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Mesa Subway Bass DI-Preamp

#301
agedhorse said:
With the common theme being along these lines, both in this thread as well as numerous PM's over the past few months, we really have been listening to your comments and suggestions... Your thoughts and comments were taken seriously and are appreciated in the interest of bringing a more "real world" useful product to you players.
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The low noise floor of this unit is particularly important with acoustic instruments. The sound clarity of the demo brought a smile to my face. Nice distinct tones, no smearing. Well thought out layout. Nice feature set and specs.

It should do well. :)
 
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#302
This definitely looks, and more importantly sounds like a home run to me. I'm not sure there's anything else out there with this kind of studio quality, simple layout, and well thought-out feature set. With great new products like this coming right on the heels of the Subway line's success, I have no doubt that Mesa will be bringing us lots of ways to get over the close-out of the WA and Carbine product lines. :)
 
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#303
agedhorse said:
This is probably fine, if the noise level is good then you are good. On the IPR amp, you can probably lower the input sensitivity by 3dB and improve the noise floor a little bit, but I doubt it's necessary.
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Ah great - no noise issues at all so I think I'm good. In fact even with the treble on full I can't hear any hiss or anything, which I love (I hate it when parts of the EQ aren't that usable because of noise etc).
 
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#304
Ok so...yeah. You should have your endorsers take that thing onto a big stage and play with it to see how it can drive your sound through the a pa and not as part of "your rig" I think you might be missing a market segment that has a real legitimate need
That thing, or something just like it is going to sit on top of every rig I ever use on a big stage right where my Avalon U5 used to sit. If I can't get that in a DI, I'll go back to my old rack to run my cab and that will just be an $800 DI.

Thanks for pulling that 30 year old thorn out of paw. It's a good day
 
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#306
Going ampless tonight. Sorry for the bad lighting.

Active jazz on the subway and ns nxt bass on the rosette
 

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#308
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#312
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#316
bucephylus said:
How do you like the Rosette? I certainly could get interested in some of those features; but, the depth dimension at 5.5" is just a bit too wide to fit on the Nano.
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I like it a lot. It provides everything that I need to get my NS NXT sounding the way that I want it to. When used in conjunction with the Mesa Subway D800 the combination of the two make it very easy for me to switch back and forth from upright to bass guitar, basically immediately. I use either the mute switches on the D800 and Rosette, or I just use the volume controls on the instruments to silence the one thats not being played. It sits on top of the D800 when I'm using it so I don't have much use for the foot switches but thats ok too.

I don't see much talk over in the big Mesa Subway thread about the Aux input on the D800, but I have found it to be incredibly useful. A lot of other amps you can go in through the effects loop but that means that the front end gets cut off. Others use something like one of the tone bone pedals but those go into the amp front end and you have to EQ the Upright around the settings for the Bass Guitar. The way I am running mine it is literally two discrete signal paths that are attached to the same power amp.
 
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#317
monkeyland said:
I like it a lot. It provides everything that I need to get my NS NXT sounding the way that I want it to. When used in conjunction with the Mesa Subway D800 the combination of the two make it very easy for me to switch back and forth from upright to bass guitar, basically immediately. I use either the mute switches on the D800 and Rosette, or I just use the volume controls on the instruments to silence the one thats not being played. It sits on top of the D800 when I'm using it so I don't have much use for the foot switches but thats ok too.

I don't see much talk over in the big Mesa Subway thread about the Aux input on the D800, but I have found it to be incredibly useful. A lot of other amps you can go in through the effects loop but that means that the front end gets cut off. Others use something like one of the tone bone pedals but those go into the amp front end and you have to EQ the Upright around the settings for the Bass Guitar. The way I am running mine it is literally two discrete signal paths that are attached to the same power amp.
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Right, there are a now lot of different ways to approach amplification.

I happen to be doing a lot of ampless gigs; so, I've actually focused on the pedal board, and then just running that into a power amp When I need a cab on stage. Of course, I can also run into the front end of a traditional head; but, that would be stacking preamps. So, I'm just trying to focus on the pedal board; because I can feed that voicing into either an FOH or a cab via power amp. Juggling different rigs was distracting.

So, it sounds like the Rosette isn't really as appropriate for bass guitar. Still some of those features sure would be nice on the Subway. Boost footswitch and HPF for certain, if we could have those in the Subway footprint. That would be my wish list.

I haven't had an amplified upright gig in a while. When I do, I've actually continued to have the best result running my Underwood into an ART Tube MP, of all things. Amplifying upright is pretty artsy IME. Like you, I gigged a solid body, in my case a Carruthers, for quite a while; but went back to a carved instrument, because I prefer that tone. Amplification for the Carruthers was a whole lot more similar to bass guitar than the Underwood/bass viol. But, for higher volume upright gigs, the solid body instruments are essential. I don't have that covered any more...
 
#318
bucephylus said:
Right, there are a now lot of different ways to approach amplification.

I happen to be doing a lot of ampless gigs; so, I've actually focused on the pedal board, and then just running that into a power amp When I need a cab on stage. Of course, I can also run into the front end of a traditional head; but, that would be stacking preamps. So, I'm just trying to focus on the pedal board; because I can feed that voicing into either an FOH or a cab via power amp. Juggling different rigs was distracting.

So, it sounds like the Rosette isn't really as appropriate for bass guitar. Still some of those features sure would be nice on the Subway. Boost footswitch and HPF for certain, if we could have those in the Subway footprint. That would be my wish list.

I haven't had an amplified upright gig in a while. When I do, I've actually continued to have the best result running my Underwood into an ART Tube MP, of all things. Amplifying upright is pretty artsy IME. Like you, I gigged a solid body, in my case a Carruthers, for quite a while; but went back to a carved instrument, because I prefer that tone. Amplification for the Carruthers was a whole lot more similar to bass guitar than the Underwood/bass viol. But, for higher volume upright gigs, the solid body instruments are essential. I don't have that covered any more...
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I actually was testing this a little bit yesterday. Running my Jazz bass into the Rosette and then into the aux in on the subway amp, I can get basically the same sound as I do running into the front of the Subway amp. The difference is that I lean on the subway amp and Subway DI's voicing control pretty heavily for Bass Guitar.

The Rosette does have features that can be used effectively for Bass Guitar, but considering that Andy has heavily hinted at a Subway DI+ coming out, and mentioned foot switches, it sounds like that would really be what you are looking for.

And speaking of the solid body upright thing. Since I started using the Rosette, the NS NXT sounds the most acoustic that it ever has for me. Previously I've used Baggs Para DI and Fishman Platinum Pro EQ/DI.
 
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#319
Bit of an update at my end:

Actual stomp boxes have shoved the Subway off the end of the pedal board; and so, I’m looking around for a different way to set the Preamp on stage.

Since there are actually no stomp switches, it seems to me that mounting the Subway Preamp on a mic stand clip widget might be pretty cool. So, I’ve been looking around for a portable mounting clip. I’ve ordered this one and will see this weekend if there are any cable access issues:

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00V3A5WRC/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o00_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

Anyone else mounting Subway Preamp on the mic stand or music stand? I’m all ears for other suggestions, and will post up after receiving the widget I ordered.

Edit: I had to cancel that original order and went with the one in the revised link above. You have to be careful with the specifications for sizing. The Subway is a bit smaller than an IPad Mini, but a little larger than the iPhone. Kind of an odd size. Again, will update when I get this widget.
 
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