What do these knobs do?

thefez · March 2022

Bought my first bass off a friend. On three of the knobs there's a halfway point where there's a little click. What does that do? They are active pickups apparently. Looks like this if that's helpful:

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mart · March 2022

The three knobs might be active EQ, so the centre click is telling you the "neutral" position. But also one might be a pickup selector, with the centre point telling you the position where both pickups are on full.

Musicwolf · March 2022

Bass, Mid and Treble controls. Unlike a passive guitar where the tone just filters off the top end with an active instrument you can boost as well as cut frequency bands.

Funkfingers · March 2022

Mart is correct at the second attempt.

Two pickup bass. Therefore, master volume (no centre detent), pickup balance, 2-band EQ.

Additional EQ bands would require dual concentric stacked pots and control knobs.

EDIT: Chances are that the pickups are passive and only the EQ controls are truly active.

NOTE: If the PP3 is flat, the controls do SFA.

ICBM · March 2022

The knob at the front with no detent goes from Off to Loud. Normally best set to Loud.

The other one at the front goes from Fat/Punchy to Clear/Humming, by the look of it - set to taste, or to Fat/Punchy if hum is a problem. (It might not be, some of the narrow hummy pickups are actually also hum cancelling.)

One of the other two goes from Thin to Full-Sounding. Set to Full.

The last one goes from Dull to Hiss, with a useful detent in the middle so you don't accidentally turn it up beyond halfway.

Most bass players don't feel the need to touch them again after that.

Does that help?

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What do these knobs do?

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