Overall Rating: I have been playing for 4 years, my main amp is a Mesa Boogie Trem-O-Verb. I ended up selling this amp to my friend because I was going to eBay it to some sucker but he said he needed a tube amp. I told him it was a bad sounding amp b...
Overall Rating: I have been playing for 4 years, my main amp is a Mesa Boogie Trem-O-Verb. I ended up selling this amp to my friend because I was going to eBay it to some sucker but he said he needed a tube amp. I told him it was a bad sounding amp but he still wanted it. If I bought this amp again I would really only pay around the 300 dollar range as thats all this amp is worth.
Features: I believe the amp was made around 1986. 2 footswitchable channels, reverb, Solid State Rectifier, 2 6V6 3 12AX7 and 1 12AT7 tubes. Lead and Bright switches via push-pull pot.
An effects loop would be nice but who really uses those? It has more than enough power to gig with.
Sound Quality: I switched out the GE tubes with JJ's, didn't hear a diffence. MayWhen I first bought this I was using the sellers 70's SG. He had the controls dimed so it sounded very nice in comparison when I eq'ed it properly. be a little loss in the high end, thats about it.
I use humbucker equipped guitars. I find that this amp sounds better with single coil guitars.
It was alittle noisy, I don't really like the sound of it. The EQ isn't very responsive either and the stock speaker that came with it was very ratty sounding so I ran it through a Mesa Recto 4x12, it sounded very nice and crunchy through that but I feel it didn't have enough power to push the cab all that much. It hung with a drummer quite well.
With the lead channel on you get a very nasty Mesa type over saturated gain thats very harsh. I tried the trick that Mike suggested on 02/17/2003 thats on this page. I found that it helped alot but was still alittle too harsh and gainy but still a great improvement. If you like Metallicas tone and are 14 years old you would dig the lead channel.
There is not too much variety in this amp, a decent clean channel and a lead channel that sounds like a dying cat.
3 with the stock speaker, a 5 or 6 with a new speaker. I hear the Eminence Cannibas Rex is a good replacement for not alot of scratch.
Reliability/Durability: As mentioned in previous reviews the amp does have point to point wiring. I think mine might have needed new capacitors. The soldering joint to the speaker broke off while I was playing it and it got this nice self osicillation sound that really hurt my ears. After I repaired it the amp was fine. Nice transformers, solid state rectifier.
Customer Support: No warranty so Fender probably doesn't give a rats ass.
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