Good practice/live performance amp
- Thread starter monkie
- Start date
woundedknee
New member
Without knowing much about your situation, and being an advocate of fender amps, I would suggest a frontman becuase they are fairly versitile and fairly inexpensive. Like the post above said, however, it depends on your kind of music and your budget. Go play some.
elenore19
Slowing becoming un-noob.
I'm also a fan of fender.
Go for the Fender Super Champ XD. Tube! $300. I play from country to heavy metal, and this amp really has FANTASTIC tones for everything I play. The clean is flawless.
So there's my little ad for the Champ. Sorry if it seems like advertising. But the amp is fantastic. Seriously. I can't get enough of it. I've been playing guitar for going on my 5th year here.
Elliot
Go for the Fender Super Champ XD. Tube! $300. I play from country to heavy metal, and this amp really has FANTASTIC tones for everything I play. The clean is flawless.
So there's my little ad for the Champ. Sorry if it seems like advertising. But the amp is fantastic. Seriously. I can't get enough of it. I've been playing guitar for going on my 5th year here.
Elliot
monkie
New member
For now I can only spend up to $600 max. The rooms that I usually play in would fit about 300-600 people. On special Occasions, I also play in rooms with a capacity of 1000-5000 people. The next gig room that I'll be playing for will fit approximately 500 people. I play rock and pop.
Hope that helps.
JuliánFernández
2&4
mikemorgan
panned out
Any of the Traynor tube models.
Any Fender amp.
Any Peavey amp.
That's about it for dependable, loud, and roadworthy tube amps<$600.
Any Fender amp.
Any Peavey amp.
That's about it for dependable, loud, and roadworthy tube amps<$600.
nopainkiller
Thunderkicks McStrum'em
I built a little tiny half watt in my hollow body to practice. Battery powered so i don't have to plug in, just pick up and switch on. When just playing for myself, I don't need a nice practice amp. In fact, if it's just guitar alone, I'm fine with a sh*tty danelectro 10 dollar mini amp.
kojdogg
bollocks redux!
do you have a cab already? if so, the orange tiny terror is great
DrewPeterson7
Sage of the Order
A small tube amp would be fun, but for convenience (and tube-like tone) it's tough to beat a Tech-21 Trademark 60, especially for the genres you mention.
Gear_Junky
New member
I was gonna stay out of this (considering that SCXD had already been recommended above). At this point, If I had a $600 budget, I might be looking at Epiphone Blues Custom 30. It's $549 (i'm sure can be gotten with a coupon discount and free S&H). Switchable 15/30watt (ClassA/ClassAB), all-tube, 2x12, tube-driven reverb, tube rectifier, footswitchable, supposedly very britishy-sounding (i'd be open to retubing and trying various speakers).
but, I've also owned Tech 21 Trademark 60 and currently own the Fender Super Champ XD (a.k.a. SCXD). What I'm going to say next is NOT to knock the TM60 - it's a VERY GOOD amp. It's just too expensive for what it is. So in my experience SCXD beats it easily for price/tone/features and practicality. That's even if you can get TM60 used at good discount.
I bought my SCXD as a "blem" for $229 shipped. I was under $300 after the speaker upgrade (Jensen Alnico p10r) and even a 12ax7 tube replacement (I just wanted to try it, didn't matter much). Sweet amp for the money.
but, I've also owned Tech 21 Trademark 60 and currently own the Fender Super Champ XD (a.k.a. SCXD). What I'm going to say next is NOT to knock the TM60 - it's a VERY GOOD amp. It's just too expensive for what it is. So in my experience SCXD beats it easily for price/tone/features and practicality. That's even if you can get TM60 used at good discount.
I bought my SCXD as a "blem" for $229 shipped. I was under $300 after the speaker upgrade (Jensen Alnico p10r) and even a 12ax7 tube replacement (I just wanted to try it, didn't matter much). Sweet amp for the money.
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DrewPeterson7
Sage of the Order
I will say you do have me curious to check out a Super Champ, dude - the idea of a hybrid with a solid state pre but a tube power amp is VERY appealing to me.
The real win for the Tech-21 though, is that the thing weighs next to nothing. One of the best SRV tones I ever got came out of that thing at whisper volumes, yet it weighs something like 20 pounds.
I personally prefer the Trademark-30, but that one has a ton more gain than the 30, and is voiced more for heavier stuff...
The real win for the Tech-21 though, is that the thing weighs next to nothing. One of the best SRV tones I ever got came out of that thing at whisper volumes, yet it weighs something like 20 pounds.
I personally prefer the Trademark-30, but that one has a ton more gain than the 30, and is voiced more for heavier stuff...
Gear_Junky
New member
TM30 is also a 10" speaker, no? It's a single-channel "recording" amp (like TM10, but with more wattage).
TM60 was the "live" amp with an excellent footswitch (and even a courtesy AC outlet!). I tell you, if TM60 was about $300 new, I probably wouldn't even ever notice the SCXD (because I am usually repelled by anything digital).
It seems that "tubes in power section, solid-state preamp" was predicted to be a much better design right around when hybrid amps with a single preamp tube and solid-state power section started coming out. I was searching the other day, to read up on "sag" and rectifiers and some "tone" page was talking about that without any reference to SCXD.
SCXD is just the first CHEAP amp with such design. A couple of modders have said that it's built "better than it needs to be" in terms of PCB components, so quality seems to be solid.
Again, while I still have very high regard for Tech 21 stuff (SansAmps especially), I can't help but feel that it's OVERPRICED. Not just from my hobbyist's point of view. In absolute terms. Professionals can just as well afford real-deal tube stuff and higher-end direct boxes. There's no way any SansAmp DI can reasonably cost more than $79.99. But they obviously take advantage of their little niche and get away with it, so I can't blame them for being successful.
Me, I currently use Behringer "SansAmp" clones (adi21, bdi21 and gdi21). They're great.
So, in that light, I feel SCXD to be an excellent amp. It's not that heavy, either (it's a 10", remember). I had to special-order a footswitch for it (through GC), but it's a 2-button one, works great. For me, to be practical, an amp NEEDS 2 channels. I have everything I want in it, even though I could easily want more, like a reverb separate from other FX, an FX-loop (can be added by modding) and prefereably modeling on both channels, but I haven't "needed" all that yet.
I would strongly recommend anyone even reading this thread to at least TRY the SCXD. I was (and still am) a total enemy of anything digital (for guitar sound) and yet I love this amp. There's plenty of die-hard fender purists (i am not one of them) who are way snobby (I'm not), and even some of them have said that SCXD has true "blackface" fender tones. So don't take anybody's word for it, try it for yourself.
TM60 was the "live" amp with an excellent footswitch (and even a courtesy AC outlet!). I tell you, if TM60 was about $300 new, I probably wouldn't even ever notice the SCXD (because I am usually repelled by anything digital).
It seems that "tubes in power section, solid-state preamp" was predicted to be a much better design right around when hybrid amps with a single preamp tube and solid-state power section started coming out. I was searching the other day, to read up on "sag" and rectifiers and some "tone" page was talking about that without any reference to SCXD.
SCXD is just the first CHEAP amp with such design. A couple of modders have said that it's built "better than it needs to be" in terms of PCB components, so quality seems to be solid.
Again, while I still have very high regard for Tech 21 stuff (SansAmps especially), I can't help but feel that it's OVERPRICED. Not just from my hobbyist's point of view. In absolute terms. Professionals can just as well afford real-deal tube stuff and higher-end direct boxes. There's no way any SansAmp DI can reasonably cost more than $79.99. But they obviously take advantage of their little niche and get away with it, so I can't blame them for being successful.
Me, I currently use Behringer "SansAmp" clones (adi21, bdi21 and gdi21). They're great.
So, in that light, I feel SCXD to be an excellent amp. It's not that heavy, either (it's a 10", remember). I had to special-order a footswitch for it (through GC), but it's a 2-button one, works great. For me, to be practical, an amp NEEDS 2 channels. I have everything I want in it, even though I could easily want more, like a reverb separate from other FX, an FX-loop (can be added by modding) and prefereably modeling on both channels, but I haven't "needed" all that yet.
I would strongly recommend anyone even reading this thread to at least TRY the SCXD. I was (and still am) a total enemy of anything digital (for guitar sound) and yet I love this amp. There's plenty of die-hard fender purists (i am not one of them) who are way snobby (I'm not), and even some of them have said that SCXD has true "blackface" fender tones. So don't take anybody's word for it, try it for yourself.
DrewPeterson7
Sage of the Order
Yeah... I remember even years and years ago when I first bought my first proper "tube" amp (this'd be probably almost 10 years ago), once I started to get an appreciation for how it worked it sort of blew my mind that a lot of "hybrid" amps simply stuck a preamp tube in the pre and then doubled the price relative to the nearest comparable pure solid state. I mean, sure, a preamp tube is nice... but most of what people love about tube amps comes from the power amp (even with modern high-gain tube amps - my Rectoverb sounds like shit until the power amp gets a little juice into it).
It just seemed a no brainer to me to combine a solid state preamp with a tube poweramp, yet almost no one does it. :/ for the price, I might grab one of those Super Champs as a jamming/backup recording rig, $300-ish for a 6V6 poweramp mated with a decent sounding pre is pretty awesome.
It just seemed a no brainer to me to combine a solid state preamp with a tube poweramp, yet almost no one does it. :/ for the price, I might grab one of those Super Champs as a jamming/backup recording rig, $300-ish for a 6V6 poweramp mated with a decent sounding pre is pretty awesome.