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Another guitar thread....but its an amp this time
- Thread starter mrrman
- Start date
Fritzo
Lifer
That's a load. Musicians use what they think sounds good to them. Today's solid state amps are actually very good, and Line6 has some outstanding products. Their Spider series is top notch and I'd recommend it.
Tube amps are great....but only for playing loud. They don't start to shine until you crank them to at least 1/3 volume- not something you want to do for practicing at home. They also take a good 20 minutes to warm up, and you need to take the tubes out of them during transport or be faced with broken tubes by the time you get to your gig.
If you're going to be gigging- sure! Get a tube amp. If this is for practice, by all means get a solid state amp. Like I said, Line6 is very good. They really know what they're doing with their modeling technology.
The ad30 vt is a hybrid. Tube preamp , SS power section. Ive had one and they do sound pretty good and have the ability to get really freakin loud, The models are pretty sweet too.
As for which is better , play what ya like. Go to guitar center and noodle on a few. If you cant noodle 😛 take a friend who can.
Saint Nick
Lifer
I own both solid state amps and a tube amp. I really love using my tube amp for that vintage vibe, and when I play more modern rock type of stuff I like to use my solid state. And really it can go both ways. But like someone else said, just pick up and play on what you think sounds the best.
Fritzo
Lifer
Yeah, tube preference is usually just an "elitist" type of thing. I can usually find these people when I ask them "why do you like tube amps and what do you use it for?".
Playing live- there's nothing like a Marshall 1959SL, those new Orange Thunderverbs are way cool, and if you can find an old Leslie around eBay, you rock in my book. But you need the right tool for the right job man.
I guess I'm saying in music there's a lot of show-offs, and their advice isn't always the best.
AlienCraft
Lifer
Agreed and what sounds good is subject to change, relative to what they think is making a particular tone, irrespective of the actual signal chain.
ALL of the name guitarists I have worked with use a combination of foot pedals /amps / speaker cabinets / speakers to achieve the desired "tones". By using an A/B switch, volume / pan pedal, they blend these amp sounds to get "there".
EVEN those that have one brand of amp lined across the stage, may be using another amp / speaker combination behind that wall or even off stage to get "their tone". Metallica uses Marshalls in an isolation case , off stage, for the PA feed because if they were to send that wall of sound across the stage, the vocal mics would be awash in guitar , ruining any chance to bring the vocals above the already loud sound field on stage.
Any abuse to an amp that is great enough to break a tube, is far more likel.y to cause the speaker to be bounced out of the gap as well. If you treat your amp like you did your toy cars when you were 5, then I don't know what to tell you except, "they won't last too long that way." The biggest problem with tube amps vis a vis transportation is not allowing them to cool down before transporting, and failing to re-seat and wipe down the tubes after moving the amp, especially if the amp does not ride in a case.
Getting and using a real road case will preserve the integrity of the device, be it speaker or electronic.
You will add 60% or more to the weight, but you won't be at risk to as great a degree as without a case. I've taken guitar amps out of cases that have taken falls from over 6 feet to hard concrete floors and had them work fine. Same with speakers. I've also taken the parts from broken amps and speaker boxes without cases.
Nothing ruins a Sunday afternoon gig for your friends faster than a mic stand shoved through the speaker or a speaker out of the gap from bouncing around in a trunk.
This contradicts the actual philosophy of gigging gear (at least in my mind) which is to say "less equipment is better". or perhaps, "the more uses one piece can have, the better."
The LINE 6 and others with modeling technology are all very good to my ear, insofar as 99.9% of your listeners will think you are using authentic signal chains to affect the sound they are hearing.
Trust me when I say the only time a piece of gear matters to someone listening, is when it gives the player a hard time or interferes with the performance.
NO ONE EVER SAID, "gee, that (fill in name of piece of gear) really sounds good tonight".... and if they did , I want to know why you, the performer allowed their attention to be diverted to a piece of crap. If the song and, by extension, you, aren't the ONLY THING on their mind, you're not doing your job.
Your job according to the paying public is to play your hit song(s), or to play someone's hit songs.
They really don't care how you get there.
AlienCraft
Lifer
LOL
best answer yet
Valvetronix is not a tube amp. It's a modeler that uses a tube in the power amp stage at very low wattage for a more natural sounding distortion. It's quite good at what it does but it's technically not a tube amp.
Do you need a tube amp? If your practicing, probably not especially for your bedroom. They're heavy, expensive, and need to be cranked to really bring out their qualities. A $200 modeler like the Roland Cube series or Vox Valvetronix can get you 80% the tone of a tube amp which is better than enough for practice.
If you're gigging and recording an album, you may want a tube amp. It depends. If you can't make out a tube amp from a solid state while blindfolded, you don't need a tube amp. Once you acquire a taste for tone, that's when you should really consider it. Until then, save the $$$ and hassle and get what sounds good to you for as cheap as possible.
If you must get a tube amp, Epiphone makes a $130 tube combo if want to play with one. It's a little dark and needs to be cranked to 11:00 to hear the benefit of it. I have one here, but to be honest it's wasted as my $99 Roland Microcube sounds 100% better at bedroom volumes.
Hope this helps.
DainBramaged
Lifer
The only thing that tubes are good for is these days is for letting all the bytes go through them so that the interweb keeps functioning.
thomsbrain
Lifer
Line 6 amps aren't a good choice for people who need a serious amp.
i'll qualify that by saying they make good practice amps, since they sound "good enough" at bedroom levels, but when it comes time to play with a band, they just won't cut it. they sound worse the louder you push them, and start to sound really tinny, cold, and harsh. at one point in my band's practice space, we had about 7 big amps at our disposal: a custom Marshall DSL100, two Marshall JCM900's, 2 Marshall JCM800's, a Marshall Valvestate 100, and a Line 6 200 watt head. we also occasionally had access to a Mesa Boogie Double Rectifier. everyone who came through agreed that the Line 6 was by far the worst sounding amp, even the guy who owned it. the Line 6 was the butt of many running jokes.
i'll qualify that by saying they make good practice amps, since they sound "good enough" at bedroom levels, but when it comes time to play with a band, they just won't cut it. they sound worse the louder you push them, and start to sound really tinny, cold, and harsh. at one point in my band's practice space, we had about 7 big amps at our disposal: a custom Marshall DSL100, two Marshall JCM900's, 2 Marshall JCM800's, a Marshall Valvestate 100, and a Line 6 200 watt head. we also occasionally had access to a Mesa Boogie Double Rectifier. everyone who came through agreed that the Line 6 was by far the worst sounding amp, even the guy who owned it. the Line 6 was the butt of many running jokes.
AlienCraft
Lifer
You're comparing apples to pears... same family, but different tastes and therefore different applications.
Modeling amps are, by their nature, designed to be used in conjunction with Sound Reinforcement gear to take them to the levels that develop when a group play together.
Simply because an amp will develop 200 watts RMS does not mean that it will be twice as loud as another amp that develops 100 watts RMS.
Speaker cabinet design and transducer selection will always be the variable as to stage SPL developed.
AgaBoogaBoo
Lifer
QFT
<---- is actually off to go look at tube amplifiers, but not for a guitar, rather general audio 😛
AlienCraft
Lifer
An amplifier is not "loud" until it is connected to a transducer aka speaker. Furthermore identical speakers will have different outputs depending upon the type of enclosure they are mounted in.
This is the basis of many an "audiophile's" argument for/against BOSE speaker products, is it not?
Isn't it true that the class of amplifier will determine the output capabilities of an amplifier , irrespective of the type output devices (silicon/ et al , vacuum tube) ?
I'll admit up front to being very rusty as to amp design technicalities, so if I'm off base there, please chalk it up to old guy / "70's being good to me" kinda thing.
But input levels and speaker enclosure type are as important to output level (in spl) as amp output rating, afaik.
AlienCraft
Lifer
NL5
Diamond Member
Amplifiers do not have speakers. But, yes, they need them to make sound, and the speaker does have a HUGE impact on the sound. We were merely talking about the amplifier though. My statements were based on just the amp, and more or less assumed the same speaker being hooked up to the different amps in my example. The class of the amplifier is based on how the signal is amplified in an amp and no matter the class of amp, SS amps still do not work in the same way as a tube amp. For one thing a tube amp will push 100 watts into any speaker - regardless of its ohm rating. SS lowers output as the ohms increase. Tube amps are louder per watt. My 18 watt Marshall will make yours ears bleed. Seriously. It is louder than any 100 watt SS amp I have ever heard. WAY louder.
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