guitar modelling amps

Zaphan58

Zaphan58

Zaphan58

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I bought a guitar last year and so far have just been doodling around without an amp. But now starting to think of buying one. Am I wrong or are most little practice amps modelling amps now? After reading some reviews and watching on YouTube I'm leaning towards the Cube 20XL but I'm not sold on it.

Are you more or less stuck with the in-built tones and imitations? They have a lot of effects yes but aside from that it doesn't look like there is a whole lot you can adjust to play around and find a tone you like. Are there still reasonable priced practice amps out there where you can play around more and just add pedals for the effects you want? I think I would use very few of the effects built into the Cube as I like a more meat and potatoes style.
 
Fender Mustang range is the best in sub £500 sector. You can adjust any setting with full adjustment of the amp, channel, speaker, effects, etc and save it as one of the 99 user presets. Doesn't rely on connection to PC for license/tonebanks, can be used stand alone, can be fully adjusted in stand alone mode, celestion speakers, very attractive price.
 
Yamaha THR10, YouTube it, it does a lot of sounds, I know people who has mesa and boutique amps loves it for it's sound. It's not real tube but for what it intends to do it does great.

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I rather like the Vox Valvetronix ranges. Good modelling amps they do clean rather well. Don't buy into the guff about the valve though, its largely just a gimmick, but they are great amps nonetheless.
 
Zaphan58 said:
Thanks guys I'm going to do some research on all your suggestions.

Raymond - That looks like a piece of art!
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There are various versions of the Yamaha, some are more geared towards metal, i have the classic.

It is a very small amp, takes up no space, can run off batteries. It comes with software that you can tweak all the settings to your heart's content so in theory, you can tweak it to model any amp you want then save it to a preset.

One caveat is that there is a limit to the small speakers, even though they do sound big, courtesy of some clever engineering, they can only do so much so if you are looking for anything that is truly loud, this is not it, but if you want something to play at home, this is great.
 
Raymond Lin said:
There are various versions of the Yamaha, some are more geared towards metal, i have the classic.

It is a very small amp, takes up no space, can run off batteries. It comes with software that you can tweak all the settings to your heart's content so in theory, you can tweak it to model any amp you want then save it to a preset.

One caveat is that there is a limit to the small speakers, even though they do sound big, courtesy of some clever engineering, they can only do so much so if you are looking for anything that is truly loud, this is not it, but if you want something to play at home, this is great.
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Does look pretty snazzy.
 
I have owned most modelling amps over time and used or tried the rest.

Best of the multi amp and fx modellers is the fender mustang v2; but to get them set up well, you must have a computer to connect to if you get the I or II whereas the III has a small lcd screen which gives a lot more flexibilty to adjust the sounds. They do take some setting up though. I have a mustang v2 I for home use these days.

Best tone from a modelled amp is from the vox ac15vr or ac30vr which are fantastic if you want a solid state amp that really gets close to a valve tone at half the price and weight of the valve variants. Used with a multi fx unit or line6 pod and imo you get the best tone without having real valves. The vr series are much better than the vt series but are obviously limited in tone, albeit giving you one of the best sounds but this is my opinion of course.

My ac15vr is the only other amp bar my jcm I regret selling.

Edit - the Yamaha that Ray has are epic but expensive for what they are. The big advantage is the size and portability and unless you are gigging or prefer a more conventional amp make a great home practice amp.
 
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Cube 80xl for me. Personally, I don't think you can beat it, but this is surely a matter of taste and preference. Whack through a good Zoom 7.1 ut and you're laughing
 
That yamaha looks fantastic, I'm considering the smaller 5 for a little something to practice at home with.

Does it have enough presence to mic up for stage use? Or is there an output you can take to a DI? If it does have an output does it attenuate the speaker?
 
The yamaha has both a direct output and a USB.

On the right side on the amp you can see my guitar cable, above that is the out that you can connect to a bigger cabinet or recording. USB is at the back.

There is also another input for an MP3 player which you can play your guitar to.
 
Thanks, it really does seem to tick a lot of boxes.

I've been looking at some reviews on youtube and the quality and variety of sounds available really seem outstanding. That and the fact you can tweak the presets by software make it look like a great package. Plus it helps that it looks so awesome too. :cool:
 
I've only ever use a POD and a Blackstar. IMO the Blackstar sounds amazing, it's modelled on a Mesa I believe and it actually uses a tube.

Here's a recording I did with it:

https://soundcloud.com/projectmay%2Fupperkut-little-bit-extra-2nd-mix

We used the HT-DISTX. They have different models which do different things. I guess the only problem is is that each model is only really suitable for a particular sound (IE - the HT-DISTX is only really suitable for heavily distorted sounds).
 
Scrutinize said:
I have owned most modelling amps over time and used or tried the rest.

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Best tone from a modelled amp is from the vox ac15vr or ac30vr which are fantastic if you want a solid state amp that really gets close to a valve tone at half the price and weight of the valve variants.
....>8....
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you can actually get the older versions of the Vox modelling amps from ebay really cheap (probably same for rolands too). I know because I sold my Vox AD30VT for £60 on ebay last year (but they usually go for less). It was a great amp. Loads of models, effects and had a power squeezer. The clean channels were very good. The dirty channels were okayish, so I just used clean with a distortion pedal (Boss MT2) to play metal. Obviously its really heavy so itd only be good value if you can collect.

I think second hand is the way to go because they are usually hard wearing anyway, and, if you're anything like me, youll get bored of all the effects and just get a decent 1 watt tube amp for practice.
 
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I use a Blackstar ID:30 for my live sound on stage and I'm told by many that I have an excellent live sound.
I've used a Marshall TSL602 for many years but this amp sounds better and my lead guitarist is eventually going to go from his TSL602 over to a Blackstar ID:60.
It is also a great bedroom amp giving an excellent sound at low volume.
 
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