Abandoning my dream amp. Am I crazy?

[jabps]

Get one and see; that's the only way to know. Sure you may take a hit on resale, but that comes with territory of these amps, and at least you'll know for yourself.

IMO

I really thought I wanted a Splawn Quickrod; but before I ordered one I looked around at other options. In the end, I ended up with a Bogner Helios Eclipse and couldn't be happier with the tones and the feel.

You never know until you try; and trying always has a price when it comes to gear.

Yep I scratched that itch back in the 90's. I bought the SLO fully intending to leave my OG 5150 behind. The SLO ended up leaving.

That said you'll never know until you give it a try so in that regard it was very much worth it. Granted I'm that way with things, I gotta try myself, too many variables with video's out there to really know not to mention, I want to feel how it reacts to my playing.

 

[Racerxrated]

Am I crazy?

I’ve wanted an SLO since forever, and now that I’m in a position to get one, I find myself shrugging my shoulders at it, kind of unsure. I put it on this metaphorical pedestal and now that I’m listening to it’s tones, I’m mostly unimpressed. Yes, the OD channel is cool. But I think I can get those tones on a Peavey 5150 if I set the mids high enough. And with the price difference between the two, maybe I can get something else? Maybe a VH2 or Dmoll?Maybe a Headfirst? Maybe a Ceriatone? Maybe another Splawn? I dunno???

Part of me thinks I’m crazy for abandoning the amp I’ve always wanted just as it becomes affordable to me, yet part of me really does think a 5150 will get me in the ballpark with a lot of $$$ leftover.

Am I crazy for this logic?

The issue you have is directly related to the CLIPZZZ effect. Listening to clips thinking its EXACT to the experience of having the amp in the room. If I only relied on da CLIPZZZ I'd have not tried at least 10 amps that I'm glad I did own.

Clips are cool, thanks to all of you that go through the process of recording. Kudos.

But deciding on an amp solely based on clips is a fools errand. Talking to guys who own these amps, and also getting opinions of guys who had one but didn't like it are more important IME when I decide to pull/not pull the trigger.

A 5150 does NOT do the same thing in the room that as SLO does. The 5150 is tighter, but the SLO is WAY more pleasing/3D/Organic/rich in tone. And, the SLO blooms like a Wizard or Superlead. Just gets better and better the more you turn up.
If I were you, I'd grab one without hesitation. And, I'd grab an OG first to see how you like it. Then, if the pre BAD one doesn't do it sell it and try the BAD version.
But that's me.

 

[rsm]

Yep I scratched that itch back in the 90's. I bought the SLO fully intending to leave my OG 5150 behind. The SLO ended up leaving.

That said you'll never know until you give it a try so in that regard it was very much worth it. Granted I'm that way with things, I gotta try myself, too many variables with video's out there to really know not to mention, I want to feel how it reacts to my playing.

Yes. While I do my research before buying, I have to use the gear myself.

So far, so good; I've kept more gear than returns / resales over the years, unless I move on to different sounds.

 

[Racerxrated]

I thought you might find this interesting...

I laughed at this and another 'comparo' long ago. You can 'record' many amps and get them to sound similar.

Unless the amp is infinitely compressed, there most definitely is. That's just a fact of how that type of circuit works.

I gigged with a 2004 SLO for a couple years. Never ever had a problem with the vol between channels live.

 

[Rackman]

I gigged with a 2004 SLO for a couple years. Never ever had a problem with the vol between channels live.

Volume between channels is fine. They both have a master and you can set them however you want.

The claim was that you could roll off the crunch mode to a clean by turning down the guitar volume and not lose volume. That's just not true.

 

[TooMuchGear]

Am I crazy?

I’ve wanted an SLO since forever, and now that I’m in a position to get one, I find myself shrugging my shoulders at it, kind of unsure. I put it on this metaphorical pedestal and now that I’m listening to it’s tones, I’m mostly unimpressed. Yes, the OD channel is cool. But I think I can get those tones on a Peavey 5150 if I set the mids high enough. And with the price difference between the two, maybe I can get something else? Maybe a VH2 or Dmoll?Maybe a Headfirst? Maybe a Ceriatone? Maybe another Splawn? I dunno???

Part of me thinks I’m crazy for abandoning the amp I’ve always wanted just as it becomes affordable to me, yet part of me really does think a 5150 will get me in the ballpark with a lot of $$$ leftover.

Am I crazy for this logic?

Myasnikov Custom x88 preamp could scratch your itch.

 

[rstites]

Now that 6dB loss may be EXACTLY what you personally want an amp to do. It is not what I want an amp to do - I want a much less distorted clean sound without volume loss. And that requires a different circuit topology than the SLO.

6 dB is massively different than the 10-15 dB you stated last night. If you had started with that, we could have moved to something more productive immediately. 6 dB is noticeable but still plenty to hear in the mix. The others would disappear in the mix.

Setting aside the fact everyone is probably backing down 3 dB or so for the cleaner/quieter parts, once you roll those harmonics out from the heavier distortion, the actual difference in perceived volume on stage and in the mix will be far less. Distortion smears the power across the frequency spectrum, but you only hear those specific frequencies that have more volume than the others on stage.

So yes, in isolation you'll noticed that difference in volume. On a live stage, or in the mix out front it's very unlikely to be perceived as less volume, which was my initial position from years of performing in that situation. It's not about preference, but rather how us silly humans perceive the audio world around us and how that interacts with the physics of live sound.

This is why you have to turn distorted guitar up so high compared to clean guitar volume once you start playing live with other instruments. Much of it gets lost under the toms and bass. (See also, bass frequencies of guitar that get lost in the mix.)

 

[Rackman]

6 dB is massively different than the 10-15 dB you stated last night. If you had started with that, we could have moved to something more productive immediately. 6 dB is noticeable but still plenty to hear in the mix.

The 6dB still didn't get it to clean. I was as far down as I could get on the gutiar volume pot, but substantial additional attenuation would be required to get it to actually clean up.

I didn't just make the 10-15dB up of course - all this information is readily available in the RCA 12AX7-A data sheet if you know how to read it.

And even if your goal is only pseudo-clean, 6dB is an incredible difference - in a mix, live, wherever.

The fact is you were simply wrong, and continue to be wrong. This is a matter of electrical engineering, not opinion.

 

[rstites]

The fact is you were simply wrong, and continue to be wrong. This is a matter of electrical engineering, not opinion.

You do realize I'm an electrical engineering professor who teaches audio electronics and physics of sound for audio engineers among my other duties. Nothing I've stated is incorrect. (I did read back through it before posting, as I've certainly never claimed to be perfect.) Nothing I've stated appears to be anything remotely controversial, though I'm happy to provide clarity to anything that wasn't clear.

 

[Rackman]

You do realize I'm an electrical engineering professor who teaches audio electronics and physics of sound for audio engineers among my other duties. Nothing I've stated is incorrect. (I did read back through it before posting, as I've certainly never claimed to be perfect.) Nothing I've stated appears to be anything remotely controversial, though I'm happy to provide clarity to anything that wasn't clear.

If you're an EE professor then you know I'm right. It's going to take quite a bit more attenuation to get from "stones" to reasonably linear (off the top of my head I'd guess 6dB), and since it's already out of clipping the vast majority of that is going to show up both in LUFS and peak. That would put it at -12dB LUFS, right in the middle of the stated range.

Why would you be arguing this if you knew upfront I was right? This isn't difficult analysis - you can really just look at what the clean/crunch switch does and from there it's only the non-linearity in the 2nd stage you need to think about.

 

[harddriver]

WizardsouthJP who a member here might be able to comment more on his thoughts about the Mezzabarba Steckel model....

 

[TheGreatGreen]

Am I crazy?

I’ve wanted an SLO since forever, and now that I’m in a position to get one, I find myself shrugging my shoulders at it, kind of unsure. I put it on this metaphorical pedestal and now that I’m listening to it’s tones, I’m mostly unimpressed. Yes, the OD channel is cool. But I think I can get those tones on a Peavey 5150 if I set the mids high enough. And with the price difference between the two, maybe I can get something else? Maybe a VH2 or Dmoll?Maybe a Headfirst? Maybe a Ceriatone? Maybe another Splawn? I dunno???

Part of me thinks I’m crazy for abandoning the amp I’ve always wanted just as it becomes affordable to me, yet part of me really does think a 5150 will get me in the ballpark with a lot of $$$ leftover.

Am I crazy for this logic?

Your instincts are correct. Turns out there are many better amps than the SLO for modern high gain tones. You're not crazy.

For a long time, especially before you could find instant clips of everything online, the Soldano SLO was kind of revered as the most awesome high gain amp ever made and understandably a bunch of people kind of held them up as the ultimate boutique amp because of its reputation.

But it's really not, especially these days. Personally I think it's too soft and round, too mid heavy. To me, an OG 5150 just sounds better. Many high gain amps sound better imo.

 

[alund]

Myasnikov Custom x88 preamp could scratch your itch.

Love mine.

 

[Rackman]

Love mine.

I've got one too. The MIDI implementation isn't rock solid but it may sound better than the X88ir. I don't think it's as nice as the synergy SLO II though.

I've got an XTC pre of theirs too.

 

[alund]

I've got one too. The MIDI implementation isn't rock solid but it may sound better than the X88ir. I don't think it's as nice as the synergy SLO II though.

I've got an XTC pre of theirs too.

Your midi not working? I contacted Oleg and he gave me the 411 on how to

 

[Rackman]

Your midi not working? I contacted Oleg and he gave me the 411 on how to

It's kinda working. One unit is fine. Multiple units chained are iffy and the Myaskinov seems to be the culprit. It's sort of random on power on - either it works that cycle or it doesn't. Both units do it.

 

[inyarak74]

Damn!