Members FalseRevRG Posted January 15, 2010 Members Share Posted January 15, 2010 Tried one of the H100 heads out today, seemed pretty cool other than some noise that I suspect to be related to old tubes (an annoying 60Hz hum and some crackling/popping sounds). A little looser than I tend to like, but seemed to take nicely to a boost. I wasn't able to try it loud, though, so I don't know how it'd sound at band levels. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members draelyc Posted January 15, 2010 Members Share Posted January 15, 2010 My main rig is the 50 watt Speed Twin through an Avatar 2x12 loaded w/ Greenbacks. I've got clispeses all over netmusicians.org, fwiw, & many of the tones in my Myspace tunes are the Speed Twin rig. Obviously, it's not an ultra booteek piece of art/furniture, but I prefer it to the Marshalls & definitely prefer it to the Mesas I've tried. Great amp, imo. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members FalseRevRG Posted January 15, 2010 Author Members Share Posted January 15, 2010 My main rig is the 50 watt Speed Twin through an Avatar 2x12 loaded w/ Greenbacks. I've got clispeses all over netmusicians.org, fwiw, & many of the tones in my Myspace tunes are the Speed Twin rig. Obviously, it's not an ultra booteek piece of art/furniture, but I prefer it to the Marshalls & definitely prefer it to the Mesas I've tried. Great amp, imo. I actually checked out your clips the other day...not much that's really in my style, though, which is part of why I decided to try one out myself. How's it sound closer to band levels? Specifically, does the bottom end start to feel more solid when you get it louder? That was my biggest dislike other than the noises it was making. I'd be curious to hear one loaded with 6550s, the manual says it can take them Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members bankboy Posted January 15, 2010 Members Share Posted January 15, 2010 I have the C50 combo and love it. Great clean, all kinds of gain, very flexible. Total sleeper of an amp. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members FalseRevRG Posted January 15, 2010 Author Members Share Posted January 15, 2010 If you look at my sig, you'll see that I'm used to a VHT and an Engl...I was playing the Speed Twin at low volumes, and I think it had old tubes, like I mentioned before, and it felt a little loose to me, even with a boost. How tight can this thing get? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members draelyc Posted January 15, 2010 Members Share Posted January 15, 2010 Turning the output damping knob (on the back panel) all the way off (counterclockwise, I think) will make a dramatic difference in the tightness of the low end. That said, I quite doubt this amp would ever be as tight as a VHT, though I've never played one personally, so I can't give a direct comparison. Imo, there's plenty o' gain in the amp by itself, but I'd say it's voiced more for rock & hi-gain/hard rock than anything like *modern* metal. However, a good boost will tighten the bottom really well -- again, imo. Ymmv, but I find the input to be very sensitive to playing dynamics, volume knob changes, & boost pedals. Fwiw. C Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members FalseRevRG Posted January 15, 2010 Author Members Share Posted January 15, 2010 Turning the output damping knob (on the back panel) all the way off (counterclockwise, I think) will make a dramatic difference in the tightness of the low end. That said, I quite doubt this amp would ever be as tight as a VHT, though I've never played one personally, so I can't give a direct comparison.Imo, there's plenty o' gain in the amp by itself, but I'd say it's voiced more for rock & hi-gain/hard rock than anything like *modern* metal. However, a good boost will tighten the bottom really well -- again, imo. Ymmv, but I find the input to be very sensitive to playing dynamics, volume knob changes, & boost pedals. Fwiw. C Yeah, I played around a bit with the damping knob and discovered exactly what you're talking about. It's certainly capable of a lot of gain, more than I normally use, and I was pretty happy with the amount of gain I had with Channel 2 set to "M", with the gain knob set to about 11:00 and a TS9 in front as a clean boost. I'm not into a super "modern" metal sound, so to speak...or at least, I don't think of it as being the stereotypical modern metal sound (see the Sig:X thread where the OP is iffy on the Sig:X for metal, while I love its tone, and the very-similar Deliverance, for metal) That said, not having heard this thing at decent volumes, I'm not entirely sure what it's capable of. I didn't find it to be as sensitive to dynamics as my Deliverance, but I'm not sure how much of that was the amp and how much was the probably-old tubes. How much is yours able to clean up by turning down the volume knob on the guitar? My Deliverance is able to get almost pristine cleans with the guitar's volume turned down, but I couldn't seem to get Channel 2 that clean on the Speed Twin. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members draelyc Posted January 15, 2010 Members Share Posted January 15, 2010 Yeah, I played around a bit with the damping knob and discovered exactly what you're talking about. It's certainly capable of a lot of gain, more than I normally use, and I was pretty happy with the amount of gain I had with Channel 2 set to "M", with the gain knob set to about 11:00 and a TS9 in front as a clean boost. I'm not into a super "modern" metal sound, so to speak...or at least, I don't think of it as being the stereotypical modern metal sound (see the Sig:X thread where the OP is iffy on the Sig:X for metal, while I love its tone, and the very-similar Deliverance, for metal) That said, not having heard this thing at decent volumes, I'm not entirely sure what it's capable of. Dig. Honestly, I haven't really had the chance to try mine out in a high volume, rawk-band setting. Since I've had the amp, I've played a few blues/blues-rock & traditional type gigs & jammed with friends. I'd like to see what she could do really opened up, tbh. Also, I have yet to try anything but the EL34s that were in it when I got it. I'm kinda going for that hot-rodded Marshall tone, so I've always figured just to keep the power tubes as they are. Might be interesting to hear what 6L6s would do... After much experimenting, I've ended up leaving the gain knob c. 10 o'clock, actually. And I use the "preamp style" function to approximate a three channel setup. The normal od channel (without the amp's extra gain stage engaged) seems to my ear to take boosts very, very well, especially in terms of tightening up the bottom end. For example, here is an old clip of my Speed Twin boosted with the Banzai Fireball II od (it's a dual pedal, and the second riff engages the pedal's second channel, as well). Otoh, the amp's built in preamp boost is not, I don't think, gonna get a whole lot tighter from boosting, because adding that extra gain stage seems to add a full range of frequencies, lows included. In fact, for hard rock I actually prefer that "fuller" high gain sound, but for metal (even non-modern, "old school" metal) I don't think it's tight/edgy enough. Ymmv, of course. I didn't find it to be as sensitive to dynamics as my Deliverance, but I'm not sure how much of that was the amp and how much was the probably-old tubes. How much is yours able to clean up by turning down the volume knob on the guitar? My Deliverance is able to get almost pristine cleans with the guitar's volume turned down, but I couldn't seem to get Channel 2 that clean on the Speed Twin. Well, I can't compare to a whole lot of really nice, high end amps ~ I just don't have the experience to draw on! But I can say that the Speed Twin isn't quite as sensitive to guitar changes as, say, the Trace Elliot Bonneville single channel amp (which I had first & which led me to look for a Speed Twin). And I don't think the od channel with the built-in boost engaged is going to clean up to near-pristine levels. But on the regular, unboosted od channel, I get a pretty good dynamic range with the amp's gain on about 10 o'clock. Here is a very old clip I did to test out the amp's dynamics. As you can hear from the lame voiceovers, these were my previous settings, with the amp's gain between 1-2 o'clock. Also, this was before I had my guitar's volume pot replace & the volume circuit redone to give me better clean-up potential. I'll try this weekend to do a new clip with the current settings & my improved guitar circuitry, since I'm getting much better clean-up results nowadays. Chris Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members draelyc Posted January 15, 2010 Members Share Posted January 15, 2010 Btw, speaking of the old tubes in the one you tried, I have found this amp to be particularly sensitive to preamp tube choices. I've gone through much trial and error ~ especially on V3, the tube for the preamp's built in gain boost, trying to tame that low end looseness. I've got NOS RFTs in V1 & V2, which helped immensely with the dynamic response, and I'm running a Tung-Sol reissue in V3, fwiw. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members bankboy Posted January 15, 2010 Members Share Posted January 15, 2010 I gig my ST with the Clean volume around 10:00, Channel 2 volume to unity with the clean (around 2-3:00) and the Master at Noon or slightly above. Effects Loop levels are both set to around 2:00 for unity. Output damping I like at Noon. Gain on C2 is around 10:00 and I use the footswitchable boost as a 3rd channel. I have a modded Boss GE-7 in the loop to take away some of the low end (amp has a ton). I am running Mullard reissue EL34's and a bunch of different pre tubes I can't remember now. Draelyc helped me out immensely when I got the amp....especially preamp tube assignments. The amp loves pedals and I run mine with a couple OD's at my disposal for some boost or flavor. I use a closed back extension cab housing a V30; the speaker I use in the combo is a Celestion Silver Series V60 which I like. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Cougar Hunter Posted January 15, 2010 Members Share Posted January 15, 2010 I REALLY want to try one. TE guitar stuff has always been top notch. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members reddt1 Posted January 15, 2010 Members Share Posted January 15, 2010 +1 for the Speed Twin not being all that tight. Even boosted, I would have a hard time getting a proper metal tone out of mine. But for rock, it's awesome. I am running Mullard EL34's and Tung Sol/chinese reissue 12AX7s. Mine currently has an issue with the clean channel, however. I cannot get enough volume out of it. Anyone else have this problem? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Zozobra Posted January 15, 2010 Members Share Posted January 15, 2010 I have an H100 and I can get a pretty damn brutal metal tone out of it although I use it for doom/sludge. Its not going to be super tight as its a 90's design after all but with the dampening set right and the bass cut (its got a lot of low end) it should get you there. I tend to run mine on the medium gain setting with the gain at 2 or 3 then give it a fair bit of gain from a pedal too. On this setting with the gain wound up it will get pretty meaty and a decent boost will get you in metal territory. I find this amp works better with 6L6GCs than EL34s. Also it is very sensitive to the preamp tubes so you have to spend a bit of time experimenting with what works for you. Even tubes of the same brand from the same order will sound quite different if you swap the positions so if you try one and it sounds weak its probably the pre. After lots of messing about with different amps I always come back to my speed twin. Its my go to. In fact I'm gonna sell my superbass and this spanks it for what I want to do and the superbass is no slouch for sludge. reddt1: I found it hard to get a real clean if you want the OD channel cooking. 6L6s improve this a lot over EL34s and I guess using a good clean PI tube will help a lot as the PI definitely distorts at high master settings. I keep meaning to try a sovtek 12ax7LPS in mine to see how that stacks up. I'm using a JJ at the minute and that might not be the best choice. As I said earlier though this amp is very fussy about the preamp tubes so it might be worth having a bit of a switcheroo. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members reddt1 Posted January 15, 2010 Members Share Posted January 15, 2010 Good point. I should try 6L6s ... what brand of 6L6s are you running? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Zozobra Posted January 15, 2010 Members Share Posted January 15, 2010 I was running EHs which I found to be better than a lot of the EL34s I tried (sovteks, mullard xf2s, sino/ruby) and they probably arent the best 6L6 on the market, I got them as a cheap experiment and was happy enough though. I'd certainly try an LPS in the PI 1st though as the clean preamp is capable of being pretty clean, it just goes wrong at volume. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members bankboy Posted January 15, 2010 Members Share Posted January 15, 2010 I really had no interest in running 6L6's in mine.....I wanted a bargain Marshall and I got one. Plus, I have other 6L6 based amps so that ground is covered. I will say though....in my 6L6 amps, I really like the EH's and Sovtek WXT+. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members draelyc Posted January 15, 2010 Members Share Posted January 15, 2010 As for the clean channel, for a long time I ran that channel as a sort of "blues" channel, keeping the gain up pretty high & going for a gravelly, dirty-clean sound which I could clean up further by turning down my guitar's volume. More recently, I've been keeping the clean channel gain around 10 o'clock, same as the od channel. When the clean gain dialed back, I find I have to use the pull-bright feature on the clean treble knob to get some sparkle into the sound. I also ended up putting a Sovtek WA in V4 (the last gain stage in the clean channel circuit) ~ normally, I'm not a fan of those tubes, but for adding some high end sparkle to the clean channel in this particular amp, it's worked pretty well, imo. It's not, as some of the HC reviews claim, a "Fender clean" by any stretch, imo. It's a different sort of clean. But now that I've gotten used to it, I quite like it. Most of the time, though, I end up staying on the od channel & going rolling back the guitar's volume. I don't often need a CLEAN clean sound... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members reddt1 Posted January 15, 2010 Members Share Posted January 15, 2010 Last night I was experimenting and found an amazing tone by hitting the clean channel with an OD808 and then rolling down my guitar volume. Sounded so creamy for clean-ish solos with a DML in the loop. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Cougar Hunter Posted January 15, 2010 Members Share Posted January 15, 2010 Last night I was experimenting and found an amazing tone by hitting the clean channel with an OD808 and then rolling down my guitar volume. Sounded so creamy for clean-ish solos with a DML in the loop. did you buy psychedelices yet?? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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