Emulation? I tend to doubt that, but maybe. I could be wrong. It is a $100 amp. The ad hype says "Sound inspired by Legendary VOX AC30" and "It captures the main characteristics". Those are pretty vague terms. Says automatically matches impedance of speaker 4 to 16 ohm. Most any solid state amp does that.
It is cute, the reviews I saw all seemed to like it though. For $100, sounds like fun
It is cute, the reviews I saw all seemed to like it though. For $100, sounds like fun
Why try to emulate a tube amp when you can get the real thing for $150? Check out the Bugera T5, a small tube amp head with one 12AX7 and one EL84. 5 watts class A, classic tube sound.
$150 USD in the USA plus shipping cost for something that weighs 9 pounds.
In my country (Australia) these retail for $350 USD plus shipping.
In my country (Australia) these retail for $350 USD plus shipping.
That's an amazing disparity. These things are supposedly engineered in Germany, and built in China. It seems they are getting to Austrailia by a roundabout route.
The cheapest 5W tube amp heads in Australia start at $300 USD plus shipping.
Pricing fixing perhaps, I don't know.
Therein lies the problem with tube amps in general, solid state is rapidly making them a nice product.
This youtube video basically shows what's happening in the semi professional scene in Australia.
YouTube
Pricing fixing perhaps, I don't know.
Therein lies the problem with tube amps in general, solid state is rapidly making them a nice product.
This youtube video basically shows what's happening in the semi professional scene in Australia.
YouTube
No luck, tried searching for any of their legacy series, you would think someone would want to pop it open and take a picture.
To my ears, the solid-state amps in that video didn't sound awful, but none of them sounded wonderful, either. The sounds were more or less in the "meh" category. Not great, not awful, just mediocre.
Sound quality at live events is rarely better than "meh" at the best of times, so I suppose it wouldn't really have mattered much if the guitar amps themselves had sounded glorious; by the time they were filtered through the P.A. system, they'd sound "meh" too.
At the insanely high prices you mention for valve amps in Australia, and given their reduced reliability, I can see why many pros have been willing to settle for "meh" solid state sound on stage.
Interestingly enough, just recently I was thinking that, here in Canada, valve amps (and replacement valves) have priced themselves out of reach of the majority of young people. A Fender Deluxe Reverb is $1430 ( Fender '65 Deluxe Reverb - Long & McQuade Musical Instruments ), and a pair of replacement 6V6 valves about $70.
Meantime, you can buy a Boss Katana 50 for $300 ( Boss KATANA Guitar Amplifier 50watt 1-12'' Speaker - Long & McQuade Musical Instruments ), and it has no valves to replace.
A guitar amp isn't an aspirational item for most young people today anyway, but even for the ones who do want a guitar amp, an extra $1130 is likely to be an unsurmountable roadblock. You have to work a lot of hours at $11.25/hr (BC minimum wage) to save up the difference in price between the Katana and the Deluxe Reverb.
The writing has been on the wall for years - the traditional valve guitar amp is well on its way to becoming a museum piece. The only question is how long it will take to get there.
There are interesting hybrid amps like the Vox MV50 series, and those might keep the valve thing going for a while, at least in modified form.
Me, I still prefer the sound of a good valve guitar amp, and I can't afford the prices of current production ones, so I'll just keep building my own. But I don't perform in front of a paying audience, so I don't have the same reliability pressures on me that those pro musicians in Australia do. I quite understand why they are switching to less-good-sounding solid-state equipment for live performances.
-Gnobuddy
That's been going on for a very long time - several decades.
The PA in Australian venues is historically and universally appalling.
Seeing James Taylor live in the eighties was a complete shock to me - it actually sounded like, you know, some people playing instruments 10 yards away. Not BOOMtizzzmumblerumble.
<rant>
Unfortunately, little has changed. If anything, the introduction of radio microphones has only made it worse.
</rant>
Back to GB's point.
Before the eighties there were a range of local brands making decent amps.
Everyone went solid state in the eighties as it was the new thing. First 2n3055/2n2955 pairs and then Tilbrook's ETI 5000 MOSFET amplifier. They were cheap and easy.
Then everyone got killed by the cheap imports.
So what was left was a) old stock b) expensive new american imports and c) solid state imports. Plus the odd weirdo still making valve stuff by hand.
A decade or so later the old stuff was either dead or snapped up by the serious musicians. The decent solid state (Roland, G-K) stuff also never became cheap.
But even with low quality gear you're still stuck with the problem of replicating a hint of what was coming out of the amp in the PA. And the PA these days - well, lets just say that seeing a Behringer Eurolive is considered a positive experience.
Acts here (other than The Important Artists) are still doing stupid miles in the backs of vans; buses and planes. Hauling iron for the sake of it just doesn't make sense.
(And, no Virginia, there's no "house backline" here - you want to play? BYO!)
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