80's_Metal
Underglazed Hair Metalologist
I've been really tone searching a lot lately.
Bought a boss Katana, bought an Egnater Vengeance, messing with my TSL settings and swapping out valves etc etc. Swapping a lot of pickups, drop tuning to B which is my new favorite....
Anyhow, I sold my Egnater to my other guitarist and he is **** giggles stoked with it! It really does rock.
So I had enough starter cash to give another amp a go.
I was looking really hard at the DSL100, (not the older jcm2k DSL, but the new model with the 50/100w option) and the JCM900 sl-x and put an offer in on reverb for a 900.. it was Denied, so I bought the DSL.
It showed up today. Thing is dead mint, not a scratch on it.
I plugged in and rocked through some settings for awhile.
I wasn't blown away with the tone, as I was lead to believe, by the numerous vids and opinions on it, reviews and love and admirations for the amp. It rocked, but not as good as my TSL.
So..... I popped the back off, (never been opened up before) pulled the stock Marshall logo ecc83s out and installed a Mullard 12ax7 into V1 and a high gain matched set of EHX 12ax7s in it.
Fired it back up and wow! There it is! These are the same preamp tubes as I am rocking in my TSL atm. I'm calling this setup "my magic formula" now. It sounds sooooo much better, with much more gain and smoothness to the tone, just wow! Now I love it!
Quickly comparing it to the TSL:
Sizewise, It is wider and deeper than my
TSL and the logo is smaller on the DSL....
The DSL is seemingly louder than hell itself! It has a bit meatier mid tone to it and less gain I think.
It is a bit hissier at full gain than my TSL and not as sparkly in the top end.
More to come on that later.
Yay for new amp days!
Bought a boss Katana, bought an Egnater Vengeance, messing with my TSL settings and swapping out valves etc etc. Swapping a lot of pickups, drop tuning to B which is my new favorite....
Anyhow, I sold my Egnater to my other guitarist and he is **** giggles stoked with it! It really does rock.
So I had enough starter cash to give another amp a go.
I was looking really hard at the DSL100, (not the older jcm2k DSL, but the new model with the 50/100w option) and the JCM900 sl-x and put an offer in on reverb for a 900.. it was Denied, so I bought the DSL.
It showed up today. Thing is dead mint, not a scratch on it.
I plugged in and rocked through some settings for awhile.
I wasn't blown away with the tone, as I was lead to believe, by the numerous vids and opinions on it, reviews and love and admirations for the amp. It rocked, but not as good as my TSL.
So..... I popped the back off, (never been opened up before) pulled the stock Marshall logo ecc83s out and installed a Mullard 12ax7 into V1 and a high gain matched set of EHX 12ax7s in it.
Fired it back up and wow! There it is! These are the same preamp tubes as I am rocking in my TSL atm. I'm calling this setup "my magic formula" now. It sounds sooooo much better, with much more gain and smoothness to the tone, just wow! Now I love it!
Quickly comparing it to the TSL:
Sizewise, It is wider and deeper than my
TSL and the logo is smaller on the DSL....
The DSL is seemingly louder than hell itself! It has a bit meatier mid tone to it and less gain I think.
It is a bit hissier at full gain than my TSL and not as sparkly in the top end.
More to come on that later.
Yay for new amp days!
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BTW - I totally do understand why you use the boost, or at least why the TSL needs one to excel with super-tight metal tones; but I think it'd be interesting to hear whether the DSL necessarily needs one as much. I'd be excited to hear how they work clean too 
