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Tried Some New Basses Today

#41
EricHargrave said:
So has anyone ever bought a good bass online.....im looking to get mine delivered to guitar center...is this not a good idea
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I have six basses. Three were custom ordered new. Three were purchased used. All were purchased over the Internet, so I did not play any of them before I got them. All are keepers.

I've bought and sold a number of basses over the Internet. Can't remember one that I bought that was a dud. I know of one person here on TB that did not like the bass that I sold him. It had several issues that he did not like. One was a damaged knob due to my substandard job of packaging that particular bass. The other things he didn't like were set up issues which may or may not have been influenced by shipping. I tend to think they were not influenced by shipping, or minimally if at all.

He sold it before I could offer to take it back.
 
#42
KingRazor said:
And besides, if all a bass needs to play well is to be setup, then why don't shops routinely setup all of the instruments in the shop?
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Some good (independent) shops do. Most of the monkeys at GC would have trouble setting up a coffeemaker, however, and I really wouldn't want them near a bass I was going to buy with tools, anyway. Then again, I don't trust the geniuses at places like superlube under my Jeep either...

What do think makes one Stingray play differently than another?
 
#43
king_biscuit said:
Some good (independent) shops do. Most of the monkeys at GC would have trouble setting up a coffeemaker, however, and I really wouldn't want them near a bass I was going to buy with tools, anyway. Then again, I don't trust the geniuses at places like superlube under my Jeep either...

What do think makes one Stingray play differently than another?
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The feel. One was much more "slick" than the other. I could slide all over the place and play more quickly and with less effort than on the other.

On the other bass, it would have been painful to play that quickly. It wasn't comfortable to play at all. I found myself straining just to play things that were effortless on the other bass.

A setup could have improved the inferior bass, to an extent, but I don't think it could have brought it to the same level of playability.
 
#44
For one thing, people like different setups. I have gone to stores where it was obvious that they were not setup at all. I took a fender and told the guy he will never sell this it is not set up and guess what? he took to the back to set it up. I like a low setup. some do not care and others do not know what set up means. If their bass was a piece of crap setup and they learned to play with it, that is the set up you will want. I do not know how some people play their basses and I also know why they do not play better. I find the store will want to sell you the bass and will set it up to sell it. I LOVED the stingray 5 played through the Ampeg amps wow! but $3000 plus price tag...
 
#45
KingRazor said:
The feel. One was much more "slick" than the other. I could slide all over the place and play more quickly and with less effort than on the other.

On the other bass, it would have been painful to play that quickly. It wasn't comfortable to play at all. I found myself straining just to play things that were effortless on the other bass.

A setup could have improved the inferior bass, to an extent, but I don't think it could have brought it to the same level of playability.
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?? You clearly have no idea why one played differently than the other. How can you insist this is a quality control issue????
 
#49
king_biscuit said:
Then for all you know, it's all setup related which is my point!
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It's just been my experience that a setup really doesn't affect playability significantly. So when there is that big of a difference in playability, I tend to think there are other factors at play.

If there had only been a minor difference in their playability (this bass plays pretty good, but this one plays great), then I might attribute it to just a setup issue.

But when it's a night and day difference like that (this bass is not at all comfortable to play, this other one is extremely comfortable) then I'm going to assume that there's more to it than setup.
 
#51
KingRazor said:
So far I've yet to find a bass where I thought: "Wow, I love everything about this bass, except I think the setup kind of stinks, but if it had a good setup, it'd be perfect!"
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I think what he is saying is that you will pick up a bass and say you dont like it and part of it is or could be the setup. I have picked up many and could not judge the bass because the setup was so bad.

Also I own a Peavey Cirrus. I have played others and was not impressed with those basses, but I believe it was not the same as mine in many ways (different woods, etc.) and therefore did not like it.
 
#52
KingRazor said:
It's just been my experience that a setup really doesn't affect playability significantly. So when there is that big of a difference in playability, I tend to think there are other factors at play.
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You have said you are basically inexperienced and you have said you don't know why one Stingray played differently (better) than another.

Setup and strings have a hugh, HUGE, HUGE impact on playability/feel and sound. :)
 
#53
To be fair, which neck (as in fenders a "c" and "D" neck play very differently), Strings, etc. as well as the set up can make a world of difference. The neck on a Peavey P-40 and the neck on my Cirrus are hundreds of dollars difference for a reason. To me, the neck makes the bass, if the neck does not feel good, back on the hanger it goes.
 
#54
nyde7 said:
To be fair, which neck (as in fenders a "c" and "D" neck play very differently), Strings, etc. as well as the set up can make a world of difference. The neck on a Peavey P-40 and the neck on my Cirrus are hundreds of dollars difference for a reason. To me, the neck makes the bass, if the neck does not feel good, back on the hanger it goes.
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We are talking about two identical Stingrays here, though.
 
#55
If they are Identical, the only thing is setup. If it was a Squire or an SX or a cheap bass, yeah they are all different animals, but not on a quality bass in my experience. If one does not know the difference between necks, they may look identical, but feel very very different. I do not like a D neck, they just are weird to me, but others love them.
 
#56
king_biscuit said:
You have said you are basically inexperienced and you have said you don't know why one Stingray played differently (better) than another.

Setup and strings have a hugh, HUGE, HUGE impact on playability/feel and sound. :)
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Well, I still don't agree. :)

Also, the basses were not identical. One was a 4-string, one was a 5. One was fretted, one was fretless.

And it wasn't just the 4-string stingray I didn't like. I didn't like the 5-string modulus either. The 5-string Cort was pretty nice, but definitely not as nice as the fretless fiver Stingray.
 
#57
SwagAttack said:
What exactly was wrong with the EBMM you played? Were the strings too high? Too loose/tight? Action too high? Tone too bland?
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I didn't even listen to it, the tone may have been good or bad.

I don't think the strings were too high, because I've played other basses with action that high and they were fine. Could have been lower, sure, but it wasn't too high.

The bass over all felt overly tight. There wasn't any smoothness.
 
#59
...the funny thing is, in reality, the difference between a $399.00 bass and a $1399.00 bass in the hands of 98% of those on this site (your's truly included) is indistinguishable by the crowd you are playing for at your local club or event. If you want to spend 1k or 2k or 3k on a bass because YOU like it, that is great. But your audience (at least about 99% of them) can't tell the difference. For most (not all) bass players, if you are spending more than 700-800 bucks on a new bass, you are experiencing diminished returns. I saw a comparison on the "Bass Whisperer" site between the Squier "Classic Vibe" models and the original Fender models they seek to evoke. Even that guy had a tough time definitively articulating a significant difference. Set up, strings etc...make a significant difference in how a bass plays; all else being equal. However, unlike swapping an Epiphone T-Bird for a Gibson T-Bird (and lightening your wallet about $1k more) won't make you a thousand dollars better, a good set up can make a moderately priced bass sound great and a bad setup/strings can make an expensive bass sound/play like crap.
 
#60
I have noticed that MM's are more particular to having a good setup, especially when I play them in stores. When they are set up well, they play as well as anything out there. I know they are great to play, but sometimes I pick them up in stores and they aren't even enjoyable, while a P or J bass with super messed up high action will be easy to play nonetheless. Fender necks seem more forgiving in general. Anyone?
 

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