Below are some of today's Solid State Amplifier models currently available on the market. There's not a lot of them new now, however. You can thank the first Marshall MG series and Line 6 kidney POD for that (Clap).
My pick is objective according to each amplifier spec sheet. Tone is subjective, thereby it will not be touched here. Let's begin.
Laney LV100 - $222/-
The LV100 has
two similar but different pre amps. The clean goes through conventional silicon
circuit. OD1/OD2 goes through Laney's TEC (Tube Emulating Circuitry)
technology, but by no means it's telling you there's an ECC83 tube in there.
Nope. Both channels have an independent tone control and dedicated digital reverb. Both
reverbs are placed before FX Send/Return (should be Pre Out/Power in). The
LV100 outputs 65 Watts RMS through its 12 inch "HH" speaker.
Laney LV200 - $442/-
The LV200 has
two different pre amps. The clean goes through a conventional silicon circuit.
OD1/OD2 tones gets laced with the ECC83 thermionic electrons.
Randall RG80 - $333/-
The RG80 has an
FET (Field Effect Transistor) circuitry design for both clean and drive with
shared tone controls. By the way this FET does not imply any onboard effects
like Phaser/Chorus/Flanger/Delay. FET is a transistor - Male is call
Transbrother… Of course there's Transmen and Transwomen that would make Transfathers and Transmothers. When a transistor goes faulty then it would be called
Transgender which… are of no use in electronics. Moving on! I guess the folks
at Randall love their FET so much. I'm told by Randall that the reverb is
before the FX loop. Doesn't that make it a Pre Out/Power in or Line Out/Line
In? Anyway, speaking of reverb, it’s the good old spring type. I like that a
lot. The loud speaker is 12 inch. I do not know the make. Power amp is at 80
watts. Generously loud indeed. Randall is staying true to the Solid State
tradition.
Peavey Bandit
112 - $349/-
This is the
most complicated/versatile tonal pre amp of the lot. Peavey calls it their
Transtube technology. However you will not find any actual tubes in there. There
was never any since the first Transtube was introduced in 1995. Yes, it’s a
transistor front end. Both channels have an independent tone control. I also yet to receive a reply from Peavey as to whether
the reverb is before or after the FX Send/Return. Knowing Peavey, I would say its before? Power amp section is 100 watts strong but only through
its internal 4 Ohms 12 inch speaker. I think the watts would be 50 Watts
through any 8 Ohms external speaker. Still loud though.
Harley Benton
HB-80R - $135/-
I do not know
whether this has a transistor or opamp based pre amp. I will kick this HB-80R
out of here if it uses any digital preamp technology. Both channels have an independent tone control. I was told by Thomann
that the HB-80R uses digital reverb. Thomann in their follow up email informed "the FX Send and Return is behind the Reverb". Not sure what that meant. It claims to output a hefty
80 watts. It too has a 12 inch speaker. Anyway, I don't trust this company as
it is still new. It's just my personal opinion. There's not a single technical
documentation (schematic) on any of its products compared to the rest mentioned
here. I think it's a fair judgement to any new brand in this industry. I doubt
Harley Benton would give out any schematics when the need arises in the future.
www.sHARLEYkatpemBENTONgan.com
Laney LX65R - $270/-
I didn't know
Laney would have this many. The LX65R has TEC technology on both channels. The
channel has an extra filter circuit. XTS (eXtreme Tone Shaping). It's actually
mid scoop for us layman. Both channels have an independent tone control The FX Send/Return is after the reverb. It should be called Pre Out/Power In. The LX65R uses spring
reverb. Very nice. The power is 65 Watts through a 12 inch Celestion custom
design loud speaker.
DV Marks DVC
Guitar Friend 12II - $600/-
I know the logo
is yellow. DVC clearly states the use of solid state pre amps. Digital reverb
is placed before the FX Send/Return. It should be called Pre Out/Power In. The power amp section is MPT "Mark
Proprietary Technology". I have to confess, it is rare to hear a company that puts
priority near the hindquarters. I guess it's
not just loud then. "It's 50 Watts DV Mark loud" into a DV Mark
custom 12 inch loud speaker. I do not know the make nor do I know whether DV
Mark manufacture their parts. At least the key components. www.dvmark.it
The Vulcano G200
is another hybrid preamp. Because I cannot read Portuguese, I'm unable to know
whether one or both channels get juiced by the pre amp thermionic valve(s).
From its face, I know it has two independent tone controls. It does have an FX
Send/Return but I don't know whether it is before or after the reverb. The
power amp outputs 100 watts. It comes with either a Celestion or OEM 12 inch
speaker.
Hiwatt Crunch
50 - $???/-
Nothing more is
known other than what's obvious. Those are two channels with independent EQ,
Spring reverb, 50 watts, and a 1x12 inch Fane speaker. Therefore I can only
suspect it has an FX Send/Return. If it does, is it before or after the reverb?
My inquiry has not been served by Hiwatt. I am not satisfied by the way they ‘’unpresently’’
present their product on the website. No spec list, no back pictures of the
Crunch 50 Combo. Hiwatt only provide a standard six (darjah enam) composition
of the amp. I’ve conducted a fair amount of searching online of Solid State
Amplifiers only to find this is one bloody spec-secretive manufacturer. Could the Crunch 50 be too new in the market that Hiwatt had no time to put up the spec sheet? Don't get
me wrong if I've thought of excluding you from this list. To be fair, I’m obliged
to rant here.
Disqualified
from this list on the last minute was Orange CR60C. It has three selectable
digital reverb options, therefore I call that cheating. Orange should've chosen a reverb and be done with it.
Next post, We/I
will be talking about the chronology of guitar amplifier technology, from my
perspective and understanding of course.
To be corrected
yustech
1 comment:
no chance to install a fx loop in the Harley BEnton HB80R (old version)?
Post a Comment