Extensive compressor reviews and FAQ

EBS MultiComp: This is an excellent unit! It has very low noise, and turning the compression knob up to higher settings does not increase the noise at all. The "normal" and "multi-band" modes are clean and transparent, however they can also sound sort of boring or dry. But the "tube sim" setting adds a nice thickness and boost to the mids, and has a rich tone; it does seem to roll off the highs just a bit. In the other two modes there is not much rolloff of highs or lows, although it is not quite as "boomy" or "bright" as some other comps. The tube-sim mode sounds great for both fingerstyle and slap, at any Comp setting from 12:00 to max, and I could happily leave it switched on all the time at that setting. But don't ignore the multi-band mode! If you set the compression to max in the MB mode you can get a very articulate and defined slap sound. The maximum compression ratio is only 5:1 however, so it is not much of a peak limiter for the very aggressive players.
 
The attack of the compression is a bit slow (and not adjustable), so it allows your natural initial attack spikes through, which can be good or bad depending on the rest of your gear- it's great for a more articulate or aggressive sound, but those sharp attacks can clip your amp momentarily. But the compression itself is very smooth and natural. High-output instruments (such as certain -not all- active basses) can distort the EBS. It has a switch for "active" and "passive" modes; you would think that choosing the "active" setting would solve the distortion problem, but I'm not finding that it helps much. I am getting the best results with the EBS set to "passive" regardless of the bass. So if you are getting distortion, do two things: turn down the output level of your instrument, and open up the EBS to adjust the internal trim pots. Turning the pots clockwise lowers the threshold, meaning the compression will kick in at lower signal levels. In MB mode, each trim pot ("high" and "low") adjusts the threshold independently for high and low frequencies. In the Normal and Tubesim modes, the "low" trim adjusts the threshold for the whole signal, and the "high" trim is not active. In Normal and Tubesim modes, with a high-output bass, I'm getting the cleanest results with the low trim pot turned to max (fully clockwise). In MB mode however, having the low trim at max results in too much compression of the lows, causing a weak and thin low end. So for MB mode I'm getting the best results with the low trim at 12:00 and the high trim at max.
 
Again, this is with a bass that has particularly hot output; your results and settings will vary depending on the output level of your instrument, and how much you want your signal compressed. You may find that raising the threshold (trim pot counter-clockwise) helps you get a more "natural" sound. When I used a passive P bass I got good-sounding results in each of the modes without adjusting the trim pots at all. To be clear though, I'm not saying you shouldn't use the EBS with an active bass, I'm only saying you may have to do some extra adjusting to make a hot signal level work more ideally with it. The footswitch is not true bypass, but the bypassed tone is quite transparent. Update: the newest ones claim to be true bypass.
 

 
 
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