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MarkBass - worth the price?

#3
I've heard so many claims to this or that with MarkBass that I simply just don't hear upon trying them myself. Maybe it's the cabs...maybe it's the heads, but tho they sound nice enough and clean tone, they sound kinda flat to me. Not knocking, just personal experience... The voicing filters at the end of the eq section are nice tho, and do help the tone.
 
#4
Well, I sure like mine. I get a great tone in a mix. Yes, they sound "flat," but they aren't really flat, neither is any amp I've tried. But, they make my bass sound like itself, so it's a good place to start. I think in a store situation you don't get to really hear how any Markbass head or cab sounds in a mix. It is pretty amazing how the tone you think you don't like sounds perfect in a mix. The VLE and VPF filters can work wonders in small doses if you need to tweak the knobs, but frankly I've found I don't need much. I usually run my Little Mark III head with the eq knobs at noon except for some roll-off of high mids, or just turn the VLE to about noon (but it's to account for playing with my fingernails). Sometimes I boost a tad of bottom. My 151P cab never complains, and gives me plenty of punch. I also have a 121H combo that has a tighter low-end sound, great tone for lower volume gigs. I just got a second 151P, so I'm waitning for an outdoor gig, it's awesome with 2x15 at home so far.

I like the weight of Markbass stuff, and I feel like it's extra good quality at that weight. Very solid, excellent build. I wish they would do away with the piezos, though, and use all compression drivers when a tweet is needed. I get a warm tone from my usual rig with the LMIII and one 151P cab. I can also get it to sound hifi. Some folks don't like the yellow and black look, but I just happen to like it very much. There is a "Markbass tone" that I can't really define in words, but it's a new and very nice sound to my ears. This is the best rig I've owned to date. I also think Markbass is reasonably priced, considering the quality.

All just my opinion, of course.
 
#5
I love my F1 because of it's size, weight, power, relatively simple control layout, etc. I just find it easy to get a good tone out of it, and it is a non issue to carry it to virtually any situation.
 
#7
Tony G said:
I love my F1 because of it's size, weight, power, relatively simple control layout, etc. I just find it easy to get a good tone out of it, and it is a non issue to carry it to virtually any situation.
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+1. Love my F1 too. Light, loud and fast.

Was never a huge fan of their cabs until I heard the NY 604. sweet little cab. Now I have a nY122 and love it. Really is everything I was looking for in a cab and matches up so well with the NY 122.

All that being said. There are so many great options out there it's almost overwhelming. If you are happy with hartke why not play that? Hartke makes some great sounding stuff especially where they are priced. If you think Markbass sounds better then I guess it's worth the price. Looks like it is to a lot of people around here.
 
#9
I tried very hard to like Markbass stuff. I owned several pieces: CMD102P combo, LM Tube 800, SD800, SA450, F500, traveler 112 cab.

There is something going in in the midrange that I do not like in ALL of the Markbass heads I've tried. It's almost like a very slight distortion of certain mid range frequencies that, at least for me, made it very difficult to dial in a squeaky clean tone. If you are going for tight and clean, they might leave you disappointed. IME, they just don't do this tone as well as others such as Genz, etc. Your results may vary.
 
#11
I dont like their cabs but I love my LMII. I run it with my Ampeg 410HLF and its got power for days and only weighs 6 pounds. I like the fact that it can be very flat and allow my bass to be fairly "un-colored". I can then color it to taste with the EQ or the filters, but most of the time I run it flat.
 
#13
jgroh said:
I dont like their cabs but I love my LMII. I run it with my Ampeg 410HLF and its got power for days and only weighs 6 pounds. I like the fact that it can be very flat and allow my bass to be fairly "un-colored". I can then color it to taste with the EQ or the filters, but most of the time I run it flat.
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I love my LMII for all of the above reasons. I run it with an Epifani 112 UL, and have nothing but great results; also ran it with an Epi 410 UL for a while. Light, reliable, does what it needs to do. Got mine pre-owned here on TB for a good price, and it's totally worth it.

I'm not a big fan of the Markbass cabs, either.
 
#16
krstko said:
I would pick Hartke over Markbass any day :) Markbass is just .. hard to explain .. withou soul.
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I think it has more to do with the player when it comes to soul. Plenty of soul coming from my Markbass head AND cab.

You should hear my LMIII head through the '68 Ampeg 810 I get to play at a jam every week. Wow! Also, took both my 151P cabs over there one night and compared them with my LMIII to the VR + 810. Both equally as good in sound. The Markbass rig was more aggressive if needed, and could sound tighter. The Ampeg rig could reach more SPL, but certainly didn't have any more "soul." Again, IMO.

Nothing wrong with Markbass cabs. I've been able to dial in great tones through mine.

I agree, more playing and less analyzing. I haven't played a rig yet that I couldn't get to sound good by messing with it.
 
#17
Markbass stuff sounds good...
Sounds great for the size. My rig LMIII with 210 front ported cab. It is not quite enough to play with a rock a band but just about anything else... fine.
It is not the best sounding amp I ever owned but it sounds good. I love the weight and size.

Is it worth the bucks?... sure!

PS. I am selliing my LMIII and buying a Genz Benz 9.0 shuttle. I need the head room for rock gigs. LMIII 500watts seems like a lot but I am pushing my amp to the brink to keep up with acoustic drums and electric guitars... not ear splitting loud, but loud
 
#18
Tijuana Tex said:
Give me the low down, guys. I've tried them, I like them. But my Hartke is pretty good too. Blasphemy? No, no.
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Absolutely not. "I like it" is good enough reason to have anything IMO. So long as whatever you have makes you happy.

I just like both of them just the same.

So tell me - What's so great about MarkBass?
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Well, nothing... at least not compared to anything else out there on the market. Like everyone else they have some really nice products and, their products have particular characteristics. Those characteristics appeal to some and not to others.

I have an F500 and a Club 121. All I can do is tell you why I bought them.

First part of the decision process... combo vs. discrete head and cabs. Combo = easier to deal with... separate head and cabs = a bit more versatile and potentially lighter although... the CMD 121P is pretty light. Anyhow, weight is a big concern for me and, I can be a bit fickle so if I change my mind about the speaker, then I'm not married to an amp as I would be with a combo.

The F500 appealed to me because it has 2 semi parametric EQs. While a fully parametric would have been even better, a semi parametric is still very useful for making precise tweaks to your sound. Great for making the final adjustments to suit a specific room, etc. It's under 5 pounds so it's super light.

Sound wise the amp itself is not perfectly flat, it has a slight rolloff of the high frequencies. It has about a 1.75 dB bump at 250 Hz. It's down 0.75 dB at 10 kHz and by 20 kHz it's down 5 dB. So, out of the box set up "flat" to my ears (with my bass) it didn't sound quite as harsh as some of other heads I tried. Markbass' heads are probably known for their "VLE" (Vintage Loudspeaker Emulator which is basically a variable lowpass filter with a steepness of about 10 dB per octave) and "VPF" (Variable Preshape Filter). Maxed out the VPF feature provides a broad boost centered at about 40 Hz, an extreme 28 dB notch at 400 Hz, and about a broad boost centered around 7.5 kHz of about 7.5 dB.

Without going to the EQ, and using just the VLE and VPF filters you can get an interesting variety of sounds. I've experimented with attenuating the highs via the tweeter attenuator on the Club 121, and doing it via the amp and what I like is the tweeter attenuator at unity (no attenuation) and using the VPF and VLE knobs together. That still allows me to hear a little bit of "air" and "clarity" but the predominant sounds I get is fundamental (works nicely for blues).

Bass Gear Magazine has a very nice review of the F500 in issue 5 although the technical review has mislabeled all of the graphs from the Audio Precision. The correct labeling should be as follows:

Figure G - High Mid sweep (no problem there)
Figure H - Dynamic Response not treble sweep
Figure I - VPF not VLE.
Figure J - High frequency EQ not VPF
Figure K - Dynamic Response pushing the limiter not dynamic response
Figure L - VLE filter not dynamic response pushing the limiter

I'm guessing they made a simple mistake in their publishing software. I can't imagine someone hasn't pointed it out already but I would think that it would be pretty easy for them to update so maybe not. I'll send them a message just in case. Great review though. They have reviews of some other MB heads in other issues as well.

http://www.bassgearmag.com

The Club 121... I liked that it had a compression driver with a dispersion horn instead of a piezo tweeter. I really liked that it was only a smidge over 27 pounds, and I also like that can be used in a wedge configuration if desired.

YMMV of course.

Cheers, Joe
 
#20
Go to a GC that has a Mesa Walkabout, they all have the MarkBass stuff. Set both flat, no EQ at all, and tell me what you hear. I know what I bought after hearing everything in the place. To my ear it was not even a fair fight, and that was in the middle of Wankerville (GC).

az
 

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