Tech21 Sansamp Bass Driver DI - Use As Preamp?
Moderators: rickenbrother, ajish4
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larsjonnson
Tech21 Sansamp Bass Driver DI - Use As Preamp?
I use a 1970 Rick 4001 running thru a Sunn Concert Bass head w/Marshall 4x12. Currently, my Sunn has lost all tone controls, just has volume. The repair techs can seem to locate suitable replacement capacitors since Fender bought out Sunn. I have been told that the Sansamp Bass Driver would work as a preamp, using my current amp's power output. Any replies would be appreciated and also what would be the best way to hookup?
Welcome aboard, Steve.
Does your Sunn head have an effect loop (preamp out+poweramp in, or insert sent+insert return)? If yes, just hook up the output of the Sansamp driver to the Sunn's "Poweramp In" or "Insert Return". If not, just use the Sansamp as a normal pedal that goes into the Sunn's input.
Does your Sunn head have an effect loop (preamp out+poweramp in, or insert sent+insert return)? If yes, just hook up the output of the Sansamp driver to the Sunn's "Poweramp In" or "Insert Return". If not, just use the Sansamp as a normal pedal that goes into the Sunn's input.
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larsjonnson
Yes, that's correct.
You'll have to set the "Blend" on the Sansamp to the maximum and its "Level" to (almost or full) maximum since it'll be used as a preamp. Set its "Drive" to your liking then.
I recommend hooking them up before turning on the Sunn's power switch.
Please do post here how the setup works for you.
You'll have to set the "Blend" on the Sansamp to the maximum and its "Level" to (almost or full) maximum since it'll be used as a preamp. Set its "Drive" to your liking then.
I recommend hooking them up before turning on the Sunn's power switch.
Please do post here how the setup works for you.
If you have a SansAmp Bass Driver DI, which is basically the same as my RBI minus the midrange EQ and XLR out controls, you do not even need a bass amp head. Use any good strong bass power amp, PA amp, or audiophile amp (tubed or solid state). "Clean" amps tend to do better with my RBI, as the bass amp tone is already in the SansAmp circuitry. Clean amps need the Blend rather high, less for dirty bass amps (like my Marshall). Level is just another name for Master Volume. Drive sets your preamp distortion (Input Gain). For some reason, I pick up more dead notes on the fingerboard when driving through my Marshall than through my audiophile amp setup. Plug my bass straight into the Marshall, and the dead notes mostly disappear. I would say it's best not to drive through another bass preamp, but straight into the power amp section.
Also, Steve, a lot of bass players who use SansAmp Bass Driver or RBI units don't seem to realize that they can pick up a better used power amp for the price of a major repair bill by buying an old audiophile amp like a B&K or Adcom. These were made in larger numbers and sold at better value than bass guitar amps. You just need a mono phone to stereo RCA adapter that is sold at Radio Shack and many other places, and a standard stereo RCA cable. I like the old B&K amps because they are ultra reliable, very long service life, incredibly good sounding with powerful bass, and have rack handles for easy carrying and big toroid transformers for saving a bit of weight and less noise. MOSFET outputs help prevent thermal runaway and burnout. Mine has been in almost daily use since 1991 and not a single breakdown to power amp or preamp. There is a B&K EX442 for sale on eBay right now with the matching Pro-10MC preamp in nice condition that is only bid up to $360. It has 4 pairs of hefty output transistors per dual mono channel for 350WPC of output power. The preamp can bring $300 or more by itself and can be resold to recover part of the cost, and the power amp sold for about $1000 when new and brings $400-$500 on the used market when you find a really clean one. It will blow away most pA amps or bass amps of similar power in the sound quality department, except for maybe a high end Crown amp which costs even more. I would buy the outfit myself, except that I already bought a similar B&K outfit years ago that I used as my audiophile amps and now use for my home bass setup that is driven by my RBI. The Pro-10MC has a line stage bypass switch that allows you to add or delete over 20dB of gain to match the sensitivity of your input, sort of like the input sensitivity select switch on the SansAmp RBI. The extra volume control and active/passive switch almost turns a Bass Driver DI into an RBI. You get a killer home stereo rig as a free bonus (or a killer bass power amp as a free bonus). The moving coil/moving magnet selectable phono stage is so good that it alone is worth the cost of the entire preamp. Nothing beat these two units for sound and value when they were in production at anywhere near their cost. They were solid state amps for people who wanted tubelike harmonic correctness and timbral accuracy that other solid state amps in their price range just couldn't match. I don't know why B&K never offered pro units with rackmount faceplates, 1/4" phone jack inputs, and cooling fans, but they sold every unit they ever made with no trouble as it was. My present audiophile amp setup cost 3X as much, but is only marginally (but noticeably) better in sound quality. The improvement was mainly in the treble and midrange. The B&K amps are still just as good in the bass it seems. The Tech 21 customer service rep told me that some of their more sophisticated and knowledgeable SansAmp customers use audiophile power amps that are driven by their SansAmp preamps. I think Geddy Lee uses some kind of a relatively clean amp behind his RBI unit. The idea is to start with a clean tone and dirty it up as you wish. You can't clean up an amp that is dirty to begin with. Bass players are finally breaking away from "guitarist mentality" and getting proper amps that are CLEAN and POWERFUL. The tone shaping is better done in the preamp and pickup controls, with clean amplification after that. The best new bass amp designs are coming from the audiophile camp, such as the new Phil Jones Bass rigs. The Ampeg SVT used acoustic suspension drivers that had previously only been used in audiophile speakers.
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jwr2
The sans amp is an excellent tone shaper ... so is the line 6 pod ...
If your old Sunn head is going bad ... then get a new head ...
Mesa, Ampeg, GK, SWR, etc... the new bass heads from the 80's on are a whole lot better than the old 60's and 70's bass heads ...
I use ampeg these days ... the old 70's bass heads were sort of atomic sounding ... I run a line 6 bass pod into an ampeg b2r and then into a 2x10 and 1x18 cabinets and then mike that into a big PA ...
I used to use a Sunn amp into a 4x12 cab in the 70's ... it was good for its day but the new stuff is better ...
If your old Sunn head is going bad ... then get a new head ...
Mesa, Ampeg, GK, SWR, etc... the new bass heads from the 80's on are a whole lot better than the old 60's and 70's bass heads ...
I use ampeg these days ... the old 70's bass heads were sort of atomic sounding ... I run a line 6 bass pod into an ampeg b2r and then into a 2x10 and 1x18 cabinets and then mike that into a big PA ...
I used to use a Sunn amp into a 4x12 cab in the 70's ... it was good for its day but the new stuff is better ...
Jeff is right, 30-year-old gear is not worth fixing up unless you do it yourself as a hobby and count your time and effort as worthless and want a collector's item.
Buying modern used gear in as near to perfect condition as possible is the best way to get the nicest gear at the most economical price.
When old gear is fixed back up, it still doesn't perform at modern levels, and will probably break down again at a faster rate than before. Collector gear and player gear are usually two different animals. In his later years, John Entwistle used far different gear than he started on. Shouldn't we move on upward as well? Most early rock stars didn't worship their instruments; they moved on up as better gear became available.
Modular rigs using separate rack and speaker units are displacing head/cabinet amps just as head/cabs displaced combo amps in serious gig rigs due to greater flexibility. Few players would try to get to a gig in a Model T, but some of them insist on playing one when they get there.
Buying modern used gear in as near to perfect condition as possible is the best way to get the nicest gear at the most economical price.
When old gear is fixed back up, it still doesn't perform at modern levels, and will probably break down again at a faster rate than before. Collector gear and player gear are usually two different animals. In his later years, John Entwistle used far different gear than he started on. Shouldn't we move on upward as well? Most early rock stars didn't worship their instruments; they moved on up as better gear became available.
Modular rigs using separate rack and speaker units are displacing head/cabinet amps just as head/cabs displaced combo amps in serious gig rigs due to greater flexibility. Few players would try to get to a gig in a Model T, but some of them insist on playing one when they get there.
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jwr2
I had a bunch of old stuff that I dumped a few years ago ... old effects, old power amps, old guitar cables, old speakers, etc ...
The only old thing that I kept was my old 68 Ric ... and that is stored away in its case ... oh ya the case is old to .... all the stuff I use now is less than 20 years old ...
Old 70's amps don't hold up well ...
my main bass is a 1990 ... it has zero fret ware ... somebody must have bought it and never played it ... and then sold it to me.
The only old thing that I kept was my old 68 Ric ... and that is stored away in its case ... oh ya the case is old to .... all the stuff I use now is less than 20 years old ...
Old 70's amps don't hold up well ...
my main bass is a 1990 ... it has zero fret ware ... somebody must have bought it and never played it ... and then sold it to me.
70's amps on the whole don't hold up well unless it's an SVT.
Things tend to run in circles, during the 80's many players started using rack systems. I knew one guy who had his bass tri-amped, it was ridiculous, he was always blowing the 2 15's he had because after all it is a bass and 90% of the energy goes into the woofers. It was a very loud band and he thought because he had three power amps and assorted mids and tweeters that he would have the volume, bass needs predominately woofers not tweeters. Most bass players that I know use a head and a cab or two, much simpler, the rig that Jeff uses sounds like a nice combination of power and portability for real world gigs.
Ampeg makes a lot of nice heads nowadays besides the all tube SVT classic which is still my favorite new Ampeg. (by the way, I don't own stock in Ampeg, I've been playing a long time and I know what the best is at least for me.) I like a nice aggressive sound and Ampeg gives it to me.
I had a 1970 SVT head for 20 years that I bought second hand in 1975, I never had problems with it, I sold it for reasons unrelated to reliabilty. I have a 70's head now that is being recapped, it was starting to hum, as any 25 year old amp with original caps would, but they have always been reliable for me. I would stay away from Solid State amps from the 70's, the techology was not as advanced back then and they are prone to blowing up at the most inopportune times. And the preamp sections of most of them s@ck. Not enough variability.
All those heads Jeff mentioned are nice. A nice 4 X 10 cab is probably the best all around cab going today, it has enough ooomph for larger rooms and has enough bottom to make your bass sound like a bass, which after all is what it is correct? I think that both me and Jeff play a lot, we play very different music but are both working musicians and realize that what may be nice in your bedroom may not be enough for a gig in the real world of noisy clubs and large rooms and Marshall heads. What you want is something simple, sounds good and has enough volume and bottom for all situations, it is easy to get top, that is why guitar amps are only 50 watts and blow your ears out, you need the watts for the clear bottom, the human ear does not hear all frequencies equally, it needs more for bass.
If you have read all this so far congratulations, I think me and Philco should enter into a competition to see which one of us can write the longest, most irrelevant, rambling, boring, and off subject post. I think that I would win. What do you think Phil, deal?
Things tend to run in circles, during the 80's many players started using rack systems. I knew one guy who had his bass tri-amped, it was ridiculous, he was always blowing the 2 15's he had because after all it is a bass and 90% of the energy goes into the woofers. It was a very loud band and he thought because he had three power amps and assorted mids and tweeters that he would have the volume, bass needs predominately woofers not tweeters. Most bass players that I know use a head and a cab or two, much simpler, the rig that Jeff uses sounds like a nice combination of power and portability for real world gigs.
Ampeg makes a lot of nice heads nowadays besides the all tube SVT classic which is still my favorite new Ampeg. (by the way, I don't own stock in Ampeg, I've been playing a long time and I know what the best is at least for me.) I like a nice aggressive sound and Ampeg gives it to me.
I had a 1970 SVT head for 20 years that I bought second hand in 1975, I never had problems with it, I sold it for reasons unrelated to reliabilty. I have a 70's head now that is being recapped, it was starting to hum, as any 25 year old amp with original caps would, but they have always been reliable for me. I would stay away from Solid State amps from the 70's, the techology was not as advanced back then and they are prone to blowing up at the most inopportune times. And the preamp sections of most of them s@ck. Not enough variability.
All those heads Jeff mentioned are nice. A nice 4 X 10 cab is probably the best all around cab going today, it has enough ooomph for larger rooms and has enough bottom to make your bass sound like a bass, which after all is what it is correct? I think that both me and Jeff play a lot, we play very different music but are both working musicians and realize that what may be nice in your bedroom may not be enough for a gig in the real world of noisy clubs and large rooms and Marshall heads. What you want is something simple, sounds good and has enough volume and bottom for all situations, it is easy to get top, that is why guitar amps are only 50 watts and blow your ears out, you need the watts for the clear bottom, the human ear does not hear all frequencies equally, it needs more for bass.
If you have read all this so far congratulations, I think me and Philco should enter into a competition to see which one of us can write the longest, most irrelevant, rambling, boring, and off subject post. I think that I would win. What do you think Phil, deal?
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jwr2
I get to use a SVT once in a while ... it is a nice amp ... I can't fit it in my vehicle though ... I prefer bass heads without tubes ... low maintenance ... I know tubes sound better but you can get a nice sounding bass amp without tubes ... that's why I like the ampeg b2r ...
If you want a nice small bass amp for home try the ampeg ba series ...
If you want a nice small bass amp for home try the ampeg ba series ...
Bob, I realize you were joking. I have a LOT of respect for Ampeg for bringing out the SVT. The new idea at the time was a lot of little 10" woofers that sound better than a few big ones, plus make it acoustic suspension to do away with that monstrosity of cabinet design that should have died in the 30's right after it was invented, the port vented bass reflex cabinet. It offers ZERO support to the driver suspension below the cab resonant frequency and makes damage very likely if a very loud and low frequency pulse comes along. The port never keeps up with the driver cone and causes overhang to the sound. The Nestorovic bass alignment is the only reflex design I have ever heard that I like, and it is only available on Vandersteen and Nestorovic audiophile speakers, so the vast majority of bass cabs are trash to me. I am NOT a fan of flabby bass. Just my personal preference I am allowed to have, thank you.
I agree with Jeff in that solid state is the way to go in a modern bass rig. This is not to say that good tube bass amps do not exist. Tube amps actually were the best available in the 70's and before. There is not a modern tube amp design, even a $10K Phil Jones Bass T-500, that isn't bettered in the bass by a solid state design at a lower cost and lower weight. Modern bass speakers take several times the power of the speakers used in SVT cabs in the 70's, so the 8x10 bass cab is obsolete as well. Just like P-51 fighter planes that were the best of their day.
Phil Jones does have one cabinet that is very interesting. That is his backloaded horn cabinet. He went all the way back to the time of Lowther one-way backloaded horn audiophile speakers. Everybody who ever used a bass horn cabinet knows that it functions as a bandpass filter. It has lows that pummel you, but the highs are sucked up by the cabinet. By backloading the horn, and letting the front of the speaker face forward into the room, you get the fabulous rockcrusher bass from the horn enclosure and the high frequencies straight off the speaker cones. Phil Jones has reinvented the wheel a bit on this one, but I do not know of any other brand that ever did it this way: Multiple small bass drivers AND backloaded horn cabinet. It may actually cover the whole frequency range well without compromise and be the present state-of-the-art bass speaker cab for large venues. It also necessarily costs a small fortune as that cabinet complexity is something else. It isn't exactly compact or lightweight either, except in the context of elephantine bass horn cabinets. No doubt the bass will rattle your eyeballs.
I think the very best Phil Jones Bass design is his little battery operated Bassman's Briefcase with two 5" bass drivers. I can see it in my future.
I can stick a Scan-Speak resistive flow vent over the port hole, or stuff the port with fiberglass, and save it from being a dastardly ported bass reflex design.
I agree with Jeff in that solid state is the way to go in a modern bass rig. This is not to say that good tube bass amps do not exist. Tube amps actually were the best available in the 70's and before. There is not a modern tube amp design, even a $10K Phil Jones Bass T-500, that isn't bettered in the bass by a solid state design at a lower cost and lower weight. Modern bass speakers take several times the power of the speakers used in SVT cabs in the 70's, so the 8x10 bass cab is obsolete as well. Just like P-51 fighter planes that were the best of their day.
Phil Jones does have one cabinet that is very interesting. That is his backloaded horn cabinet. He went all the way back to the time of Lowther one-way backloaded horn audiophile speakers. Everybody who ever used a bass horn cabinet knows that it functions as a bandpass filter. It has lows that pummel you, but the highs are sucked up by the cabinet. By backloading the horn, and letting the front of the speaker face forward into the room, you get the fabulous rockcrusher bass from the horn enclosure and the high frequencies straight off the speaker cones. Phil Jones has reinvented the wheel a bit on this one, but I do not know of any other brand that ever did it this way: Multiple small bass drivers AND backloaded horn cabinet. It may actually cover the whole frequency range well without compromise and be the present state-of-the-art bass speaker cab for large venues. It also necessarily costs a small fortune as that cabinet complexity is something else. It isn't exactly compact or lightweight either, except in the context of elephantine bass horn cabinets. No doubt the bass will rattle your eyeballs.
I think the very best Phil Jones Bass design is his little battery operated Bassman's Briefcase with two 5" bass drivers. I can see it in my future.
I can stick a Scan-Speak resistive flow vent over the port hole, or stuff the port with fiberglass, and save it from being a dastardly ported bass reflex design.Ampetg SVT cabs are everywhere, except that nowadays they cut them into sections and are made by different manufacturers, an 8 X 10 SVT cab is actually (4) 2 X 10 cabs in one, the design is alive and well, just more compact and more expensive. The SVT cabs themselves are *ubiquitous* on MTV so I don't think they themselves are obsolete either. The reason those Phil Jones things cost so much is that it takes that much more money to significantly improve upon the old acoustic suspension Ampeg design, which is the most copied design in bass cabs today, most of the manufacturers have an 8 X 10, a 4 X 10 and a 2 X 10 cab somewhere in their line up and these are all copies of the SVT design, which was introduced in 1969. The SVT's are big, heavy, and clumsy, but like it or not they are probably here to stay.