How did you choose your current/main amp?

[Mailman1971]

Got mine in a trade. HAd a Mark IV at the time and someone had a FJA Modded Recto(single 50 watter) that they offered in trade. I took it...hey why not right?
Tone was perfect for what I wanted.....sold that one and got FJA to mod me a 100 watter Mesa dual 3 channel recto and never looked back.

 

[glassjaw7]

Played my buddy's Mark IV and loved it so I traded for one.

 

[glpg80]

I designed and built it.

Steve

EE's have all the fun

I took a 5150 II which was close to the platform that i wanted and modified it to my liking. The entire amp has been gone through, clean/crunch and lead as well as a recap.

In the process of modifying my 1994 tremoverb for dual bias and also doing a re-cap.

Have a third proto that has been in the design phase for years. Just no time between work and studies. Eventually it will be done

 

[rupe]

I designed and built it.

Steve

You didn't build that!!!

 

['63-Strat]

Hands on ..... I would never consider any other method.

I use the other stuff mentioned to become interested in going to check out stuff for hands on. My experience is clips & other peoples opinions have little to do with what works for me. When I lived in areas where it was not easy to check out several amps I would get together with other local players & travel across states to go check out the stuff. I do not really have a main amp. I have several I use depending on my needs at the time.

Yep, I agree with a lot of this. I knew about Bogner in the 90s and lots of my favorite records at the time had used bogners of some sort but there were none available to try locally in Vancouver. Drove down to Seattle and tried an older XTC 2X12 combo that I loved as well as a Shiva. Eventually got a 101b in 2001 and largely due to Steve Snider's clips of his Classic took a bit of a risk and sent my 101b back to Bogner to be modded to the Classic in 2002, the longer I've played that amp the more I like it. Nearly finished mixing and mastering one of my band's new records and am extremely happy with the tones.

 

[blackba]

For me it was word of mouth from a friend and reviews/forum posts on the web. I have actually had better luck with buying amps used without demoing them. The amps I have bought new that I tried, typically didn't last that long.

 

[some dude]

For me it was word of mouth from a friend and reviews/forum posts on the web. I have actually had better luck with buying amps used without demoing them. The amps I have bought new that I tried, typically didn't last that long.

It's funny. There is absolutely nothing in my current rig that I tried before I bought. Basically went on a mixture of reputation and prior experience.

In fairness, there's been a lot of gear I've purchased this way that didn't work out. My point is that I've been equally as successful/unsuccessful at choosing gear regardless of how I selected/purchased it.

 

[VC4Ever]

I find it hard to believe the results of this poll. A lot of the gear mentioned on these forums is hard to find at a local shop. Many of the guitars for example are custom ordered, as well as amps. All these amp mods going around, I doubt you had a chance to play it before you bought it.

With the interwebs and online stores making it easy to access and these forums, I think the majority of people buy gear based on Internet resources, be it this forum (user opinions/hype), Youhootube, soundclips online stores ect.

 

[glassjaw7]

I find it hard to believe the results of this poll. A lot of the gear mentioned on these forums is hard to find at a local shop. Many of the guitars for example are custom ordered, as well as amps. All these amp mods going around, I doubt you had a chance to play it before you bought it.

With the interwebs and online stores making it easy to access and these forums, I think the majority of people buy gear based on Internet resources, be it this forum (user opinions/hype), Youhootube, soundclips online stores ect.

Totally depends on location. In the Twin Cities for example (used to live there) local shops have Marshall (new, vintage, mods) , Mesa Boogie, Orange, Engl, Bogner, Savage, Randall, Egnater, Soldano, Cornford, Fuchs, tons more... about the only thing I couldn't test drive when I was there was Diezel or Splawn but I found those within a couple hours drive. I imagine most cities have a pretty good selection between all the local shops.

 

[stephen sawall]

I find it hard to believe the results of this poll. A lot of the gear mentioned on these forums is hard to find at a local shop. Many of the guitars for example are custom ordered, as well as amps. All these amp mods going around, I doubt you had a chance to play it before you bought it.

With the interwebs and online stores making it easy to access and these forums, I think the majority of people buy gear based on Internet resources, be it this forum (user opinions/hype), Youhootube, soundclips online stores ect.

Totally depends on location. In the Twin Cities for example (used to live there) local shops have Marshall (new, vintage, mods) , Mesa Boogie, Orange, Engl, Bogner, Savage, Randall, Egnater, Soldano, Cornford, Fuchs, tons more... about the only thing I couldn't test drive when I was there was Diezel or Splawn but I found those within a couple hours drive. I imagine most cities have a pretty good selection between all the local shops.

I was also thinkinking this shows all the people that flip amps. Really there is not that many modified amps around. Last time I saw the numbers Fender was making about 700 amps a day. Marshall about 200. Mesa about 15. Peavey also has a large number .... but all the rest of them do not add up to much at all. Most people have never heard of amp companies mentioned on these forums ..... even less have tried one or owned one. If I go to watch a band local pretty much it is always using the gear I mentioned above. I never see bands using the other gear.

 

[VC4Ever]

This is probably true. My question is who's buying those Fender Amps

 

[thunda]

It was on sale...

 

[Anonymous]

I designed and built it.

Steve

EE's have all the fun

I took a 5150 II which was close to the platform that i wanted and modified it to my liking. The entire amp has been gone through, clean/crunch and lead as well as a recap.

In the process of modifying my 1994 tremoverb for dual bias and also doing a re-cap.

Have a third proto that has been in the design phase for years. Just no time between work and studies. Eventually it will be done

Cool! I look forward to seeing/hearing your proto!

Steve

 

[nevusofota]

Went in for a SLO back in 2007.

Walked out with the EVH, been playing it ever since.

Blasphemy!

 

[glpg80]

Cool! I look forward to seeing/hearing your proto!

Steve

Thank you sir! You're PCB design turned out great. I am still in the embedded systems design phase. researching what chips i want to use and designing the footswitch for controls. A lot more complicated then the standard sinking current approach.

 

[stephen sawall]

This is probably true. My question is who's buying those Fender Amps

Lots of people on this forum and several on this thread..... Fender makes a lot of amps that do not say Fender on the front of them.... The only Fender amps I have owned were / are vintage.

Fender builds more amps in a few days than most of the small companies build ever. Just about none of the names you see on this forum have built as many amps as Fender does in a week.

 

[Anonymous]

Cool! I look forward to seeing/hearing your proto!

Steve

Thank you sir! You're PCB design turned out great. I am still in the embedded systems design phase. researching what chips i want to use and designing the footswitch for controls. A lot more complicated then the standard sinking current approach.

Appreciate the comments - I put some more gut shots in the High Gain gut shots thread just now... I like clean designs... Sounds like yours is gonna be cool, man!

Steve

 

[glpg80]

Cool! I look forward to seeing/hearing your proto!

Steve

Thank you sir! You're PCB design turned out great. I am still in the embedded systems design phase. researching what chips i want to use and designing the footswitch for controls. A lot more complicated then the standard sinking current approach.

Appreciate the comments - I put some more gut shots in the High Gain gut shots thread just now... I like clean designs... Sounds like yours is gonna be cool, man!

Steve

Wow i just noticed my spelling error. *Your and not you're. It has been a long day.

Clean designs are good. I also like the modular approach you took. Makes more sense in my books. It turned out great.

Yes a bit of everything is in this one. As you know finding time to really dive into datasheets is hard

 

[Anonymous]

Cool! I look forward to seeing/hearing your proto!

Steve

Thank you sir! You're PCB design turned out great. I am still in the embedded systems design phase. researching what chips i want to use and designing the footswitch for controls. A lot more complicated then the standard sinking current approach.

Appreciate the comments - I put some more gut shots in the High Gain gut shots thread just now... I like clean designs... Sounds like yours is gonna be cool, man!

Steve

Wow i just noticed my spelling error. *Your and not you're. It has been a long day.

Clean designs are good. I also like the modular approach you took. Makes more sense in my books. It turned out great.

Yes a bit of everything is in this one. As you know finding time to really dive into datasheets is hard

No doubt! The modular approach was essential to me because now I can use the power supply and efx loop with other preamp designs...

Steve

 

[colimofsmoke]

Hands on ..... I would never consider any other method.

I use the other stuff mentioned to become interested in going to check out stuff for hands on. My experience is clips & other peoples opinions have little to do with what works for me.

dead on.

I would have never been looking for a VHT, as I played a few Fryettes at GC and was unimpressed, but I posted my Mesa on CL for a trade and it was offered. played it and that was that.