line6 lowdown studio 110

Hi Carlo,


If you're looking for a quality small bass amp, check out the Gallien Kruger MBIII150.
It's not cheap... but it sounds great.

If you're looking for more of a 'practice amp', check out a small Dean Markley combo.
If you can find one, they're inexpensive and sound pretty decent.

Try ungrounding it with a two prong adapter to see if that removes the hum.

If it hums, theres something wrong in it, dont take the risk and return it while you can.

I used to sell all the major bass amps for a living. If you don't need all the effects and modeling of the Line6, an Ampeg BA112 is the best sounding small bass amp out there. It definatly has the most thump of the small combos. The other you should play thru is a Fender Bassman 100. Just avoid the "Rumble" series Fender bass amps. Poor build and we saw several come back with issues from customers.

The Line6 bass series has alot of neat features, but they are very overrated in wattage and have cheap parts.

There is a hum when a cord is plugged in and I tried several different cords

If it does not hum without anything plugged into it, it's probably not the amp. Although it could be a bad jack but I think that is unlikely. Sounds like a grounding problem with your instrument. Try a different guitar and see if that makes a difference. If there is no hum with a different instrument, then you know it's your bass. Guitar grounding problems are easy to fix.

What do you mean by ungrounding it with a two prong adapter? I know nothing about amps? Can you explain it greater detail?

Before you return the amp, check to see if it's a grounding problem. Often there will be a "hum" when there are other electronic devices plugged into the same circuit. Sometimes florescent lights or a light dimmer will cause hum problems. Also as I said, you may want to try plugging a different instrument in the amp to see if the problem is with the amp or with the instrument. Also, try taking the amp to a different room with a different circuit and see if the hum goes away.

What I meant by a two prong adapter is this: www.instawares.com/three-prong-grounded-plug.fel99480.0.7.htm

If it's a grounding problem, then trying one of these little adapters may help. I had a loud hum once and found out that when I ungrounded my keyboard using one of those adapters the noise went away. At first I thought it was my mixer or my guitar amp. I tried un-grounding each device until the hum went away when I tried the keyboard. If you can't determine that it is merely a grounding problem with the amp or with your guitar, return the amp and tell them the darn thing is too noisy for recording. Good luck!

PS My money is on a grounding problem with the guitar.

carlo- if you can, take your bass to the store to try it thru the amps. You'll know if theres something wired wierd in your bass that way. Also you can hear how the amps react to your bass. My Tobias Signature and Ernie Ball Stingray sound very different thru the same amp.

ORIGINAL: carlo3874

I compared the hum from the Line6 lowdown studio 110 to a Fender Blues Junior amp and the Fender Blues Junior had considerable less hum than the Line6 Lowdown Studio 110.

carlo3874

If you are getting 60 cycle hum I'd expect a bass amp would get it worse than a guitar amp.

ORIGINAL: carlo3874

I don't think I will buy another Line 6 product again.

carlo3874

It's always nice to see people who don't overreact to life's problems.

I stopped by Buffalo Brothers in San Diego this weekend (It has a giant chicken on the roof). I tried out the SWR workingprom 10, Ashdown 12-180, & Ashdown minirig perfect 10.

The SWR sounded great! I thought it had a lot of clarity. The low E was well defined, and not a low end blur. It was easy to dial up some good tones and it was quiet with a little hum (the salesperson said it was likely caused by the lighting). It's a nice size @ 41 pounds.

The Ashdown Electric Blue 12-180 sounded pretty good. It had a nice classic rock sound. I wasn't too crazy about the subharmonic effect (octave effect). It was noiser than the SWR due to the fan. I liked it but it was too big to be consider portable and no way it weigh 18 pounds according to some websites.

The Ashdown minirig perfect 10 also sounded pretty good, but not as good as the EB 12-180. It's small width wise but not height. It looked real cool, like a mini stack. I passed because it didn't appear easy to lug around and wasn't too loud.

Overall, I thought the SWR was a pretty good combo and will start saving my pennies. If I was in a band with loud drums & guitars, I think Ashdown EB 12-180 would be just fine.

I'm glad I returned the Line6 Lowdown Studio 110. It felt cheap, was noisy in terms of hum, and I thought the models weren't that dramatically different from one another with the execption of the Grind model. It's too quiet below 5 on the volume knob and gets real noisy above 5.

Thank you Jim Roseberry, Hard2Hear, GPM, & MarlboroMan23 for your time & help!

carlo3874