New Amp...ADVICE
- Thread starter DestructoSpin
- Start date
schenkadere
Obey my dog!
Friend of mine that plays professionally has a VHT Pitbull throught a Marshall 4/12 with Vin 30's. It has Fender clean tone and stupid gain. He typically plays with the gain on 4. His sound for the varity of music they play is incredible, but he's experienced enough and patient enough to take the time to get the sound needed to closely reproduce the origional sound of the songs they are covering. His origional dropped C tuning stuff sounds sick as hell. I cant speak for the death metal sound because I dont know what really seperates it from other heavy metal. This dude is hard to please and Ive seen him change amps multiple times, some of that had to do with having more money, but he can walk into our areas largest music store and leave with what ever he wants to try for awhile, no questions asked. This VHT is the longest I have seen him keep an amp and its been a few years. Last time I talked to him he said he was getting tired of it
Myself I cant see the money for some of these amps and would spend mine on a Carvin V3 4/12 vin 30 half stack.
I agree...the stuff is just stupid expensive. I think it's so tough to find the right amp. You can't possibly have enough time to properly fiddle and tweak while sitting in a music store...it takes forever to find your tone...it can take weeks or months of small changes....and who is ever really satisfied? If I spent 3 grand on a rig and wasn't completely satisfied, I'd lose my mind!
I think the Carvins are a good value...but who knows?...you can't try them out unless you have a friend with one.
Kenneth R.
Cináed
schenkadere
Obey my dog!
No tax and free shipping...why not? That seems pretty intelligent to me. Try the amps at your music store and buy them online.
Well you do get a 10 day trial. If you made learning the amp and tone 2nd priority those 10 days, chances are you would find you liked the Carvin amp of choise.
For myself I know currently my fingers and technique are my tone problem. Technique is everything unless your really playing some cheap assed gear.
progmetaldan
Member
Has anyone had any experience with the Carvin Legacy amps, the Steve Vai ones? I'm kinda looking at the combo...
rockmanxpr
High Speed Samurai
That's exactly what I did with the HK, tried it out in Japan, loved it, and bought from MF
schenkadere
Obey my dog!
I agree with what you say about technique and tone...look at Andy Timmons doing that BB Preamp demo...that's him...that's not the box...there's no magic pedal that will give you that tone.
10 day trial is cool, but packing up an amp and sending it back is a major hassle!
Kenneth R.
Cináed
you got lucky then.
shipping + vaccuum tubes + weight + distance = disaster waiting to happen. I prefer to pick the gear up at the store and transport it more carefully to my place.
You'll argue that it gets shipped to the store in the first place. Sure it does. But likely packed better and in a truck driven by a guy who knows that there's fragile guitar gear in the back, rather than UPS trashing your unknown box. Not to mention the obvious - at a store you can play the amp, make sure it works, and know that it works when you take it home. And finally, but perhaps most important - every amp is different because no two tubes are exactly alike. You might love the tone on one, and the one they ship to you might piss you off.
schenkadere
Obey my dog!
True about the tone...you need to play the one you buy, but most stores aren't going to lug a new amp out of storage and allow someone to play it just to reseal it and sell an opened box if they don't want it.
How about Carvin...they've been in business long enough using standard shipping.
Also...shipping is nothing special...it all comes UPS or FED-X...all components are shipped at some point, in all seasons and all types of weather.
Kenneth R.
Cináed
Point being the subtlety I pointed out above -
in the first case it's handled well because they know that there are fragile guitar amps in the box. It has to get to the store in one piece. In the second case they send it via UPS or FedEx. Those guys don't know what's in the box, and you'd be lucky if they marked it "fragile" or "this end up". In all, I'm just not a fan of discovering expensive equipment busted inside the box upon arrival.
in the first case it's handled well because they know that there are fragile guitar amps in the box. It has to get to the store in one piece. In the second case they send it via UPS or FedEx. Those guys don't know what's in the box, and you'd be lucky if they marked it "fragile" or "this end up". In all, I'm just not a fan of discovering expensive equipment busted inside the box upon arrival.
schenkadere
Obey my dog!
If it's broken or not right...they replace it.
Honestly, I don't usually see the most skilled, knowledgable, bright or caring guys working in music stores...it's usually a bunch of flunkies trying to do and help as little as possible. Then, when you're trying any piece of equipment, there's some dick who needs to try something right next to you but twice as loud.
schenkadere
Obey my dog!
Go to the Carvin bulletin board...there are a lot of conversations about amps and many of the dudes posting have tons of sound clips.
http://www.carvinbbs.com/
schenkadere
Obey my dog!
schenkadere
Obey my dog!
progmetaldan
Member
I'll try not to take offense to that...
haha, it's cool, most stores are as you describe, though my family business here in Adelaide is not...
schenkadere
Obey my dog!
I'll try not to take offense to that...
haha, it's cool, most stores are as you describe, though my family business here in Adelaide is not...
Of course, there is always the exception. Obviously that was a generalization.
