I’m thinking that too. I’ll probably just leave it with the zero fret and be satisfied.
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@Al1885 knows both pickups and could weigh in on using them on a BEAD.
They are active so have more punch. Not sure if that’s what you want in a BEAD Vs your general genre of songs you play @PamPurrs
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I don’t much care for active basses, so I don’t know why I even became interested in these.
BTW, where would you put the battery?
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Right in the control cavity, loads of room.
I am going to have a look and see if I can fit a Fishman universal USB rechargeable battery in and on the control cavity cover, then will never have to put a battery in again.
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Just for reference, here is how to install an EMG pickup. It is really super easy.
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Many players love passive and hate active, on the other hand active pickups (emg, not active eq preamp) users can’t live without them.
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Can you please clarify that?
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For active EQ I’ve never understood this. “Please, take away my tone choices!” 
It’s not that hard to change a battery.
I can understand wanting an active/passive switch though. I love mine. But that’s mostly for even more tonal choices.
For active pickups that’s another story, yeah. Then you don’t have a choice to go passive if you want.
Pickups can be active (require power to operate) or passive (work without power). The vast majority of bass pickups are passive, even if a bass has active EQ.
Active pickups are hotter and generate more signal. The disadvantage is you cannot run them in passive mode and they always require a battery to operate.
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My comment was, “I don’t much care for active basses”. I never said I hated them, I am simply saying I don’t seek them out. I’ve had active basses and was fine with them, and never had an issue with changing batteries. I’m more than fine with passive ones, however.
P.S. I’m more annoyed with having to remember to unplug the bass when I’m done for the day than I am with having to change batteries.
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There are 2 main types of active electronics
First is like Fender and Seymour Duncan, etc. they are passive pickups with active eq or preamp it modify (eq) and boost the signal. In my case of noiseless fender pickups, if you have hum, turning on active only make it louder hum.
Active pickups like emg, fishman to name a few, actually have built in electronics that cancel the 60cycle hums and boost signal a little. The result usually very quiet and more tonal control because you can crank the treble without any fear of static or hum.
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I’ve actually wondered about this - do they actually have any specific hum canceling, or is it just that the boosted signal to noise ratio is so much higher that the hum matters a whole lot less? I’d actually thought the latter but could easily be wrong here.
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I didn’t me you Pam, but in general players who loves passive bass don’t want to go near active pickups. Many of those I came across hardly put on any treble.
The sour grape in me say, yeah because you don’t want any hum, lol.
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Well, the other hum could have come from grounding and shielding, active pickups take care of all that. On my American deluxe jazz, I put nylon string on, it has the ultra noiseless pickups. Since it’s not a metal string the ground hum stays, when usually goes away when you touch the string and complete the circuit.
On Emg the signal is definitely stronger but nowhere near db boost in active eq, that’s not what they are designed to do. That’s why they offer the X series, more in your face punch and boost.
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I may get some argument on this, but I’ll say it anyway; I get all I need from the VTBass DI as far as EQ goes. I don’t know that an active bass could bring anything additional to the party.
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Assuming it’s just the bass, preamp pedal, and amp, then no; that’s exactly equivalent to having a (great) preamp in the bass.
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No you don’t. That’s the beauty of having options. I have passive basses and they work well with my setup.
@eric.kiser you are absolutely right, the app is crazy good.
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I had a lot of fun with it too. Once I got the board, I noticed it’s better to keep the pedals inside that outer rail on the left and right. It makes everything easier to work with. Between that and the space you lose from even low profile patch cables, you’ll probably have to move one of those pedals to the lower rails.
Even using the low profile Boss cables it’s a little more than an inch between pedals since the connectors run into each other.
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But you can get this with Passive pickups too, it 's not only with active. I have a set of Seymour Duncan Apollos for my Paranormal Jazz which have split coils and are hum cancelling. Nordstrand also has a few models which are hum cancelling, and there is also another Jazz model, I can’t recall off the top of my head, that has phantom coils in the pickup that cancel the hum.
All passive pickups. I think there’s something to be said, and will find out soon enough, about a 1960 style bass with separate tone for the neck and middle pickup. Which you can then feed through a preamp. Going to see how that theory works soon enough.
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Depending on the pedal, you also have to think about clearance for power, etc. Not all are nicely on top and out of the way. I had to deal with a lot of cable clashing.
I like the deeper boards with smaller ‘holes’ so you can run another row of pedals up the middle if needed, or, leave room for other cable connections like XLR outs, etc.
Running to the edges of the board can be helpful too depending on cables.
Whatever you plan…
- assume you will need more room.
- assume you will change things, a lot.
- assume you will need different lenght cables, and sometimes differnt connectors (right/straight, pancake/low profile, etc).
Or, you can keep your board reasonable and not do something insane like me. haha
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If you go with the cheaper manufacturers you can just go big easily for less price than Pedaltrain. Problems solved.
It’s a metal rack you velcro things to. There’s no point in paying more than the lowest priced one you can find.
Go cheap and big. You won’t need an app to plan it.
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