Harley Benton HBZ-2005 Deluxe Series Reviews

Amazing for the price

This is my first 5-string, and I am extremely impressed by it. It's just as beautiful as the pictures, if not more so. The only real aesthetic problem (and it's not really one) is that the saddle that came on the bass is slighty different than what was pictured.

Feature-wise, the EQ controls aren't in the order I would have put them in, but everything else seems great to me. If you turn the treble up on the bass or the amp, you will get some background noise as a result of the pickups, but that's just something you need to be aware of with single coils. Otherwise the sound is superb especially for the price.

Everything feels solid and well-built. The body is comfortable and the neck is much thinner than I would have expected, which I like. It also came pretty much tuned and with D'Addario strings, so I could start playing almost out of the box. This bass feels like it can compete with others up to $600 or $700.

I would suggest this if you're looking for a great all-around 5-string on a tight budget, or even if not, this is a steal at under $300.

Wow!!!

Harley Benton HBZ-2005 Deluxe Series

This Bass Guitar having great and banging sounds!

I'm using this on our Church services and it was fantastic comparing for my Yamaha 4 String Bass Guitar and a little bit expensive comparing for this 5 String of Harley Benton.

This Bass Guitar had a good look satin wood finish! and I love that uniqueness that most of guitars are glossy finish.

This is quite cheap comparing for the Branded 5 Strings but I'm not disappointed for the quality and sounds! I thought it will not meet my expectations, but it does! and more than enough!

Absolutely amazing.

I'm trying to be as impartial as possible with this one.

I absolutely love looking at it cause it's a gorgeous beast, even with the little cosmetic quirks. I also love playing it cause it's insanely comfortable. The neck, even though it's thick is actually amazingly comfortable (I suppose big credit goes to the satin finish). I have no problem with playing fast. I don't slap, so I can't give you a review on that, but probably it's not the best for it considering the 24 frets. Overall, it's very comfortable to play. No frets stick out, though it will probably still need a fret job, which is fine.

Setup wise, it didn't come perfect out of the box, no buzz but high action and bad intonation, which is also fine, but it is quite tricky to set up. The individual saddles don't have an intonation screw, so basically, every time you need to set the intonation, you need to loosen the string, and guess the saddle position, and then tighten the string again. I suppose that's the price you have to pay for smaller gap between strings, beauty and also the fact that you can fix them in place and make sure the saddles don't move.

Sound. It sounds very powerful. You can make it sound both warm or punchy. It's got an amazing range. It sounds great at band practice, through DI or amp or amp into DI, and not so much with my practice amp at home. So if you buy this as your first one and only have a tiny practice amp, just lower the preamp volumes, cause the output it has is a bit too much for a small amp/speaker.

So, for closing notes:

pros:

-looks beautiful;

-satin finish;

-comfortable neck;

-good sound;

-tuners do the job;

cons:

-I suppose, the bridge, which is quite strange to operate.

I guess I will switch to an Ibanez or Warwick style. But I suppose this is just personal preference.

-some cosmetic quirks which I don't care about.

-can't play in a passive mode; the closest you can get to it is by moving the bass/treble knobs to the zero positions.

So, probably the best value for your money on the market. There is no similarly priced bass that can compete with this one.

Best 5 string for the price

The quality of this bass is superior to anything I've tried in a long time. I had certain doubts, but this is beyond belief. The construction is every bit as solid, as the one on instruments from the 1000+ price range. Even the battery slot is well made and unlike the situation with other instruments, it didn't have any wires hanging around in the cavity.

I honestly enjoy everything about the bass with two exceptions - the pickups don't work for me, aesthetically and I would prefer if it had straplocks. I did buy a set of those, but the actual price difference would probably be minimal.

Great 5 string at a bargain price

I've been playing guitar for ages but I've never owned a bass until I bought this one. I do a lot of writing / recording etc at home and thought it was about time I had one. I didn't want to spend a fortune on it, but I wanted one that felt nice and sounded the part on recordings in a variety of genres. After reading reviews here and looking through the pictures over and over, whilst scouring second hand options elsewhere and seeing what else I could get for similar money, I decided to take the leap and go for this...

Very glad I did! The bass looks as great in the flesh as it does in the pictures on here. It's all finished very nicely.

Feel wise, it's quite weighty, but the weight is balanced nicely and it sits well in the lap, it feels reassuringly solid. I haven't tried it standing up yet but I imagine it will balance fine there too. The controls are great; Very solid feeling and definitely not easily knocked once set. The indents on the pots are really handy too.... Only downside here is it takes a minute to figure out what each knob controls! Not the most intuitive layout but that's just my opinion I suppose and it doesn't really matter anyway, once you've figured it out. I'd tell you the order now to save the hassle but I've forgotten til I get it out again!

The active electronics do introduce some noise when boosting rather than cutting if you're playing into a very distorted / compressed signal chain but that's to be expected. It's only problematic when really cranking the EQ controls right up, which you almost certainly won't need to do! Otherwise, a little noise is always unnoticeable as soon as you start playing.

It's a fun bass to play! In my situation, as a guitarist converting every now and then, it's perfect. The action is nice and low, without loads of fret buzz out of the box. It sounds great for a variety of styles. It feels nice, it looks nice.... Great buy all round!

Since enjoying this bass so much I've now definitely got my eye on a few other Harley Benton guitars.... I'll almost certainly be ordering one of their tele-style models after pay-day at the end of the month. If this bass is anything to go by, they are very impressive instruments for the money!

Incredible bass for this price - and even better de-fretted!

I bought this as a cheap starter to get back into bass after a long break.

My expectations of a through neck 5 string for this sort of money were not high. Wow, I was so wrong.

This is a great sounding, great looking, well built, easy playing instrument. I was truly amazed at how good this was. It comes with good strings and the range of sounds that come out of the active electrics is impressive.

OK, it needed a good setup out of the box. The relief was too shallow and action too high (fpersonal preference) and the intonation was way out. This is the only reason for only giving 4/5 stars on quality. Probably unfair, you'd expect any brand new guitar to need setting up.

But it has since got even better - after pulling out the frets (and another setup of course), this makes an amazing fretless! I can't put it down - the Warwick GPS Corvette 5 that I bought to "replace" it gets less attention.

HOW IS THIS SO CHEEP!!?

When I looked at the price on this instrument I was absolutely stunned at what was on offer for o little money. Admittedly I did but the 'B-stock' version of this instrument so there was a sizable discount on the original price (€208). The first thing that really struck me was the tonal range this bass is capable of; tones ranging from the bridge pick up, tone down 'Jaco' sound, to the neck pick up, full active dub sound, to the tone up bridge and neck pick up blend (my favorite for slap) which gets a great thumpy slap sound; that's just a small few of the sounds this baby can produce, I'm still learning.

I did have to bring it to a luthier to have it set up as there was some fret buzz around the B of the E string and in a few other places, the fret buzz wasn't bad enough that it was audible through the amp but it was there enough that it bugged me when I was practicing. The set up cost me €10 and I've had no problems since. Really I think the action was just set too low when it was sent out to me.

As a bass to wear this is a really comfortable 5 string, allot of others have a problem of always sliding so that the neck is pointing down (just from the weight of the neck) but a combination of the way the body is styled and the weight of the wood being used seems to have stopped this happening.

Altogether, this is a great bass, with versatile tones, great resonance, nice playing feel, comfortable to wear and even looks good for very little money.

Pleasantly Surprised

I saw this and thought that for a 7 piece neck through active 5 string it was worth a punt but found it was actually a very good quality instrument, would highly recommend.

Surprisingly good bass

At this price, I was expecting to be disappointed, but this is a nice bass.

A good range of tone means you can play anything from dub or slap bass. It is nicely balanced and feels good to play.

My only gripe is a few of the higher frets stick out very slightly from the neck, but this hasn't been an issue while playing.

I bought a good set of strings (from another shop) so I could swap them when this bass arrived, only to discover the same good quality strings were already on there, tuned up and ready to go!

This may not match top end basses but it does match basses two or three times the price.

I highly recommend it.

Seriously good bass

I had been toying with the idea of buying a new bass for a while now, based on the reviews I bought this item. As soon as it arrived, I checked and adjusted the setup and tuned it, then I plugged into my home studio, tones were clear and the general sound is of a good quality. I was particularly impressed with the low end on this bass, I play a lot of down tuned stuff and I often use a 7 string. This bass offers a brilliant sound and a really brilliant look, for very little money. I can't imagine anyone being disappointed with this item.

Excellent value

I couldn't believe the sound from this bass for the price. My only issue is with the quality of the finish. It is a bit rough in places, however, for the price it is incredible value. Well recommended.

An amazing bass

I'm a bit of a noob when it comes to the bass guitar, but this thing sounds and feels great. The only problem I've come across is in relation to my noobness. I can't quite figure out what the tone knobs do, and this guitar did not come with any kind of documentation.

This have a very good construction and materials. After a little set up it's very comfortable. The only problem is the pick ups. These are too wide change it with standard 5 string soap bars, single coils or humbuckers. It's a bit sad but the a sound is good enugh to not to worry about it.

Amazing

This bass.. it is superb and its so cheap! this is the one of the only basses i could find within my price range that not only had active pick-ups, but has a 7-Ply Neck.

The sound is thick and straight out of the box there is not much setting up to do, i just adjusted the truss rod by half a turn and did nothing to the action and it was perfect. The only downside to this bass is that there are no instructions, so i didn't know what the control knobs did, by my best guess, the bottom left is volume, bottom right is a mid control? not too sure about that one, top right is treble control and top left is bass. but aside from the lack of instructions this is a great guitar and you would be hard troubled to find an equal bass in this price range

Great Bang for the Buck

Bought the bass for DI recording. Great features such as neck-thru construction, active electronics and a sexy natural finish make it unbeatable for the price. It sounds nice and is quite versatile.

There are tiny flaws here and there and the fifth string is a bit floppy, but you won't find anything comparable featurewise in this price range, used or new.

A friend couldn't believe how much I paid for it. "But... But it looks like a proper bass!"

Awesome guitar for not much money

Bought this five string as an experiment(normally play fender aerodynamic jazz bass). Couldn't believe the sound it produced.Find it now difficult to leave behind when gigging

Best offer for this price

First of all, I am a guitarist, I make music at home and i needed a bass guitar to record bass parts for my songs easily. I was skeptical about the quality of this bass and Harley Benton label, which makes affordable musical instruments, but I was really surprised by the quality of it. The guitar is built really good, all the frets, and pickups and all the hardware is placed very smoothly and on its place. The guitar feels very comfortable. And the look of the wood is awesome, this guitar looks totally awesome with all those lines. Sound is better than I expected also, all the strings give enough low frequencies and sound equally loud. Also the guitar was already tuned, so didn't struggle with hight of the strings or some things like that.

You can also check a demo sound i recorded here:

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So i think this offer is best offer for a low price.

If you need a bass guitar that sounds good, looks good and u have a small budget, i recommend this baby ;)

Perfekt Bass for recording Hardcore Music!

Oh man! This Bass is f***ing awesome!

The cost-performance ratio is huge. I compared this bass guitar to a 500 bucks bass from LTD and in my honest opinion I liked the Harley benton one more!

The mahagony body and neck make the sound fat, warm and heavy. Just like I wanted it to be in my recordings.

The active pickups are making a good job. They garantee a high output whithout generating too much noise what is exactly we are all looking for.

The tone and volume nobs are solid and are pretty easy to handle.

The mechanics of this bass are all black and make a solid impression.

Buy it, its worth every penny!

Harley Benton HBZ005

Similar to other reviews I bought this bass for use in my project studio. As Ive had it a couple of weeks now i thought i would post this small review.

I am not a bass player but wanted an instrument that would suit my needs as a general all round bass to make my bass lines 'live' rather than programmed.

I have been lucky to play some expensive instruments in my time and i am very surprised that this is not more expensive.

It is a heavy bass but as i'm sat down to play most of the time so this is not a real issue for me but may be for someone who is going to gig with it. Tonally it has done what i've asked from it in a variety of styles from country to classic rock etc.

My only niggles with it are some of the upper frets required a small amount of dressing as they were quite rough, again no real problem especially at this price point. No thumb rest, the pickups are quite shallow and i require something a little more substantial to rest my thumb on as i tend to play mainly with my fingers rather than a pick and the supplied battery, required for the active controls, did not last very long, i do unplug at the end of a session!. This may be a worry to someone who has not used active controls before suddenly finding their output to be very quiet and distorted. I would thoroghly recommend this bass, may get the fretless one later, its even cheaper!!

Its worth its value

After 3 weeks of learning and practising, I realize the quality sound I have been missing. I love its versatility and style. Its a master piece creation. I was a bit worried when i unpacked everything and pluged it and I couldn't hear any sound. That's when I got to find out what the battery was meant for. For me its a better guitar compared to most of the ones I have tried. The strings are also well layed out. I'm very glad I made the purchase and I would encourage everyone who intends to learn or practise or play at professional levels on a big stage to go for the HBZ-2005.