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pickups or preamp - warwick content

Pickups or preamp?

  • Pickups

    Votes: 5 50.0%

  • Preamp

    Votes: 5 50.0%
  • Total voters
    10
F

Fishbrain

Dec 8, 2000
1,910
4
38
England, Liverpool
www.mattlawtonbass.com
Disclosures
Endorsing Artist: Warwick Bass and Amp
#1
I've got a warwick FNA Jazzman 5. It's currently just got the stock MEC's and stock pre. I wanna upgrade it, mainly so its got a bit more mid presence and possibly a little more clarity in the upper and lower register. would i benefit more from upgrading my pups or pre? also, any recomendations?
 
#4
Personally, I like passive for its simplicity.

I have it wired Vol, Vol, tone.

I can blend the pups and roll off some treble If I need to. Together with my fingers, I can get a huge range of different tones at the bass.

Any further EQ manipulation I want I can do at my amp.

I select the pickups I like for their tone. In this case I have Bartolini 9CBJD1's. They're very nice. Big low end, tight mids and smooth highs.

All an on board pre would give me is maybe a hotter output....that's what the gain knob on my amp is for :D

:)
 
#5
Changing the MEC preamp is the most common mod people do to Warwicks. A popular choice for rock players is the Aguilar OBP3 or something from Seymour Duncan Basslines. Almost everyone that does this mod notes better control over their knobs and increased growl. Other people sometimes go with EMG, Bartolini, and other smaller brands when they really want to define a specific sound.

You can decide to go with that first and see how you like it...Changing pickups afterwards is always easy to do.
 
#7
Having done both and then gone back to the MEC pickups, my vote is to start with the preamp unless you know exactly what pickups will work best with your bass to give you the sound you're looking for.

By starting with the preamp you can look for one that's feature-centered around the part of your tone you want to tweak, i.e. in your case 3 band as opposed to 2 to give you mid flexibility and preferably with switchable mid frequencies or even a variable mid control depending on how wacky you want to get.

J.
 
#8
for jazzman, i recommand duncan pre and pups.
duncan pups are the most recommanded stuff for warwick mod and duncan pre is a kind of stock pre for jazzman years ago.

in my experience, i have a 90's thumb NT with Bart pups and MEC pre.
and MEC pre's broken so i wanted to replace it to aggie's (but out of stock)
now, i'm gonna change my pre to audere 4 band pre!
i'll write about that in a few days...:)
 
#9
I have a stock '92 Thumb NT. I sometimes feel the sound is somewhat compressed - is that caused by the preamp?
I'd like to get a warmer, more vintage sound. I've been using a stock Jazz, which has the right sound for my current blues/R&B trio, but I miss the playability of the Warwick (changing basses is like step out of a new BMW into a '62 Chevy - the Chevy can be kinda cool, but it's much more hard work and it's really only good for cruisin').
The passive Bart approach is attractive.
At the moment I'm running bass boost (half way) and treble cut (half way) to get closer to the sound of my Jazz Bass.
 
#11
ToneRanger said:
I have a stock '92 Thumb NT. I sometimes feel the sound is somewhat compressed - is that caused by the preamp?
I'd like to get a warmer, more vintage sound. I've been using a stock Jazz, which has the right sound for my current blues/R&B trio, but I miss the playability of the Warwick (changing basses is like step out of a new BMW into a '62 Chevy - the Chevy can be kinda cool, but it's much more hard work and it's really only good for cruisin').
The passive Bart approach is attractive.
At the moment I'm running bass boost (half way) and treble cut (half way) to get closer to the sound of my Jazz Bass.
Click to expand...


I can certainly recommend the passive Barts for a nice smooth warm tone ;)

...for the record, I tried some Seymour Duncan Classic Stacks on my Bubinga Corvette. Had them in for three or so months.

Lots of people love Seymour Duncan gear, but they just didn't do it for me - I much prefer the Barts.

That's the thing about tone - it's very personal :)
 

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