Behringer BX4500H Ultrabass Bass Amplifier Head (450 Watts)

Feature:
The supplied power cord is really short for a head to be used with large cabinets. The EQ controls (five rotary controls)are useful and effective. The Ultrabass and Shape are less important to me. It would be really great if it handled 2 ohm loads, like 2 BA410/BB410 cabs or 1 BA115/1 BA410.

Quality:
Still early to give a long term quality rating. It arrived and worked as expected without any problems. The case is extremely sturdy. Would be better with metal corners on it. The rotary controls work fine, but are at odds with the overall quality feel. Good knobs are smooth and offer some resistance. These move too freely. Minor thing.

Value:
I believe this to be the best buy available right now for a bass amp. It is also actually useful for other applications (with some tweaking of the controls). It is a very powerful amp and can provide a good solid clear sound. Short of much more expensive tube amps this is it.

Desirability:
When combined with various Behringer cabinets, it is an attractive stack on stage.

Sound:
The BX4500H produces a broad range of useful sounds that work for many types of music. The high headroom allows nice clean sound, and the Gain control can add some crunch. Enormous power available. Certainly not as musical as a tube preamp or all tube amp, but really outstanding for the money.

Support:
No experience with support yet.

Overall:
The value makes the BX4500H almost irresistable, unless you have a huge budget two or three times the cost for this unit. Only drawbacks I can really see are the limitation of staying above 4 ohms total impedence, and the light feel of the knobs.

Feature:
Please read my previous review, but in general, almost every feature is a useful one, especially if you decide to use this capable amp for other things than bass. I didn't think the ultrabass was important at first, but we have come to use it as well when we want an octaver effect.

Quality:
All my amps and cabs came without problems and have not had any problems since. We play regularly, move them from gig to gig, use them for practice, and don't baby them. They are very solid, with both the amps and cabs being housed in thick wood and black rug. Metal grills on the cabs have held up well and offer lots of protection. Here's a story - On the first amp I said that the knobs were too "loose", no resistance to the touch, which feels "cheap". Well by the time I bought number two, they had substituted knobs that had great high quality feel. Number three came that way as well. To say I was impressed, is an understatement. I am not saying they listened, I am just saying they are looking to improve and have.

Value:
The rig I have described above includes 3 BX4500H, 2 BA410s and 1 BA115. Even if you think the heads are overrated in terms of power (which I doubt having used them) lets say they produce close to 1000 Watts, you have three cabes with 8 10" drivers, 1 15" driver, and three high frequency horns (switchable) and they all have aluminum cones. All this costs less than $1700 even with Speakon cables added. Well - you could say Ampeg is the way to go - the 450W solid state heads there start at about $580 each. Hartke - $500. Do the math, then buy these things before they go up again.

Desirability:
As a group this triple rig has a lot of appeal, but even the smallest version looks fine on stage.

Sound:
This amp's main reputation problem is people love to bash Beringher. Otherwise, it's a really great bass amp for the working musician. I wrote a review on my first one back in October of 2005. We now use three BX4500H heads in our setup. Two of them drive BA410 cabs, and one drives a BA115. Someone back then said buy two, they're cheap. We got thinking about it, and it seemed appropriate to buy three in fact! The heads work best with a single cab, because of the impedence, so we bought three cabs, and three heads. We loop them, plugging the bass into the first one, coming out of the effects loop to drive the second, and into the second through the return jack, which basically just uses the power amp section of that head, and then the same loop out of head two and into head three. You can then adjust the settings on the first head, just crank up the output knob on all three and KABOOM! You get far less noise by slaving them in this manner. It's still not as spiffy as some tube amp at twice the price, but there's little else that will match it at the money. By the way, use Speakon cables to the cabs, it really makes a difference.

Ease of Use:
The variety of inputs and outputs make the set up I describe under sound possible and that is the key to making this a first class professional rig, while not spending the earth. And what I describe is just one possibility. A huge side benefit of the collective rig, is that it is modular. If you want to go to a small venue, or practice, take one head, and the BA115. Need a sweet setup in a medium sized venue, two heads, and the 2 BA410s. Need a system for an outdoor, or just want to impress the troops (and yes people will be impressed even though its Beringher) bring all three heads and all three cabs. A setup for any occasion.

Support:
No real experience with service, they work far too well. I have used the Beringher web site to keep up with what's going on there, and I find it useful.

Overall:
Great value, and it delivers. Would consider Fender pro series and Ampeg is money was not an issue.