what is your reason for using an onboard preamp

[leavetheconnoli]

I am new to the onboard preamp world and am not really up on the usefulness of it.
I get when I sit in, open jams.. nice to have control over the tone, but when I'm playing with my gear I get a sound and thats that.. stay passive. NO need for preamp into preamp..

How do you all use them?

 

[Lonnybass]

Onboard preamps are really helpful if you need to make shotgun adjustments to your sound that you'd rather do on your bass rather than at your amp. And they give you a lot of opportunity to really fine tune the way your bass fits into the mix without being too disruptive to your playing. And, if you're playing a gig that requires a lot of different tones and voicings, preamps give you fingertip control.

Lonnybass

 

[JakobT]

It came with the bass.

 

[groove pump]

I sampled some new Jazz pickups in my bass last year just because I got the itch to try something different. When I tried the new pickups though, I immediately recognized that they didn't have the same "oomph" that I got from my other pickups. They had okay tone with more clarity in the mids compared with my older pickups, but the "fatness" was more diminished, especially when I blended slightly toward the bridge pickup.

I suspected that these newer, less imposing pickups might work well in a bass with an on-board preamp, so I eventually dropped them into a cheap Bacchus import with a preamp to see what I could get out of that. Turned out that this combination was better than I expected. I could solo the neck pickup without much boost or cut, bump the highs for more snappiness with the pickup blend right in the middle, or bump the lows to fill in the bottom if I faded just a little in favor of the bridge pickup.

Although this Bacchus worked well with the on-board preamp, I have no desire to add one to my old passive Jazz, probably because I just don't recognize something lacking in that one. I suppose the need or want for a preamp in any bass is really a case by case issue. While a preamp can bring some flexibility to a player's control over aspects of an instrument's sound, it won't make a bad sounding bass magically sound great.

My other main player is a custom P/J that came to me with a B/T preamp and active EMG's. Something about those pickups wasn't thrilling me, so I got a similar itch to try something else. My luthier pal sold me on a set of Joe Barden's, but we also took out the preamp - he thought that would be the smart way to go. Turns out he was right and the touch, tones, richness, yaddah-yaddah are absolutely thrilling me many months after the swap. So here's a case where nothing is lacking - no need to fill a void with a preamp.

The other perceived "need" for an on-board preamp could simply be about being able to tweak your frequencies right there at your bass instead of going over to your amp's tone controls to do it there. This can actually be a nice convenience if you jump from perhaps an old-school blues sound right into a more aggressive rockin' tone or something funky that needs brighter highs. Maybe easier to adjust on the fly.

Both my basses are now passive (the Bacchus is loaned out to my pal's daughter) and I can turn the passive tone control up or down to take care of that end of my tone. I may use one in a new instrument in the future, but I really don't think it's a deal-breaker either way.

 

[India_Sierra]

The ability to make instant adjustments to your sound is handy, and we all know how a room sound can change very quickly depending on myriad factors.

Of course, success with an active preamp depends both on the useful of it's control and voicing and the familiarity of the user with that particuarly system. Two band cut and boost isn't too tricky but filters like ACG or Alembic use are a different ball game.

 

[Hundred proof]

I have one active bass and it actually has two built in preamps one for each half of the 4 coil humbucker pickup gives me almost limitless tonal options, but I mostly use it in what I call Pbass mode but I can get Jbass-ish and full on vintage Music Man vibe too. I mainly use it when I’m having to use someone else’s amp so I don’t have to mess with how they have it set. My 36 year old Peavey T45 passive is my usual go-to, it will do a lot passively what my active does.

 

[JRA]

i might use them for more tonal variation for some recordings. these days i'm gigging passive axes just for the convenience of not having to replace batteries. but the large palette of an active pre-amp can be pretty cool if your playing/music benefits by it.

 

[dabbler]

Because it's there... on some of my basses.

 

[jd56hawk]

Try to find a G&L L2000 without one!
Other than that, I haven't used it since 2017.

 

[MrLenny1]

I use 3 different tones and having it onboard is a breeze.

 

[MD]

I play an ABG. Pretty much all of them have active pres. Can't plug in - with good results - without them.

 

[bassbenj]

Try to find a G&L L2000 without one!
Other than that, I haven't used it since 2017.

Passive vs active bass is a real thing. Which is why I love my G&L L2500s. Got a switch that lets you choose. I find I do about 50-50 active and passive. Love them both when they work.

 

[SnowTau]

I've got 3 basses and they're all active, but honestly they basically all stay in the middle on the eq, I don't really use it. They're all switchable from passive to active but I notice there's a tone change when switching, and I like the active tone, it's usually a little.. Zingier? And more alive. My ideal bass would be a passive bass with that un-eq'ed active sound so the only things I can to fiddle with is the pickups and a tone knob. I find the more options I have the worse I seem to make it hah.

I think I'll go passive for my next bass, and since I can't quickly switch between active and passive I probably won't really notice the tone change and just enjoy the simplicity.

 

[leavetheconnoli]

Very interesting replies. I recently picked up a Sadowsky that has a preamp, which coming from 30 years of passive playing is a little overwhelming and confusing. I like that it has a passive toggle and even in passive mode i can blend the pickups. There are so many possibilities without the preamp lol.

 

[40Hz]

I have one in my fiver. With a 5-string I find it’s easier to get a decent balance between that low B string and the other four
with an onboard preamp.

I also have one in my ABG. An onboard preamp is not an option if you’re using piezos.

 

[Gnal]

For me the preamp is about options. I like to have an active/passive switch of some sort just in case.

Many times I’ve played direct to FOH no amp on stage, so the preamp granting the ability to tweak my sound was important.

 

[madmaskbass]

for some weird reason my bass just sounds better with the treb, bass and mids, slightly boosted. I have generally always preferred running flat but my thumb just comes to life with a minor e.q boost. this is not a volume thing. My second bass the preamp is the BQC which give you a shapable mid range...this makes this bass unbelevably flexible as I can flavour the mids to suit each song if needed. I like to play with this bass tonally and it is the reason I love it so much..my thumb bass has the best trick in the book but can only do that.. my Spector can pretty much cover the rest of the book within rights..the onboard e.q plays alot into this..i think they are great and only play active basses because of this.

 

[Brad Johnson]

All of my gigging basses have preamps and passive pickups. The majority have Bartolini preamps which work perfectly for my approach: low action, high output. I set the internal gains high and control dynamics mainly with my touch. As a result my Bart-equipped basses have much hotter outputs than any 18v systems I've heard. Big sound. Kind of baffling for folks who think 18v should be "better".

Because I keep my volumes wide open bass, mids and highs are there in abundance so I rarely need to tweak onboard EQ. I get a ton of tonal variety using just the blend control and touch.

This works very well with my amplification scheme: robust sound without the need for tonal tweaks. Massive overhead that I have control over. My hands on my basses through my rig or recording console gives me a powerful, repeatable platform, making my job a breeze.

I can play passive basses but this, despite how it looks, ends up being a simpler solution. Literally plug and play.

 

[Brad Johnson]

FYI: I find that many people don't play with a high output. It can be noisy or sound clumsy until you learn how to control it manually. We hear differently at lower outputs which can necessitate the need for tonal tweaks to make things sound better. What most don't do is turn up enough to really highlight the full tone of the bass. If you haven't, give it a try.

This applies especially to passive basses. Turning down the bass' volume often results in a lack of high end or openness.

 

[red_rhino]

An active on-board circuit just gives you a wider pallet of tones to work with on the instrument. It's not really meant to replace the amplifier's EQ. But because of the potential for overlapping frequencies and the boosts/cuts provided, you need to make sure that you take the effect of both EQs into account when making adjustments.

For example, if you had a passive instrument with overly pronounced lows or mids, you would likely make adjustments on the amp to compensate, especially if the venue reinforced those characteristics. The same is true on an active instrument; get the sound characteristics you want, and then let the amp EQ do the rest.

The approach I've taken lately is to set my amp's EQ while instrument's EQ is flat, and then boost or cut whatever frequencies I want on the instrument to fine tune, or sweeten, the sound to my liking. The EQ circuits are meant to compliment each other; you just gotta let them do it.