Double Bass Small combo amp vs powered speaker

[drurb]

I think the [Invalid or Expired Link Removed] (okay, 30.87 Hz)... anyway, keep in mind the old physics principle:

You can have only two of the following three in a speaker system:

1) Extended low-frequency response
2) Small size
3) Efficiency

 

[LHbassist]

With all the sine wave measurements, power handling ratings, and the brilliant designers and their science and knowledge...there is something here that has not really been addressed. HOW does the string bass YOU own and play SOUND through a particular speaker combination....regardless of the theory behind the amp/cab?

All I know is, I LOVED what I heard come out of a JBL EON 15, and my GK MB 150 is a nice compromise- and yeah, it falls short in a few areas. At the end of the gig, when I'm tired, and still have an hour and a half drive home, sometimes in blizzard conditions, at that point I don't care if I heard a roll off below 50 hz.

I STILL want to hear my bass through a NEW Mackie SRM450 v2. Neo- 40 pounds. about 450-500 bucks. Full range, biamped- I think these are at least 400 watts. That's a LOT more power and fidelity than a GK MB can deliver.
There's got to be a reason why Larry Grenadier specifies a Mackie in his road gig requirements.

 

[Ric Vice]

With all the sine wave measurements, power handling ratings, and the brilliant designers and their science and knowledge...there is something here that has not really been addressed. HOW does the string bass YOU own and play SOUND through a particular speaker combination....regardless of the theory behind the amp/cab?

This is a very good point, and ultimately that’s what all of us do. Personally, I’ve save a great deal of money, by reading posts on here on Talkbass, and consulting with members like Durb, FDeck, PB+J and others, but in the end you go with your own ears, and I don't think anyone here would disagree with that.

All I know is, I LOVED what I heard come out of a JBL EON 15, and my GK MB 150 is a nice compromise- and yeah, it falls short in a few areas. At the end of the gig, when I'm tired, and still have an hour and a half drive home, sometimes in blizzard conditions, at that point I don't care if I heard a roll off below 50 hz.

Among the different amplifiers I’ve owned, the GK MBE was one of the least pleasing sounding amplifiers I’ve owned. I think that the MBS sounds so good because it's EQ voicing is better for DB, IMHO, IME, so from the standpoint of portability, decent sound, and
construction, the GK MBS that you own is a great amplifier.

I STILL want to hear my bass through a NEW Mackie SRM450 v2. Neo- 40 pounds. about 450-500 bucks. Full range, biamped- I think these are at least 400 watts. That's a LOT more power and fidelity than a GK MB can deliver.

I’d have to play them side by side at a gig to really get a good handle on it, but based on my recent experiences using a QSC K 8, I would think the JBL EON 15 would be a good combination, provided you had a decent pre amp, like the Headway EDB-1, but that’s going to cost you an additional $300.00. From just the weight perspective, I'd prefer something like a QSC K 10, but there more expensive.

There's got to be a reason why Larry Grenadier specifies a Mackie in his road gig requirements.

Larry Grenadier uses a Schoeps CMC6 with a MK41 capsule, together with a RNP preamp into the Mackie, so his total system is very high end. In his particular case, the Mackie is just the tip of the iceberg, and something that’s easy to rent on the road.
In most situations, he is going into a decent house system, that will reproduce the full range of the instrument, captured by the Schoeps Mic and Really Nice Pre Amp. He uses the Mackie to hear himself onstage, where the proximity effect of his basses natural acoustics are also heard.

 

[drurb]

This is a very good point, and ultimately that’s what all of us do. Personally, I’ve save a great deal of money, by reading posts on here on Talkbass, and consulting with members like Durb, FDeck, PB+J and others, but in the end you go with your own ears, and I don't think anyone here would disagree with that.

Thank you, Ric. Well stated and absolutely true. I sure would never suggest that one buy a cab based on specs alone. Specs can get you into the ballpark of options before you audition cabs. Specs can even help you to avoid pulling the trigger on a cab even when it sounds good to you in one setting because they can be informative regarding its performance in other settings. Sadly, as I mentioned here, objective and meaningful tests of such cabs are few and far between. More than once I've thought of starting a business and doing it right... Oh well, my day job keeps getting in the way.

 

[61pollmann]

The problem with specs is that they don't tell you everything. You can have two cabinets that are both rated to 40hz on the bottom, but you need to know the response curve. One might be flat to 40hz, and the other may be down 12db. An unintended result of this might be that room interactions might be eliminated. When I use my bigger cabinet, I usually have to use the HPF on my Focus head. When you play a 40hz E on the Gallien Krueger, you're mostly hearing 80hz first harmonic.

 

[pbasswil]

The problem with specs is that they don't tell you everything. You can have two cabinets that are both rated to 40hz on the bottom, but you need to know the response curve. One might be flat to 40hz, and the other may be down 12db. An unintended result of this might be that room interactions might be eliminated. When I use my bigger cabinet, I usually have to use the HPF on my Focus head. When you play a 40hz E on the Gallien Krueger, you're mostly hearing 80hz first harmonic.

Right.

Thing is, the average non-sound person is going to assume that if their cabs can't produce the fundamentals of their lowest notes, that the sound is "deficient", or incomplete.

This is as good a place as any to explain to those folks that that's not so.

a) Human hearing extrapolates the missing fundamental. Having it present or not doesn't effect one's ability to hear the pitch.

b) It's not inherently _better_ to have available the lows that can reproduce the fundamentals of our lowest bass notes. Rather: having deeper versus shallower extension into the sub freq's are merely different sounds/timbres.

c) As someone already mentioned, there are practical drawbacks to having really low frequencies bouncing around on a stage.

For the most part, I want my bass's on stage "lows" to impact mostly in the octave between 100hz and 200hz (I call it "whump.") A tad lower than that is ok, but below 75hz is usually best left to the PA. You can roll that stuff off your amp, and everybody's happy.