I've never bought an active or passive bass. I only bought basses that sounded right and I liked to play. Some had preamps and some didn't. Having a preamp was never a reason to buy a bass or not.
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what is your reason for using an onboard preamp
- Thread starter leavetheconnoli
- Start date
Well said. I own both active and passives. The sound and playability is what makes them worth owning.
Passive volume and tone controls have an even bigger loading effect, and of course interact with the cable C to effectively become a variable low pass filter.
I'm going to do my own version of the Alembic SVF in a retrofit to another bass soon. There'll be an external supply as well.
Haven't decided on the pickups yet, but the Alembic ones are too rich for my blood. I'd rather wind my own if need be.
I've owned 4 Series basses in the past.
Yes, it's great. Pity it's not really intuitive for most users or it would undoubtedly be in much wider use. With suitable pickups of course, and most on the market aren't.
My reason is because every bass I’ve ever owned has come with one from the factory.
I too some time have the same question. I asked the Fat Bass Tone guy and here is their answer:
"Most of the time when we say on-board bass preamp what we are really talking about is an equalizer being built into the bass. This allows us to have bass, midrange and treble controls like you would find on an amplifier. The truth is nobody needs one. You could just use the equalizer built into your amp. That will work perfectly fine. It’s just that some of us bassists are so fussy that we just feel compelled to have our equalizer immediately under hand, and save the trip across the room to adjust the amp."
^^ They have completely ignore the impedance issues previously mentioned.
And whilst the above may be true for some people, it's not true for all of us; I hardly ever touch my EQ on stage or in a jam. Once set, I forget about it.
And whilst the above may be true for some people, it's not true for all of us; I hardly ever touch my EQ on stage or in a jam. Once set, I forget about it.
I find using onboard pre makes my life much easier. I don't want to have to turn around and deal with my amp in the dark, and pedals can be a pain to change on the fly as well. An onboard lets me make quick adjustments between songs typically. I don't go crazy, but I play covers, so I try to cop a bit of the original sound for each song.
Right, but the EMGs probably need batteries for them to work. Active pickups themselves by design need some kind of boost. Alembics are the same. You can't run the pickups without a preamp of some sort. Granted seems like most pickups these days are passive with a preamp boost, not the actual "active" pickups I'm talking about.
Granted I'm not an expert and I'm basically regurgitating Rick Tuner's posts.
Correct, except for the few passive models they sell, eg the HZ range.
Not true, at least outside the pickup casing itself. All of the EMG active pickups I have could easily, and some do, just run with a "passive" VVT wiring loom out to an amp with plenty of level. Of course with a battery to power the amplification inside the pickup shell.
Alembic pickups are unique beasts because they are very low impedance, ie a low number of windings, to keep the frequency response as flat as possible and the resonant peak high. Consequently, they are very low output and need a preamp. I've owned 2 Series basses and have examined the electronics (I'm an EE) and have used the same type of filter they use both in MI and industrial engineering so I understand how the Alembic PU/pre system is designed to work. FTR Alembic pickups themselves are passive, ie no amplification within the pickup shell.
Like others have said, I've simply bought basses that I took a liking to, were great deals, or thought would work for me. Whether or not they had a preamp was never a deciding factor or a deal breaker.
Having said that, 5 of my current six came with preamps, and the passive one actually needed an aftermarket preamp to stay in the top spot.
It's interesting that I really like having the ability to tweak EQ on the bass, but never seem to go more than 3db or so from the center detent and never make adjustments during songs or even for specific songs. Once I get the amps just right, I get each bass where it needs to be when I soundcheck then vary my sounds with my hands.
I feel like I could also be happy in the passive bass world but would have to spend a lot of money trying a plethora of different strings to get to the same place.
Having said that, 5 of my current six came with preamps, and the passive one actually needed an aftermarket preamp to stay in the top spot.
It's interesting that I really like having the ability to tweak EQ on the bass, but never seem to go more than 3db or so from the center detent and never make adjustments during songs or even for specific songs. Once I get the amps just right, I get each bass where it needs to be when I soundcheck then vary my sounds with my hands.
I feel like I could also be happy in the passive bass world but would have to spend a lot of money trying a plethora of different strings to get to the same place.
