That is awesome. Thanks @DaveT
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I love that guy’s channel. Wish he did bass pedals too.
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Yeah he’s awesome. I love his Behringer roundup where he identifies the clones that sound exactly the same as the vastly more expensive originals.
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So now after having looked into the Blues Breaker and Tube Screamer families of overdrive pedals, I continued to go down the rabbit hole and wonder what happens with actual tube tubes and wondered if there’s a way not to have one of the many super heavy and large amp heads to go after that.
In the pretty expensive category I found the Effectrode Blackbird. The demo tracks sound dreamy smooth. They claim it has the low end to handle a bass.
According to Effectrode the Leo Fender Blackface design came from the RCA tube application notes. Soooo, I looked it up for fun. Sample audio circuits start on page 690 or so. @terb may possibly be interested in this.
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Been getting a ton of good reviews and looks cool, too.
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thank you @DaveT but no, I’m not a big fan of Fender amps, especially for bass. The only Fender amps I like are the Brownface-era amps (probably the more rare species), I already made one from scratch (a little 5w pure class A head) for myself, it sounds good with a guitar but is not really impressive with a bass.
By the way, with guitars, I much prefer Vox and Marshall -like amps. Not that I have really something against Fender amps, but they just don’t fit me.
@itsratso : two good friends (one being probably one of my closest friends) have this preamp. they both love it and use it all the time.
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Seems super versatile and nice sound. The cool light show doesn’t hurt either.
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What a cool preamp.
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Just so I have this straight, is this something you would hang between the bass and a solid state amp to make it sound like a tube amp?
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That is very cool and sounds super fun!
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Yes, that’s the idea.
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the idea was to imagine and create the missing link between the Fender Tweed Champ and Blackface champ : a Brownface champ. It’s close to a Blackface Champ circuitry but with a Brownface-era equalizer and voicing, and a few hidden weapons (like the pot on the back, which is a dry/wet for the EQ)
size does matter …
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I’m in complete awe. It looks perfect! The design is amazing.
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Wow, the little touches are really well done!
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thanks 
I made this little thing maybe 12-15 years ago. still have it.
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Have you been spying on my teenage years @Krescht 
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Here is the last new piece for my little Line 6 museum 
, the very first Bass POD model. now it would be refered as a “bean” or “desktop” version, but at the time it was the only model :
the POD came with the official dedicated Line 6 weird-shaped little bag :
Compared to the Bass POD Pro, the models are exactly the same and the way you use the preamps is similar too (pretty close to an analog preamp). the differences are :
- the DAC, much more expensive on the Pro (but still good quality on the Bean) : the low end is a bit more sharp on the Pro, a very little bit blurry/muddy on the Bean. also the Pro is a bit more sensitive to touch/attack. but it’s really a very subtle audible difference.
- the connectivity, insane on the Pro (two DI (pre+post, XLR+jack), two loops (pre+post), clock frequency sync, plugs and switches everywhere …) and much more simple on the Bean : one input, three outputs (record, amp, headphones, all jack only), switching connectivity (Line 6 pedals + MIDI) and that’s it.
- the format, obviously. the Pro is a 2U all-metal rack, the Bean is a … bean-shaped metal case. funny enough, it’s a bit smaller than the Bass POD XT and a lot smaller than the Bass Floor POD. the Bass POD is really small enough to be integrated into a pedalboard. and it drains only 9v 1200mA which is not huge for such a preamp.
overall I’d say that the Bass POD is a cheaper, smaller, easier, simpler version of the Bass POD Pro. it sounds a very little bit more blurry but still a very interesting peace of gear. it sounds better than the Bass Floor POD overall, so I might build a new pedalboard around this Bass POD. still thinking about it, but it’s a serious possibility. I wouldn’t have any problem playing rehersals or live concerts with this old little bean.
I plan to record my next cover with the Bass POD, because that’s good to test a “new” piece of gear in real situation. but I will probably stick with the Pro for further recordings, it’s just more logical to plug the highest end gear for studio work.
and here is a little group picture, my main Bass POD Pro is not pictured because it’s rack mounted but the spare one is here :
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The beans are super cute. Line6 makes good stuff.
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I don’t know a lot about noise gates but my EQ2 pedal has one built in as an option. I’m somewhat confused by the manual terminology though. It says “Adjust the threshold of the noise gate from -100dB to -60dB”. So -100 would be full gate full noise squash and -60 would be less gate, correct?
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sounds logical.
But, either way, you have a 50/50 shot of choices. Unless it is hard to tell the difference between the two MAX settings, you should be able to confirm which way does what.
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