5 String IBW-550 Bass Solid-Body Electric Guitar, Natural

Nice bass that plays above its price point. Neck through design with their 18v active pickups give this bass a sound and sustain all its own. No sharp frets, no dead spots, tweak to one saddle and she was ready to thump. The 18v electronics are good quality and the pups sound great stock. The satin finish that looks amazing on the walnut and I could not find one finish flaw on this bass. Battery compartment was the low point, breaking on me on first open, but that is a small, cheap fix. This was a great purchase, grab one while you can.

I could not believe my eyes when I unbox the bass. It looked so amazing, look so expensive, it felt so smooth and the finish was so professional design. Active and passive activation, pickup sounds great and I have no plans to replace them, the bridge is solid, the tuner works very well because it stays in tune, the neck is thin which makes the bass very playable and to me it's not heavy at all. I order new strings(SIT) power steel for it, but the strings came with it are not bad it's just my favorite are SIT's. The bass looks, feels, plays and sound like basses that I've owned and played that cost 4 to 5 times the cost of the IYV 550. Guys and Gals please get one before the word gets out, because for just a little over $200 that price now is unreal for a bass with all the different sounds that it gives and to mention a neck thru bass, it's no way you'll find one for that price. I've played bass for over 40 years, and it would have been nice to have had this beautiful thing during the Disco, and Funk during the 80's. One more thing it required no setup, just tuned it right out of the box and went right to thumping.

First off, I’m not currently really a bass player. This is my first bass. But, I’ve got a couple of Bass VI style guitars that I use for sub-octave guitar. I wanted an actual bass with bass string spacing, so this seemed like the best “first bass” for a guitarist. The bass now plays really well, looks good and sounds pretty good!! After a setup, it plays as well as my $800-$1200 instruments! Absolutely worth the under $250 I paid!! Now, all the issues: Truss rod came completely slacked and the saddles were all the way down. The bass was completely unplayable out of the box, basically everything was fretting out like half the fretboard above what I played. I raised the action all the way and still had some problems. So, put some relief in the neck (it was dead straight with the truss rod loose, though!) and brought the action back down to a reasonable height. Now it plays fantastic!! The intonation was surprisingly not bad. I haven’t set it fully yet, because I’m planning on putting on the top five strings of a 6-string set as a 5-string tenor bass (mimicking the bottom five strings of a Bass VI). Haven’t gotten to that yet, but I don’t anticipate any issues. If there are, I’ll update this review. I play a whole step down and I really don’t want that low string. D1 is plenty low enough for me. It was supposed to come with the two 9V batteries for the preamp. It did not. I have some coming tomorrow. I wasn’t about to pay $10 each locally. So, no idea how good the preamp is. But, I expect it to be reasonable. Again, if it’s not, I’ll update this review. The pots aren’t the smoothest, but they’re fine for this price. If I get too annoyed, I can replace them. Not worried. The pickups (in passive mode) are decent. I can get it to sound like a good death metal clanking bass tone, so it does what I want. The actual hardware isn’t bad … it’s not great, but it’s all completely reasonable and will hold up. Lastly, the body’s wings are supposed to be Walnut. And, well, that’s the lightest walnut I’ve ever seen in my life. It’s far from the dark brown of walnut I was expecting. There’s other reviews where they’ve sent them back for this (some times multiple times). And, while it annoys me, it’s not a dealbreaker for me. That said, the wood figuring isn’t awful, so no point in sending it back, especially at this price. Half a star off for aesthetics not really matching what was shown. Half a star off for missing batteries, no setup and so-so electronics. Overall, I’m incredibly pleased sky this bass!! I will absolutely be looking at IYV for more instruments in the future!!

A-plus five-star rating for this bass. It's a work of art, sounds amazing, plays fantastic. Added batteries, tuned it up, and it was ready for the jam. Have not found a flaw in the workmanship. Amazingly affordable. The active electronics add a lot of punch. I understand from reviews that some have had quality inconsistencies with IYV, so I may have lucked out. I received three of the same guitar on another order and one was clearly superior in tone, so there's that. Some controversy about the wood color not matching the photos. Mine has the light wood for the back and walnut or faux walnut top with very nice grain. Love it, everyone is raving about it and can't believe how inexpensive it was.

When I bought this bass I was pretty skeptical but honestly I am pretty impressed. I have played stringed instruments for 30 years and owned many basses, guitars, mandolins, double bass, cellos, violins, ukuleles... needless to say I know my way around stringed instruments. I bought this bass because I wanted to record some tracks in my home studio during quarantine, so I figured I would get something disposable. Wow was I wrong! It sounds great and plays great. This bass is anything but disposable. It is extremely playable and comfortable. Don’t get me wrong there are some trade offs at this price point, for example, the tuners are not amazing and there are small cosmetic flaws but the tuners get the job done and are solid and as for the cosmetic they are extremely minor and barely noticeable. The only thing I don’t like is the gloss finish on the neck. I much prefer a more matte finish on the neck but it’s nothing a bit of 0000 steel wool can’t solve. Also, the fret ends are just a little sharp but this too can be easily fixed and nothing a $1200 guitar wouldn’t suffer from. I now fully intend on keeping this instrument in my studio. Again, I can’t stress enough how much I am impressed about the quality at this price. I am blown away.

I bought 2 of these over a three week period. Returned the first one, kept the second one. First one: Very dissapointed. Out of the box it was beautiful, active electronics were strong! Straight neck and In tune with itself, but not to correct pitch. Tuned to B E A D G AND THAT WAS THE END OF THE STRAIGHT NECK. Bow was huge! The truss rod route is so deep on this one you can't even use the allen wrench provided. Had a shorter short leg allen but rod was extremely tight. Backed it off but the pocket is so skinny and the rod is so deep could not even get a 1/6 turn. So it is impossible to get any additional turns with a right angle allen wrench without widening the slot. Could not straighten the neck at all. Didn't have a ball end allen but doubt it would have made a difference. Truss rod extremely tight so it may just be junk even if you widen the slot. I must return it. I'll reorder and hope for a better result. After getting credit for the return I ordered again. This one has Walnut wings with a figured top cap, looks sharp. Truss rod pocket super deep but was adjustable and responded well. Finish above nut very sloppy. Bridge height adjustment is a problem. Will have to shim bridge only because they routed 1/8" deep pocket for the bridge to sit down in. Preamp has plenty of tone adjustment but lacks the power of the one I sent back. You would think they could CNC drill the screw holes for everything but they don't. Every screw that holds pickups, bridge, cavity cover, truss rod cover etc are crooked. I Kept it.

Bass guitar received was not as described. It was supposed to be solid walnut the back was not walnut. Seemed to be made well though . After a set up it plays great and is a looker. Haven't tried it yet thru my bass rig at church. I was disappointed that it wasn't as advertised and the packaging was single boxed . It arrived with a small crack at the tip of headstock. A little glue and sanding took care of it. That makes 6 IYV guitars and this 1 bass. I have been pretty satisfied with these guitars for a very affordable price. Returning this and trying another. If not as advertised it will go back and I will try something different. ***Just received the second one : Another headstock tip broken out. These are not walnut . The second one is lighter colored than the first. I dont get why they are boxing these in single ply cardboard.At least use heavy grade cardboard. Very disappointed they could be a great instrument . **** The third one came today .It was perfect and double boxed. Set up perfectly and solid walnut wings as advertised. Very thankful . I can now change my rating from a 2 star to a 5 star.

I think this is quite a nice bass. It has a really nice feel, very pleasant to play on. I've had to fiddle with the truss rod and bridge to get to action to a point I like. Out of the box, the action was super low with lots of rattle. Maybe some people will like it like that, but I didn't. There might be something a bit weird with the truss rod, initially it turned with no resistance, but then it seemed to engage, don't know exactly what's going on in there, hopefully it will keep its tension. The fretboard has no inlays of any kind, which is very unusual. Not even dots. That worried me initially, cause I thought I needed the inlays but it turns out I don't really. The neck does have the usual markers on the top edge, and that's enough of a cue. The bass looks really nice, I would call it attractive. The wood top appears to be a separate piece pasted on, not sure what you call it, an applique? But it's attractive, and from comparing mine to other pictures, seems to be a unique wood pattern on each instrument, which is nice. It's neck-through-body, which is slick. As far as the sound, seems fine to me. I think the B string could have more power, maybe on a larger amp it would come through more (I have a Rumble 100W). Or maybe different strings would give more output. It uses two 9v batteries, I have no idea why. Comparing it to the natural-wood-body Bullfighter, the Bullfighter has much hotter output with just one 9v battery. So I don't know what you get from the double battery. I have the volume up all the way, whereas on the Bullfighter I have to turn the volume way down or fart out the amp. Just seems like modest output on the IYV. But still a nice bass to play on. Might work best with a bigger amp is my thinking.