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  • November 3, 2009 at 7:39 pm #79253
    TenSecondTed
    Member

    I play through a solid state Marshall, using just the clean channel and pedals to create whatever tones I need. I thought I was pretty happy with my sound until a friend of mine gave me his Vox Valvetronix. Straight away, it sounded great even before I had plugged in any pedals! It models 11 different amp sounds, and my od/distortion pedals all sound completely different through each of the 11 ‘channels’.
    Now I just don’t know where to start. I had a nice easy system, which I ‘thought’ sounded great. Now, everything in insanely complicated.

    Should I chuck half of my pedals, and keep the Vox?
    Go back to the Solid State Marshall?
    Or save up for a nice, single channel tube amp and continue to use my od/dist pedals to model my sound?

    Help!

    November 3, 2009 at 7:47 pm #103261
    chev
    Participant

    a nice decent clean channel tube amp would be better than any modeling stuff if you want the warm of tubes.

    and you would get all the sound you like from your pedals.

    the modeling is good for headphone or computer practice imo. and it’s easy to carry…that’s it.

    I use that at home. but I prefer playing loud on my Sunn amps way better!

    November 3, 2009 at 8:44 pm #103268
    electro-melx
    Moderator

    There’s advantages and disadvantages with every type of amp, it really boils down to what’s best for you at any point in time.

    I’ve told myself that I won’t buy another all-tube amp until I can afford an excellent one. On cheaper tube amps there are just too many corners cut with regard to parts quality (output transformers etc) and general build quality in my experience.

    Depending on your budget (and needs) you could be better off with a good SS/modeling amp than a cheap tube amp. Like most things in life it comes down to money …… if you can afford an excellent qualuity tube amp then you’ll never look back.

    It would be nice to take the ‘tone is everything’ attitude (thank you I’ll have that Orange 40th Anniversary Custom Shop head) but for most of us price, reliability, portability and versatility all play a part in what we play through.

    ….all I’d say is don’t rush into buying an amp, play as many different ones as you can before you decide.

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