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MGR/Greg « BBE BMAX Bass Preamplifier »
Published on 12/05/03 at 15:00I purchased this unit from USSpeaker.com and paid $349.00 no tax and shipping was $18.00. US Speaker is a great place to do business, they realized I lived close to the BBE corp HQ so they had the unit shipped from BBE to me and saved about 5 days transportation time - I had the preamp in 2 or 3 days. I was not expecting to see it for another week at least.
I had to replace a Ashley preamp and limiter/compressor that I had been using since 1982. They finally gave out so the search was on for a replacement. I use BBE units in my home stereo as well as my bass rig and have always felt that they provide the best sound improvement per dollar value available. So when I saw they were making bass preamps I knew I wanted to get one. Bass preamp is the logical extension to the BBE line. This unit has a built-in full featured BBE sonic maximizer and a limiter/compressor as well as parametric mid range EQ and Bass, Mid, and Treble controls, input gain, and master out. LED's indicate on/off status of the Maximizer and Limiter/Comp and Limiter/Comp threshold activity. A bright switch provides 8db boost at 5khz. I found this useful for fretless but unneccessary for fretted bass if you have active onboard preamp in your bass. There are front panel inputs for active and passive basses, active input is attenuated by 6db and is very smooth for active bass. The Bass and Treble controls are mainly "boost", the Mid control is all "cut". If all 3 controls are set to zero no sound is passed. I have found that you need to set these controls very low to get great sound so you have a lot of reserve capability to spare. The parametric mid control provides a 250hz to 1000hz frequency range with a -12db to +12db gain control. Rear panel provides foot switch jacks for both the Sonic Maximizer and the Limiter/Compressor. Using these footswitches over rides the front panel switches (the footswitches are not provided but any simple on/off foot switch will work). Direct out (XLR), 1/4" Main out, send/return jacks and a ground lift switch are all provided on the rear panel as well. This is a great sounding preamp, very warm and smooth and with a good power amp this thing is loud. I use it with two old Crown DC300 power amps, one I use bridged into a custom built folded horn with 4 12" EV's. The other Crown is run is Dual mode into 2 1x15" Trace Elliot cabinets. Old equipment but it still sounds great. You simply cannot beat this preamp the value is evident the second you take it out of the box. BBE has since released a version with a 12ax7 tube front end which I would get had it been available at the time. I use a Art Studio 3 tube preamp in front of the BBE but you don't need it to get great sound from the BBE preamp. For $350.00 nothing comes close in my opinion.
What's not to like. This unit looks great with the red abalone shell knobs!
The build quality is top of the line. the front panel is 1/4" thick aluminum and the chassis is equally as sturdy. This is one of the best built 1 space rack units I have seen. It will withstand heavy touring use for sure. No plastic jacks are used and the switches are solid with very good tactile feedback. You will be very happy with this preamp.
You can spend over $1000.00 for a Bass preamp but you will get little for the $650.00 difference in price. BBE has built a great preamp and has put serious thought into the design and engineering not to mention the sound quality - and for $350.00 street price it's the best deal I have seen. You might have to look around to find one or you can go to USSpeaker.com but do yourself a favor and get this preamp!
This review was originally published on http://www.musicgearreview.com
I had to replace a Ashley preamp and limiter/compressor that I had been using since 1982. They finally gave out so the search was on for a replacement. I use BBE units in my home stereo as well as my bass rig and have always felt that they provide the best sound improvement per dollar value available. So when I saw they were making bass preamps I knew I wanted to get one. Bass preamp is the logical extension to the BBE line. This unit has a built-in full featured BBE sonic maximizer and a limiter/compressor as well as parametric mid range EQ and Bass, Mid, and Treble controls, input gain, and master out. LED's indicate on/off status of the Maximizer and Limiter/Comp and Limiter/Comp threshold activity. A bright switch provides 8db boost at 5khz. I found this useful for fretless but unneccessary for fretted bass if you have active onboard preamp in your bass. There are front panel inputs for active and passive basses, active input is attenuated by 6db and is very smooth for active bass. The Bass and Treble controls are mainly "boost", the Mid control is all "cut". If all 3 controls are set to zero no sound is passed. I have found that you need to set these controls very low to get great sound so you have a lot of reserve capability to spare. The parametric mid control provides a 250hz to 1000hz frequency range with a -12db to +12db gain control. Rear panel provides foot switch jacks for both the Sonic Maximizer and the Limiter/Compressor. Using these footswitches over rides the front panel switches (the footswitches are not provided but any simple on/off foot switch will work). Direct out (XLR), 1/4" Main out, send/return jacks and a ground lift switch are all provided on the rear panel as well. This is a great sounding preamp, very warm and smooth and with a good power amp this thing is loud. I use it with two old Crown DC300 power amps, one I use bridged into a custom built folded horn with 4 12" EV's. The other Crown is run is Dual mode into 2 1x15" Trace Elliot cabinets. Old equipment but it still sounds great. You simply cannot beat this preamp the value is evident the second you take it out of the box. BBE has since released a version with a 12ax7 tube front end which I would get had it been available at the time. I use a Art Studio 3 tube preamp in front of the BBE but you don't need it to get great sound from the BBE preamp. For $350.00 nothing comes close in my opinion.
What's not to like. This unit looks great with the red abalone shell knobs!
The build quality is top of the line. the front panel is 1/4" thick aluminum and the chassis is equally as sturdy. This is one of the best built 1 space rack units I have seen. It will withstand heavy touring use for sure. No plastic jacks are used and the switches are solid with very good tactile feedback. You will be very happy with this preamp.
You can spend over $1000.00 for a Bass preamp but you will get little for the $650.00 difference in price. BBE has built a great preamp and has put serious thought into the design and engineering not to mention the sound quality - and for $350.00 street price it's the best deal I have seen. You might have to look around to find one or you can go to USSpeaker.com but do yourself a favor and get this preamp!
This review was originally published on http://www.musicgearreview.com