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Rosewood vs Maple - Clips + Poll

Which is maple, which is rosewood

  • Total voters
    63
phatduckk

phatduckk

Well-known member
Joined
Jul 25, 2004
Messages
8,145
Location
San Mateo, California, United States
ANSWER: Rosewood vs Maple - Clips + Poll

OK guys ...

So which sound clip is Maple and which is Rosewood?

Bass & recording info:
Both basses are EBMM Sterling's w/ Stainless Steal Super Slinkys on em.
One bass has a maple board and weighs a ton, the other has rosewood board and is way lighter.
Both have really fast action, but one is faster
both have string buzz
PUP height is pretty much the same - i adjust em to factory spec w/ a straight edge
Both recordings were done 45 seconds apart from eachother on my Mac w/ garageband
Same GarageBand preset
EQ flat on bass - volume up - gain on the sound device set to barely clip
PUP switch on neck position (series)

The strings have been on the respective basses for pretty much equal playing time BUT one set still sounds brighter.

The begining of each clip is the same. 1 riff that's mainly low notes (played w/ a pick) followed by a riff w/ high notes (w/ a pick). The i played some random stuff just so i would remember which clip was which bass

ok ... so which sound clip is from the Sterling w/ rosewood and which is from the Sterling w/ maple

Clip 1
Clip 2
 
Last edited:
Haha. How many days until your new bass arrives? ;) Also, this reminds me of that Pepsi Challenge or whatever that was going on for a while. :p Neat idea!

Thinking about it, they both sound quite the same to me, but I cast my vote anyway.
 
midopa said:
Haha. How many days until your new bass arrives? ;) .
Click to expand...

dude im dying!!! i dunno. ive tried to be good and have not called or email anyone for any kind of status. i figure bugging folks wont hasten the process. LOL

which bass? i have 2 on order. he he

ya im interested in seeing how many people get the answer here correct. i personally can hear a difference between the 2.
 
I like the way even though there is NO votes for 1 yet, it still has a little red bar up there. Just so it doesn't feel left out!

I've never played rosewood/maple side by side to try to compare, but if the rumour is true and maple sounds brighter, then I suppose clip1 sounds somewhat brighter than clip2, that's how I'm figuring it out.

But duck, you say you can personally hear a difference between the two, and yet you had to play some different riffs at the end of each clip to be able to distinguish which was which! Doesn't sound like you are THAT sure!

Will have to "pick your brain" someday to find out what I need to hook my bass up to Garageband. It won't hurt :)
 
LowDownDave said:
But duck, you say you can personally hear a difference between the two, and yet you had to play some different riffs at the end of each clip to be able to distinguish which was which! Doesn't sound like you are THAT sure!
Click to expand...

i meant "i car hear the diff" as in "they dont sound the same to me" not as in "i cant tell x is maple and y is rosewood". sorry for being vague there.

LowDownDave said:
Will have to "pick your brain" someday to find out what I need to hook my bass up to Garageband. It won't hurt :)
Click to expand...

any USB or Firewire audio interface. USB 2.0 is faster than firewire so its a better bet. slow transfer from the audio interface to the computer = you can hear your bass, then you'll hear the computer speaker. its annoying as hell.

so buy one of those. install the drivers and plug iun the USB cable, fire up garage band, open the preferences, change the input device to the audio interface, create a new track in garage band, in the track info window's "pick a channel" pulldown select the channel youre using on the audio interface and youre done :) its super simple
 
The difference between the two is negligible to me. If I were just throwing something out there, I would have to say that #1 sounded a tiny bit brighter than #2.

But I've always been a proponent of the difference between rosewood and maple boards being so minute that either could be eq'ed to get the sound you want.
 
phatduckk said:
any USB or Firewire audio interface. USB 2.0 is faster than firewire so its a better bet. slow transfer from the audio interface to the computer = you can hear your bass, then you'll hear the computer speaker. its annoying as hell.
Click to expand...

Actually USB2 has a faster theoretical max speed, but Firewire has better sustained speeds. Thats why Firewire is better for things like video transfer. Also when comparing Mac USB2 vs Windows USB2 performance, it has been shown that the Macs USB2 performance is not as good, not bad, but not as good.

For one or two track simultaneous recording USB2 is fine. You'll notice the higher end M-Audio interfaces are usually Firewire though.

That said, I use a the M-Audio Fasttrack USB2 device on my Mac and for $99 its all I need for my purposes.

Oh and the first one is Maple.
 
Clip 1 is definitely maple, says I. It has that "openness" to the sound that maple fretboards lend to basses. My Wal has a maple board and has very similar sonic characteristics. I like 'em both.
 
Mobay45 said:
The difference between the two is negligible to me. If I were just throwing something out there, I would have to say that #1 sounded a tiny bit brighter than #2.

But I've always been a proponent of the difference between rosewood and maple boards being so minute that either could be eq'ed to get the sound you want.
Click to expand...


+1

tk
 
I voted that clip #1 was maple, too. I'm hearing the extra little 'pop' on that track. I am also listening with PC speakers, but what the hell.. I'll stand by my vote. ;)
 
smallequestrian said:
Actually USB2 has a faster theoretical max speed, but Firewire has better sustained speeds.
Click to expand...

ah ... ya, i never actually looked into this. thanks for the info dude. On a related note, i heard that Apple's ditching Firewire. Dunno if its true but tiz the rumor
 
Is the rumor but won't happen for awhile. Firewire lives on even the latest Apple computers.

tk
 
phatduckk said:
ah ... ya, i never actually looked into this. thanks for the info dude. On a related note, i heard that Apple's ditching Firewire. Dunno if its true but tiz the rumor
Click to expand...
The rumor came out of them dropping firewire from the iPod. They did this because of space constraints within the iPod itself (they are getting smaller) and cost of having both a USB2 chipset and a Firewire chipset. Espescially considering the majority of iPod users are PC based now where USB2 is more plentiful. Apple won't be getting rid of Firewire any time soon as a lot of the digital video market depends on it.
 
i wish they made it an option for ipods because i have 2 firewire wall chargers that are now useless because they switched (and my one dock connector firewire cable is destoyed)
 
So which clip was which? Clip 1 with the firewire fretboard or Clip 2 with the Rosewood cable?
 
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