Ibanez TMB100-MGR Talman Bass

Ok, let's start a semi in depth review!

Fretjob's good. It's a 200 dollar bass, it's got some proud frets if you wanna go waaaay low but for now it's fine. Maybe I'll get around to do a full level and crown when I'm itchy to polish those "dirty" frets. A plus for doing a nice job on the edges. None of the frets wants a blood sacrifice, and that's a good thing.

The neck itself is a DREAM to play. One of the most comfortable neck/fretboard/fret size combos I've ever played. I mean it's fantastic. I did not expect it to be that nice, I'm LOVING it. I could go with a tad more junk in the trunk but really, it's just LOVELY. Fretboard wood's also feels very nice. Jatoba, I believe. Very, VERY, V E R Y nice!

Pickups are fine! Didn't expect that, but they're ok. A few usable tones out of both. They're not perfect and solo'ed even less so but the smack-in-the-middle setting gives a nice P tone mixed with enough burp from the J bridge to keep it tasty and present in the mix. It snarls well enough. They're cool. Would I change them to Geezers? Absolutely. But not right away.

The preamp's ok. Didn't fiddle with it too much but you can add or subtract treble and bass. It's ok. Nothing impressive and I don't much care for active electronics so... yeah. It could be useful for on the fly adjustments, I suppose. Tone shaping... eh...

Bridge seems fine. Sturdy enough.
Tuners are serviceable. They seem a little cheap and fragile but they work smoothly enough.
Everything's bolted on correctly.
Finish is good. Didn't see anything obvious. Couple of negligible blemishes but I'll probably put more dents on it so I don't care.

It came set up pretty ok from Thomann. Needed a few adjustments, nothing too excessive.

Now the bad.

Pickup screws are crap. And the pickups need to be lowered quite a bit, which isn't easy.

Nut's badly cut. It does its job but it's a very shoddily cut nut. Had to tidy it up quite a bit.

String tree's the cheapest piece of metal I've ever seen. To be expected but, oh well.

A few shoddily cut places on the pickguard. Pretty negligible as well, just me being way too nitpicky.

Now the pots. I absolutely hate them. Two concentric ones. One's a volume/blend and the other is bass/treble for the preamp. I HATE them. The concentric crap are so tightly bunched together they keep bumping the other control whenever you turn the knob. They're kinda stiff, too. One's sticking out too high from the guard, as well. And I'd certainly prefer a tone control over the preamp. I'll be getting a bunch of 500k pots and I'll rip out the preamp and convert it to passive. HATE them.

Worst of all, the bridge pickup routing. It's by far the WORST routing job I've ever seen. If you'd told me they did it with a drill and a screwdriver, I'd believe you. Corners have "teeth", there's no line that's actually straight, the J "ear" cuts are totally eyeballed. WORST. ROUTING. JOB. EVER.

I can live with it (after I go at it with a file...) but yeah, BAD. SHAME!

It's got a set of rounds on it that sound... well, ok. I'm used to playing with flats for such a long time time it's a welcome change. For a while. Already got a set of LaBella 760FS waiting to be put on. Guess I'll wait til the roundwound novelty wears off again. Although, I do think this would sound amazing with a set of black beauties...

In any case, I'm quite happy with the bass, overall. It needs a few stuff but for the price, it's quite nice.

Fantastic shape, fantastic sound, great to play!! I've been a guitarist and singer for many years, but only took up bass around 18 months ago. A friend of mine once said that "music is a very visual medium", which is why all my instruments have to look great. This bass is a retro looker, but with modern sound capabilities. The sound is punchy and clear, with wide ranging tonal capabilities. At this price, it's almost rude not to buy one! Great service from Thomann- ordered on a Sunday evening and it was here by Thursday morning. Also, as far as I know, in the UK, this is only available in black or sunburst. The only thing that could make it better is a pearloid scratch plate, but the dead tortoise looks good! If I was going to be picky, the control panel doesn't fit quite flush to the body.

For the pricepoint this bass comes in at it's a definite steal. The arrival of the package was quick and it was in perfect condition coming straight out of the box, I didn't need to set its truss rod or fix intonation just a quick tune up and she was ready to go. This is an extremely comfortable bass, it's not too heavy the medium scale frets make it for quick playing without extreme stretches, It has become my go to, the sound is extremely versatile having a volume and different tone nobs, you can go from a very nice boomy bass sound to a very twangy trebly sound. Overall it is a joy to play, it looks great it feels fantastic its easy to play and very versatile.
Would highly recommend this to anyone looking for a good cheap bass to take to gigs and/or recording sessions.
If you are not used to playing an active instrument, I would suggest keeping a spare battery and screwdriver in your gig bag/with your pedalboard/in your hard case just because this (having been my first active instrument) has caught me by surprise just once or twice having stopped on me mid rehearsal.

i bought this bass after finding it cheaper on this website than in england,, but ! i had to pay custom fees,, so the price shot up too around the same amount,, i heard about quality control issues concerning this bass , and was very disapointed when mine arrived the two conntrol knobs were not secured to the body securly at all and some of the tuning pegs are very loos too ! thomann advised me to repair it myself which i couldnt do but a friend of mine done it for me,, thomann did make arrangements to return it but with a load of terms and conditions thrown in,, if in england buy from here !!!! the bass sounds really nice cost me nearly £200 but mine did come with faults and was a headache to fix am still not entirley happy with it ! i cant enjoy it like £200 is money i saved to buy this guitar,, and it does need a tinkle here and their but yes its a nice sounding bass ,,,,, phewww!

I've been playing on this bass for a couple of months now and it has never let me down. The bass has an active EQ with the battery already included. I've put some flatwounds on it which really go well with the sound.

The bass is quite heavy, playing while standing up requires a good strap and some back-strenght, after about 30 minutes or so this becomes a problem for me.

The feel and finish is what you get for the price, some rought edges around the pickups and the battery, but this doesn't affect your playing in any way. The finish on the fretboard on the other hand is of a very good quality. The frets are nice to play on and feel like they are on par with a basses with a much higher price range.

Overall you can't really go south with this bass. Because of the active EQ the sound is versatile and full, with the extra bonus of p and j pickups. If you are starting out this is a great first bass!