Warwick Dolphin Pro 1 4-String

Manufactured May 2004, Purchased new October 2005, Made in Germany
Neck Thru design, Ovankol with Wenge/Zebrano neck, Active MEC Jazz in neck position and MEC Twin-J in bridge position, 35" scale, 26 frets, Just-a-Nut nut, Push Pull Pot volume pot bypasses active electronics, Push Pull Tone Control pot changes neck pickup from dual to single coil pickup .....see other reviews for more complete description.

This thing is awesome. I fell in love with the sounds immediately. You get a wide variety of tones from a deep dub bass to a hide the wine glasses piercing bell tone.

I play dinosaur rock with the fellas through a Hartke 3500 head (soon to be an Ampeg SVP CL preamp) and a Hartke XL 4-10 bottom with Eminence paper drivers (the kind used in Ampeg SVT Cabinets). I also use a GK 400RB 2-10 kickback combo. The sound is clear and punchy and fat when I want it but never flabby. You can get Jazz bass sound and a passable Precision sound. You also get a modern ping for slapping when you want it. You can feel and hear the density of the wood and its effect on the tone.

The Dolphin also gets a killer Jaco sound.

The only change I would make would be to calibrate the treble tone control to a lower frequency as I feel a need to roll off most of the highs and play with it between 2 and 4 out of 10.

The bass shipped from the California distributor to my local store without problems. I was surprised when I saw it was made a year earlier. Apparently the Dolphins are kind of rare.

The setup was usable but I didn't get the sense that it was setup prior to leaving the distributor. I felt what I got was how it left the factory or was setup when initially received by Dana distributors.

I have been working the setup to my taste and I tend to pluck hard and hate string buzz but want low action. The parameters on the bridge make tweaking fairly easy.

Everything was well aligned, indicating craftsman made the bass. The only complaint was a slight feel of the Zebrano stripe on the back of the neck in the first position on the thumb side (E). It can easily be fixed with a little 400 grit sandpaper.

No flaws. Only complaint is the wood was rather plain unlike other Warwick basses. The grain was too uniform for my liking but probably make for a sturdy, even sounding bass.

Just got it and have been banging on it since. This bass is built to last and I hope to be playing it when I am 70! It will probably out live me!

Duuno. Haven't needed it.

I tried a lot of basses including 60's Fender Jazz basses (the one I liked cost $10K!), Fender Custom Shop Jazz Basses (nice but not worth the $2K price tag), Modulus basses (a 5 string will probably be my next bass), Ken Smith and Fodera.

The Dolphin spoke to me immediately and I knew I was home. It looks great, feels great, and has great craftsmanship. I initially started looking for a Fender Jazz Bass but soon felt the Warwick had far more craftsmanship to it. The Fender's were uneven and felt like it 1 of a dozen.

I love this bass and recommend it highly. Try it and you may fall in love with it.

I give it a 9 because a 10 is perfection and the Dolphin Pro I is pretty close.

This is a 2000 Dolphin Pro 1 4 string bass with the Neck-Through design. The neck is Wenge and Zebrano and the body is Ovankol. Overall a pretty heavy piece (about 10 lbs) but it's got great tone wood so the sound just RESONATES. I got it fretless with an Ebony neck to accentuate the Jazz sound it produces. I kept the factory pickups, an MEC Twin-J and an MEC Jazz, both active. The Jazz will give great clear lows, and the Twin can give nice high bell-tones but tends to be a bit loud and responsive to the touch. The body shape (like a rhombus, as Warwick says) is great for balancing on your body, but is an odd fit when you sit down or put it on a stand as the bottom slopes diagonally. The tuners are Warwicks own design; they slant back toward your body so that they're easier to turn. Because of this, though, I find the bass goes sharp when it goes out of tune, which is rarely - thanks to the just-a-nut and Warwick's bridge. Overall, this thing is a workhorse. You could bludgen somebody to death with it and still hit a slappin groove. I use it mainly for Jazz and Blues, but it's got GREAT slap response for Funk grooves. I bought it with a case and MAN is the thing a tank! Included in the case were Warwick's own body wax (the bass is natural and unfinished) and special Truss Rod tools that make any adjustments a snap....that is if you ever need to MAKE any. I figured I was going to have to lower the action a bunch and tweak it up, but the way it came Factory is the way I've been playing it.

I've played the beauty through an SWR Silverado and a Kustom Stack, and I prefer the SWR's sound as it's much lower and more responsive to the active pickups. The Neck-Through design gets great warm sounds at the low end, and bright almost annoying highs when you mess with the tone knobs. I really dig the two stacked knobs on the bass: a volume knob/Pickup sweep and a Tone/Bass boost. The pickup sweep switches between the full, expanding lows and the pingy highs whereas the tone/bass do what you'd expect. You can adjust to get a range of sounds from a full upright to a fender precision sound. Overall, it will complement the Jazz player and the Jaco Jock with distinct and punchy tones.

Factory "out of the box" action suited me just fine. I noticed the action to be lower than other companies set them. The only thing it lacked was a battery, but that was easy thanks to Warwick's easy-open back with tabs. Those guys in Germany must take great strides to perfect and fine tune the setups BEFORE you get the bass.

Like I said before, this thing is a Horse. The Neck-Through design makes this piece as solid as a trunk. It came with straplocks au Warwick; the locks were RECESSED into the horn and bottom of the bass, and your strap button locks into this hole. When you take the strap off of the bass, you can't even tell this thing is made to be strapped on thanks to the recessed locks. It's a cool little tweak that other guitars should adopt. The only problem is that these recessed locks tend to move over time and have started to sink in a little bit. It's nothing major, but it could develop into a problem.

I haven't experienced this area yet.

Overall, it's more than you could ask for. I'm almost intimidated by this thing :) It cost a small fortune, but this is a bass you keep for a lifetime and pass on. I love the small things Warwick does to improve on playing (recessed straplocks, slanted tuners, easy-open covers, tools/wax included with bass, just-a-nut, special bridge) and adjustability. It's those things which make a customer keep coming back. Everyone I've talked to who owns a Warwick says they've had no problem with them. It's that great German craftsmanship. I'd love to list a bunch of flaws, but I haven't really run into all that many of them. The only thing I've run into is that the bass is fretless, and the strings are starting to cut into the Ebony fretboard, but that will happen with any bass. To sum it up, it's quite a piece for professionals and those who want to take bass to another level. I'd say it was for beginners alike, but with a retail of $3500, I wouldn't recommend starting out with this bass and then not liking it.