The Great Bass Preamp/DI Comparison

[Erithon]

Thanks, Chris. Pretty sure a Khan is going to replace the Grace ALiX you sold me. The ALiX is incredible and I'll probably keep it for acoustic guitar and double bass, but I've come to realize that for my bass guitar I just need a DI and not a whole preamp. Something the size of the Khan, RNDI, or JDI can be mounted below my board giving me some surface area back up top.

 

[morrisonhendrix]

Yes

I'll second that. I wish I still had my Khan.

 

[Sugarbear08]

Trickfish Minnow... consider it, won't you?

 

[kringle77]

I'm loving the Khan. It makes my genzler sound and feel like I've always wished and, it's the closest to satisfied as I've ever been with a straight to the board sound……although now I'm lusting after a Neve 8801 as an all in one di solution. The khan is top shelf stuff.

 

[Erithon]

Thanks to all who have chimed in so far!

Trickfish Minnow... consider it, won't you?

It certainly has a footprint that would work, but given my plan is to mount it under the pedalboard and get away from preamp eq controls, I suspect this is not the di out I am looking for. (Too easy for the EQ to get bumped unseen.) If you care to provide more details for why I should consider it, I am certainly open to hearing them

10/10 for writing that in Yoda's syntax

 

[Mark Ambler]

I'm loving the Khan. It makes my genzler sound and feel like I've always wished and, it's the closest to satisfied as I've ever been with a straight to the board sound……although now I'm lusting after a Neve 8801 as an all in one di solution. The khan is top shelf stuff.

Does the Khan do really clean or is there always a bit of dirt/grit there?

 

[Sugarbear08]

Thanks to all who have chimed in so far!


It certainly has a footprint that would work, but given my plan is to mount it under the pedalboard and get away from preamp eq controls, I suspect this is not the di out I am looking for. (Too easy for the EQ to get bumped unseen.) If you care to provide more details for why I should consider it, I am certainly open to hearing them

10/10 for writing that in Yoda's syntax

My apologies... I didn't appreciate what you're trying to do. Mounting a Minnow under your board would probably be impractical: As you said, knobs would get bumped, and that's if you could actually put it under the board in the first place as the Minnow is a hefty box. In fact, I find it ironic that a pedal named Minnow is the biggest device on my board.

That said, the Minnow is a delightfully straightforward device with a great eq... I can't get a bad sound out of the thing.

 

[kringle77]

Does the Khan do really clean or is there always a bit of dirt/grit there?

No dirt, just warm, round, clean sound with a touch of very light natural compression that slightly softens harsh attack and pops.

 

[Mark Ambler]

No dirt, just warm, round, clean sound with a touch of very light natural compression that slightly softens harsh attack and pops.

Have you compared it to the Noble?

 

[kringle77]

No

 

[4Mal]

This one probably is about 200 pages back but... after playing through scads of stuff, my setup is driven from a Mesa Subway DI +. Small rooms it goes straight to the board and I take an aux mix back to a power amp and cab. Larger stages where I feel the need for an amp, the Mesa fronts an Alembic F1-x. I use the DI from the Alembic in that case.

I hadn't gotten to flattening yet so the knob settings were what happened in transit. That show was front ending the F1-x. The Mesa hpf is set up a hair, maybe 50hz and voicing is set to the mark on the green tape and the eq is flat.

I need a bigger board

 

[chadhargis]

FedEx just delivered my JT Amplification Alpha. I plugged it in and noodled around a bit. Not really long enough to review it...but a review will be forthcoming. Initial impression is that it sounds nice and fat. Very full. And it's nice and quiet.

 

[Zbysek]

So I have a question for the masses. I currently am running a P-Bass into my pedalboard, and at the end is a Pinstripe Pedal LWDI. The sound techs at church love the tone I give them, but have commented that my signal is pretty weak and have to gain me up a lot. As a result, the noise floor also increases. Is there a small utility pedal I can place before my DI that will give them a hotter signal that is clean?

Any clean booster would do (tc spark for example)

 

[Naack]

Any clean booster would do (tc spark for example)

I'm thinking this might be the way to go. I chatted with the guy at Pinstripe Pedals and he said he could make me an active version which would solve the problem as well. All of that being said, the only current drawback from my current setup is that the FOH sound guy has the add a lot of gain to my channel which make it have a lot more string noise. I think they also put a low pass at 5k to get rid of any hiss.

 

[shwashwa]

I'm thinking this might be the way to go. I chatted with the guy at Pinstripe Pedals and he said he could make me an active version which would solve the problem as well. All of that being said, the only current drawback from my current setup is that the FOH sound guy has the add a lot of gain to my channel which make it have a lot more string noise. I think they also put a low pass at 5k to get rid of any hiss.

https://www.broughtonaudio.com/product-page/low-high-pass-filter
this has a ton of clean gain, and a low pass and high pass filter

 

[chadhargis]

FedEx just delivered my JT Amplification Alpha. I plugged it in and noodled around a bit. Not really long enough to review it...but a review will be forthcoming. Initial impression is that it sounds nice and fat. Very full. And it's nice and quiet.

I've been playing with the JT Amplification Alpha a bit and I have to admit, for such a simple device it really does sound good. It has loads of gain available and can give you a nice bit of break up if you so choose. It sounds much better than I expected and really is on par with something like the Noble.

I did a shootout of various preamp DI's I had sitting around. See which one you like best.


All samples were recorded using a TC Electronic Ditto looper to make sure the same clip was played through each preamp/amp.

Here's the details:

5 string active J bass set flat
Ditto Looper
Preamp
Presonus StudioLive AR8c Mixer
GarageBand via USB - Flat..no plug ins or effects

Here's the devices (not in order!):

Line 6 Pod Go - Fullerton guitar amp sim, EQ, LA Compressor, EQ
Presonus StudioLive Mic Pre - direct from Ditto to line in. Bass boosted on channel strip
Radial Pro DI
Ampeg PF-50T - Bass at 3 o'clock all other controls flat
Shaw Tube Injection - Bass at 3 o'clock all other controls flat
JT Amps Alpha DI - "Deep" mode engaged, other switch flat

And here are the clips. The list of which preamp is which is posted below in an attached text file.

Sample 1:


Sample 2:


Sample 3:


Sample 4:


Sample 5:


Sample 6:

 

[jmbjandfam]

I've been playing with the JT Amplification Alpha a bit and I have to admit, for such a simple device it really does sound good. It has loads of gain available and can give you a nice bit of break up if you so choose. It sounds much better than I expected and really is on par with something like the Noble.

I did a shootout of various preamp DI's I had sitting around. See which one you like best.


All samples were recorded using a TC Electronic Ditto looper to make sure the same clip was played through each preamp/amp.

Here's the details:

5 string active J bass set flat
Ditto Looper
Preamp
Presonus StudioLive AR8c Mixer
GarageBand via USB - Flat..no plug ins or effects

Here's the devices (not in order!):

Line 6 Pod Go - Fullerton guitar amp sim, EQ, LA Compressor, EQ
Presonus StudioLive Mic Pre - direct from Ditto to line in. Bass boosted on channel strip
Radial Pro DI
Ampeg PF-50T - Bass at 3 o'clock all other controls flat
Shaw Tube Injection - Bass at 3 o'clock all other controls flat
JT Amps Alpha DI - "Deep" mode engaged, other switch flat

And here are the clips. The list of which preamp is which is posted below in an attached text file.

Sample 1:


Sample 2:


Sample 3:


Sample 4:


Sample 5:


Sample 6:

A quick listen without looking at the text file and I liked Sample 1 and Sample 4 the best. After looking at the text file I'm a bit surprised how much I liked the Pod Go.....

 

[Derek Williams]

I've been playing with the JT Amplification Alpha a bit and I have to admit, for such a simple device it really does sound good. It has loads of gain available and can give you a nice bit of break up if you so choose. It sounds much better than I expected and really is on par with something like the Noble.

I did a shootout of various preamp DI's I had sitting around. See which one you like best.


All samples were recorded using a TC Electronic Ditto looper to make sure the same clip was played through each preamp/amp.

Here's the details:

5 string active J bass set flat
Ditto Looper
Preamp
Presonus StudioLive AR8c Mixer
GarageBand via USB - Flat..no plug ins or effects

Here's the devices (not in order!):

Line 6 Pod Go - Fullerton guitar amp sim, EQ, LA Compressor, EQ
Presonus StudioLive Mic Pre - direct from Ditto to line in. Bass boosted on channel strip
Radial Pro DI
Ampeg PF-50T - Bass at 3 o'clock all other controls flat
Shaw Tube Injection - Bass at 3 o'clock all other controls flat
JT Amps Alpha DI - "Deep" mode engaged, other switch flat

And here are the clips. The list of which preamp is which is posted below in an attached text file.

Sample 1:


Sample 2:


Sample 3:


Sample 4:


Sample 5:


Sample 6:

I can barely tell a difference between the first 3 (and they all sound great). 4 had some kind of vibrato type thing going on, I can't quite explain, but if felt off and would annoy me. 5 and 6 were too thin.

Looking at the list afterwards, I'd be happy with any of those first 3. I'm probably going to pick up an Alpha at some point.

Thanks for putting this together!

 

[chadhargis]

A quick listen without looking at the text file and I liked Sample 1 and Sample 4 the best. After looking at the text file I'm a bit surprised how much I liked the Pod Go.....

Yeah. It's really really good...especially for $450. You get amps, cabs, compressors, EQ, effects, etc....all in one box. No worry about bumping knobs as they are all electronic. When you load your preset...it's EXACTLY the way you saved it...including the volume pedal level (ie..I saved my preset with the volume pedal full off so I can plug in and not "pop" anything...I cycle the pedal and it reads the position of the pedal again). If the POD dies or gets stolen, I have backups. I just hop down to the local Guitar Center, grab a new one, load all my settings..and BOOM...I'm gig ready. No waiting weeks and months for a replacement.

 

[chadhargis]

I can barely tell a difference between the first 3 (and they all sound great). 4 had some kind of vibrato type thing going on, I can't quite explain, but if felt off and would annoy me. 5 and 6 were too thin.

Looking at the list afterwards, I'd be happy with any of those first 3. I'm probably going to pick up an Alpha at some point.

Thanks for putting this together!

I don't hear anything odd from it, but perhaps I'm used to it. I assure you, with the flexibility of the Pod, you can tune out anything you don't like. Maybe I have my tube sag set too high in the amp sim.