..Is kicking my arse. Have had some time to toss a few more of my buddies' pedals in front of it. The clean channel is so much like a peavey 60/60 tube power amp. It's just a VERY clean channel that doesn't color the tone of what is in front. But it DOES bring out the richness of whatever pedal nonetheless.
And the tones I have tooled around with still sound good LOUD. This amp is 100 watts. At volume level 2, the drummer is getting pissed. At 5, you wont hear the drummer. At 7, you are pissing everyone off and communicating directly with the International Space Station. Via direct sound.
Long story short.....anybody looking for a good amp to run pedals through, this is your beast. I paid $175 used for mine. And it will smoke any Peavey C-30 or 50..... at half the price.
I bought it as a back-up. But it quickly made it's way to being my main amp. I love my JSX.....but I might sell it as I may have found something more versatile (and you guys know how much I love my JSX) .
More to come. Haven't made decisions yet. Will keep yooz guys in the know.
Carvin makes great amps at great prices. X100B, Nomad, Legacy, T100, Quad X, etc... All quality pieces of kit.
The funnier thing is that his is an SX!
Back in 2000 I was in California and went to the Santa Ana Carvin store and played pretty much everything there because I'd never really been around their gear all that much.
I was sincerely blown away at how great the SX amp sounded at every volume level (and I actually cranked it for a little bit to see what it could do, which drew a lot of annoyed stares), especially when you factor in that it's solid state. I actually liked it more than some of their other stuff (including the MTS series amps).
I'm really glad you're enjoying it, Johnny. Unless you really need the money, I don't think it'd be smart to part with JSX, though.
Tripper
Tripper — Feb 07, 2009 Back in 2000 I was in California and went to the Santa Ana Carvin store ...
Heh, I miss going there. It was so close to where we worked in Irvine that we would go there during lunch times to play with all their toys. I've always loved the finishes on their guitars (wasn't as crazy about the necks though so never bought one). They used to be just stupidly good values before people knew about them.
I had a couple of friends that had tons of stuff from them; amps, guitars, cabs... They make very good quality stuff! :)
this is interesting... I've always read Carvins ads where people were saying it was the best SS OD channel they'd heard, sounded as good as tubes, etc. But you just don't hear much about them. Many SS amps have a rep as not taking pedals well. While this certainly CAN be true, there's no reason they can't take pedals well.
IMHO, a lot of guys want to use their ODs the same way they do with a tube amp and that could be a lot of the problem. I'm a big fan of slamming V1 with a boost/OD or whatever. With a SS amp, you should use the gain from the device, but not use a big boost in volume. If you keep the pedal at (or if it's a solo boost pedal, a little above...) unity, then most of the better SS amps I've tried, take pedals very well. Of course, I'm using some high quality pedals. ;)
Wonder what a nice 50 watt version can be had for....
I did not know you were alking about a ss Carvin, I have never tried one of their ss guitar amps. Frankly, it surprises me to hear you compare it so favorably to a JSX. But, whaever works for ya, right?
Don't get me wrong, the JSX is a total beast. Just amp to amp it blows the Carvin away. But the Carvin takes pedals better. The clean channel has a lot more low end (believe it or not) than the JSX's. . Imagine the pedals I could run in front of this thing with half of what I could get out of the JSX.
About Howie's point....when I run pretty much any pedal through the gain channel, the bottom end just totally drops out (based on the pedals' settings while used with the clean channel). Yes I could back way off the lows on the clean channel and crank the lows on the lead channel to even things out. But then I get a very sterile clean tone when I need just clean. That is one issue I have found.
But.....I am able to make up for this by using my MXR EQ pedal (which also has variable gain and volume levels). And just using the clean channel. As I have found out by trying this with many amps and pedals...clean power boost pedals do not add decible levels to gain channels. They only add gain. But in front of pretty much any clean channel, they can add stupid amounts of decible levels (and some extra gain). Something about how the circuitry is done. So if I'm using only the clean channel, the MXR EQ is a perfect solo boost......eliminating the need for additional 'solo' pedals and/or the gain channel of the amp for such.
And yes.....the gain channel by itself is quite usable as well. I would say it does classic rock VERY well. It just doesn't have enough gain for modern rock. But the tone is pretty damn good for a SS :)