ezietsman
Yep. Exactly. That is why my 18 watt has vvr too. Without it i won't be able to play it the way its meant to be played. All amps should have it. Even the non believers will use it because well, its awesome.
singemonkey
I think the problem there is that an amp that's attenuated say, 15% will sound closer to its best than an amp that's attenuated 65%. If there's a tone-sucking element, it affects more powerful amps more - because obviously you have to be heavier handed with the attenuation to hit the same volume.
I just frankly think it's perverse to run these amps - famous for their massive power amp overdrive - clean, and then use floorpedals to put the drive back in. You're running a solid state preamp (the pedal) for all your drive and merely using your classic 100watt Hi-Watt head to boost the volume and give it some warmth. An amp like that is capable of giving you a vastly superior, true tube overdrive - but only at face removing volumes or heavily attenuated.
Those amps rightly didn't become famous for those master-volume or floorpedal-driven sounds. That's why, having only heard 100watt amps played with master volume, pre-amp distortion, or with the inevitable overdrive pedal in front of the amp playing clean, I was blown away to hear a <20watt amp cranked. Suddenly, there was the sound I heard on records. Live at Leeds, Back in Black, The Bluesbreakers with Eric Clapton, The Song Remains the Same, Get Yer Ya-Yas Out, Fleetwood Mac at the Boston Tea Party.
They were not running clean amps with pedals. They used fuzz pedals to get zany sounds, and boosters to give them a lift, but not the way big amp-owners now use overdrive pedals to simulate that sound of the amp played beyond a volume their venues can handle. Nor were they cranking the pre-amps alone. Those amps sound totally different with the power amp going full tilt. And what they sound a helluva lot like is a 20watt amp going full tilt. But they sound nothing like a 100watt with a tubescreamer in front of it.
And the magic of being able to totally control your overdrive with a flick of the volume knob (and I have a heralded floorpedal which is advertised as one of the most "dynamic" and tube like out there, and it doesn't come close to giving me that ability to go from pure roar to chimey clean with quarter turn of the knob). Suddenly your overdrive pedal is your guitar volume knob - and your control is vastly enhanced. The drive pedals just stay at home. Because:
They were only there to sound like a cranked tube amp anyway
MikeM
Personally, I think the magic of big amps, is how they drive the speakers. Obviously more air is being moved, so they sound bigger, but the higher wattage also gets some speaker distortion. You won't get that if you're running 10 watts into 60 watts worth of speakers.
This how spiel of driving just the poweramp is just one part of the puzzle. Getting distortion from the phase inverter is a major part of getting that cranked overdrive sound - one of the (many) reasons a little single ended amp doesn't sound like a 20watter. Take any iconic amp, pop a PPIMV in, crank the volume and turn down the master volume, there will be preamp and PI distortion.
Point is, running an 18watter cranked into a single G12H or similar, will get you pretty dam near to a a big amp - just smaller.
ezietsman
yeah the PPIMV (For those who don't know, its a volume control between the phase inverter and the power tubes) will help you get some drive at lower volumes and just how much depends on the specific amp. Those classic awesome sounds were pretty much a mixture of some preamp drive, some phase-inverter drive and some power section drive. Point is, driving the preamp and PI is easy, driving a 100 watt power section is not.
Speaker distortion is also part yes, there's unfortunately no low volume solution to that one unless someone can make low efficiency low wattage speakers that sounds like the classics (G12H, Celestion Blue etc) we like.
Of course, there's another side to this story. Some people like a volume boost during solos. Easy right? Stomp on your clean boost pedal and thats it? On a driven amp this will not result in more volume but more drive. Somewhat tricky to get past if you're used to the pedal options. Solution on a driven amp? drive it more and roll your guitar down a notch for your normal drive sound, that will reduce the volume a bit and give less drive, roll it back to 10 to get slight volume and drive boost. Slightly different, not as easily to control but thats the only way. (No one said using a driven amp is easy ? )
MikeM
ezietsman wrote:
yeah the PPIMV (For those who don't know, its a volume control between the phase inverter and the power tubes) will help you get some drive at lower volumes and just how much depends on the specific amp. Those classic awesome sounds were pretty much a mixture of some preamp drive, some phase-inverter drive and some power section drive. Point is, driving the preamp and PI is easy, driving a 100 watt power section is not.
Speaker distortion is also part yes, there's unfortunately no low volume solution to that one unless someone can make low efficiency low wattage speakers that sounds like the classics (G12H, Celestion Blue etc) we like.
Yup, what I was really getting at is that there's not just one factor to getting those iconic tones that some of us aim to achieve.
25watts into 1x 100db speaker is pretty similar to 100watts into 4x100db speakers, just at a quarter of the volume.
On the topic of volume boosts, that's where it'd be awesome to kick in a second amp.. Heheh rock some wet/dry solos ?
Reinhard
I'm ashamed of owning big amps now.
They sound glorious,but I still feel bad.
ezietsman
Reinhard wrote:
I'm ashamed of owning big amps now.
They sound glorious,but I still feel bad.
No you don't ?
Garren
It does seem better to mic up a smaller amp for all the reasons mentioned...
BUT
I love drowning out my drummer just to peeve him off ?
I don't know much about valve amps but is there no difference in tone
between having say 2x 6l6s or 4x 6l6s?
It seems intuitive that by using the same valves and speakers
but by halving the amount you would get the same tone but softer?
PS. My favourite amp ever is a JTM 45, IMO sounds just as big as a 100w
plexi or what have you but a 3rd of the power. ?
MikeM
It's not as simple as just pulling 2 tubes etc.. That usually decreased the load on the PT so probably bumps the voltage up, decreases sag and and and... You can design an amp with 2x 6L6s to sound like a 4x 6L6 one. You could get pretty close with 6V6s even, some tweaks, particularly in terms of the filtering to get the more piano like bass of 6L6s.
But yep it's pretty close ?
vic
Last weekend we played a gig at Sundays River (the entrance to the Addo National Park in the Eastern Cape)....attended by a few 100 people. Now how do you present a small Roland cube for such an occasion ?......like this. ? Sounded veeery good indeed. Apologies for the pic quality
Stoner-Riff
http://www.flickr.com/search/?w=all&q=jucifer&m=text - check out this duo. Jucifer.
For some bands, a 30Watt amp will just not do.
Try and give High On Fire, SLEEP, Electric Wizard, 'Ol Scratch, Boris, Sunn O))), Earth, Shirenbuilder, a 30watt combo (per guitarist) and they will
not be able to get 'their sound' live, no matter what.
MIKA-the-better-one
YEH!!! Boris, High on Fire, Converge, SUNN o
nick
MikeM wrote:
Personally, I think the magic of big amps, is how they drive the speakers. Obviously more air is being moved, so they sound bigger, but the higher wattage also gets some speaker distortion. You won't get that if you're running 10 watts into 60 watts worth of speakers.
This I totally agree with and have experienced. 8)
AlanRatcliffe
nick wrote:
MikeM wrote:
Personally, I think the magic of big amps, is how they drive the speakers. Obviously more air is being moved, so they sound bigger, but the higher wattage also gets some speaker distortion. You won't get that if you're running 10 watts into 60 watts worth of speakers.
This I totally agree with and have experienced. 8)
Yeah, but miking up a small amp and putting it through an accurate PA means the PA speakers are doing the big air movement thing. Has the big advantage of you not going deaf by age 35 like the guys pictured above likely will (and as a muso, how much is your hearing worth to you?).
If you really must have speaker distortion what stops you from running 10W into 10W of speakers? For that matter, how much distortion do you figure eight Vintage 30s are adding to a 100W Marshall (let alone G12K100s)?
HairMetal84
Just about anything above 15w is enough for a normal show.
not every amp range has lower wattage versions. so you are basically deciding on tone and/or weight or
if you have sound restrictions. Who cares if you've got a Peavey 6505+ (for example) and never have the
volume past 3/4 or you have Fender twin that never goes past 3. If it sounds good that's all that matters.
Are you really going to feel bad that you aren't using the full volume of the amp (even though i hear this often)?
Do you feel like your amp is too much for you, because you don't have the eq dimed?? I doubt it.
Bigger amps sound better just about 99% of the time - if you have a combo vs the head version of the combo,
the head will sound better/bigger at cranked gig level. If you've got volume restrictions then you'd be better off
with a smaller amp or an attenuator or effects unit to cut some volume down.
ActionArnie
With an enthusiastic drummer 15W may be a bit light if you're needing crystal clean when your amp is also used for monitoring. Never experienced real quality monitors but the one's I have experienced don't convey the sound of my rig well so I prefer using only the amp for monitoring.
Stoner-Riff
Alan Ratcliffe wrote:
nick wrote:
MikeM wrote:
Personally, I think the magic of big amps, is how they drive the speakers. Obviously more air is being moved, so they sound bigger, but the higher wattage also gets some speaker distortion. You won't get that if you're running 10 watts into 60 watts worth of speakers.
This I totally agree with and have experienced. 8)
Yeah, but miking up a small amp and putting it through an accurate PA means the PA speakers are doing the big air movement thing. Has the big advantage of you not going deaf by age 35 like the guys pictured above likely will (and as a muso, how much is your hearing worth to you?).
If you really must have speaker distortion what stops you from running 10W into 10W of speakers? For that matter, how much distortion do you figure eight Vintage 30s are adding to a 100W Marshall (let alone G12K100s)?
Guitarists can be a funny bunch.
While i agree with you, that a 10W speaker can produce speaker break up in a 12W 5E3 Deluxe Tweed like amp . . . some people might not like the tone of the lil 10Watt driver, and might perfer the higher watt Vintage 30's.
We all know (or should at this point in our lives) that every single speaker sounds diff from one another, hence the fact that are so many on the market today.
MikeM
Stoner Riff wrote:
Alan Ratcliffe wrote:
Yeah, but miking up a small amp and putting it through an accurate PA means the PA speakers are doing the big air movement thing. Has the big advantage of you not going deaf by age 35 like the guys pictured above likely will (and as a muso, how much is your hearing worth to you?).
If you really must have speaker distortion what stops you from running 10W into 10W of speakers? For that matter, how much distortion do you figure eight Vintage 30s are adding to a 100W Marshall (let alone G12K100s)?
Guitarists can be a funny bunch.
While i agree with you, that a 10W speaker can produce speaker break up in a 12W 5E3 Deluxe Tweed like amp . . . some people might not like the tone of the lil 10Watt driver, and might perfer the higher watt Vintage 30's.
We all know (or should at this point in our lives) that every single speaker sounds diff from one another, hence the fact that are so many on the market today.
Come come Alan. You know not all speakers are equal. My point was that a 25watt amp into 1x speaker is going to sound very similar to a 100 watter into 4. And we all know speakers we like don't always respond linearly.
