Harley Benton HBZ-2005 Deluxe Series

Features: First of all, this is cheapest 5-string bass guitar with active electronics and neck-through body I have ever seen. All hardware is black, natural wood body is covered in light polish and looking great. Sound knobs have a very pleasant go and you can feel very light click when it passes the middle (So light I haven't noticed it in couple first weeks)

Sound: I have tried few other guitar for brief time, and compared to this one they all are dull. Don't know, is it ceramic pickups, body, my own feeling or I just don't have enough time to feel other guitars. Sound is generally is very deep and powerful, and using active electronics it is possible to get very wide range of sounds. However I noticed that this guitar can't achieve some sounds in metal songs. Nevertheless its sound is all I could have dreamed of. I am playing Muse, Metallica, Deep Purple and it fits perfectly, especially Muse.

Quality: Body feels very durable, hardware is very good as well, tuning pegs are very stable. However, I have to glue sound knobs so they would be more stable. Also I have to use soldering iron as one of the wires inside fell off. Also it might sounds crazy, but I have enjoyed fixing my guitar. Just be sure you have some tools.

Total: Reasonably cheap guitar with great sound.

I have to say thank you Thomann for making this great guitar, I love it all !

I am delighted with the HBZ-2005 DeLuxe series bass guitar! So much fun for so little money. Wow. The look is fantastic. The details are neatly executed and it looks better than in the photos. If only electric guitars were so beautifully designed. The bass is delivered with an already made set up and very good strings! I've only been playing it for a month and I'm still enjoying it as if it had just arrived. It is easy to play, and 24 frets and active electronics are a big advantage. Intonation is good in all positions. Tuning pegs are much better than expected. The thumb can rest correctly on the upper edge of the pick up. I'm still getting used to the sound due to the new amplifier, but for now it seems to me that it's very good and that it inspires me to work more on my playing skills. I tested it in the studio and it sounds like a real beast. If there is a small minus, then it is a detail on the plastic cover on the back of the guitar. But, compared to the competition and much more expensive bass guitars, I can freely give it the highest marks. Thanks to the previous user ratings and especially to Thomann for this beautiful bass.

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.

It has a clear sound, plays pretty well and it has a killer look.
Now, it's not perfect, the frets ends were very sharp and scratched my skin whenever i played. Had to file them quite a lot.
The controls are a bit weird, not the most intuitive layout.
The bridge looks awesome, but some of the couldn't be lowered.
On the neck, you could feel with your fingers where the wood stripes are glued together.
However, with 30 minutes of setup, filing the frets, oiling the fretboard, setting the truss rod... etc, you get a very good looking and very good sounding bass.

I bought this bass as a studio tool, to track the bass in my original songs. I wanted a 5 string for the versatility, but also wanted something that sounds good. I wasn't disappointed- this guitar is absolutely amazing. It feels really nice, has a really comfortable neck, has 2 active pickups that sound great. I was torn between this and the cheaper, black 5-string Harley Benton, but decided on this one because of the awesome natural finish and the upgraded hardware. It was definitely worth it.
I have nothing to fault about this guitar, for the short time I've had it it's been great!

I bought this bass over 10 years ago as my second 5 string bass and didn't regret it. I wanted a wooden natural looking neck thru body instrument to replace my old 4 string EKO/Camac (now quite rare) bass so I could move to the 5 string world with something I would also love aesthetically, and it ended up one of my best purchases in a long time.
It arrived in a cheap but well packed cardboard box; both string action and bridge were finely adjusted and all it needed to start playing was tuning the strings. The sound is clean and the electronics is versatile and quiet. Pots and knobs feel a bit cheap but they do their job and in many years they never crackled, however I usually don't make heavy use of them during play, so YMMV; tuning pegs work as expected and don't miss tuning even after over an hour of heavy playing.
Would I purchase it again? Yes, definitely, although the +50% price bump from back then could make it less appealing for others.

This bass is absolutely beautiful. It's a piece of art, especially for the price. Crazy
The sounds are good, assuming that you're looking for that active Jazz tone. If that's your thing, then you're going to really like this. I'm usually more of a passive P-bass player, so this is great to give me something different.

I chose to string this one with Elixirs and a high C to give me some better soloing options for when playing in a duo with an acoustic guitar, and I really like what I'm getting.

I can see where one might want to change out the pickups, and I might look at that at some point, but I'm also struggling to find pickups which fit this 5 string configuration. It's not a big deal, but it could see where swapping out electronics could take this bass from good to great.

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!