Wish Bass-focused Features

S

scottyhuff

New Member
I looked around the forum and didn't see this request specifically so here goes. If I'm being redundant, my apologies.

I would like to see more bass guitar focused features. This includes amps, cabs, etc. But also expanded frequency options on the parametric and graphic eq blocks, better low-end tracking for synths, filters, etc. Bass often needs eq adjustments at 90hz, 750hz, 800hz, etc. These aren't available on the graphic eq block. You can grab most of them on a parametric, but the 90hz option is only on the low-end shelf and not in a peak adjustment. The tracking for the synth block is terrible. I have consistent tracking down to G on the E string. Below that it gets whacky. But it loses tracking on the higher end of the bass as well.

If you cater to bass players a bit more, I'm sure you'd see a lot more of them using this amazing piece of gear.
 
Unfortunately, bass items are not a high priority focus here in Fractal Land. The good news is that the products themselves (I'm using the FM9 Turbo) continue to improve steadily over time. Many of the gripes I've had in the past, as a bassist hoping for more bass stuff, have been alleviated simply by virtue of the improvements to the modeling in general, and the increasing quality and flexibility designed into these pieces of gear.

Do I still wish we'd see a SansAmp BDDI drive model, or a GK, Acoustic, Aguilar, et al amp, or a wider selection of Dynacabs for bass? Absolutely. In the meantime, I've been getting some of the best bass sounds ever on my FM9 (thankfully I'm an Ampeg guy). I was less likely to express this level of satisfaction from previous iterations of the AxeFx I've owned. IMO it's just a LOT easier now to get a good bass sound going...but yeah...Fractal doesn't offer much variety for bassists off-the-shelf.

In the meantime, keep up the wishes. Maybe enough users will help these requests gain some traction. In the meantime, there's not a lot to suggest that much - if anything - is going to happen. Still keeping my hopes up for some 3rd party DynaCab bass packs sometime in the near future.
 
+1
p.s. If I remember correctly, the lack of accuracy while tracking the lowest bass notes are due to limitations of the hardware that cannot be improved upon in this generation of products.
 
Admin M@ said:
It's actually due to limitations of the known universe. One cannot measure a frequency until it has been established, and that requires time. The lower you go,
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I'd like to understand why the synth block struggles to track bass notes below a low G on the E string, regardless of note recognition processing latency (which is expected). No doubt there exist products (digital muti-fx with synth blocks) that are able to track the low range of bass (I've owned a number of them). Why do Fractal products have problems with this?
 
slimefuzz said:
which amp models do you like for clean full range bass tones
that keep the fundamental strong?
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Which bass amp? Any of them are capable with appropriate settings. Where bass guitar typically will lose the fundamental is with a front-end drive pedal (that inherently tend to roll off low end) or an IR of a cabinet with a pronounced low-end roll-off (which is common).
This is why parallel/dual path bass sounds are popular, whereby the low frequencies can be left untouched by NOT routing them through drives, amps, cab IRs, etc. in order to retain an unfettered low-end.

If I want a very present, clean, full-bodied full-range tone, I'll often not use a cab block at all, and just use the amp in an amp block to shape the tone.
You can get a lot of tonal variation from just an amp block and a compressor block.
 
jimfist said:
I'd like to understand why the synth block struggles to track bass notes below a low G on the E string, regardless of note recognition processing latency (which is expected). No doubt there exist products (digital muti-fx with synth blocks) that are able to track the low range of bass (I've owned a number of them). Why do Fractal products have problems with this?
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It is stated here that the lowest note trackable on the synth block is 47hz. You'll find some possible reasons for this in this article on the wiki. Maybe limiting detection to the more common use cases (guitars) is worth it in the pursuit of saving some ms. This choice may have been a solution to another problem.
 
zedeloc said:
It is stated here that the lowest note trackable on the synth block is 47hz. You'll find some possible reasons for this in this article on the wiki. Maybe limiting detection to the more common use cases (guitars) is worth it in the pursuit of saving some ms. This choice may have been a solution to another problem.
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Ah, yes. Poorly phrased question on my part. Ultimately, bassists would appreciate decent tracking down to low E at least, if somehow Fractal could accommodate it. Ultimately, whatever decisions were made to limit bass note tracking makes it a bummer for bassists to use without those extra low notes of range.
 
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