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Double Bass Tuner for DB?

#21
Haven't tried many tuners, but most of the tuners I had seem to have needle spazzing problems. Then I chanced upon the stroboflip tuner, its pricy but for the accuracy and ease you get, I think its pretty worth it. It has a tuning pickup which you can clip to your bridge, or alternatively you could just plug in your current pickup. You definitely won't have problems seeing in the dark here, plus you can even clamp the whole tuner right onto your stand or something. The only problem i found here was tuning the D string, for some reason the tuning gets a little 'hyper' before claiming down. Other then that its one neat tuner. Just my 2 cents.;)
 
#22
I had great hopes for the Korg DT-10. I like the floor stomp-box form factor, and it's got an industrial-strength feel to it. I've got several GA-30 type tuners and am generally happy with them.

My big hope was the mute function when kept in-line. With the plan of moving to gut G & D strings, I was looking for a quick way to discreetly check tuning between songs.

I've read a lot of posts about "true bypass", "tone sucking tuners", etc. And my ears are not the best of ears. But I did some A/B testing, and sadly I can really tell the difference with the DT10 in-line, especially in lost clarity (upper mids, I'm guessing). My signal chain was:
Carved Upright -> Realist -> Fishman Platinum preamp -> DT-10 -> GK150MBE.

I guess the Peterson Strobostomp is the only answer, as I wouldn't expect much better bypass from the Boss tuner.

...Lyle
 
#23
LyleRyan said:
My big hope was the mute function when kept in-line. With the plan of moving to gut G & D strings, I was looking for a quick way to discreetly check tuning between songs.
Click to expand...

Instead of going through the tuner and relying on its mute function you could us an A/B box to go from amp to tuner and achieve muting without having to run signal through the tuner to get to it to the amp. It is more crap to carry but it works.
 
#24
I am a big fan of the Peterson V-SAM and Stroboflip.
The most accurate tuners I have encountered and they have very useful parameters that I use frequently.
Good drone sound (best is the Peterson 490)
Useful open string sweeteners including one that gives you the perfect 5th tuned cello. I find it very useful to use the cello preset on the Low C for chambermusic thus avoiding the chrash of the cellos very low tuned C and relatively low G.

I regularly practise Dimoffs version of the vomit, using a drone on the root and with the Peterson set to Just temerament.

the small korg is very handy for avoiding clutter on stage and for use in sections where tuners are frowned upon.
 
#25
i use a korg GA30, and like velvetkevorkian above its just gone on and on and on... been dropped loads of times (usually buy the guitarist)...
it does the job and i think it cost me about £7..?

doesn't do 'in-line' though... but it is switchable from guitar to bass. does have a needle and lights (for those dark places), and you can slot a credit card in the back to stand it up (***..!):eyebrow:

i must add however... i think my intonation is bad enough not to worry about whether the bass is perfectly in tune...!
:hmm:
 
#27
Reefer said:
I recently acquired one these Planet Wave tuners and am very impressed. It is very small and does not require to be plugged in nor does your instrument need to be played loud acoustically to register.

http://www.planetwavestuners.com/index.php?option=com_tuner&task=tunerdetailpage&id=1
Click to expand...


RUN AWAY from the planet waves pedal tuner for DB. It wouldn't tune my upright AT ALL. I messed w/ it and messed w/ it, NO WORKY. Plus as an extra added bonus the latch that held the battery closed was broken when I took it out of the factory sealed box. The store I bought it from wouldn't take it back because they were going out of business, so I had to send it back to D'Addario, and get a new one. It took them almost 2 months to send a replacement. So I decided to sell the replacement as fast as possible on ebay.

Johnny
 
#29
Johnny Atomic said:
RUN AWAY from the planet waves pedal tuner for DB. It wouldn't tune my upright AT ALL. I messed w/ it and messed w/ it, NO WORKY. Plus as an extra added bonus the latch that held the battery closed was broken when I took it out of the factory sealed box. The store I bought it from wouldn't take it back because they were going out of business, so I had to send it back to D'Addario, and get a new one. It took them almost 2 months to send a replacement. So I decided to sell the replacement as fast as possible on ebay.

Johnny
Click to expand...

That's good to know about the pedal tuner, but the strobe light version I'm referring to works great!

http://www.planetwavestuners.com/index.php?option=com_tuner&task=tunerdetailpage&id=1

Here's a review:
[Invalid or Expired Link Removed]
 
#30
Reefer said:
That's good to know about the pedal tuner, but the strobe light version I'm referring to works great!

http://www.planetwavestuners.com/index.php?option=com_tuner&task=tunerdetailpage&id=1

Here's a review:
[Invalid or Expired Link Removed]
Click to expand...

Sorry if I didn't make this clear. I Can't comment on the Planet Waves strobe, but the Planet Waves pedal tuner wouldn't work AT ALL.





to recap
sos.png
:) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :)





this one
pedal.png
:spit: :spit: :spit: :spit: :spit: :spit: :spit: :spit:

Johnny
 
#32
I have a Korg CA30 plugged into the effects send jack on the Focus 2RIII. It has a real short cable with right angle ends that wraps around one of the amp feet to keep it still on top of the speaker. It's not in line with anything that way but it always reads the bass signal weather its muted or not. So when I want to tune in gorilla conditions I hit the mute switch, tune, and turn back on again. I prefer to tune with the bow when I can as it's good practice but during the gig it's not always practical. If my rig is a distance from me I'll just carry my bass back to it, tune, return.

I have several of those tuners laying about as I think they are great and cheap. Some are GA30 some CA 30. They work the same to me. Got one just lives in the bass bag, one in every fender bass case etc. The one on the amp lives in the amp's bag with the power cable and speaker cable. Always there so I can't forget it. When I'm playing without an amp I've still got one in the bass bag.

If I'm playing with a piano I'll try to tune to it unless its a computer piano.
 
#34
At least for live situations I think this is a great choice., and they are pretty affordable used. I just bought a second one from a TBer last week. I'm sure that the Petersen pedal tuner is amazing but at $180 it should be. And I hear it really eats batteries.
I haven't noticed any difference in tone and the ability to mute your instrument's signal to the amp wit the boss tu2 is invaluable.
In my case, I do a lot of doubling and simply mute the upright, lean it back in it's stand and pick up the electric. In certain situations I've been known to even play an arco passage (abeit not very well!:hmm: ) on double bass while having an electric hanging upside-down off of my back and then mute the double bass with the tuner, lean it into the stand, flip the electric over my shoulder, turn the volume knob up and and play electric. Sounds more dangerous than it actually is. I couldn't do it with out the mute function of the Boss Tu-2, and it tracks low notes as quickly as anything I've seen.
Word to the wise: any tuner just gets you close with an upright.
Use it to get your bass close to pitch and then trust your ears. I don't use one on gigs, but I absolutely understand why people use a tuning fork. When using a tuner, try to remember what the difference between the tuner's idea of in tune is and what your ear is telling you. For me, the D string open is always reading just a little flat on the tuner because of the prevalence of overtones. I tune the D to read just a hair sharp and I'm in buisiness. I suspect that this will change with each bass and different strings. Also, Arco for me always reads just a hair sharp as compared to a good strong pizz attack on the same note, I think it's because of the pressure of the bow on the string shortening the length ever so slightly.
And remember- Ron Carter rarely played in tune and he's still one of the greatest- cuz he just played and meant it. Don't let the challenge of playing such a beast of an instrument in tune prevent you from enjoying the music you are making.
 
#35
After being sort of surprised that my "tin ear" could clearly tell the difference with the Korg DT-10 in-line, I got a Peterson StroboStomp, and am happy with it.

There is *no* affect on the sound with this tuner inline, and no pops or clicks as it goes to mute/tuner-on mode.

It gives me the foot-switchable mute while tuning that I wanted. I wish my amps (GK & Eden) had a mute switch, but this is quicker: look down, stomp, muted, tune, stomp, ready to play. No trips back to the amp. Also I'm finding it easy to work with the preamp (Fishman Platinum or Sansamp Para) next to it on the floor in front of me (I used to have these on top of the amp).

Finally, from what I had read, I was expecting the Strobostomp to be too sensitive for between-song quick tunings. But it seems to work fine. I'm using the pizz octave harmonic so far, and the tuner locks in quickly.

...Lyle
 
#36
PETERSON.
You can learn so much about tuning and the tendencies of your own ears with one of these. The stroboflip comes with a piezo that clips on your bridge for better detection.
It's also great for brass/woodwinds.

Spend the extra money!
 
#40
labravajazz said:
The clip on tuners like this are the easiest to use on a gig by far and even if you are an acoustic player with no pickup you can tune in a noisy environment easily and conveniently. They do work great IMHO.
Click to expand...

They have some advantages but if you abuse it at all the Intellitouch tends to break where the arm hinges to adjust the visibility of the screen. It'll still tune fine but it's floppy and annoying.
 

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