NAD

[JMP/HBE]

I kinda want the 50 watter because it sounded good to me in clips but no way I'd ever crank it up to where it would sound best. I'd be pretty happy I think with pedals in front.

I sorta get cathode biasing but after reading a few tidbits on using any tubes in such amps, I'd not personally want to drop in whatever tubes into an amp unless it was biased to match them or previously tested to be sure they are within the range the amp was designed for (as boogie does). Yes, I understand they'd still probably work. It would just be in the back of my mind that maybe they wouldn't be ideal.

At any rate, glad it works for your needs. I love a handy grab-and-go amp!

I feel your pain. 3 weeks ago i bought a quad of ANOS [almost new old stock] Amperex 6CA7's with good results but taking the sellers word for the testing data. Couple years ago i got a nice quad tested 70% new.
So if 2 quads are good than another quad is better [my classic GAS thinking].
Well last Saturday i installed & biased the latest quad testing at 50% to 70%.
There was an audible hum on startup, i turned it up and popped a 1 amp fuse. One of the tubes is bad pulling too much "Z".
I had never popped a fuse in the JMP in the whole 15 years ive had that amp.
I may be able match a pair for one of my 50 watt amps but i wont use them as a quad.
The seller gave me a partial refund.
Its the price of messing with NOS power tubes but tube prices for new are not that different than NOS.
All my amps have NOS and all have good tubes now. I shouldn't have any problems.
Thermionic vavle amps are electro-mechanical devices. No need to be apprehensive.
With Cathode bias if it doesnt redplate in the first 10 to 15 minutes you're prolly okay.

[misterwhizzy]

I kinda want the 50 watter because it sounded good to me in clips but no way I'd ever crank it up to where it would sound best. I'd be pretty happy I think with pedals in front.

I bought one of the 50-watters maybe a year and a half after they came out. I love it, but if you value your hearing, you won’t get the tones you hear on YouTube videos. Putting pedals in front of it has convinced me to get over my tube snobbery, though, because it’s an excellent pedal platform.

Even that deserves a small caveat, though. My main rhythm tone now is a Friedman Small Box pedal into the front end into Greenbacks. It sounds and feels amazing. But my Revv G4, which I bought for more modern and higher gain sounds, HATES going into the front, but it does all the tube-preamp sound and feel going into the effects loop return.

I don’t really use the power scaling feature, because it just seems to kill the punch that the amp has at full power without lowering the volume significantly.

[DankStar]

I bought one of the 50-watters maybe a year and a half after they came out. I love it…..

Thanks for the insights. Interesting about those two pedals. When I had a jcm900 it loved the tube king in front as my main sound