| Author | Message | ||
     Jasonblue |
I've been playing on and off since I was 16, am now about to turn 33. I've been playin my old Fender acoustic for years now without having played an electric for a long long time. Today however my lovely wife was nice enough to buy me a Schecter S-1Elite series electric for my b-day. A very beautiful guitar. My question to any axe weilders out there is- What would you recomend as a good all around amp in the 300 to 500 dollar range? Keep in mind that I play for personal enjoyment only and am by no means a Stevie Ray Vahaun or Joe Satriani. I probably won't be playing any gigs or going on tour, just some thing I can crank up when the wife isn't around and plug in the headphones when she is. I would like something that sounds good and has some digital effects built into it. I have done a little research tonight and here are a list of some I have been looking at. If you have any advice or expierience with any of these pleaze chime in. Line 6 SpiderII Combo Behringer V-tone GMX212 Crate XT120R Marshall MG100PFX Combo Crate FXT120 Combo with DSP RandallRC200G2 Thanx Jason  | ||
| Paulinoz |
Marshall AVT100 100W 1x12 3-Channel Combo with DFX I have been trying to use one of these for the past 6 months and can't fault it. | ||
| Koz5150 |
As a 10+ year vet of stage and now simply playing in church once or twice a month, I have used tons of equipment. The Line 6 products I have used have always been great. Personally my favorite setup is a multifunction pedal (I use a Boss GT-5)with an external 31 band eq, a small power amp and a 2x12 cabinet. Guitars were just meant to be played through a cabinet with 12" speakers. (Message edited by koz5150 on August 02, 2004) | ||
| Djkaplan |
I play an American Standard Telecaster through a Fender HotRod DeLuxe tube amp. Perfect set-up for the single-coils but I'm not sure if it would be appropriat for the Schecter. What kind of pick-ups does it have? | ||
| Bluzm2 |
Get yourself a Tech 21. The small one is around $325 or so. With this one, you can have any kind of amp you want. Killer sound at low volume levels if you want. Has a speaker out if you want to feed a bigger cabinet. Amazing little piece of gear. My son hardly used his big Laney tube stack after he got the Tech 21. | ||
| Bluey |
I was actually pretty happy w/my little Galien Kruger(w/2 12" Celestions). Sounded great alone in small venues or just miked 1 speaker in my large venues including outdoor concerts!! I used my pignose as backup(always miked) just in case. That little baby kicked •••!! The only effect I actually fell in love with was the envelope follower for Monster sustain!! Otherwise I would use only the amps built in distortion. Great sound for transistor!! | ||
| Gearhead |
What is it about cycles and guitars?? I know at least a dozen guys who ride and play and this thread really validates that. I'm a guitar beginner as I've been taking lessons for a little over two years but I'm really enjoying the challenge. I was a drummer thoughout my early years and I just finally decided to see what the guys in front of the band do. It's a LOT tougher than it looks!! I play a DeArmond electric and use a Line 6 "212" Spyder amp. I'm kind of like the guy who goes out and buys a high end sport bike who's never riden! I've got some pretty good equipment but can barely play. Oh well, it's fun, challenging and good for the soul just like riding!! | ||
| Fly |
Lots of possibilities. However, a recent fav of mine in your price range is the Peavey Bandit 112. Great tone! Effects include reverb and really good sounding modern/vintage/high gain voicing options that are footswitch selectable. Your best bet is to play an amp before you buy it if you can. http://www.peavey.com/products/shop_online/browse.cfm/action/details/item/004813 70/wc/1A1B214/fam/TT/tcode/4/transtub.cfm | ||
| Court |
>>>What is it about cycles and guitars?? I've been saying that about Buells for years and with each passing year get only more amazed. I am sitting here under my picture of Strawberry Fields (Actually 72nd and Central Park West) and a collection of my favorite guitar pictures. My favorite is the ad currently running about NYC on the side of the city buses. It's a gorgeous blonde E335. I took a photo, did an 8" x 10" glossy, put a poem in the picture, framed it and sat it atop the Grand Piano in the living room. I don't know what the connection is, but I assure you there is one! Court  | ||
| Jasonblue |
Hey guys thanx for the info. In the past I had seen threads where guys were talking guitars so I knew I'd get some feedback. No pun intended. Dj- My Schecter has 2 Duncan Designed humbuckers. I have been reading good things about alot of different amps, kind of hard to make a descision just by reading. Tommorow I plan on spending some time down at the local Guitar Center to feel out a few models. I've heard some good things about the Line6 amps. Supposedly alot of features for the money. Guitars and motorcycles, must be tha badboy thing. Jason  | ||
| Stealthxb |
My guitar is missing 2 strings!!!  | ||
| Lemonchili_x1 |
Jason - I've got one of the early Line6's, and they rock. Only problem with mine is too many buttons, but I think the current ones are much simpler to use. Like you I mainly play at home, don't do gigs often, just noodling around in the garage etc and the Line6 is great for getting so many different characters out of one amp with it's different "models". I use two or three amp models most of the time, but every now and again I have a zillion different combinations of amp models and effects at my finger tips if I feel like something different. So my tip(IMHO), like Bluzm2 said, is to go for one of the modelling amps, like Tech21, Line6 etc, because you get so much flexibility out of one amp (and I hardly have to use any pedal effects any more either). cheers, lemonchili Hey Stealth, I started playing "4-string" in a band recently - lots of fun, so much fun I went and bought a used Ibanez  | ||
| Whodom |
Cool thread. Sounds like I'm not the only bass player here- how many other bassists do we have? Hugh | ||
| Jasonblue |
Actually the only time I played in a band I was on bass. It was right after I graduated highschool back in 89. I had just moved out on my own and my roomate had always been in bands and was putting one together. He knew I played guitar and asked if I wanted to play bass. Shortly there after followed one of the wildest and funnest times of my life. We were just a party band, some covers, some originals, and lots of fun. Good memories. | ||
| Buellish |
I like my fenders,'63 blond Bandmaster,'72 Deluxe Reverb and '03 Acoustasonic Jr. I'm playing a Jimmy Vaughan Stratocaster w/tex mex pickups and a Washburn Festival Series w/Fishman Equis Gold eletronics. Mike | ||
| Djkaplan |
Hey..., Erik plays a Fender. I still rue the day I decided not to buy a used but perfect Stevie Ray Vaughn Strat for $600 at Guitar Center. I only waited one day and it was gone. | ||
| Fuscat |
I got some bass equipment I am trying to sell if anyone is interested check it out at: http://www.birch.net/~stftr/bass/bass.htm | ||
| Pilot |
My wife used to play the violin,she went into the music store and told them that she had broken her g string and needed another,thought about it for a second and blushed. | ||
| Blublak |
I'm a bass player.. (although I used to arrange/write on 6 strings) Later, | ||
| Cyclonemick |
Too bad about the SRV model it retails for about 2 grand. I play a Les Paul standard. | ||
| Bluey |
I was a pretty well known guitarist all through the 80's & 90's playing mainly here on the Island and queens& brooklyn(LaMours and all the colleges). The name of the band was Spellbound. I lived on my Les Pauls during those times. Sold everything and stopped playing (cause my ex wife couldn't handle it) Just picked up a Yamaha acoustic and am Starting to get into it again after about a 10 year reprieve! Was seriously thinking of getting a Strat this time cause I want to mellow out and play the blues with a couple of guys on my block. Practicing all my scales,arpeggios,riffs,etc... Ican't wait to get back out there. Planning on doing only local bars though...no more touring or concerts for me anymore!! Just wanna know...Any good ideas on a strat?? I want top of the line!! HELP!! | ||
| Anonymous |
Oh, did some one ask a question about Strats for blues?! Oh yippee! Here are my thoughts on it: For a Fender with real clean tone, get a Custom Shop Classic Player model. They are made really pretty well, and cheaper than many other Custom Shop models. Forget the aged replica crap; I'll damage my guitar just fine by myself, thank you very much! Now, to get deeper into guitar madness, for even cleaner classic sounds, then put in Lindy Fralin or Kinman pickups. Or to get a more singing Gibson P-90 style sustain out of it, put in Joe Barden pickups or the DeMarzio blade type. For a lot of sustain, but muddier, you can get a Custom Shop Clapton replica. Odd neck though, and too impure sounding for blues to me. Unless you are Clapton, of course...how he makes one of these sound so good, I'll never know. My favorites are the Bardens, but he has gone out of business, and they are getting stupidly expensive. For a premium top of the line Strat type guitar that's not a Fender (ie. "boutique"  , I recommend a Melancon. Then you can order it with what you like. All the boutique guys are more expensive, but Melancon is the most reasonable. As far as amps are concerned, for the best blues tone you can buy an older (pre-69)Fender tube amp and maybe get a good one, or buy a DR. Z. It's THE choice. Dr. Z's are the best deal out there in non-mainstream manufacturers. Get a Z-28 or Maz-18, it'll be all you need for clubs. The sound is incredible, the owner of the company a prince. Yes, they are still expensive, but no major manufacturers make anything even close, IMHO. You can also run a few pedals for some more range in sounds, but honestly you will be amazed at how this set-up sounds straight. You will play and play and never want to stop! | ||
| Captainkirk |
As for amps, I've been playing through a Fender DSP90 modeling amp I bought about a year ago and just LOVE it. More mojo than I'll ever need.And I haven't yet found a sound I can't duplicate out of it. As for Strats, I have both a customized '65 with a DiMarzio Fat Strat in the bridge position and a new Fender "Mexican" Strat with a maple neck, both are incredible blues machines in their own right. That being said, I see no reason to go all out for a custom shop Fender or an SRV when any American Standard plays and sounds as good as many of the customs. There is a great deal of "snob appeal" in the guitar world...just like in the cycle world. | ||
| Court |
The BEST guitar is when someone from Austalia calls my buddy Matt Umanov and says "a friend in NYC is going to pick up my new 50th Strat and play ir for a couple months before I get to the US" Hey...ya got's to do what ya got's to do. Now...to check out one of those Z-28's. Rock on. | ||
| Lemonchili_x1 |
>>>What is it about cycles and guitars?? Go for a ride - clears my head, and I forget why I was stressed... Go out to the garage and play guitar for a while, or band practise on wednesday nights - clears my head, and I forget why I was stressed... I've been thinking for the last few days of so many parallels between guitars and bikes, and guitarists and riders... like sometimes you'll find a guitar/bike, and it might not be the latest and greatest, or it might not have all the features of some other model or brand, but it just feels right for you. Sometimes it's even a particular bike/guitar - something to do with the person who actually put it together, maybe??? And yeah, Captainkirk, you do get the same range of attitudes in the guitar world as the bike world! I only have one bike, but I do have these:  Nothing particularly special or rare, but I love them all. I haven't actually ever sold a guitar - I grow too attached to them Any bass players ever used a Peavey Basic 112? I don't have a proper bass amp and I've seen one for sale. Jason - found an amp yet? Did you get to test a few? cheers, lemonchili | ||
| Anonymous |
I agree with Captain Kirk about a standard Strat being excellent, but the question was about top of the line, so I answered accordingly. A Mexican strat can sound pretty good, but the finish on the frets, the intonation, the set-up and the pickups don't match up to the best out there. I think American standards are definitely a little better in the details. I have currently a Mexican Strat deluxe, an American Standard strat and a custom shop one, along with a Kramer strat replica and a Suntech Strat replica. The order of quality is: Custom shop, American standard, Suntech, Mexican deluxe, and then Kramer. Quality of fit and finish aside, the American standard actually sounds better than the custom shop even though they both have the same pickups. Who knows why? But honestly, the biggest difference in sound is my mood and how much I've been practicing. On one of the rare nights that I don't suck, they all sound good! And face it, a lot more great music has been played on cheap Strats than on boutique ones (ever seen Eddie VH's Frankenstrat, a hideous mess, but oh what a sound!), so it's all in what you can afford, how much you play, and how much talent you have. Great players also sound great on beautiful boutique instruments; bad players sound bad on everything. | ||
| Aaron |
Don't you know that engineers are supposed to be the analytical, logical, boring type? Not the artsy-fartsy creative type? You know, the whole left brain/right brain thing. You're breaking the rules! | ||
| Court |
I called Son #2 today to tell him I was heading down to pick up the 50th in the next week and what amp should I get? His reply: "The cheapest thing you can get. You can't play well and by the time you do, you'll know much more about what you want." I have to tell you thought that I am taken with those Dr. Z's...awesome. Hey...notice anything in this pic of the Buell Basement?  I think we are all bozo's on this bus. We now return to you Buddy Guy . . . "Damn Right I got The Blues" | ||
| Phillyblast |
Damn, what's a sax player to do? (besides pick up the Cort Jim Triggs semi-hollow body and play the only 3 to 5 chords he knows?) hey Co(u)rt - nice bike. | ||
| Whodom |
Are we going to start a sub-thread here? How many of us ride Buells, play guitar or bass, AND are engineers? I guess there's at least 2 of us. Lemonchilli- haven't tried a Peavey 112. Most players seem to poo-poo Peavey stuff, but they do make some decent equipment. They made (make?) a practice amp called a Minx that was rated very high in a couple of Bass Player magazine shoot-outs. |
