Nitro or 5153 or... (AKA NAD)

[nevusofota]

I don't have any experience with Splawn Amps but from what you're describing it sounds like you can't go wrong with the 5153 (i.e. Steel Panther). If channel 3 isn't cutting it, go with a TS style boost on 2. Also, don't waist the extra money on the Stealth IMO. The standard can reach everything the stealth can do with the help of a $20 boost. Furthermore, there is absolutely no reason to go with the special edition standard unless it's a steal.

 

[BrentSSL]

Two metal zones in series into a Fender Ultimate Chorus.........but they have to be Japanese from the fukyomama factory circa '89 or it's a total trainwreck.


........thank me later.

Is there a demo of this somewhere

Just need to search You Tube, but it's probably in Cyrillic and the audio might not be that clear from the dashboard cam. Those Ruskies know tone, especially when it's running into a farm truck on the highway.

 

[blackie13]

What kind of metal tones you need...???
Cannot be done with a use of a boost...???
Keep in mind also that heavy tuning, such as Droped C or A is essential for brootZ...

 

[scriptphase]

Two metal zones in series into a Fender Ultimate Chorus.........but they have to be Japanese from the fukyomama factory circa '89 or it's a total trainwreck.


........thank me later.

Best thing I've read in a while.

 

[Racerxrated]

Dude..if you have and are willing to spend 2500 on an amp you have a ton of endless possibilities. There is/was a Stealth here in the classifieds. If you go EVH get the big gun brother. Everyone says they are killer. Diezel/SLO/VHT/Jubilee/Peters/Rhodes/Engl.....Friedman/Bogner..used but still. You have a ton of options. The striped EVH stack is still the same tone as a used 100w EVH and cab from guitar center for a grand less. Good luck!

 

[hatrick00]

I have both. Selling the EVH. Nitro for days. One of my favorite amps. Check out a used 20th anniversary Shiva also. Such an awesome amp.

 

[stompboxfreak72]

I have a Nitro, a 5153 Stealth and Ive owned 2 QRs. the 5153 and the Nitro are two different animals. I love them both for what they do and the Nitro like any Splawn will dominate a mix. The 5153 is great also. I much prefer the Stealth to the regular 100 watt head. Hell I like the 50 watt better than the 100 watt.

The Nitro and QR differ mostly in voicing. More low mids in the Nitro. Despite popular opinion the Nitro is not dripping in gain and probably has little more is any gain than your QR. ive play Lord Tone Kings 3 pre QR and that amp smokes any QR Ive ever owned or heard. But I digress.

Just buy one of each. Dont worry. Just charge it and forget about it. Buy me Lord Tone Kings QR too.

 

[ChadVanHalen]

Well the day after seeing Van Halen I went and picked up that used 5153 at the GC, gives me 30 days to really run it through its paces and then the rehearsal paces with the whole band mix

With the Splawn I usually kept it one channel and did the traditional roll the knob back thing but one thing I really dig about the EVH is the channel switching, it's pretty instantaneous which is real nice compared to some other channel switching stuff I've used which caused me to go back to the roll back the volume and turn some chorus and delay on method of cleans... But this channel switching is really useful for the type of stuff we play, their first album is very 80's tinged dirty sleaze metal sorta thing but this new stuff we're writing has a lot more drop C# stuff that needs to be real tight and saturated then go to a clean verse and all that. Plus we throw in covers from everything from Megadeth to Ted Nugent to Poison so having a real nice clean channel that sounds good with my TS on (one less thing to tap dance), a channel 2 being the tone I like (I jotted down Satchel's setting real quick before heading to GC to get a good starting point and so far just a few tweaks and I'm where I like it) and channel 3 being a super metulz channel for when we bust out the heavier stuff is just really nice, we've been to the point where we've been running my bass player's Mesa and my Splawn through a Radial Tone Bone just to beef up some of the heavier stuff... That's one entire amp I don't have to set up and lug in!

Only con I've got so far is lack of a MV, but I've only had it for less than a week now so it's still honeymoon phase

All in all it's exactly what I was looking for... And the dude working the GC was apparently the one who put it up for sale there and installed LED's inside the chasis, so it gets bonus point in that regard. Now just to see how it fits with our mix...

 

[Racerxrated]

Cool! HNAD....if it has any issues they all seem to be preamp tube related so make sure you have some good spares in case. There seems to be that common issue with the tubes that come with the amp initially. But hope you love it!

 

[nevusofota]

And remember, you may need a boosted channel 2 for the dropped tuned stuff if you need it tighter.