Diezel vh4 vs Mesa Road King 2

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Sigma.Xiria

Sigma.Xiria

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I know I know this a diezel forum haha. I honestly want to know your absolute opinions of the 2 amps. I honestly love both of them and am torn between the 2 sometimes but what can I say... diezel all the way for me haha. The only thing that is a catch for me is the price here in colorado. The Mesa is half the pric of the vh4. So what is your opinion of the 2. How do they compare? What do like better of the 2? I want this just to be a comparison of the vh4 and the road king so if we can leave it just to those 2 it would be awesome.
 
The only partial win I could give to the Road King 2 ( Had a V1.4, V2.1 and V2.2) is the clean channel. The VH4 is superior
in clarity, control, accuracy of the tone controls and voicing. The VH4 has a WAY superior effects loop, channel inserts and midi.
Whenever I buy a VH4 I simply tell myself, you could go out and buy four new amps for the same price as one and the VH4 always does more
than the others combined.
 
Even if you drop all the specs and how they compare on paper. Vh4 being the clear winner in that dept. Road kings and Recto series take almost rocket science to dial in a decent tone and if you add nuclear physics to your learning curve you can get some great sounds. On the other hand if you power up the vh4 and leave the knobs turned wherever they are (except maybe the volume to avoid becoming deaf) you'll probably already have a better sound than if you spent an entire day with the road king.
 
Hell yeah! Go vh4 haha! You think the vh4 and road king pair together well in a band with 2 guitars?
 
i would agree with Mark2C but also add that the Mesa makes a great doorstop to hold the door open while i carry my VH4 in & out of the house! :lol: :LOL:
 
Both are killer IMO. Obviously the Road King is going to be called the worse amp here at Diezel central, but the reality of it is they both kill. Both are super versatile and do different things. If I had to choose one I'd go with the VH4, but that's because I already have a Rectifier.

The Road King has a better clean channel in my opinion. It's fuller, more bell like and round and just sounds lush and beautiful, much like the Mesa Lonestar cleans. They both have killer mid-gain crunch, but they're voiced differently. VH4 has an almost Marshall-like crunch while the RK can sorta get british voiced with the EL34's selected, but sounds more American and gritty, yet warm.

The high gain channels kill on both amps. There's nothing as big sounding as a rectifier/road king when you're rocking loud with a band. The road king has this cool cascading thing happening when you hit a chord, like the gain rolls over itself. It sounds like many layers of gain and kills in a mix. The Mesa also has a really nice "give" to the feel. It's tighter than a regular rectifier with the el34's selected, but still has a bit of that sag that feels really fun to play.

The VH4 is brilliant sounding for rhythms on channel 3 and responds very quickly to your playing. It is a tighter and not quite as "big" of a sound, but it's more balanced.

The Diezel wins for lead tones IMO, but the Mesa is no slouch. Both amps have a ton of options, with Diezel sporting a better fx loop and midi switching capabilities, while the Mesa wins for power amp options, selectable wattage and tubes. Both killer amps.
 
To the OP's original question....

Answer: :hys:

Um, the V slays man, seriously...it simply slays.

Just sayin',
V. (Ultra Diezel Fanboi :salute: )
 
Sigma.Xiria":3smzdohh said:
I know I know this a diezel forum haha. I honestly want to know your absolute opinions of the 2 amps. I honestly love both of them and am torn between the 2 sometimes but what can I say... diezel all the way for me haha. The only thing that is a catch for me is the price here in colorado. The Mesa is half the pric of the vh4. So what is your opinion of the 2. How do they compare? What do like better of the 2? I want this just to be a comparison of the vh4 and the road king so if we can leave it just to those 2 it would be awesome.
Click to expand...


This isn't going to help you at all, but in case you are not able to try both intensively it might very well be so that you happen to purchase the wrong one for you. Tone is always so subjective topic and thus it is bad idea to base your judgement on others opinions.

In my case, I have a VH4 and would never trade it to RK, but I know many who prefer Recto sounds over VH4's sounds. They are rather different especially in their feel. To me VH4 is much more focused and faster in attack where as Mesas tend to have more of liquid feel in them.

I just purchased also Mesa Mark V combo and also that is very different in comparison to VH4, but much closer than Rectos as it is much faster in its attack. I find the Mark V to be freaking bright amp, but on the other hand someone would argue that VH4 is dark sounding amp. ...tone is a subjective topic.

I know both amps are wonderful and it is easy to get great tones out of both of them. Still, I would argue that one is not able to get them sound to each other as the bits and pieces inside are not similar.

Also, one point to consider is that are you interested in all of those features that RK offers? There always is a danger that you end up tweaking and tweaking and tweaking...more than actually playing. Of course they enable you to fine tune your own sound, but are you able to tame your curiosity for wondering how would this affect and maybe still not or I will try that next, hell what was the setup last time, too many switches, now im confused, maybe I prefered the previous, but what that really was, or maybe I still try this first...
 
take the one which sound you like best. i have the roadster and the vh4 and i just love the vh4. i just cannot get along with the mesa distortion tone. not my style.

take a good friend to the store... play both... ask him/her, when you smiled. take THAT amp.
 
I say try them, especially if you are putting that kind of cash for an amp. What some like might not be what others like. Especially in a Diezel forum. By the way I am Diezel owner and love these amps!
 
I have a Mesa Roadster (the younger brother of the RK) and although it have lots of options, my Diezel sounds more natural.

I'd definately go with the VH4.
 
Now go ask the same question in the Recto section on the Grail forum and get the opposite viewpoint.
 
Just as a side note, I played the Pony for years as Monmouth county is my home county.

I played on Mesa amps from 1974 through 1989, and they got to be so complicated to dial in, that I gave up on them, and went to Marshall amps for awhile until I heard about Diezel amps.

The wiring in Mesa amps is so complicated due to all the options it has, that the tone becomes degraded after having to go through all the wiring options. Also, Mesa uses cascading distortion by using channel one to boost the next channel and so on. Any change made to any channel affects the saturation and voicing dialed in on the other channels. Jim Marshall was correct in saying that the purer the circuit the better the tone.

Diezel amps are all this way. Four independant preamps. You can dial them in blindfolded. I tried to help a friend of mine dial in his MK IV. It took us 4 hours to get all the channels to where each sounded as good as they were going to get. Then I let him plug into my Diezel. I had used it the night before and the dials were still set from that job. He turned it on and immediately said "That is the sound I want from my Mesa!" I told him to sell the Mesa and buy a Diezel.

Yes, Mesa has it's sound and it is unique, but the constant tweaking drove me crazy on those amps. After the MK II B, it was all downhill for me with that company. The amps became way to finicky and lost the simplicity of dialing in tones they had with the MK II B. The MKII C+ was a horror show to get all channels to have the tone I wanted. Also, the saturation was gritty and hard on my ears no matter how I dialed everything in.

Not so with a Diezel. The Diezel sound, to me, is bigger, wider, fatter and can be dialed in easily to brighten or darken up the amp to taste. The saturation has more roar and vocal quality to its sound.

Forget the cost of the amps in question. You will be spending far too much time tweaking and re-tweaking the Mesa. Is your time more valuable spending all that time dialing in the tones, or would you rather turn the amp on, dial in the sound immediately and begin to enjoy playing through it?

You decide. Good luck in making your decision.
 
C-4":3l4vqlq6 said:
Just as a side note, I played the Pony for years as Monmouth county is my home county.

I played on Mesa amps from 1974 through 1989, and they got to be so complicated to dial in, that I gave up on them, and went to Marshall amps for awhile until I heard about Diezel amps.

The wiring in Mesa amps is so complicated due to all the options it has, that the tone becomes degraded after having to go through all the wiring options. Also, Mesa uses cascading distortion by using channel one to boost the next channel and so on. Any change made to any channel affects the saturation and voicing dialed in on the other channels. Jim Marshall was correct in saying that the purer the circuit the better the tone.

Diezel amps are all this way. Four independant preamps. You can dial them in blindfolded. I tried to help a friend of mine dial in his MK IV. It took us 4 hours to get all the channels to where each sounded as good as they were going to get. Then I let him plug into my Diezel. I had used it the night before and the dials were still set from that job. He turned it on and immediately said "That is the sound I want from my Mesa!" I told him to sell the Mesa and buy a Diezel.

Yes, Mesa has it's sound and it is unique, but the constant tweaking drove me crazy on those amps. After the MK II B, it was all downhill for me with that company. The amps became way to finicky and lost the simplicity of dialing in tones they had with the MK II B. The MKII C+ was a horror show to get all channels to have the tone I wanted. Also, the saturation was gritty and hard on my ears no matter how I dialed everything in.

Not so with a Diezel. The Diezel sound, to me, is bigger, wider, fatter and can be dialed in easily to brighten or darken up the amp to taste. The saturation has more roar and vocal quality to its sound.

Forget the cost of the amps in question. You will be spending far too much time tweaking and re-tweaking the Mesa. Is your time more valuable spending all that time dialing in the tones, or would you rather turn the amp on, dial in the sound immediately and begin to enjoy playing through it?

You decide. Good luck in making your decision.
Click to expand...
Haha oh wow! That is dumb lol. I already know I want the vh4 haha.
 
C-4":rph4edb1 said:
Just as a side note, I played the Pony for years as Monmouth county is my home county.

I played on Mesa amps from 1974 through 1989, and they got to be so complicated to dial in, that I gave up on them, and went to Marshall amps for awhile until I heard about Diezel amps.

The wiring in Mesa amps is so complicated due to all the options it has, that the tone becomes degraded after having to go through all the wiring options. Also, Mesa uses cascading distortion by using channel one to boost the next channel and so on. Any change made to any channel affects the saturation and voicing dialed in on the other channels. Jim Marshall was correct in saying that the purer the circuit the better the tone.

Diezel amps are all this way. Four independant preamps. You can dial them in blindfolded. I tried to help a friend of mine dial in his MK IV. It took us 4 hours to get all the channels to where each sounded as good as they were going to get. Then I let him plug into my Diezel. I had used it the night before and the dials were still set from that job. He turned it on and immediately said "That is the sound I want from my Mesa!" I told him to sell the Mesa and buy a Diezel.

Yes, Mesa has it's sound and it is unique, but the constant tweaking drove me crazy on those amps. After the MK II B, it was all downhill for me with that company. The amps became way to finicky and lost the simplicity of dialing in tones they had with the MK II B. The MKII C+ was a horror show to get all channels to have the tone I wanted. Also, the saturation was gritty and hard on my ears no matter how I dialed everything in.

Not so with a Diezel. The Diezel sound, to me, is bigger, wider, fatter and can be dialed in easily to brighten or darken up the amp to taste. The saturation has more roar and vocal quality to its sound.

Forget the cost of the amps in question. You will be spending far too much time tweaking and re-tweaking the Mesa. Is your time more valuable spending all that time dialing in the tones, or would you rather turn the amp on, dial in the sound immediately and begin to enjoy playing through it?

You decide. Good luck in making your decision.
Click to expand...


Yes, I've talked to you before about NJ. I played the Pony for years and to some packed houses. Love that place. But i played at Jenks in the Summer and the crowds at the nicer shore spots are outrageous. But you gotta play covers.


About Boogies. I've owned and played bunchs of them. The IIC+ still rules in my book and that lead tone is unmatched by pretty much anything. I put a Herbert against a IIC+ for a week and the Herbert's a great amp with a more modern,deep sound. But for leads the IIC+ won for me. Of course the IIC+ isn't versatile and just when Mesa was onto something great they stopped making it. Along with the JCM800, the IIC+ IS 80's metal IMHO.

But after the Mark III i can do without them. And the Mark V is such a hit or miss amp. But, try this with an open mind. Go checkout an Electra Dyne. Forget that it says Mesa on the front and CRANK it. It's unlike most Boogies and it's only got 6 knobs. It's a seriously overlooked amp, but bring along an OD pedal if you want high gain.

And getting back on topic. I did try a Roadster today............hated it. Recto's i guess are not my thing. Muddy bass, spongy sound, and horrible for lead playing. I'd go with an Einstein and i want to try one out if i can find one.
 
C-4":2zpqbi2t said:
Just as a side note, I played the Pony for years as Monmouth county is my home county.

I played on Mesa amps from 1974 through 1989, and they got to be so complicated to dial in, that I gave up on them, and went to Marshall amps for awhile until I heard about Diezel amps.

The wiring in Mesa amps is so complicated due to all the options it has, that the tone becomes degraded after having to go through all the wiring options. Also, Mesa uses cascading distortion by using channel one to boost the next channel and so on. Any change made to any channel affects the saturation and voicing dialed in on the other channels. Jim Marshall was correct in saying that the purer the circuit the better the tone.

Diezel amps are all this way. Four independant preamps. You can dial them in blindfolded. I tried to help a friend of mine dial in his MK IV. It took us 4 hours to get all the channels to where each sounded as good as they were going to get. Then I let him plug into my Diezel. I had used it the night before and the dials were still set from that job. He turned it on and immediately said "That is the sound I want from my Mesa!" I told him to sell the Mesa and buy a Diezel.

Yes, Mesa has it's sound and it is unique, but the constant tweaking drove me crazy on those amps. After the MK II B, it was all downhill for me with that company. The amps became way to finicky and lost the simplicity of dialing in tones they had with the MK II B. The MKII C+ was a horror show to get all channels to have the tone I wanted. Also, the saturation was gritty and hard on my ears no matter how I dialed everything in.

Not so with a Diezel. The Diezel sound, to me, is bigger, wider, fatter and can be dialed in easily to brighten or darken up the amp to taste. The saturation has more roar and vocal quality to its sound.

Forget the cost of the amps in question. You will be spending far too much time tweaking and re-tweaking the Mesa. Is your time more valuable spending all that time dialing in the tones, or would you rather turn the amp on, dial in the sound immediately and begin to enjoy playing through it?

You decide. Good luck in making your decision.
Click to expand...

Guitar Center in East Brunswick has an Einstein combo and i checked it out this past weekend. I hope there's something wrong with it because it didn't sound that great. I think it probably has some beat preamp tubes, at least i hope it did for the $2800 price.
 
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