V-Tone Bass BDI21 : Not sounding cheap

I bought the Behringer V-Tone Bass BDI shortly after its release in 2005. At this time I was looking for cheap bass preamps because my SWR amp sounded much too clean for my liking. To get the Ampeg-like sound I wanted the SansAmp BDI was (and still is) the affordable alternative if you already had an non-Ampeg amplifier, but for me as a student still to expensive. So I ordered the Behringer BDI, because everybody told that it should get close to the SansAmp BDI. And it really gets to it. Though the Behringer BDI just has a plastic housing it is built quite solid. I still use the Behringer BDI as DI-Box for smaller gigs I don't want to carry my whole halfstack to. It sounds more expensive than it really was, but you should not expect a warm tube-tone (because there are no tubes :)).