frighteners wrote: Mon Jun 12, 2023 11:19 am After enduring the want-almost buy-chicken out at the last second cycle for > 2 decades, it only took the looming spectre of divorce to finally shove me into buying a Travis Bean. Happy (I suppose this is technically midlife) crisis to me.

Which model?

Mickey242 wrote: Wed Jun 21, 2023 5:37 pm

frighteners wrote: Mon Jun 12, 2023 11:19 am After enduring the want-almost buy-chicken out at the last second cycle for > 2 decades, it only took the looming spectre of divorce to finally shove me into buying a Travis Bean. Happy (I suppose this is technically midlife) crisis to me.

Which model?

Bought that 500 from Gallo. Kidding. This 1000S.

Picked up a GK 400rb. Hooked it up to an ampeg 4x10 cab. Sounds great. Thanks for suggesting it, forumites.

I've been using a volca Fm to add little weird shit behind my Arturia Mini Brute. Just twinkles and stuff. I only like like 2 sounds in it so I'm replacing it with this little desktop granular synth/sampler that looks fun. [youtube][/youtube]

thecr4ne wrote: Thu Jun 22, 2023 11:09 am Picked up a GK 400rb. Hooked it up to an ampeg 4x10 cab. Sounds great. Thanks for suggesting it, forumites.

I don't use mine that often these days, but it's probably the last amp I'd get rid of, since it's not worth as much as my big heavy tube amps, but it's the most reliable amp I've had and it really does sound pretty damn good!

tallchris wrote: Thu Jun 22, 2023 12:07 pm

thecr4ne wrote: Thu Jun 22, 2023 11:09 am Picked up a GK 400rb. Hooked it up to an ampeg 4x10 cab. Sounds great. Thanks for suggesting it, forumites.

I don't use mine that often these days, but it's probably the last amp I'd get rid of, since it's not worth as much as my big heavy tube amps, but it's the most reliable amp I've had and it really does sound pretty damn good!

It's the amp I suggest to everyone that asks me what bass amp I would buy. Can be had so cheap it's a no brainer to have one sitting around just in case.

Speaking of 400RB, I've always meant to ask if anyone has any experience here w/ the MkIII, MkIV variants. How similar (or different) are they?

The one small gripe I have always had is that the direct out on the back is 1/4" instead of the DI you usually see on bass amps from mid-90s onward (including 800rb) so I've always had to manually DI them when they come onto a stage. The newer versions have a low-impedence jack on the front...but do they sound the same?

I recommended (like a lot of us do) that the bass player in our band pick up his own 400rb instead of always borrowing mine, but he got one of the 'Backline' ones. We tried them both side by side and the Backline sounded veiled and muddy in comparison. Not unusable, but since the 80s/90s versions are still easy to find cheap he went and got one of those instead.

Garth wrote: Fri Jun 23, 2023 8:22 am Speaking of 400RB, I've always meant to ask if anyone has any experience here w/ the MkIII, MkIV variants. How similar (or different) are they?

The one small gripe I have always had is that the direct out on the back is 1/4" instead of the DI you usually see on bass amps from mid-90s onward (including 800rb) so I've always had to manually DI them when they come onto a stage. The newer versions have a low-impedence jack on the front...but do they sound the same?

Haven't played the mkIV but I've played the mkIII - it was different but I didn't feel in a signficant way and in a couple minutes you would have the same sounds. Seemed to have more volume for a given gain setting etc.
I have an original (mk0?), two mkIIs and an 800

This may just be some combination of player/bass/cab/etc but I definitely noticed that my 400-RB with the -10db gain switch underneath the input (w/ the grey power cable attached) seemed louder than when I saw a friend play through the same cab w/ the gain switch to the side of the input (and had the IEC cable). No idea if the circuit is at all actually different.

Have definitely noticed that those later ones when they start adding more knobs and shit never seemed as loud; kind of assumed they had some circuit to keep it from clipping as hard so you couldn't drive them as loud.

No experience w/ the new mini-ones but I know Ian from Kowloon has the 800RB version and I've seen him use it with several bands over the last year and it seemed plenty damn loud.