Ibanez SR305EB-WK

Plus points:

That neck. Just so damn playable and easy. Satin finish, asymmetrical C-shape that makes it a dream to play. I love it.
Lovely black finish on the body that has a nice understated look.
The pickup config and tone options are versatile and useful. Does everything from rounded, smooth tones, to funky attack. The split coil really good, and very useful when you need that snap to cut through the mix. Takes very well to overdrive! Not too muddy, though the factory strings are bit unbalanced tonally. I find the low B is just a little too rounded compared to the others (or the E could do with another .05, depending on taste).

Negatives:
QC on Ibanez's cheaper guitars has always been pretty bad over the years, but even Harley benton are doing a better job these days. Well done Thomann.
The neck alignment/bridge drilling is off by a mm or two, so the strings are not parallel with the neck edges, getting progressively worse as you move up the neck, and the dot markers also then appear off-centered. The latter I can live with as its a minor cosmetic issue, but the former is affecting playability.
The fret finishing is non-existent. Sure the ends are clipped reasonably ok, but there is no consistency to the fret hammering and as such the action must remain high to avoid choking. Lots of lifted and uneven frets means this will need a full level, recrown and polish before it is playable at reasonable actions. I'm not fussy here as it's bass after all, but this has really not been consistently made.
There has been no effort made to clean the crap off the frets or the fretboard, and there is a strange lump at the end of the board that looks like its been melted on somehow.
The bridge is cheap and uncomfortable, and keeps losing its height settings as the grub screws rotate too easily under the palm.
The knobs are scratchy feeling and produce crackles.
The nut is cut very badly and still has burring hanging off it.

I have two options now. Keep the guitar and do the work myself to fix it, or return to Thomann for an exchange and hope the next one is better.
I have read numerous reviews that mirror my experiences and so I'm not so sure I can be bothered to play the lottery again.

If I decide to keep the bass it will need:
New nut (grapite)
New bridge
Fret level, crown, polish
Try cleaning the pots, or if not then new ones.

Is it worth all this for a budget bass? Well it does play like a dream, and it sounds great too. Maybe even a redrill of the bridge mounting would help enough to bring the string alignment back. I'm on the fence still but am confident in Thomann's excellent return policies and customer service so I will update this review if anything changes.

First of all, the sound quality is very good, the dual-coil pickups produce a great bass sound so no complaints here. This applies especially if you are into metal bass.
The instrument is quite comfortable, for a 5 string bass, the neck is rather slim and easy to handle. The finish is nice and smooth.
The only cons that I have noticed after using this for 4 months or so are related to the switches and knobs. For switching between the pickups, there is a turnable knob instead of a switch, which I dislike.
Recently, the knob for the mid frequencies came loose, then again I am quite a violent knob turner so it might be on me. A similar thing happened to an Ibanez 8-string guitar that I own. This is easily fixed with a small wrench.
The bass is also surprisingly lightweight so it won't strain you much when having it strapped to you.
Last but not least, this bass is one hell of a looker so that already adds to the feeling of playing the thing.

Bought it as first bass. For the price the perfomance quality is pretty good, no scratches, fine tuners, convenient neck, light weight. But there's something that I wasn't expecting before the byuing:
1. Weight is light but the neck is heavier than the body, so the neck is constantly ducking.
2. Besides the ducking, the fulcrum of the guitar on the foot is tiny, and in spite of light weight, it presses on the leg at one narrow point. I personally experience some pain on my foot because of it, especially when long playing. It would be better if the lower horn of the guitar body was wider and bigger. Then the guitar wieght would be spread evenly across the foot.
3. Scratches on the body appeared very fast after some playing. The black paint lies in a very thin layer and the paint is peeling off when a pick or nail hits it. So after some slapping you may find out a lot of scratches on the body. I'm really dissapointed with the paint, it makes the guitar a cheap work horse. Cheaper than it is.
4. Very noizy pickups in single mode. But maybe it's normal.
In general sound is fine, but I can't compare it to others because this is the only bass I have. Regarding pickup selector and features - it's too much I guess. I don't use 90% of the modes.

I've been watching this specific bass since 2018 when I first got into bass playing, but I couldn't afford it.
Here's the pros and cons:

PROS:
-Playable out the box
-Decent setup, even the intonation was spot on
-Neck is very snug in the joint
-Tuners are bit tight, but stable
-Pickups are strong
-Preamp makes tons of difference in the tone
-The 3-way switch makes a difference too, the Tap (coil split) sounds great for slap, the humbuckers are beefy and not too muddy
-It looks and feels amazing to play
-All the knobs, except volume, are notched at the middle. Didn't see anyone anywhere mention this, but they are, in fact, notched.

CONS:
-It's playable only when it's powered. Even though the pickups are passive, they go through the active preamp and there's no bypass. Meaning that when you don't have something to power the preamp, your bass sends no signal. That's the biggest CON for this bass, but as long as you remove the cable when you're not playing it, your battery will last pretty long. Make sure to have 1 or 2 spare 9V batteries around.
-Nut is plastic and mine had lots of burring on the edges. It's not low, in fact it's .001 higher than normal, but it's not a big deal. Probably the first to be replaced. The burring was easily removed by hand.
-Knobs are not uniformly straight, they go from the body curvature, meaning that the EQ knobs are pointing out at an angle. Treble knob has a weird "notch" towards the cut side where it has extra resistance, but it's no more than an annoyance and most likely an individual issue on the bass I got.
-The Power Tap option is not very good. It makes a difference, but I haven't been able to get a tone I like with it. I think it keeps the neck pickup as humbucker and coil splits the bridge one.
-Frets are uneven on a perfectly straight neck. Most of the frets I tested with a rocker were noticeably uneven. The only problems with fret buzzing comes around the 15th fret to the end, but it's easily managed by setting your saddle action a little higher. It's not a huge problem.
-The E string is much more dull than the rest. I'm pretty sure this one is just on my model, but it's not as bright as the other strings. I used GHS Fastfret liberally on it and it didn't make much of a difference. Just bad luck with the string set they put on it.

Overall, great bass. It has its problems as any bass for that price will, but they're not making the bass unplayable or tough to play. Just not at its highest ability. A nut replacement and fret level will make this bass play like an absolute dream!

For the price this instrument is amazing. You can't expect the handmade quality and beauty you get from expensive or exotic instruments of course. Very versatile sound due to the active 3-way eq, pickup balance and preamp options switch. I bought this as my first 5 string bass and I'm very pleased with it. Everything is there to set it up to your playing style, it's surprisingly light and pretty easy to play. I wouldn't think of buying an Ibanez when I first started researching considering my play styles (blues-funk), I will put the brand high on my list when I go for my next instrument. Make sure you also buy a set of strings because the ones that came with it is pretty off-putting combined with the poor set-up which I wouldn't say was done if the factory didn't state so. I also don't like the plug placement which kinda forbids you from using angled or thick jacks.
Would recommend to a friend.

This is a workhorse.
Lightweight, comfortable, with unexpected sustain and tons of features.
Versatile and trustworthy, it's a proper, proper gigging musician's instrument.
Only minor drawbacks, the fretboard edges (not fret edges) are a bit sharp, so I lightly sanded them with a soft sandpaper and now it feels played in. Also I would slightly move the Mid and treble Q of the Equalizer about 500Hz higher if I could, but that might be my personal taste.

All in all this is a bargain, I would recommend it to any gigging player, you can count on this bass feeling and sounding great anywhere.