Why are amps still dinosaurs?

[Mantis Tobaggan]

How wrong you are here (IMO and IME).

PCB's were introduced to improve reliability, hand wired amps would have a first pass defect rate of about 25% coming off of the production line, and sometimes these defects were impossible to find, or were intermittent and hidden under something else.

PCB's greatly increase the consistency from unit to unit by removing much of the variability due to hand wiring. This has become essential in high gain amps where interaction due to stray coupling is a very real issue.

PCB's allow amps to contain more features, feature sets that would be impossible with hand wired technology.

PCB's improve the reliability of solder joints by a factor of 100 or greater, especially when using double sided PCBs and plated holes.

PCB's greatly decrease the amount of time required to troubleshoot and repair amps with similar feature sets at the component level. I can (and do professionally) repair PCB based amps and it's far easier to do so, and do so in less time and at less cost.

PCB's using quality materials, have been powering our spacecraft, air planes and satellites for at least 5 decades in the most extreme environments. The reliability is WELL proven.

i’m happy to learn from you brother. much respect. I had a bad experience with a fender reissue reverb unit (w/ board) vs. hardwire vintage unit. my experience is anecdotal whereas yours is scientific. appreciate the knowledge. def your wheelhouse not mine.

 

[DJ Bebop]

kcducttaper - I too have never found an amp head that gave me everything I wanted. However, an extra pedal or two is usually a good way to make up for what for what you are missing/requiring. For me, I use the Mesa D800. Now, I stopped thinking about the head I use at the show and just focus on playing. I still want more tone controls on the head, but I refuse to spend more money on the D800+. That's OK with me.

To answer your question, Markbass made "modules" that you could add to an amp power block. You could change EQ controls, gain controls, and so on. It never caught on and I never saw one in the wild. Perhaps you should stop looking at a "forever" amp head and just focus on what makes you happy now. You can always trade/sell it later on in the future. Tone preferences change!

Oh, not this Mesa Boogie is the Savior of the bass world, again...

Kidding

 

[rickwolff]

i’m happy to learn from you brother. much respect. I had a bad experience with a fender reissue reverb unit (w/ board) vs. hardwire vintage unit. my experience is anecdotal whereas yours is scientific. appreciate the knowledge. def your wheelhouse not mine.

Kudos for your beautiful attitude and response. You made my day. Thank you !!

 

[byacey]

I think long term gear investments are possible. I play with a number of old time bandleaders (typically jazz, weddings, etc.). They often show up with what look like the PA system that they bought when they first started out 40 years ago, including mics, stands, cables, everything. If something is new, it's probably second-hand, and probably replaced something that broke. One reed player likes to mention what he paid for his saxophones, one of each size, that he bought in 1960.

We are all headed in that direction, and most of us who continue playing will become like those guys. After awhile, it's more so the playing that becomes important, and the gear used, less so.

 

[DJ Bebop]

Just wait until you get older...

See my signature

 

[seamonkey]

Reliability and longevity are reasons for going low tech. Your cell phone can process stuff better than the computers that ran the Space Shuttle, but your cell phone is not as reliable in a harsh, vibration filled, radiation soaked environment. The shuttle crews brought laptops but had to change memory modules often due to radiation. The dinosaur shuttle GPC (General Purpose Computers) had no issue.

The ISS is still in space and has around 80 Laptops. iPads and Surface tablets are up there also.

Complexity of the electronics is not a problem. Put a laptop or tablet on top of a bass cabinet and tell me if it fails. Use a SSD but even spinners have shock detection.

And shielding humans from radiation in space is also important. Space shuttle and ISS are mostly protected by the Van Allen belts.

 

[DJ Bebop]

We are all headed in that direction, and most of us who continue playing will become like those guys. After awhile, it's more so the playing that becomes important, and the gear used, less so.

Yup, my dad used one of these for a, road case for mics and cords, PA, electric piano amp, sometimes bass amp and a drink stand, all at the same time until his passing

 

[GreyBeard]

I bought this cab back in 1970, that's 51 years ago and I still use it from time to time. How's that for a long term investment.

 

[james condino]

The sad reality is there will only be you and one other person at the gig who will even notice. Great timing and a good smile go a whole lot farther at the gig than fancy equipment....

 

[juancaminos]

It's all in your head or their head. My 20+ year old Eden WT400 is still as bad a$$ as when I first heard it onstage behind me years ago. I tried newer stuff but keep going back to that 14 lb killer, I don't consider it a dinosaur at all.

 

[BassNugget]

The ISS is still in space and has around 80 Laptops. iPads and Surface tablets are up there also.

Complexity of the electronics is not a problem. Put a laptop or tablet on top of a bass cabinet and tell me if it fails. Use a SSD but even spinners have shock detection.

And shielding humans from radiation in space is also important. Space shuttle and ISS are mostly protected by the Van Allen belts.

Well, I'm basically repeating what NASA said. You can argue with NASA.

The ISS is still in space and has around 80 Laptops. iPads and Surface tablets are up there also.

Complexity of the electronics is not a problem. Put a laptop or tablet on top of a bass cabinet and tell me if it fails. Use a SSD but even spinners have shock detection.

And shielding humans from radiation in space is also important. Space shuttle and ISS are mostly protected by the Van Allen belts.

I am basically repeating what NASA said. Feel free to argue with NASA.

"With a ThinkPad 760XD laptop, two to three memory changes due to radiation occur during a shuttle flight to the Station, Klausman said. That number balloons up to 30 for a mission to NASA's Hubble Space Telescope. The reason is that Hubble orbits about 150 miles higher than the station, where the radiation protection from Earth's magnetic field is not as strong.

Designers also found out that laptops would crash when the shuttle passes through the "South Atlantic Anomaly," which is an area where the magnetic field draws in to Earth, again offering less radiation filtering for spacecraft flying through it.

The GPCs don't crash for radiation concerns because the GPC hardware includes a memory scrubber that prevents the system from reading radiation-changed memory."

[Invalid or Expired Link Removed]

 

[Jack Deth]

I am basically repeating what NASA said. Feel free to argue with NASA.

All data centers worth their name employ servers that leverage ECC memory for the same issues. In fact, the most common cause of a bit flip error is gamma rays. Sun spots have been know to force failovers.

 

[dkelley]

My helix floorboard does everything the OP wants. And I just plug it into a hifi powered speaker for monitoring and even for gigging with pa support when possible.

This sort of thing has existed for a couple decades now, in the form of hardware based amp modelling. In an amp? ok, kemper. But even then there are actual amps that get pretty close to having everything you are asking for.

But I mean, eq points that change with your attack? Get a good modeller with very minute control over a touch wah model and voila. or program it yourself, in the case of the helix or the axe fx.

Folks have been using these types of systems professionally with power amps and hifi cabs for a very very very long time now.

 

[GreyBeard]

My helix floorboard does everything the OP wants. And I just plug it into a hifi powered speaker for monitoring and even for gigging with pa support when possible.

This sort of thing has existed for a couple decades now, in the form of hardware based amp modelling. In an amp? ok, kemper. But even then there are actual amps that get pretty close to having everything you are asking for.

But I mean, eq points that change with your attack? Get a good modeller with very minute control over a touch wah model and voila. or program it yourself, in the case of the helix or the axe fx.

Folks have been using these types of systems professionally with power amps and hifi cabs for a very very very long time now.

I did something like this 20 years ago with a Line6 Pod Pro (rack mount) a QSC PLX1202 and a Whappo Jr. But, I ended up just using one setting and not even using any of the other setting. Eventually I switch out the Pod for a Alembic F1-X. Back in those days they weren't all that expensive.

 

[seamonkey]

I am basically repeating what NASA said. Feel free to argue with NASA.

The GPCs don't crash for radiation concerns because the GPC hardware includes a memory scrubber that prevents the system from reading radiation-changed memory."

Times have changed. NASA doesn't have the space shuttle anymore so what they did in the past doesn't matter much as what scientist are on doing on the ISS.

One of my PCs has ECC memory and RAID on the disk arrays. But it's not going into space. And I admit that it's way overkill for the MTBF on earth or low earth orbit.

 

[dkelley]

I did something like this 20 years ago with a Line6 Pod Pro (rack mount) a QSC PLX1202 and a Whappo Jr. But, I ended up just using one setting and not even using any of the other setting. Eventually I switch out the Pod for a Alembic F1-X. Back in those days they weren't all that expensive.

For sure. I used to play an alembic series 1 bass, and went into the most complex preamps they had, and then into line6 stuff and various others back when they were new. Total tone control freak here, along with being an engineer who understands and loves this stuff.

I totally get it.... most bassists don't want that much control, but I sure do.

 

[Topkat13]

Hmmmm. I live in the Nashville area and although I don’t play professionally or to make a living I know several cats who do. They all seem to be happy with the gear they use.

 

[dkelley]

I did something like this 20 years ago with a Line6 Pod Pro (rack mount) a QSC PLX1202 and a Whappo Jr. But, I ended up just using one setting and not even using any of the other setting. Eventually I switch out the Pod for a Alembic F1-X. Back in those days they weren't all that expensive.

and fyi the helix is in it's own league as far as UI and on the device editing, once you understand it. I will never go back to a simple amp unless it's supplied to me.... and I will never go back to an older modeler unless I'm financially forced to sell the helix and downgrade. It's an incredible system, the line6 helix.

 

[Michael Stanley 2112]

BOSS GT-1B, direct to the board FTW!

 

[Schlyder]

Forever bass amp?...... Trace Elliot.