H&K Small Amps opinions?

[H-evolve]

Was wondering if anyone here had a good experience with them.

I was able to try a H&K Granmeister Deluxe 40, but it wasn't in a great cab and I didn't have a lot of time to fiddle with the settings. Therefore, after my quick test, I thought it wasn't great. The gain sound was weird with the settings I had. The "grain" of the distorsion, if you know what I mean, sounded a bit fizzy or digital.. I don't know.

The thing is, I am shopping for a small tube amp that is relatively easy to carry around, and that would be loud enough to jam with a band. The local stores in my area don't have many options... it's generally Marshall or Orange, and I'm not a big Marshall/Orange guy. But, surpringly enough, a store nearby is selling H&K products.

I'm a lot more into 6505, 5105, Mesa tone. I own a ENGL Savage 120 and I very, very much like my tone.

So should I look for those small H&K amps (Tubemeister or GranMeister stuff?)

Thanks.

 

[henryjarv]

So should I look for those small H&K amps (Tubemeister or GranMeister stuff?)

...Maybe not. I have used tubemeister 18, well, with not so great cab, but anyway. It somehow just doesn't sound like a "metal amp".
Distortion is annoying and fizzy when recorded. This amp could work really well for something like Chuck Berry Or anything low gain.

And cab can't be the only problem, because I have tested it with one of those orange micro amps, and it was great.
I would recommend to try those orange amps at least, amazing how loud those are.

 

[H-evolve]

Distortion is annoying and fizzy when recorded.

What you say kinda describes also what I experienced with the GranMeister Deluxe 40... That distorsion was "weird"... Fizzy isn't quite the correct term, but it's close to how it sounded, yes.

 

[GrabtharsHammer77]

If you want a small tube amp and like the 6505/5150 sound, why don‘t you just buy a 6505 MH?

 

[H-evolve]

If you want a small tube amp and like the 6505/5150 sound, why don‘t you just buy a 6505 MH?

Well, I actually didn't mean that I wanted specifically a 6505 tone, but was using it as an example to describe the genre of tone I like.

Nevertheless, you are right, the 6505MH could be a good alternative, however it doesn't look super versatile, hence my hesitation to go for that. But, it is clearly one small head that could interest me indeed.

 

[GrabtharsHammer77]

Yes, the H&K *meister amps are very, very versatile. You can do pretty much everything with them, from Jazz to Death Metal. Also the way to create, save and manage presets is very well thought out. And it all looks very good on paper. The problem with them is, they do everything, but they don't really excel at anything. For every purpose there are a couple of amps that are better. I would describe them as "cover band" amps because of their versatility.

They just released a new tube-emulated amp called "Black Spirit 200". There are a couple of YouTube videos about it and it seems that this amp doesn't have that weird, grainy distortion of the *meister amps. Haven't played one of them myself, though. Perhaps you could check that one out?!

 

[H-evolve]

Yes, the H&K *meister amps are very, very versatile. You can do pretty much everything with them, from Jazz to Death Metal. Also the way to create, save and manage presets is very well thought out. And it all looks very good on paper. The problem with them is, they do everything, but they don't really excel at anything. For every purpose there are a couple of amps that are better. I would describe them as "cover band" amps because of their versatility.

They just released a new tube-emulated amp called "Black Spirit 200". There are a couple of YouTube videos about it and it seems that this amp doesn't have that weird, grainy distortion of the *meister amps. Haven't played one of them myself, though. Perhaps you could check that one out?!

Welp, the more I was thinking about it, the more the 6505 Mini made sense. I mean, I was talking about versatility, but I actually don't need that much versatility! haha

I stay on my high gain channel 85% of the time. This small amp would just be for practice, where I don't need all the features that I use for, say, recording.

And, big surprise, I found out that Peavey stuff isn't being sold in Canada anymore...! This was a shock... why a company as big as Peavey decides to stop selling stuff in Canada is beyond me... I mean, sure we're not the biggest market ever, but I think we're a decent market nonetheless...

Anyhow, I was able to find one 6505 Mini left in a store somewhere and will most likely order it.