Hi, my name is Fuse, and I am a Tweaker.

[FuseG4]

Re: Hi, my name is Fuse, and I am a Tweaker.

Congratulations on the new amp. Glad you finally got a real amp . All those posts a bout the DSL not cutting it... It's more suited for louder applications and don't sound good on low volume at all. No Marshall does actually.
Now all you have to do is change out that speaker and you're golden for a long time.
Does the amp have a crunch channel? How does it sound?

it's one channel, but it has a switch that changes the gain to (I think it's) +9dB, they call it the hot switch. It sounds thick and full, with out as much low-end as the DSL. The brit mode at max gain doesn't have that same sizzle and bite that the dsl has, but it is capable of getting that british flavoured midrange that reminds you of marshall.

The american side when really driven has a bit tighter bass, nice treble, and less mids. With the "modern" switch on (it's either a mid-cut or a bass/treble boost) it does some things that make me think of the hot-rod deluxe but not as edgy sounding. It doesn't have enough gain at low volumes to get into mesa territory by itself. I'll have to find some time to give it a go with the master cranked.

 

[FuseG4]

Re: Hi, my name is Fuse, and I am a Tweaker.

the gain structure has a certain sag to it

I think this is what I'd been missing since I had the night train. I didn't realize how much I really liked that sound until I gave it up. I thought for a while that everything had to be high gain and all tight and immediate. There's plenty of use for that but I've figured out that I definitely need some natural sag for a lot of the stuff I play.

 

[FuseG4]

Re: Hi, my name is Fuse, and I am a Tweaker.

 

[misterwhizzy]

Re: Hi, my name is Fuse, and I am a Tweaker.

I bet that cabinet's breathing a sigh of relief.

Speaking of which, when are you going to put in an Eminence Wizard like your tone deserves?

 

[FuseG4]

Re: Hi, my name is Fuse, and I am a Tweaker.

when i put in a few more hours at work? I was actually thinking of going for an american flavored eminence like a C-rex or a texas heat, to really compliment the USA voicing of the amp which I like so much. Or maybe the "ultimate DR speaker" the Weber 12F150... that sounds like it'd rule.
I had also contemplated going back to a greenback, but am thinking of experimenting and leaving the GB as a "if nothing else works out I'll go back to this" kinda thing

First though, I've been putting off buying a PGn for my agile forever, as the stock neck pickup is actually decent. I MUST do that first.

 

[greatbob6]

Re: Hi, my name is Fuse, and I am a Tweaker.

I'm pretty interested in the Tweaker, since I'm not completely happy with the cleans on my HT-5...what's your opinion of the clean sound, both Vox-ish and Fender-ish varieties?

 

[FuseG4]

Re: Hi, my name is Fuse, and I am a Tweaker.

I'm pretty interested in the Tweaker, since I'm not completely happy with the cleans on my HT-5...what's your opinion of the clean sound, both Vox-ish and Fender-ish varieties?

awesome. The night train is a lil sweeter in the clean than the vox side of the tweaker but the american side of the tweaker is pretty sweet. it's better than a blues Jr or pro jr. It's also nicer than the BF voicing on the SCXD. it's got a tone that really makes me think of blackfaces fenders but it's not quite as smooth and shimmery... but the general EQ is right.
The sweet spot for cleans is pretty wide. The "clean" setting goes from dead clean to a light crunch but in between there's a nice palette of cleans of varying warmth.
The "hot" mode cleans up pretty easily when the gain's less than half.

This amp has some of my favorite cleans of an amp less than $600 or less than 40W. That was a HUGE factor in my decision to buy.

 

[greatbob6]

Re: Hi, my name is Fuse, and I am a Tweaker.

Sweet! I've got some time off work next week so I may have to go in to GC when there aren't a bunch of dropped-D metal kids blasting out of the Line 6 Spiders. Last time I was there I tried to check out the Tweaker but I couldn't hear a thing I was doing.

 

[Empty Pockets]

Re: Hi, my name is Fuse, and I am a Tweaker.

Foot switches? Or is it just a "studio" amp with all these tube tones accessible via the facetoggles?

Either way that's pretty rad -- definitely good enough for most basement / bedroom / apartment jammers and small-scale rockers. I wonder if my shop's ever gonna stock 'em...

 

[FuseG4]

Re: Hi, my name is Fuse, and I am a Tweaker.

Foot switches? Or is it just a "studio" amp with all these tube tones accessible via the facetoggles?

Either way that's pretty rad -- definitely good enough for most basement / bedroom / apartment jammers and small-scale rockers. I wonder if my shop's ever gonna stock 'em...

footswitchable? nope. I'm glad this amp doesn't really need it. It cleans up well with a volume knob, sounds good with OD pedals, and I don't know why one would ever wanna switch tone-stack voicings mid song. Some people would like to do that maybe, but I wouldn't have a need to.

The tweaker 40 and tweaker 88 are gonna be channel switchers though, looks like with 2 master volumes and 2 reverbs (at least on the 88), and with bright, tight, and hot switches for each channel. Looks like the tone-stack voicing switch and EQ are global. I read that the preamp is the same in the whole tweaker line, but the difference will be the power section. 40W of 6l6 in one, and an unknown wattage coming from I think 4 KT-88s

 

[FuseG4]

Re: Hi, my name is Fuse, and I am a Tweaker.

I'm still waffling about speakers, but for now lets see what 2 Sylvania 6V6GT/A do for this baby. Hope they get here soon! With all my tube amps so far, I've always experimented with at least 1 other brand of power tubes besides what the amp came with, and in every case except for the JJ 6v6 (couldn't hear a difference vs EH), thing have been better, even at low volumes.

I have my ANOS japanese 12AX7 in v1 and it has better note definition for sure. I don't really care for the sovtek 12ax7wa that came stock. I thought about getting another NOS or ANOS 12ax7 but the other tubes are the PI and the loop buffer... my gut tells me that new production stuff is probably fine there.

For the speaker I think I should just wait to do my taxes and then just get a new cab too, something a lil beefier and made from... not MDF. A nice avatar 1x12 would be cool.

 

[misterwhizzy]

Re: Hi, my name is Fuse, and I am a Tweaker.

That's interesting. Only two preamp tubes, huh? I'm really interested to see how he's doing what he's doing with that. I'd be very, very surprised if he's buffering the loop with that second tube. I would imagine it's probably a second tone-generating tube, and the loop and the PI are solid state.

I had heard quite a bit about this amp, but I have yet to play one. Any way we could get gut shots of this bad boy? I would imagine the BlackStar HT-5 is one of the amps this one is targeting, and it looks like there is probably quite a bit of the same type of solid-state trickery they're using. And I'm not passing judgment based on tube compliment. I'm just interested to see how it's done.

 

[FretFire]

Re: Hi, my name is Fuse, and I am a Tweaker.

There are actually three preamp tubes.

 

[misterwhizzy]

Re: Hi, my name is Fuse, and I am a Tweaker.

There are actually three preamp tubes.

I guess the website is wrong then. Still, I'd rather use two tone-generating tubes for gain and one for phase inverter than to waste one on the loop, which may or may not be used.

 

[FuseG4]

Re: Hi, my name is Fuse, and I am a Tweaker.

yeah it's one tone-generating 12ax7 in v1, the v2 is the tube buffer (not listed in the "preamp" because it's not really a pre-amp application) and the PI is V3.

I don't think this amp needs 2 preamp tubes before the PI, y'know? It doesn't suffer from lack of gain, unless you want that "metal" stuff or whatever the hell kids listen to these days.

I like the tube effects loop. The loop on the DSL sounded a lil noisy and things like delay or reverb came in really, really strong.

Everything I throw through the loop on this tweaker sounds just a touch mellower. It's nice. My reverb doesn't get washy so quickly. Loop hos no add'l noise either, Pretty cool.

 

[misterwhizzy]

Re: Hi, my name is Fuse, and I am a Tweaker.

yeah it's one tone-generating 12ax7 in v1, the v2 is the tube buffer (not listed in the "preamp" because it's not really a pre-amp application) and the PI is V3.

It's just surprising that it's not listed on either the specs or the layout. That's all.

I don't think this amp needs 2 preamp tubes before the PI, y'know? It doesn't suffer from lack of gain, unless you want that "metal" stuff or whatever the hell kids listen to these days.

Yeah, I'd honestly be surprised if the amount of gain I've heard in YouTube videos come strictly from the tubes. Is there a significant volume boost when you engage the hot mode? If not, I'd be willing to be that's switching in a pair of clipping diodes. Again, I'm glad you like the head. I'm not passing judgment. I'm just trying to figure out how they accomplished all those features.