Attenuators

boycey

Hi guys,
just wondering have many of you used attenuators/ heard them in action? Have a lovely 50watt non master volume Marshall head traded from another board member, sounds great with an overdrive pedal at low volume but would be nice to crank it too!! Any recomendations? Was thinking of ordering a Weber M.A.S.S. from the states.

Cheers,
Kev.

Voodu Child

Attenuators work great at knocking a little off the total volume. If you just want to crank the master volume an extra 1/4 turn, but keep the volume the same, they absolutely excel at something like that.

But trying to take a totally cranked amp, and bring the volume down to 'low' levels, the results won't be great. Too much attenuation and the sound gets messed up, you lose all the lows etc, just doesnt sound good. If that's what you're trying to achieve (super-low practice levels), your money would be better spent on a little microcube or something. But if you just want to take the edge off a super-loud amp, they're fanastic tools.

The best attenuator on the market is the THD Hotplate series, I recommend them personally.

Dord

Your best bet for the 50w Marshall is to get it modified with a master volume.

boycey

Thanks guys.
I suppose I'd be happy if it made the amp 'neighbour friendly' at 3 or 4 on the volume as I always find amps suddenly 'grow balls' at that stage. Sure they sound better at 7 or 8 but the tubey goodness starts happening further down the scale (thats with my Laneys anyway).

PS- Joe Robot- you know anyone doing that kind of modding in Dublin or near hand?

punchdrunk

has it got 4 power amp valves?
i've heard you can pull a pair of these and it will half the power,afaik you'd have to rebias though

Dord

boycey wrote: »

Thanks guys.
I suppose I'd be happy if it made the amp 'neighbour friendly' at 3 or 4 on the volume as I always find amps suddenly 'grow balls' at that stage. Sure they sound better at 7 or 8 but the tubey goodness starts happening further down the scale (thats with my Laneys anyway).

PS- Joe Robot- you know anyone doing that kind of modding in Dublin or near hand?

Check the sticky, there are a few amp tech's in Dublin. Any good tech should know how to do it.

If you're just looking to crank it at home for recording then you should have a look at some isolation cabinets. Thomann have a few for sale afaik.

boycey

Thanks guys, Ill contact some of the amp techs and see if they'd be interested- and reasonably wallet friendly!!
What I have been doing with rather nice results this afternoon is turning the amp up loud and putting the volume right down on my overdrive pedal (fulltone fulldrive2- wicked pedal and then some). Sounds good. Thanks one and all for the advice.

BostonB

Many moons ago I used an attenuator on my old Marshall. I thought it worked ok. Only started playing again recently and this time I've just gone for a Roland Cube. Mainly because I can play it at very low volume or with headphones. You might like to hear these though...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8xJbLa6jRv0
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sK5dzFwbfS8&feature=related

Mind you some people can get great tone out of a MS-2
http://www.youtube.com/profile_videos?user=ohjiozubon&p=r