about to give my current bass to a buddy of mine who wants to learn - its a subray 4. i have some extra money from winnning my fantasy football league and am having a hard time deciding between these models below. I like the feel of all of them as I had a chance to mess with them a little bit.
any input from owners on what they like or dont like? I have seen reviews on all - but figured i would ask -
Sire P7
Fender Boxer reissue
Fender Aerodyne Bass ( PJ setup)
San Dimas Pro mod : did you have any qc issues ie) noise?
I don’t have any personal experience with a P7, but I have owned several Sires and they have all been well built, solid instruments. The bass I consider my main bass is a Sire D5
I had an Aerodyne for a short time, the lack of body contours bothered me more than I thought it would. YMMV, it was a fantastic instrument otherwise
Boxer is an interesting bass. It has a TBX circuit which gives more tonal options without a preamp. Basically, from 1-5 the tone pot acts like a normal tone pot, but from 6-10 it does some boost/cuts of some frequencies. Also the pickups are wired in serial so cut the volume to one, and you lose both. Never played one, but thought about it
Charvel Pro Mod San Dimas - I’ve got two, though I will sell one soon I believe. Fantastic bass, great pickups, great neck, never had anything like it. No noise issues, and my lessons are in a fairly noisy environment. I believe it is @JustTim ho also has one and had noise issues, but they are easy to fix and the bass is well worth it. I will sell one because I don’t need two.
I bought mine used, and my noise issues were two-fold: one, it wasn’t shielded/grounded properly, but that was an easy fix and is documented in many different places. Two, the pre-amp did this weird thing where it would suddenly drop to about half volume and be all staticy and crackly, then after about a second, it would return to normal. Since I prefer passive and bought this for the neck and the PJ setup, I just had the pre-amp removed and now it’s a Charvel No Mod San Dimas.
The former is, from my understanding, a common problem with this model. The latter seemed to only be happening with mine, as I found no other reports of that specific problem on the 'net. I blame the former owner. I wouldn’t take that issue into account if you’re considering a Charvel Pro Mod San Dimas. It’s a great bass.
Only have had the chance to play a Sire and a Charvel. For the money the Charvels I tries all needed to have the fret ends dressed and cleaned up. For that kind of money they were horrible and chewed up my hands. The Sire was nice though. It was much smoother and I liked the neck on it. Did not really notice any noise with the Charvel. I really wanted to like it as I had a B3 back in 87 that I liked. Just my 2 cents.
Hey @WillieD, I asked a super similar question a while back and got some good advice from the BB brain trust here. Love this community - folks gave good advice without being brand shills/snobs. Feels like BB is the only place like that. FWIW, my Sire U5 is super high quality - beats run of the mill MIM P-bass in quality for sure, but haven’t been able to evaluate it against an Aerodyne - not lucky enough to have one in my hands yet. (To be fully transparent - the U5 is new and the MIM P is at least 10-15 years old, second hand through who knows how many previous owners - so take that comparison with a grain of salt.)
so many choices and the boxer and charvel are pretty even - however the boxer is passive. thanks for your input! choices choices! if i were to get the charvel id get the white one - and throw on some black knobs
i havent tried a P8 or P7 ,i only had a chance to mess with a V7 but the finish on it and the way it felt was great. i just dont know if the p7 series has that artificial P sound… ya know what i mean?
