Spent Enough Time With The Bogner Ecstasy 104BV to Have An Opinion

[GreenRust]

Hello,

I have one of these 104BV’s as well. Amazing amp. I am having some difficulty dialing in the purple channel however compared to the others. Mine sounds a bit thicker and fuller (than some of the Youtube clips I have watched) even when using the brightest pre-gain setting and high treble with low bass. I can tell it would be my favorite of all the channels if I can dial out some of the thickness especially with humbuckers but even some with my single coils. Has anyone else who has one tried it with a Fryette Power Station in order to use the presence control on that unit? I’m considering buying one to try to get a little more clarity than I have been able to dial in so far as I am committed to getting the best out of this channel.

As a side note, I don’t own a cabinet yet for it as I am looking for the perfect match before buying but have tried a 4x12 with greenbacks, a 1x12 open back with Mesa Black Shadow C90, and EVH 2x12 with Celestion Anniversary 30’s, a Friedman 1x12 small ported cab with Celestion 65 creamback as well as though a 2x12 twin reverb using only the speakers which were JBL D120f’s.

I appreciate anyone else who has one letting me know about their experience using this channel specifically. Again, amazing amp!

Thanks,
John

Not sure on 104, but own a 101 anniv., but i would go for a bogner 4x12...green backs or v30, or a mix. Give that dragon the oxygen it needs to bring the fire. Any good 4x12 will be great...friedman, cornford, etc.

Then with the bogner 4x12 see if you have the same issue with the purple channel.

You could also add a graphic eq in the loop (boss ge7 is good, dont overthink it) and only assign it to the purple channel when activated, cutting lows (c. 100 hz), or tweaking to ear..likely possible with midi and easier than adding a power station.

Another option for purple would be crank the amp if thats doable...12 oclock on master should be enough (and is loud on my 101). I find for lower gain (gasp lol) my xtc likes volume...but it stills sounds great low, but can be less open in the upper mids.

Good luck.

 

[jkaffenb]

Not sure on 104, but own a 101 anniv., but i would go for a bogner 4x12...green backs or v30, or a mix. Give that dragon the oxygen it needs to bring the fire. Any good 4x12 will be great...friedman, cornford, etc.

Then with the bogner 4x12 see if you have the same issue with the purple channel.

You could also add a graphic eq in the loop (boss ge7 is good, dont overthink it) and only assign it to the purple channel when activated, cutting lows (c. 100 hz), or tweaking to ear..likely possible with midi and easier than adding a power station.

Another option for purple would be crank the amp if thats doable...12 oclock on master should be enough (and is loud on my 101). I find for lower gain (gasp lol) my xtc likes volume...but it stills sounds great low, but can be less open in the upper mids.

Good luck.

Thanks so much for the suggestions! I appreciate it. I hadn’t thought of a graphic eq in the loop and will definitely give that a try. I haven’t found any local cabinets yet with v30s or a mix to try but will keep my eye out to test that as well.

Thanks again

 

[Jccobb2]

I got mine in today and put 30 minutes on it quickly. The master volume is superb. The blue channel is pretty damn close to a 101B. The red channel however is pretty different. I had my 101B with the red channel Cameron mod sitting next to it and to be honest i couldn’t match it. The bite was a little better/different on the 101B. Probably some more tweaking to do there. Still good, just not quite the same.

The clean channel is probably better, and it was already good. Less scooped, more mid forward. Sounds a bit like a fumble style clean channel or a two rock type thing. The purple channel is interesting. Sounds great, but it’s super thick. Like truck stop lot lizard thick. I like it with the giant lower right now, but we’ll see where it goes.

Overall it’s a solid improvement if you didn’t live and die by the red channel. Even that’s a matter of taste. I think now it has a bit more of that filtered sound the uber ultra has in it. Either way, Reinhold has still got it and is kicking out some great stuff!

 

[jkaffenb]

Congratulations on getting yours and thanks so much for the review! My purple channel is super thick as well and I wasn’t sure if mine was slightly more than others. I totally agree about the master volume…. I am just a home player and have no issues getting the volume right when I have taken it to test with cabinets at different stores. Please post again with further observations after you get more time with it…..especially with dialing in that purple channel. It’s so much thicker sounding than the clean that shares the same eq and I can’t seem to get it there even with max treble and zero bass and I can tell that it would be my favorite channel in levels of gain, tone and feel if I could get the blanket feeling removed.

 

[Rackman]

I got mine in today and put 30 minutes on it quickly. The master volume is superb. The blue channel is pretty damn close to a 101B. The red channel however is pretty different. I had my 101B with the red channel Cameron mod sitting next to it and to be honest i couldn’t match it. The bite was a little better/different on the 101B. Probably some more tweaking to do there. Still good, just not quite the same.

The clean channel is probably better, and it was already good. Less scooped, more mid forward. Sounds a bit like a fumble style clean channel or a two rock type thing. The purple channel is interesting. Sounds great, but it’s super thick. Like truck stop lot lizard thick. I like it with the giant lower right now, but we’ll see where it goes.

Overall it’s a solid improvement if you didn’t live and die by the red channel. Even that’s a matter of taste. I think now it has a bit more of that filtered sound the uber ultra has in it. Either way, Reinhold has still got it and is kicking out some great stuff!

Yeah I ended up with some pretty specific settings for Purple - gain just above no sound, all switches to the brightest position, "Fender" mids mode, Treble 11:00 mids 10:00 bass 10:00. Sort of a variation of the classic Fender 6-4-2 and then adjusted to taste. Works really well with single coils.

I like Red mode. Really all 4 channels sound good, and that without having to change settings is the key from my perspective. There's a million amps that have one good sound. I typically use 4 depending on the band, and there's no way in hell I'm bringing 4 amps and I really don't want to have to turn knobs live.

 

[tonedog]

Yeah I ended up with some pretty specific settings for Purple - gain just above no sound, all switches to the brightest position, "Fender" mids mode, Treble 11:00 mids 10:00 bass 10:00. Sort of a variation of the classic Fender 6-4-2 and then adjusted to taste. Works really well with single coils.

I like Red mode. Really all 4 channels sound good, and that without having to change settings is the key from my perspective. There's a million amps that have one good sound. I typically use 4 depending on the band, and there's no way in hell I'm bringing 4 amps and I really don't want to have to turn knobs live.

Pretty much where I am with the amp and in a band where I need 4 tones from clean to mean and in between, this amp covers it better than anything I have owned and that is an obscene list. .

 

[jkaffenb]

Yeah I ended up with some pretty specific settings for Purple - gain just above no sound, all switches to the brightest position, "Fender" mids mode, Treble 11:00 mids 10:00 bass 10:00. Sort of a variation of the classic Fender 6-4-2 and then adjusted to taste. Works really well with single coils.

I like Red mode. Really all 4 channels sound good, and that without having to change settings is the key from my perspective. There's a million amps that have one good sound. I typically use 4 depending on the band, and there's no way in hell I'm bringing 4 amps and I really don't want to have to turn knobs live.

I’ll give those purple channel settings a try! Thanks

 

[Rackman]

I’ll give those purple channel settings a try! Thanks

Yeah with some guitars I move the "bright" switch to the right "slightly less bright but still bright" spot. Just depends. And then usually the treble end up a bit higher. But It always ends up somewhere near there.

 

[Jakem]

Thanks. I really like the Eclipse as a simple rack FX option. I have an H8000 too but that's a lot to schlep around and since there's not many 5u racks it pushes me to a 6u if I want to have wah.

So tried to buy a DCR-2SR after a couple of weeks of going back and forth and now it is sold out even from Thomann however I might have a deal on an Eclipse!

 

[Rackman]

So tried to buy a DCR-2SR after a couple of weeks of going back and forth and now it is sold out even from Thomann however I might have a deal on an Eclipse!

Cool - it's a great unit. The H8000 is definitely more programable and maybe has slightly better analog blocks. But 99.9% of what people want to do the Eclipse works great. I generally run mine as a volume control (0 to -30dB on a MIDI expression pedal) and have a 300ms Vintage Delay (or delay + reverb8) on all the time. Then I've got one slot to put any other effect in - compression, pitch shift, flanger etc.

I find I don't need the cross-fade capability but if I did that might push me in the direction of the H8000 as the Eclipse can't cross-fade into a compress+delay+verb preset for example.

 

[Jakem]

Cool - it's a great unit. The H8000 is definitely more programable and maybe has slightly better analog blocks. But 99.9% of what people want to do the Eclipse works great. I generally run mine as a volume control (0 to -30dB on a MIDI expression pedal) and have a 300ms Vintage Delay (or delay + reverb8) on all the time. Then I've got one slot to put any other effect in - compression, pitch shift, flanger etc.

I find I don't need the cross-fade capability but if I did that might push me in the direction of the H8000 as the Eclipse can't cross-fade into a compress+delay+verb preset for example.

Could not pass this deal although it is more limited; 1200€ for a totally mint, last year one, incl. a memory card.

 

[Rackman]

It's a good unit and that's a good price. I own two and 95% of the time that's what I'm using not an H8000.

 

[MattQc]

wondering how much different the amps is from my 20thA EL34B . I should try Kt77s maybe. Its a freacking awesome amps, yet I am not bonding with it for some reasons.