Sleeper Amps On The Cheap!

line 6 vetta and hd147 especially. genz benz el diablo is another. pre's..pv rockmaster..especially fja modded ones, ada mp1, carvin quad x. art dst rulesbraker...the old johnson milleniums....lot of shit when you think about it.
 
My bassman broke at a jam one time. The drummer had an ugly ass 2x12 Crate combo and a Behringer rack effects unit. Slayed. We had a great jam. I thought I was hot shit with my finely tuned 50 watter and old 4x12. Somebody could have come in and whooped my ass with that thing.
 
Buddy just paid $350 for an Orange OR15; we stacked it up against some of our heavy hitters and it did really well. He’s in the lookout for one for me.

I bought a Herbert here for less than guys are asking for 5150s from one of the mods about a year ago. Defuckinstructive for cheeeeep. Favorite amp by far and I’ve paid more for lesser amps.

Also me and my boy have a Randall RH100 at his place, we paid $80 shipped for it a few years ago from GC. That thing is a fuckin solid state MONSTER. There’s not a person here that would play that and not have a fuckin blast, it’s a super fun amp for less than I’ve paid for dinner.
 
dawnofdreamx97 said:
i snagged an old school carvin xv112 combo with el34's off craigslist for $100 bucks recently. It was a crazy story, original owner played it less than 8 hours and then quit playing guitar and put it back in the original box and put it in storage until a few months ago when I grabbed it. It was like a time capsule. had the box, invoice, original tubes still in it. Thing sounds fricken great , it's uglier than shit with the grey carpet but otherwise It's a cool amp !

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with that back story, you may want to consider having the electrolytic caps changed. I've had a few of each of the carvin x amps. the x100 with 6l6's and tolex was a bad ass amp, especially with a sd-1 on top of the lead channel. the el34 version and the hot rod mod or whatever version were a lot more saturated in the lead channel. i wonder what made them switch from that nice smooth black tolex to that ugly grey rat fur!?
 
Marykelly said:
A Johnson Millenium is a Digitech 2120 Artist with a SS poweramp fwiw.
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seriously? man that makes so much sense now. They sounded ok until you turned them up load.
back in the day, you could get the millenium 4x12 with vintage 30s cheaper than a quad of vintage 30s without the cab :D
 
Dyllheaven88 said:
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I had three stacks of these at one time,one being the prototype for the Archetype model. Got a great deal thru a Randall rep.
The amount of hiss from the preamp was insane!! Noisy bitches for sure.
The best sound I got outta them was using a distortion box thru the clean channel tweeked with the graphic.
The "run the mid knob high with it cut by the graphic" trick didn't work worth a fuck on this amp for me. Didn't work the other way either.
But damned it that wall of shit wasn't impressive as fuck in the jam room.
 
JimAnsell said:
don't people still pay decent money for Rivera stuff? His preamps aren't super common, and i remember they being sought after back in the '00s. everyone knows his fender super champ is a bad ass, that sells for a grand, at least, all day.
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M series were fetching $500-$800 or so last I looked. Everything is inflated now though.
 
I pulled good tones out of a Line 6 Spider Valve. It was designed by Bogner and was the beginning of modeling for Line 6. I shot it out with my Mesa DR and they were really close. The edge went to the Rev G, but it was actually close.

I used it as a practice amp for a bit. It had built in fx for getting ideas out when writing, and you could sweep the volume pedal back for high gain tones at whisper quiet volumes. I mean, for $300-$400, it was a great practice amp, with a built in phaser! What more could you ask for?!
 
JackBootedThug said:
they have shot through the roof Keith...
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weren't they kinda expensive even when they were released? I mean not today expensive but I seem to remember seeing the pricing and thinking "jesus christ I think i'll just get a jcm 900" (my 900 was great so I think I lucked out..was single channel, no reverb nothing, just plug in and go haha)
 
I got an Orange Brent Hinds Terror for X-mass a couple of years ago. Dad snagged it for $299 of MF STOTD.
 
sytharnia1560 said:
weren't they kinda expensive even when they were released? I mean not today expensive but I seem to remember seeing the pricing and thinking "jesus christ I think i'll just get a jcm 900" (my 900 was great so I think I lucked out..was single channel, no reverb nothing, just plug in and go haha)
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yup...high for PV back then. PV is a strange company. They had tons of trash products and they had tons of killer stuff as well. Especially guitars. I had a pv falcon with a kahler that I would put up against any usa strat. General rule of thumb is their usa made stuff is pretty fuckin good for cheap.
 
There are so many regrets I see in this thread.

Bought a D60 in 2012 for $600. Traded it + $300 for a Roadster later that year. Bought a D120 and FB412 in 2013 for $1000. Traded the D120 plus $300 for a Sig:X in 2015... after being offered a red stripe GEQ Mark III and passing on it.

Bought a Trem-O-Verb head in 2014 for $700 on eBay. Bought a JCM-800 2204 halfstack for $900 in 2014. Sold both to my other guitarist at cost. He got out of playing and sold them to an amp rental company. So much regret.

Sold my old VTM60 in 2013 for $200. But bought a VTM120 this past fall for $400 so I guess I still found a deal.

Thought about buying a 2555 head reissue when they were on clearance but passed on that.

I don't even know what the bargain amps are out there now. I do remember absolutely loving the sound of a completely dimed Blues Jr. amp plugged into an extension cab.
 
my best deals of the last 2/3 years:

£200 for a Peavey Triple XXX. Bought a couple of Jet City 100 HDM’s for £180. DSL for £300. Marshall Vintage Modern+1960A for £350. Mesa Dual Rec Rev G £750. Marshall JMP 2150 £500

About 15 years ago I paid £750 for a 1977 JMP 2203 and 1960TV cab which still feels like a great deal.

Definitely still deals to be had, if I didn’t have the Jet City and a DSL then I think a Laney would be cool. Also bought a Selmer and sold it out. 1966, all the good stuff internally, lots of mustard caps, Mullard tube rectifier etc. JTM45 equivalent from that year is in another stratosphere price wise.
 
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