should be divisible by 4 on everything. That way it's modular and can easily be interchanged and combined. But if you run a 6 ohm cabinet, you can't even pair it with other Markbass stuff. Getting 6-10"s the way you did it is the way to go. 4-10" and 2-10", 4 ohms, 500w, that's even more wattage in the same surface area.

 

[tombowlus]

I was in Columbus yesterday, and I stopped by their GC to see what they had in stock. They had one of the combos (1x12, I think) and the newer 1x15 and 2x10. Sitting on top of this stack was an LMII and an F1. So, I grabbed a bass, and went to town comparing the two!

I found the two heads overall to sound very similar. There was no SD800 on hand, but from my previous experiences, the LMII and F1 seemed to sound more alike than do the LMII and SD800, but this may not hold up if I had all three amps on hand, playing through the same cab(s). The main difference I heard was in the low mids, with a tad more 'wool' to the LMII's low mids, and a tad more 'smooth, clear, and slightly round' coming from the F1. I love the quality feel of the knobs on the F1, too, btw! The lows did seem just a tad bit quicker on the F1 and a tad more 'punchy' on the LMII, and the high end was, I think, just a bit more open on the F1. But again, on the whole, these two were far more similar, to my ears, than they were different.

Tom.

 

[greenboy]

Cabinet impedance should be divisible by 4 on everything.

Why? It's just another choice. Incidentally, the difference in dB produced by a rig with the same speakers in 6-ohm versus those in 4-ohm is minimal, so the typical bit about "maximizing one's power amp's/head's potential" is just not that big a deal.

Arguably what's more important is balancing a load well among multiple speakers/cabs.

 

[KJung]

I was in Columbus yesterday, and I stopped by their GC to see what they had in stock. They had one of the combos (1x12, I think) and the newer 1x15 and 2x10. Sitting on top of this stack was an LMII and an F1. So, I grabbed a bass, and went to town comparing the two!

I found the two heads overall to sound very similar. There was no SD800 on hand, but from my previous experiences, the LMII and F1 seemed to sound more alike than do the LMII and SD800, but this may not hold up if I had all three amps on hand, playing through the same cab(s). The main difference I heard was in the low mids, with a tad more 'wool' to the LMII's low mids, and a tad more 'smooth, clear, and slightly round' coming from the F1. I love the quality feel of the knobs on the F1, too, btw! The lows did seem just a tad bit quicker on the F1 and a tad more 'punchy' on the LMII, and the high end was, I think, just a bit more open on the F1. But again, on the whole, these two were far more similar, to my ears, than they were different.

Tom.

Interesting again. These sound WAY different to me Very different up top, and very different mid response (as most have heard when comparing these)... and also a significantly different low end response, especially as you turn them up in a big room. The response to slap style is also very different, with the LMII being very smooth, a little forgiving, and very sweet up top, and the F1 being extremely tight, precise, and touch clinical up top... very unforgiving (similar to the SD800 with less deep low end response and less ooomph). The F1 and SD800 sound quite similar to me when A/B'd... with the primary difference being the much bigger low end of the SD800, especially as you turn it up, and a slightly more present upper mid response of the SD800. The treble response is identical, and quite different from the LMII to my ear.

I wonder if the MB cabs were adding enough of their own color to reduce the impact of the heads' voicing? There have been a few posts from TBers who have tried various heads with the MB cabs at GC and reported not hearing the differences that hit other's of us in the face with different cabs and on the gig.

However, for certain playing styles and tone goals, I could see both of these amps working reasonably well and being somewhat interchangeable, expecially with cabs and basses that don't cover the entire frequency range. That's not what I'm about though (Edit:... and of course not what you are about either!)

 

[tombowlus]

I wonder if the MB cabs were adding enough of their own color to reduce the impact of the heads' voicing?

I am suspecting that this might be the case.

 

[KJung]

I am suspecting that this might be the case.

I REALLY need to try some of these cabs. I just can't get myself to walk into GC

 

[Kosko]

I just picked up the 121P off the used section here on TB. Crazy excited! I guess there's the conclusion of getting the LMII vs. the 121P

 

[Vic]

I REALLY need to try some of these cabs. I just can't get myself to walk into GC

Meh, I love their heads, tried their cabs a few times, don't do much for me.

Tom, I'm pretty sure the MB cabs had a lot to do with whatever you're hearing, so another cab test would definitely be good.

 

[joelb79]

Well last night I had some tonal bliss with my UL410(s1)+LMII combo. The EQ setting that seems to have me all giddy for 4 hours of jamming with music was the VLE all the way up, the bass down to 10 o'clock, and some Chromes on my bass. Everything else was flat. Passive mode on the bass, both volumes up all the way, tone control didn't do much except smooth the upper mids out. For more cut I would either lower the VLE or add upper mids. Volume control was set to about 12 o'clock.

It was mellow, yet completely woody with the jazz bass punch and depth, but the tone fit the pocket perfectly for just about every song I played along with. It would not work for hard rock at all (and i don't suspect this head is great for that application at all), but for pop/top 40/Blues/Jazz it would be the perfect tone setting all night. Nice controllable and not overbearing at all, just all warm and snuggly in the pocket.

I couldn't put my bass down for hours. My wife was sitting there rolling her eyes at me.

 

[Altitude]

The EQ setting that seems to have me all giddy for 4 hours of jamming with music was the VLE all the way up

Wow - different strokes for different folks. To my ears, turning the VLE all the way up would sound like placing the amp behind a thick door and playing in the next room. I can see how that might deliver a big thumpy dub tone, but it would just kill me to miss out on the nice, clear, crisp high end this head delivers.

 

[vision]

Meh, I love their heads, tried their cabs a few times, don't do much for me.

Tom, I'm pretty sure the MB cabs had a lot to do with whatever you're hearing, so another cab test would definitely be good.

Hey Vic, can you go into more detail on why the MB cabs aren't that great? (I haven't been able to check them out yet.) I've seen a bunch of people that didn't care for them, but I haven't seen a review or reasons why they aren't great. I know they use B&C speakers like the Epifani S1 line, so is there a problem with the tweeter/crossover? Or is it with the construction of the boxes? Is there an overall quality issue or moreso a design flaw(s)?