recommend me some budget friendly cabinet and head combinations!

[bon viesta]

seriously man, i've been defeated. or rather, i've been confronted by the fact that speakers are very tricky, and it's not so simple to find a good match. sorry for the spam as of lately, but i don't want to keep my thread ideas cooped up in my head forever.

anyways, cabinet and head combinations. i'm looking for something sort of vintagey, but not in the traditional sense. not like your average fender clone. take a look at the very vague idea painted by the pictures below. powerful, probably ported, within the 0(haha) to around 600 or maybe 700 bucks range. and of course with a matching head to boot that isn't terribly expensive either. i probably only need 500 watts of solid state power, wherever i go. my plan in case of none of the recommendations really getting on with me is a fliptops.net b15s cabinet and a micro vr fliptop head.

also, i should probably mention my vintage obsession has a little more to it than just me wanting old looking things. i'm completing a 1964 precision bass build in the next month or so, the neck is just about here. so i was wanting to have an amp to match with it (roughly) because i really plan on making it my one and only workhorse bass. it would be a crying shame to have an ugly match between two musical instruments when i could have put much more thought into it and found the best possible match i could.

though, what would be way worse than an ugly match is a good looking match that is dysfunctional. seriously, thank you to all the speaker aficionados for both being patient with my childish lines of questioning, and also actually trying to give me help and be as good of a resource of information as possible.

 

[MattZilla]

What's wrong with the micro vr stack?

 

[bon viesta]

What's wrong with the micro vr stack?

i'd rather have something a little bit bigger, a little more substantial i guess. those guys are tiny and i'd need two of them to have 4 ohms.

as of right now, the traynor cabinets and hartke 410 cabinets seem pleasing to me. both are ported, very simplistic looking and good reviews. though the traynor is pretty expensive, so i think it's off the table.

 

[Mushroo]

If you want to go full retro you need tubes, friend.

 

[bon viesta]

If you want to go full retro you need tubes, friend.

too bad every 50+ watt tube amplifier head is about 1000+ bucks.

 

[Alex Xander]

i'd rather have something a little bit bigger, a little more substantial i guess. those guys are tiny and i'd need two of them to have 4 ohms.

Have you played through one, or through something similar? Do you know how loud they are? Most importantly do you have a realistic gauge on how much volume you need for your intended purpose?
I have a feeling that based on your experience and your current rig being a small guitar amp, any decent bass amp you buy is going to knock your socks off.

 

[forrestlaw]

I gigged a Rumble 500 combo for several years and it was great with the vintage switch activated. If prefer separates they made a Rumble 500 head that you can likely find used and whatever your preferred driver size for a matching cab.

Something else to consider would be a Rumble Stage 800. Lots of sounds hidden in there. I'm not sure I'd like it as it has way more choices/features than I want, but lots of people really like the different amp and cab models it offers. Plus, built-in effects and a tuner.

Last thing that comes to mind is an Ampeg PF500. These show up used fairly regularly and would be pretty cheap. Then, just choose the 1x15, 2x10, or 4x10 Portaflex cab to go with it.

 

[The Petro]

I picked up a Hartke TX600 new for $329 from Sam ash. Not vintage looking, but is nice. paired up good with the 410 xl.

 

[bon viesta]

Have you played through one, or through something similar? Do you know how loud they are? Most importantly do you have a realistic gauge on how much volume you need for your intended purpose?
I have a feeling that based on your experience and your current rig being a small guitar amp, any decent bass amp you buy is going to knock your socks off.

yeah, i certainly hope it will. i don't know how loud they are, i've never played through one, and i have a rough estimate of my required volume. not that much. but, i want enough to be able to hang with someone if need be. solid state means that i need a lot more clean headroom to be safe, as opposed to tubes which can be overdriven a little and be usable. isn't that how that works?

 

[bon viesta]

I picked up a Hartke TX600 new for $329 from Sam ash. Not vintage looking, but is nice. paired up nice with the 410 xl nice

i wonder if anyone still makes those solid state heads with the little briefcase-esque headboxes. think ashdown solid state heads, or sunn coliseums. here's a picture of what style i'm looking for in a kinda modern cabinet design. hartke seems to emulate it in a pretty cool way.

 

[MattZilla]

i'd rather have something a little bit bigger, a little more substantial i guess. those guys are tiny and i'd need two of them to have 4 ohms

ya, get the full stack. They come up used for under $700 somewhat regularly.

 

[bon viesta]

ya, get the full stack. They come up used for under $700 somewhat regularly.

for the price of those two guys i can pretty much get a big traynor cabinet, which is what i really really want out of the selections here. i know they sound great but as of right now i don't think i want to do the little 2x10s.

 

[jthisdell]

Vintage style instruments work perfectly fine (and arguably better) through modern amplifiers. Vintage amps were very limiting and good ones very expensive. If you care about toan put most of your money in a quality cab (think Berg, Barefaced, Fearless, Mesa, etc) and lesser funds on a used class D head. If you get a vintage sounding amp and cab you are very limited but it is easy to get a quality cab to sound vintage. For instance a ToneHammer does vintage very well but is very versatile.

 

[Kipp Harrington]

Rumble 500 C, Rumble 500 head with Rumble 115 (or 410 cab,.. the 410 is quite heavy, though) or Rumble Stage 800 should check all your boxes. Hard to beat Rumble price and sound for what you're looking for.

 

[Mushroo]

too bad every 50+ watt tube amplifier head is about 1000+ bucks.

I've definitely seen used Ampeg PF50T's or Traynors for under $1k. Maybe you can get lucky and find a cheap V4B on your local Craigslist.

 

[jthisdell]

Whatever you get, find a Shure Vocal Master to go with it.

 

[bon viesta]

Whatever you get, find a Shure Vocal Master to go with it.

oh boy, i've heard a lot in passing about stuff concerning master volume knobs. do they come standard these days?

 

[ardgedee]

Where will you be playing and who will you be playing with? If it's mostly at home and studio practice, you probably don't need a particularly efficient cabinet; something old and cheap can help you put more money into a good amp that can see you through to the cab you want to build.

If I were you I'd get a clean hi-fi sounding amp and experiment with preamp-in-a-pedal stomboxes (like the kind Sushibox makes). That will be a cheaper and more efficient way to find your sound, and get you into some tones that are going to otherwise be difficult to match without having a lot of cash, like old Laney or Hiwatt stacks. Each will only cost a couple hundred bucks and you can swap them for other pedals to save even more cash. Then when you find your sound, it'll be easier to focus your next amp and cabinet purchases.

...and I really hope you do get into building speaker cabs. You've asked a lot of good questions and you seem to have learned quite a bit, and hopefully buying a working system will help take the pressure off getting your first build perfect on the first try.

 

[bon viesta]

Where will you be playing and who will you be playing with? If it's mostly at home and studio practice, you probably don't need a particularly efficient cabinet; something old and cheap can help you put more money into a good amp that can see you through to the cab you want to build.

If I were you I'd get a clean hi-fi sounding amp and experiment with preamp-in-a-pedal stomboxes (like the kind Sushibox makes). That will be a cheaper and more efficient way to find your sound, and get you into some tones that are going to otherwise be difficult to match without having a lot of cash, like old Laney or Hiwatt stacks. Each will only cost a couple hundred bucks and you can swap them for other pedals to save even more cash. Then when you find your sound, it'll be easier to focus your next amp and cabinet purchases.

...and I really hope you do get into building speaker cabs. You've asked a lot of good questions and you seem to have learned quite a bit, and hopefully buying a working system will help take the pressure off getting your first build perfect on the first try.

even if i get a perfect rig out of this, something i'll always be happy to use, i still want to learn a little about electronics and such just so i can always have a hand in my bass gear. my dad does that heavy lifting, with soldering and wiring and all this and that, but when i'm an adult and need to do that stuff on my own i really want to actually know how.

 

[bon viesta]

also i like how when i start asking for recommendations for efficient, ported cabinets that are super loud, i have guys warning me to not be too loud and how i don't really need efficient cabinets when the opposite is all i would get when i asked about fender style cabinets. i can't please you people!!!

no, i'm just joking. both sides are true. i don't want to have a useless cabinet that can't gig for its life, and i also don't want a rig that'll knock all the crap off my shelves if the knob is a few millimeters off of 1.