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Dual Recto Help: the orange channel pwns & my red channel sux!?!


mda96bjh

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Never really had a goood go of tuning my recto as it has not been used very often (my triamp MKII has pride of place :D)

 

Anyway today i had given up trying to get some scooped modern tones on the red when i thought i would try the orange channel for some more general tones....anyway i cranked the gain & there was what i was expecting from a recto all along!!

 

On switching between red & orange the difference is huge. Even on similar settings the red channel lacks the smooth bottom end & power of the orange channel......and the red sounds like a tinny/bright POS by comparison.

 

SO....

 

Is there something wrong with my recto or is the red channel just useless? I have recently re-tubed the power & the pre-amp valves so the tubes should be OK (unless it is the rectifier tubes)

 

Although i have noted my outer power tubes glow blue at the base?

 

Any comments or advice please

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red = modern

orange = vintage

 

so, what are you asking? if your two differently voiced preamp channels are differently voiced? modern should have more volume and low end.

 

You can clone red to vintage or orange to modern if you want to play around with it.

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You must be using a 2 channel. They are all like that. I run mine on orange as well. So does TU BE. Welcome to the greatest secret the recto ever held.

 

 

It's not an older 2 channel rec.....it is one of the newer 3 channel ones

 

 

I just cant believe that the red channel should sound so crap & so much less brootal than the orange!! Especially when the manual goes on about how i should never even consider maxing the gain on the red!

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red = modern

orange = vintage


so, what are you asking? if your two differently voiced preamp channels are differently voiced? modern should have more volume and low end.


You can clone red to vintage or orange to modern if you want to play around with it.

 

 

 

 

Thats it really i expected red to have the more volume & low end.....and it doesnt......

 

So i'm wondering if something is wrong with the red channel

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Never really had a goood go of tuning my recto as it has not been used very often (my triamp MKII has pride of place
:D
)


Anyway today i had given up trying to get some scooped modern tones on the red when i thought i would try the orange channel for some more general tones....anyway i cranked the gain & there was what i was expecting from a recto all along!!


On switching between red & orange the difference is huge. Even on similar settings the red channel lacks the smooth bottom end & power of the orange channel......and the red sounds like a tinny/bright POS by comparison.


SO....


Is there something wrong with my recto or is the red channel just useless? I have recently re-tubed the power & the pre-amp valves so the tubes should be OK (unless it is the rectifier tubes)


Although i have noted my outer power tubes glow blue at the base?


Any comments or advice please

 

I tend to play more on the modern cloned to vintage orange myself these days, but try a couple 5AR4 rectifiers, and set the amp to tube rec, bold, modern red. Lower the gain to about 12:30-1:00, crank the mids up, drop the treble to noon or below, bass at noon, just enough presence to add bite, crank the master to 2:00, and smack that with a good boost. If you think that sounds tinny, or lacks low end balls, well the problems either with your hearing, what you're feeding the amp, or possibly the speakers/cab.

 

What kind of guitar/pickups are you using?

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I tend to play more on the orange myself these days, but try a couple 5AR4 rectifiers, and set the amp to tube rec, bold, modern red. Lower the gain to about 12:30-1:00, crank the mids up, drop the treble to noon or below, bass at noon, just enough presence to add bite, crank the master to 2:00, and smack that with a good boost. If you think that sounds tinny, or lacks low end balls, well the problems either with your hearing, what you're feeding the amp, or possibly the speakers/cab.


What kind of guitar/pickups are you using?

 

 

For playing around this afternoon i was using my voltmodded EMG 81's

 

 

 

I suppose i've not made my thread really clear as i'm not really asking how to dial in a good sound...

 

 

 

I just wanna know if the red channel should really sound tinny/trebly in comparison to the orange channel when all the settings/EQ is pretty much the same??

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It's not an older 2 channel rec.....it is one of the newer 3 channel ones



I just cant believe that the red channel should sound so crap & so much less brootal than the orange!! Especially when the manual goes on about how i should never even consider maxing the gain on the red!

 

In that case, just call Mesa and have them send you a 2nd channel presence pot. Replace the presence pot on the 3rd channel with the one that has the 2nd channel's taper and you effectively have 2 channel 2's. :lol:

 

Read the manual about the presence pots, it's mentioned in there I believe...

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If I'm not mistaken, isn't channel 3 orange and channel 4 red on the Road King?

 

If so, you must have something wrong, because channel 4 CRUSHES on the RK set to modern!

 

I probably use channel 3 vintage boosted most of the time, though, with the two EL34 power section, as the band I'm in doesn't do much brutz, but when I play it at home, channel 4 modern with either 4 6L6es or 2x6L + 2xEL config nails it, with or without a boost.

 

No blue glow at the base of my output tubes, either... :cop:

 

May wanna check them thar tubes, mang!

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It sounds harder, more plasticy, etc... especially at lower volumes. Once you crank up the power section some and get a little compression going on it smooths out a good bit. The orange channel is definitely warmer and smoother though. Red is louder on the other hand, and has more low end punch on tap.

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Thats it really i expected red to have the more volume & low end.....and it doesnt......


So I'm wondering if something is wrong with the red channel

 

 

I have a Single Rec and the red (modern) is much louder with more bottom end and an overall bigger sound. The orange (vintage) is smoother but not as crisp on the attack or big sounding. The red does have more noise/fizz, but I prefer it overall. I'm not sure what's up with your amp but it should definietly be louder when switching to red.

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I have a Single Rec and the red (modern) is much louder with more bottom end and an overall bigger sound. The orange (vintage) is smoother but not as crisp on the attack or big sounding. The red does have more noise/fizz, but I prefer it overall. I'm not sure what's up with your amp but it should definietly be louder when switching to red.

 

 

 

I thought as much but i have already changed the pre-amp & poweramp valves so I've no idea what to do now to fix this!!

 

I don't wanna send it out to repair as i am very short on cash at the moment :(

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I have a Single Rec and the red (modern) is much louder with more bottom end and an overall bigger sound. The orange (vintage) is smoother but not as crisp on the attack or big sounding. The red does have more noise/fizz, but I prefer it overall. I'm not sure what's up with your amp but it should definietly be louder when switching to red.

 

you're confusing things

orange is a channel

vintage is a mode

they work in different ways

:thu:

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I know they're different, I just figured the vintage mode was meant to sound like the orange channel.
:confused:

 

I thought that too when I had the single recto

but I compared to a Dual and they work very differently

 

what shiny surface said about the presence pot is true

actually it's not even a true presence pot, cause a presence should be in the power amp

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I thought that too when I had the single recto

but I compared to a Dual and they work very differently


what shiny surface said about the presence pot is true

actually it's not even a true presence pot, cause a presence should be in the power amp

 

 

Yeah, I just read some of the dual/triple manual on the Mesa site and see what you're saying. It looks like the Dual/Triple offers more to shape the sound of modern mode than the Single. It does sound like something is funky with his amp, however.

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Yeah, I just read some of the dual/triple manual on the Mesa site and see what you're saying. It looks like the Dual/Triple offers more to shape the sound of modern mode than the Single. It does sound like something is funky with his amp, however.

 

 

not that much

actually both amps sounded surpringly exactly the same on diode/bold setting, and very close even with the tube rectification activated

the main difference is the 100w extra oomph

but the vintage mode works on the power amp response, while the orange channel is just a red channel with a different preamp presence response

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