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I bought a Peavey ValeKing 112 in my senior year of high school, before I knew poo poo about poo poo. I still think it's a drat fine amp- I use it for clean (afropop, funk, "indie", fake jazz) chords and leads, and usually get my dirt from a pedal- in my case a Butler "Real Tube"  Overdrive. The on board distortion is okay but a bit overzealous for me. I can get it to break up naturally on the clean channel but only at stupid loud (for me) volume. To my ear, the sound is just fine. I keep meaning to replace the speaker, or retube it, but I can't convince myself that either of those things need to be done even after four years or so. The one thing I did do was eventually buy an MXR 10-band EQ and stick that in the effects loop. That had a really pleasing audible result, so it just sits in "always on" mode on top of the amp now. Someday I'll probably throw a Weber in there, or maybe a Jensen neodymium model to cut weight. I'm sure the tubes will eventually die as well and then I'll see how much difference new ones make. I highly recommend the MXR EQ to anyone with any amp by the way; if you don't want to use it conventionally you can always set it up as a clean boost. I'm of two minds on the whole subject: First, I think many guitarists who are self-described "tone freaks" spend way too much time on pickups and loving cables for gently caress's sake and neglect their amp and settings. Second, I think I'm comparatively easy to please sound-wise. I'm not one of those idiots saying a budget model Crate is "just as good as" an Orange/Marshall/Vox/what have you, I'm just not married to the specific characteristics of any of those. I like Fender cleans, Vox cleans, and Peavey cleans just fine. Of course being a contemporary music student tends to give people "John Cage Syndrome" where if you hear any loving sound for long enough you start to think it's musically useful. So maybe disregard the above, I dunno.
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Jul 6, 2010 22:09
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ruinedhero posted:Ferrous Wheel - I have really lost much respect for Peavey gear the past few years. While I like the 6505, I've never been able to get a good clean tone the times I demoed it - the metal sound is great but like the Marshall I talked about before, it seems like it is limited to doing one thing really well. The VALVEKING series never impressed me at all when I demoed it. Most people agree that the 112 is the best of the VK line. Verdict seems to be that the 100 watt head is only okay and the 212 is poo poo. If the 112 wasn't to your taste then there's not much I can say to defend it-- it's worked fine for my needs thus far. I like the cleans just fine and I use my OD pedal for whatever dirt I need. I do like the cleans on the Classic 30 a little better and I really want one of those but until I find one for super cheap I'm sticking with what I have. Again, I think my attitude toward the Valveking is largely shaped by the fact that I never wanted "Fender cleans" or "Marshall crunch" out of it. Still don't in fact. Those who do should absolutely steer clear. ruinedhero posted:Going back to Peavey - I picked up a Peavey BAM! ( Peavey makes a ton of stuff like that and I don't know why. The Classic 30 and 50 are great amps in their various configurations, as is the Delta Blues. I always liked the old Mark series solid state bass amps too- lots of practice spaces in Vancouver have them and I always manage to get a decent (and loud) sound out of them no matter how beat to poo poo they are. And I love the old cabs that you sometimes find with those amps- usually a 1x18" plus 2x10" or something in one big-rear end box. I had two Classic chorus 2x12 combos until they were stolen (got them together for super cheap). Used them as backup amps for whatever needed to be loud; the chorus was as intense as could be and the assorted 80s reverbs were silly but kind of fun. Clean was Roland-ish, distortion utterly unusable. And on the other hand there are the Rage, Bandit, and TransTube amps which are terrible, and awful anomalous stuff like the bass amp you described. It's a very mixed bag but I don't think it's a matter of their overall selection going downhill as much as a matter of them always having made both poo poo gear and great gear. Though the proportion has likely shifted for the worse; their guitars in particular come to mind as being much worse on average now than they used to be.
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Jul 7, 2010 02:43
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BAM!) 2x12 combo bass amp with effects modeling, and amp modeling, and it was from the early 2000's and was a total piece of loving poo poo that I traded for another lovely (not as lovely though) Kustom guitar amp. The BAM! had 1000 options and they all sucked, just give me one option that works! Horrible amp, I really am tired of Peavey' poo poo.
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Since I've probably already discredited myself but now might be the time to mention that I actually like the old Hartke 3500. It's a 350 watt head, all solid state with a preamp tube that can be blended to taste for subtle effect. Graphic EQ, usable on board compressor, nothing fancy. It's not the loudest thing ever but through a decent cab it can stand up to a drumset and it has an additional XLR out to run to a board if that's your thing. The 1000 watt version sounds awfully good though, I've been wanting something class D. As far as bass goes I'm thinking that modeling pedal/preamp->crazy powerful class D power amp->loud loving cab might just be the way of the future. I really want to build a Fearful cab but I'm not quite up to it yet.
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Jul 7, 2010 09:26
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The above is why more and more modern bass cabs are distributing the frequency response across multiple drivers and tweeters. In light of how effective those systems are, I can't imagine a very convincing argument in favor of abusing guitar speakers. If anything guitarists could probably benefit from exploring setups closer to the new bass rigs. In particular, the fearful design incorporates high performance drivers for low and mids, with an optional tweeter. Obviously not everyone has the means to build one but I think it's a great approach. Edit: Apparently DR Bass are a not a good place to order from, I had no idea. Ferrous Wheel fucked around with this message at 00:33 on Jul 10, 2010 |
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Jul 9, 2010 02:36
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I'd look for a used Vox or Peavey combo (I think there's a Classic 50 2x12). A treble booster pedal would probably help give you that edge and definition too.
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Dec 24, 2010 06:03
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Okay, so I'm looking to downsize in both wattage and weight from my ValveKing 112. Even though I'm going smaller, I still want decent clean headroom since the plan is to get my OD from pedals. I play mostly single coils (strat copies, Epi Casino) and use a bridge humbucker for more defined distorted stuff. I play all kinds of music so versatility is good but I'm not concerned with emulating any particular sound. I just want an amp that has 15-30 watts of largely clean headroom and takes pedals well. I've considered the Egnater Tweaker 15 combo and the Jet City JCA2112 (I've since heard that the Jet City specializes in early breakup) as well as various stuff like VHT, old Traynor and Sunn, even Carvin. Looking to spend maybe $500-$600. Thoughts?
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Jan 4, 2011 18:52
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That is easily the most apt and concise description of the Dumble phenomenon that I have ever heard.
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Feb 9, 2011 10:45
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Okay, so two things. First in defense of the Valveking 112: I've had mine since about 2006, when I chose it over a Blues Jr without knowing really anything about amps. I've never regretted that choice. While the gain channel has always been a bit aggressive for me (the most I like is kind of fusion-y lead), I can still dial in a usable sound if I'm careful. And I use a dirt box for boost and/or crunch most of the time anyway. Right now I have the pedal set up with a moderate crunch and the OD side of the amp set to very mild breakup. That gives me four flavours to choose from, all of which are pretty usable. In any case, I mostly got the amp for the clean, and to keep up with a drum set. It does both. I would absolutely recommend it as a first amp if you need a fairly portable combo that can keep up with a hard-hitting drummer at rehearsals and cover clean to medium-gain sounds for gigging. It's never once broken down on me, nor have I had to re-tube it since I got it. If, like me, you're largely unconcerned with exactly replicating sounds you've heard elsewhere I think the VK is a really solid choice. Also, probably no one's going to loving steal it. To the detriment of the ValveKing: Everything got much better when I added a ten-band MXR EQ to the effects loop. Mostly what I do now is cut the lowest few bands, which on the MXR are below normal guitar range anyway. This frees up the mid and high range (which I also boost slightly) of the amp, and gives a lot more cut and presence. I won't say the clean is exactly Fender-like, but it gets into Classic 30 territory and that's more than fine by me. I like to have access to a pristine setting with no obvious breakup, and although the ValveKing always did that, it now does it at lower volume settings. So if you do go for a VK, I'd budget for an EQ pedal as part of the deal. It goes a very long way toward overcoming the biggest weakness of the amp, which is the stock speaker. There are other mods you can do, but I've never seen the need. Uh, until now. Question: What neodymium speakers do people like for 112 combos? My main motivation here is to make the amp a bit lighter, but I've also finally decided that I've lived with the old one long enough. In terms of sound, I mostly want a wide frequency response so I can EQ things to my liking. The Eminence Tonkerlite and Lil' Texas seem to be popular choices along these lines.Celestion has some of course, but they're on the pricey side. Oh, and it needs to be 16ohm... As for the rest of my rig, I play mostly bolt-ons with hot-ish single coils, plus an Epi Casino. Two of the bolt necks have medium-output bridge humbuckers. The music has a mix of big chords (clean and distorted), jazz shapes, funk strumming, fingerpicking, and single note leads. Other band pieces are drums, five string fretless bass, and vocals. Maybe keys too someday soon. Effects are: EB Volume->Tubeworks overdrive->modded Crybaby (darker/louder) in the front, Boss PS-5 (chorus)->MXR M108 in the loop. If the Neos all sound terrible or the good ones don't come in 16ohm I'll probably just go with the Eminence with the least annoying name, or even a generic Carvin. Much as I like this amp, I feel like any decent speaker will be an improvement.
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Aug 5, 2013 16:17
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Yep. And not just guitar amps either—I'm pretty dogmatic about hi-passing anything that's going to be amplified somehow. Of course I'm probably never going to convince my bass player to filter out sub-audio, but for guitars and vocals I see no downside. For guitar use, I would recommend the M108 over the six band or the Boss GE-7 specifically because it allows you to cut a big chunk of low frequency content that is unlikely to be useful in a band setting and most tunings. The two gain controls are also very handy, and the whole thing is supremely useful live. I've used mine as a boost when my OD was out of commission, and to get a borrowed (and crazy bright) Fender combo under control without running back to the amp or changing the owner's settings too much. As for "generic", to me that's a good thing. I don't have the attention span to build my signal chain or playing around one sound, and I think idealizing existing styles is kind of dangerous. It certainly hasn't spurred much innovation in the world of guitars and amps at least. That may be too much of a can of worms for this thread though.
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Aug 5, 2013 17:37
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Speaker replacement depends heavily on what you want to achieve. Some speakers will give you more clean headroom, others will break up earlier. Either one might be an improvement for your purposes. Greenbacks, as far as I know, are favoured mostly by people who like a fairly tight distorted sound. I'm sure they're fine for other things, that just seems to be their main selling point. I think Weber speakers are a good place to start looking since they have offerings at a lot of price points and no one seems to hate them. Also, they're having a 10% sale right now according to their highly attractive front page. If your budget is tight, Jensen makes a lot of pretty cheap models and having been a supplier of stock Fender speakers since forever a lot of their offerings are designed with that in mind. As jwh says, the Blues Jr. isn't really a typical Fender. But maybe dropping in a more traditional speaker would get it closer to sounding that way, or just work out well for other reasons. Returning to the ongoing struggle between my ValveKing and my spine: Has anyone tried a Celestion G12 Century? I was initially looking for the original version but it looks like the new "vintage" model may have replaced it, which is unfortunate since the new 60 watt rating is a little low for my comfort. Most people who dislike them find them too "hi-fi", which sounds like exactly what I want. I wish I was better as reading the specs and charts, because the Eminence models seem good but their branding and ad copy screws with my head. The neo versions seem hard to find for a test drive as well.
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Aug 9, 2013 15:35
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If they were made for Garnet amps they might be from a Canadian manufacturer like Westinghouse or Marconi, but really could be anything. Is there any marking on the bottom? I'm very interested to hear your impressions once you've test-driven them too.
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May 15, 2014 00:01
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One version of the vintage Ampeg Jet (I forget which is which) produces a gorgeous, blistering distortion at pretty low volume. They're very portable too, and might be obtainable within your budget. I've seen one for $400, with beat up tolex but fine internals.
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May 17, 2014 08:00
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In theory upping the master should give you more clean level if you back off the preamp gain as you raise it. In practice, you might start causing other things to clip — your speakers might start breaking up for example. Speaker behavior might account for the change you've noticed in EQ as well. If your sound is getting too woofy and/or distorted at high volume, using an EQ pedal to cut some lows might help clean things up. Backing off the lows and mids on the amp EQ can also reduce clipping; I found I had to do this to keep my wah sound clean. More efficient speakers can also increase effective clean headroom if you want to go that route. What won't work is dropping in lower-gain preamp tubes. This is recommended all over the web, but it won't give you more level; all it does is change the behavior of the knobs while lowering overall output (though few people dime their amps, so most won't miss the extra db).
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May 23, 2014 18:10
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Considering we're still encouraging high schoolers to give each other brain damage through contact sports, I think widespread gently caress-giving about hearing loss might be more than a few decades away. I'd like to think otherwise. I've felt pretty hypocritical for a while since I evangelize about hearing protection all the time and use it when I play, but then there's audience members six feet in front of me who don't have any hearing protection and here I am turning up so I can be heard over 120dB of drums... I wish there was a way to play energetic music without deafening everyone close enough to enjoy it, but I don't really know what it would be. Drum kits, instrument amplifiers and PAs are all designed to be loud as hell. And people seemingly really enjoy the sensory experience of really loud poo poo. Still, knowing that it's my playing chipping away at someone else's hearing freaks me out a bit. Good for making solos more tasteful though: I just have to think "Is each of these notes really worth the contribution it will make to these peoples' tinnitus in a few years?"
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Jun 9, 2014 22:54
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Your customer wanted you to put EH preamp tubes in it?  Edit: vv That's fair and I'm not a huge NOS advocate anyway. I just thought EH had an especially bad reputation for inconsistency and failure rate (I'm aware this has to do with selection rather than manufacturing.) vv Ferrous Wheel fucked around with this message at 22:39 on Jul 22, 2014 |
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Jul 22, 2014 22:23
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Just went to a local shop looking for a replacement speaker today—thinking I'd walk out with some sort of Eminence or Celestion—and instead they offered to re-cone an old Italian Jensen for me for $110. I figured what the gently caress and told them to go ahead. Reviews about their customer service are very mixed, but the consensus seems to be that they do good work. It never even occurred to me that a local place would do that sort of thing though; I know you can order custom Webers and Scumbacks and such, but I never thought of having a general speaker place put something together.
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Dec 14, 2014 01:24
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So I've got my new speaker installed in a combo, but the wires to the amp can't reach the little tabs because the frame is a bit different. Is there any particular reason I shouldn't just splice them? Is there anything I need to know if I decide to do that?
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Dec 23, 2014 04:34
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Yay! Kind of. I installed the new speaker and it seems to be working. I can hear a bit of difference, though not as much as I'd hoped. It might be different at band volume. And of course in the process I tugged on the connectors trying to get them to reach and now I'm getting a constant hum that's present even with nothing plugged in and doesn't react to the volume or EQ knobs. If I plug a guitar in it does seem to react to the volume knob, but maybe that's just guitar hum. Point being, I guess tomorrow is the day to actually pull the chassis for the first time and see if I can tell what I did. I think I'm going to want to look at some circuit mods too; the guy who reconed this speaker claimed that it would be unbearably bright until it broke in, and I'm still maxing out the treble knob at low volume. At least the silver dust cap looks pretty cool showing through the grill cloth. 
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Dec 23, 2014 08:09
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I just read this article which, if it isn't full of poo poo, explains why I have never felt like typical Fender and Marshall style T/M/B knobs were doing what they were supposed to. On any amp. I feel strangely vindicated, but also like I nee to tear out the tone circuit in my amp and replace it with a brownface-type two knob setup.
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Jan 21, 2015 22:38
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burritonegro posted:Speaking of which, has anyone tried a Quilter? No, god drat it because  but I'm pretty much obsessed with them now and they just released a bunch of cool poo poo like the Micro Pro Mach 2 (now in black!) and Aviator Gold (the gain channel is gainier). There's going to be a "heavy duty" version of the Micro Pro 12 sometime soon-ish with a neo speaker so the whole thing weighs in at 21 pounds. Best place to get them if you're a poor seems to be AMS because they have a bunch of scratch and dents in stock for cheaper, and also payment plans that are probably some kind of horrible scam. I wish the company was getting more attention because they build in a lot of really useful stuff, like the ability to handle basically any speaker cab, a great-sounding XLR out, and CAT5 to connect to footswitch. And to me, doing a class D analog amp with a relatively flat EQ option seems as close to a future-proof piece of gear as you'll find in the world of guitar. You're free of the expensive/inferior trade-off in the tube world, but keep the modelling offboard so advances in processing don't obsolesce your amp in a month. And the things just sound great in almost every demo I've heard. But other than a very vague suggestion that L&M might carry them someday there's no sign of a dealer with a storefront picking them up north of the border. So, everyone buy them so that some of you will hate them and I can sneak down to Bellingham and grab one for cheap.
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Mar 19, 2015 09:38
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Welp, just ordered the second tiniest Quilter. I'm cautiously optimistic. Pulled the trigger blind because I couldn't find one near enough to Vancouver to try out. If it's as loud as everyone says they are, then sweet. If not, I'll be forced to be quieter which is arguably even better. Or I'll use the XLR out. Tiny amp! 
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Jul 18, 2015 21:47
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Yep, it has on board gain and it sounds pretty good to me. More important to me is the control layout, which I think is ideal. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iNpgV1VPlNA They're not being carried in a lot of shops, probably because storefronts are struggling as-is and not a lot are eager to stock up on high-end solid state combos just now. Quilter offer a pretty decent return policy if you're in the US (30 days and I think they pay shipping both ways) but I'm in Canada so instead I'm buying one and hoping for the best.
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Jul 20, 2015 07:35
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Got my Quilter. First one had very slightly higher self-noise than I thought it should so they swapped me for a new one. Very quickly. The new one is lovely. There is still self-noise but it's really loving quiet. More like what you'd get from a powered speaker than any amp I've ever met. The amp is loud enough to be heard in my band, and light enough that I can take transit without accidentally assaulting anyone. A few things that are interesting to me given what I've seen online: 1. Everyone raves about the scooped settings on the EQ, but I find the shelved settings much more useful in a band context. Part of that is the P-90s in my Casino being a bit hi-fi, but I also like it with my strat-type Ibanez. 2. People tend not to like the drive channel, and I can sort of see why; it's capable of producing bad sounds in a way that most common amps don't. Still, if you spend some time trying different settings you can get cool sounds. In general I find it works best to keep the gain knob low and boost with the EQ; much like with anything else ever. 3. Speaking of the gain channel, it also doesn't sound good at as low volume as the clean channel. Really nice at normal conversation level, killer at band volume, but people trying to dial in a great lead sound at the same barely-audible level as the clean may have trouble. In general, I think it sounds great and I love the features. I will try to bash some clips together soon with the DI.
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Aug 18, 2015 08:20
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Pokey Araya posted:gently caress the guy making Matamp in the US. Dude is a chump. I have no dog in this game but do you want to elaborate on this anyway? Also, still super happy with my Quilter and particularly happy not to have to deal with tubes anymore.
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Oct 4, 2015 20:15
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Quilter Tone Block or the new Pro Block are probably very good candidates for backup amp. They're tiny, weigh next to nothing, don't care what cab they're plugged into (even no cab is fine), sound great, are fairly cheap, and have every feature you'd probably need other than channel switching. You could probably even cram one into that crazy van if you really had to. The Aviator and MicroPro heads are more full-featured, but also bigger and more expensive. I'm obviously biased since I use a aviator combo already, but I'd almost certainly go with a Pro Block if I needed a backup for touring.
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Mar 7, 2016 05:52
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I have one of the original ValveKing combos, and I defended it for a long time. Then I got a new amp and hated my past self for sticking with the VK for so long. I'm not sure about the new version, but here is why the old one was bad: 1. The speaker is complete garbage. 2. Changing the speaker (to a custom-built JBL copy) didn't help that much. 3. The gain channel is garbage and changing V2 helped very little if at all. 4. There is a noticeable delay/volume drop when switching channels, not that I ever really wanted to because see 3. 5. The mods that correct the gain channel's poor design are invasive and labour-intensive so I never did them. 6. It's too heavy for an amp with only one usable channel. I did like the clean channel okay and that's mostly what I used, but overall I don't think it was a particularly good first amp. Not even the best Peavey you could get; Classic 30 or Classic 50 would be way better. Even more better would be a Traynor YCV40 or Quilter 101/201 and whatever cheap cab you can get.
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May 2, 2016 15:00
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Or get a Quilter and have the same rig for home practice and gigging! Unless you're set on building. Sad about Traynor, those things own. Best cheap tube amps I've ever tried by far, and the kick-proof speaker grill is something more manufacturers should adopt.
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May 18, 2016 19:08
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peter gabriel posted:You're opening yourself up to all the blues tones that way and doing it with valves to get that awesome volume control using your fingers and guitar. While the Night Train will definitely do this, so will plenty of non-tube gear. Maybe they don't all do it the same way or with the same amount of control, but I feel like it's gotten really uncommon for new amps and pedals to lack the ability to clean up when they see a weaker input. I think the last thing I owned that didn't do it was an 80s Peavey Stereo Chorus, which had the same "can of bees" distorted sound at all attack and guitar volume levels. I feel like everyone in the industry figured out how to do the volume cleanup thing recently, and have been constantly reminding us ever since.
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May 23, 2016 22:01
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