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Double Bass Sansamp Para Driver DI for DB amplification

#82
Now I'm convinced I have the swiss army knife preamp combination I've been seeking all these years: Paradriver -> TC Electronics BodyRex -> Broughton HPF

Last night a had a rehearsal in a different band's practice space, and I ran my preamp through a Peavy TNT 15" Combo (effects return). I was able to dial in "my amplified sound" in about a song and a half in a room I'd never played in before, with a drummer I'd never played with. My cabs are sealed 2x10's, so I thought a marginal 15 was going to be a nightmare. Bumped up mids, bumped up treble, increased to HPF, and I was in business.

I'm actually considering getting a Baby Sumo to mount on the upper deck of my board now for a power amp.
 
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#83
Progris Riport: Working with the FC-equipped travel bass and finally understanding more about what i am dealing with, and now getting a good usable sound with the FDeck and ParaDriver in the FX loop. There's a funny thing about the "Air" button, though: it includes some kind of cut in the lows that always seems to make the signal sound better, but I can't find any specs on exactly what it is doing. Seems to be a closely guarded secret sauce!

EDIT: "Now getting a good useable sound". Proofreading is fundamental!
 
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#84
Chris Fitzgerald said:
Progris Riport: Working with the FC-equipped travel bass and finally understanding more about what i am dealing with, and now getting a good usable sound with the FDeck and ParaDriver in the FX loop. There's a funny thing about the "Air" button, though: it includes some kind of cut in the lows that always seems to make the signal sound better, but I can't find any specs on exactly what it is doing. Seems to be a closely guarded secret sauce!

EDIT: "Now getting a good useable sound". Proofreading is fundamental!
Click to expand...
Chris, do you mean both the sans amp and fdeck in the FX loop, or just the sans? And if both— I’m assuming you're get something better than just one of those components in the loop?

Thanks,
Dave
 
#87
Chris Fitzgerald said:
Progris Riport: Working with the FC-equipped travel bass and finally understanding more about what i am dealing with, and now getting a good usable sound with the FDeck and ParaDriver in the FX loop. There's a funny thing about the "Air" button, though: it includes some kind of cut in the lows that always seems to make the signal sound better, but I can't find any specs on exactly what it is doing. Seems to be a closely guarded secret sauce!

EDIT: "Now getting a good useable sound". Proofreading is fundamental!
Click to expand...

Funny how different players utilize different features. I find the air switch to be a tone killer in my setup! Probably a different effect with the tube emulation wide open though.

Are you running through the effects loops, or just into the return?
 
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#88
Chris Fitzgerald said:
Both in the loop. Works best for the travel bass. Will try it with the main bass on Wed.
Click to expand...

For me, I really like having the HPF on my bass so that I can adjust phase, volume, and roll-off frequency even if my location on stage is quite a piece away from the amp where my ParaDriver DI is (usually sitting next to my little AI head on top of the speaker). Since the HPF has a nice high input impedance, it's a great thing to have on the bass as the first stage in the chain in any case.
 
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#91
sean_on_bass said:
Bought a Para Driver V2 and am very impressed with it for both double bass and electric bass. Truly a magic box. Cleans up my upright bass tone in a much more pleasing way than either my Fishman Stage Platinum or Headway EDB-2. Excited to get it on a gig, kind of wondering why i didn't get one years ago at this point.
Click to expand...

I second this. I love my Paradriver and will not use anything else.
 
#92
I've had the Paradriver in my gig bag for a few years, but rarely use it -- prolly because I haven't studied it well enough to get a good result. But now, after reading this thread, I'm inspired to give it another go.

I am using the raw Erhlund Pickup (without it's preamp) direct into into my AI Coda, my focus has been on finding the best placement of the pickup on my bass, after a couple of years, I think I found that sweet spot -- it's a good bit further south and west than what Erhlund recommends...but it took for freakin ever to find because you gotta move the pickup and play again, rinse and repeat, -- it's physically and mentally exhausting because your mind cannot decide what moves sound better after 20 minutes.

So it occurs to me that fiddling with the Sansamp is an equally exhausting chore. But I just got a looper pedal -- so I'm thinking (minus the acoustic output of my bass) I'll capture my playing Ehrlund direct into the looper pedal. Then feed that into my Sansamp and fiddle with the knobs.

Is this a good approach? Chris did not mention he used a looper pedal to figure out his paradriver, so I'm assuming it was play/tweak/play/tweak.....
 
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#94
Chris Fitzgerald said:
Progris Riport: Working with the FC-equipped travel bass and finally understanding more about what i am dealing with, and now getting a good usable sound with the FDeck and ParaDriver in the FX loop. There's a funny thing about the "Air" button, though: it includes some kind of cut in the lows that always seems to make the signal sound better, but I can't find any specs on exactly what it is doing. Seems to be a closely guarded secret sauce!

EDIT: "Now getting a good useable sound". Proofreading is fundamental!
Click to expand...

Good to hear Chris! Sometimes you just find out that it’s the “secret sauce” switch. :laugh:

Since I’m also using my Kolstine Busetto out more, now that things have opened up a bit, I got a Realist Lifeline for my Busetto because I have wooden
adjusters on my travel bass. I’m really glad you didn’t have to go with the Krio.
 
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#95
Well, the looper pedal idea worked. I was able to play with the paradriver and my Fishman platinum pro and my boss 10 band graphic EQ. It might be interesting to try a pre with variable input impedance. My AI Coda has a hi/lo Z button on one of its channels, but it doesn't seem to make a huge difference with the Erhlund.

I came to the conclusion that no pedal will help you if the what's coming in sucks. What worked the best with this Erhlund pickup was my boss 10 band graphic EQ pedal. It's really ugly at 400hz and boomy at 60hz. A little lift at 3.2khz helped some with presence...but it's still not good. I can't get what I would call a "professional" sound with it. I stopped short of plugging into my digital mixer with RTA and three band parametric EQ, but my ears tell me that the signal from this pickup is jacked up all over the place. A pedal like the paradriver brings "secret sauce" for sure, but if what you're working with is cardboard... I would think that a soundman would be upset to get a signal from this pickup in an intimate concert situation...possibly even offering to stuff a SM57 in my tailpiece as a better alternative.

So I dunno about this Erhlund pickup...I've been struggling with it for way too long. Maybe it's time to get rid of it? I got better results with my little Radio Shack electret lav mic sticky puttied on top plate. The Erhlund at least taught me the value of sticky putty!

I have a fixed bridge on my bass. The realist copper head was just alright, but I sold it a student years ago. I guess I'll try a wing pickup? Or Realist soundclip?
 
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#96
When I got tired of fiddling with the Ehrlund on gigs, sometimes to no avail, I bought a used Soundclip and fiddled with it on gigs for a while. At it's best, it wasn't as good as the Ehrlumd at it's best, but it was more consistent...still fiddly, though and ultimately I just had enough. It sounds like you're on the same path.

Bridge wing pickups have never worked that well for me. If you liked the original Realist, you might consider going back to it. It is the opposy of fiddly.

Some people do get a good sound from bridge wing pickups, though. The Stat-B can also be fiddly, but might be worth a try if you're looking for hi-fi signal.

Pickups are a necessary evil.
 
#97
stefaniw80401 said:
I came to the conclusion that no pedal will help you if the what's coming in sucks.
Click to expand...
This is true. I am happy with Paradriver for some years, though I think the less naturally sounding pickup, the more it helps. I have Ehrlund for a short time, and I came to feel that if I place the Ehrlund correctly, then the Paradriver doesn't add much, and makes the sound unnecessarily artificial. So I'm using Ehrlund with the Ehrlund preamp and am very happy with it. I play mostly pizz, big band and jazz stuff. With bow, the Ehrlund sounds to me a bit on the harsh side.
To find what the Ehrlund can do, I needed to make a youtube video with many short clips of different Ehrlund positions, just to be able to sort through the 'natural EQ' differences with a clear head. I added a clip of Realist Lifeline, and Ehrlund with Sansamp as well. See here. After a few gigs, it seems that position #1 works best for pizz and usable with bow. The point of difference, to me, is that with Ehrlund, I can hear my intonation nicely, and also I can hear the rest of the band, even closed piano on a big stage, and saxophones far away from me.
 
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#98
JJ, thank you so much for that video. I can tell that took you hours to do. Your bass sounds a little better than mine with the Erhlund pickup. It's not "ta-dah!" great though is it.

I have a K&K bass max wing pickup that I got in a gear swap a few years ago. I'll try that soon. And also the revolution solo pickup is on my radar.
 
#100
It makes your action a bit higher, but the Shadow SH-965NFX a worth trying if you liked the Realist but want more highs. The output is a bit low level and t might sound better with only one foil connected. Sometimes some rubber foam in the battery adapter helps de-rattling if needed. If it works with one foil only, you have a spare one.

If you dislike the Ehrlund but might want to try a different contact mic with more upper frequency content, try the AKG C411L with its preamp (B29L, I think). Sounds better than the Ehrlund on my bass. But use the white Faber-Castell putty, not the black AKG.

And there is the Ischell if you don’t care about the complete isolation with putty every time you mount it.
 

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