2nd Hand Marshall Advice

Myrddin

Hi guys, Im just looking for some tips between two different amps Im looking at. Basically Im trying to decide between the TSL601 and the AVT150.

Apparently that lad Kobiba (Youtube) uses an AVT150, and manages to pretty much nail the Guns N Roses sound with it. But Ive read conflicting reports and picking up to much humm/buzz.

The amp will be used for personal use only, so Im aware 150w may seem like a massacre there, but Im looking for a really high quality sound at low usage volumes. The TSL601 is a 60 watt amp, and again its overkill for a bedroom, but apparently you dont have to crank the amp to get that punchy Marshall sound.

My main influence would be Richie Sambora, but I like a bit of Slash too, so the amp would need to be versatile, and have that tube sound.

Ive never played either amp, so any experience with them from anybody would be great. Cheers

-=al=-

sounds liike the tsl id more for you, i have the 100 and have it on 25 watts all the time, does the 601 have that option?

either way i only use my clean channel on my tsl + a fulldrive and tubescreamer for similarish kinda tones to the people u mentioned... you need more than an amp to sound like those fellers

Myrddin

-=al=- wrote: »

sounds liike the tsl id more for you, i have the 100 and have it on 25 watts all the time, does the 601 have that option?

either way i only use my clean channel on my tsl + a fulldrive and tubescreamer for similarish kinda tones to the people u mentioned... you need more than an amp to sound like those fellers

Im not sure about the step down option...would be very handy.

I know the amp is the last in a chain of units when getting your sound, just from what Ive heard I really like the sound of them. Cheers

Quattroste

The 601 will need to be cranked to get the right sound you're looking for. There are a lot of queries on here about bedroom level tone etc. The fact of the matter is that you will never get Slash or Sambora's tone at bedroom level. Their tone is all about saturated driven tubes.

Now, having said that I use tube amps at home and can get the sounds "I" want. I also use a Pod X3 which gives me similar enough tones to a variety of amps, effects, that I do not have. You may be better off with something like that if you're not going to gig.

Last point, the AVT150 (I think) is not a tube amp so the 150 rating does not mean it is way louder than the 60 watt TSL. Tube amps are louder in general.

Myrddin

Quattroste wrote: »

The 601 will need to be cranked to get the right sound you're looking for. There are a lot of queries on here about bedroom level tone etc. The fact of the matter is that you will never get Slash or Sambora's tone at bedroom level. Their tone is all about saturated driven tubes.

Now, having said that I use tube amps at home and can get the sounds "I" want. I also use a Pod X3 which gives me similar enough tones to a variety of amps, effects, that I do not have. You may be better off with something like that if you're not going to gig.

Last point, the AVT150 (I think) is not a tube amp so the 150 rating does not mean it is way louder than the 60 watt TSL. Tube amps are louder in general.

Good points, cheers. Im aware Ill never get them exactly, but Id like to approxamte them as close as possible. I dont want to get into a war about copying tones either, as its purely for my own personal pleasure I dont see the harm in it.

What is the Podx3? It is an effects board?

-=al=-

digital multifx really and amp modeler and that jazz... ive a podxt i use for recording and all sorts + a tsl for live and normal tones, but on the tsl i only use the clean channel and the likes, ive a nice enough tone out of it

also used my pod thru the tsl for decent enough results, cant beat real amps though, but the convienece of the pod and similar units is great... heres a vid of a sambora like tone i done with the pod - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FmwLp0QJ50I

ive some tsl vids up but the quality is lame but a nice overdrive into a tsl will give nice sounds indeed

avt is a hybrid, so yeah the 150 isnt exactly tube loudness... tube to solid state is an average ratio of 3:1 in loudness the solid state being 3, so 150w solid state is similar to 50w tube

Myrddin

-=al=- wrote: »

heres a vid of a sambora like tone i done with the pod - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FmwLp0QJ50I

Thats absoloutely brilliant man, very impressed. It more or less nails the Sambora tone Im after too...

Ideally Im looking for my guitar, an integrated pedal board unit - nothing fancy, and an amp.

Which would be the better effects unit - the XT or the X3? I have a lend of a Boss ME-50 which I quite like also, so how would the Pod's rate against that? Sorry for the stupid questions, but when it comes to effects ect Im more or less a noob. Im at home with an amp, the amps distortion, the amps reverb and a guitar

-=al=-

x3 is the newew one id imagine thats better and comes in pedalboard form too so its pretty nifty

you can always use the pod through anything with an audio input they're super handy andy

darrenw5094

EnterNow wrote: »

Thats absoloutely brilliant man, very impressed. It more or less nails the Sambora tone Im after too...

Ideally Im looking for my guitar, an integrated pedal board unit - nothing fancy, and an amp.

Which would be the better effects unit - the XT or the X3? I have a lend of a Boss ME-50 which I quite like also, so how would the Pod's rate against that? Sorry for the stupid questions, but when it comes to effects ect Im more or less a noob. Im at home with an amp, the amps distortion, the amps reverb and a guitar

The POD XT Live can be bought for €200 used on adverts.
The newer one is POD X3 Live......both are floor board controllers too with expression pedal for wah etc.

With either of those, you can go onto the Line6 website, search for the exact song you want, download it and then transfer into the POD XT memory.

NoQuarter

EnterNow wrote: »

Which would be the better effects unit - the XT or the X3? I have a lend of a Boss ME-50 which I quite like also, so how would the Pod's rate against that?

The XTL is great! The X3 is probably slightly better but for €200 the XTL is well worth it, the Me-50 is just a distortion pedal but the Pod's are like little magic boxes, you can hook them up to your computer and change throught loads of amps and cabs and effects throught that or through the unit itself, and as someone already said you can go to the line6 website, search for any song and cling "get tone" and the tone of that song whisks down your USB cable straight into the machine and hey presto you have whatever tone you want!

darrenw5094

king-stew wrote: »

The XTL is great! The X3 is probably slightly better but for €200 the XTL is well worth it, the Me-50 is just a distortion pedal but the Pod's are like little magic boxes, you can hook them up to your computer and change throught loads of amps and cabs and effects throught that or through the unit itself, and as someone already said you can go to the line6 website, search for any song and cling "get tone" and the tone of that song whisks down your USB cable straight into the machine and hey presto you have whatever tone you want!

Yep. Handy job. Line6 website Custom Tones are decent enough. Just search for the song or band/guitarist and download. You even tweak the tones to suit you.

Myrddin

Excellent advice guys cheers. Ive since got the TSL601, and as Quatrroste said above, you do have to crank it slightly do get the tones Im after. This isnt really suitable for me as the neighbours wont be impressed Im going to move it on and shop around, as I should have done in the first place.

Regards the Pod tone download, has anybody here tried the Slash tone?

-=al=-

theres 100's and 1000's of tones from users rated too, theres tones for guitarists and songs and individual stuff too its endless really

at the end of the day u cant beat proper pedlas and a nice amp but the digital stuff is pretty handy and most folk cant tell differences

NoQuarter

EnterNow wrote: »

Regards the Pod tone download, has anybody here tried the Slash tone?

Yeah as al said, you can get a tone for most guitarists (about 20 tones actually) so you'll definitly get a close slash tone. Just to note, you have to make sure your amp has an effects loop to run the pod through. Because the pod is an amp modeller, it doesnt make sense to get a tone from the machine and then run it through an amp which will give it that amp sound. It would be like getting slash's amp and running it through your own amp, the sound would be coloured!

Myrddin

king-stew wrote: »

Yeah as al said, you can get a tone for most guitarists (about 20 tones actually) so you'll definitly get a close slash tone. Just to note, you have to make sure your amp has an effects loop to run the pod through. Because the pod is an amp modeller, it doesnt make sense to get a tone from the machine and then run it through an amp which will give it that amp sound. It would be like getting slash's amp and running it through your own amp, the sound would be coloured!

I actually finally understand the fx loop now - thanks for that common sense explanation. You guys have really helped me here, its more advice than I could have hoped for. Im going to try pick up an AVT50, and an XTL when I move the TSL on.

Regards using the fx loop, how is the accomplished say compared to just using a standard pedal through the amps input?

-=al=-

tbh the pod in the normal chain works too i done it a few times once its on a neutral clean channel so its grand for use of the effects yeah maybe thru the loop but on its own once its on a clean channel its grand yes it may be slighyl coloured but aok

i uised it on a handfull of amps p.a's and recordings, its so handy but it really foest atch live amps but like i said everyone wont know.... cept me of cours

darrenw5094

EnterNow wrote: »

I actually finally understand the fx loop now - thanks for that common sense explanation. You guys have really helped me here, its more advice than I could have hoped for. Im going to try pick up an AVT50, and an XTL when I move the TSL on.

Regards using the fx loop, how is the accomplished say compared to just using a standard pedal through the amps input?

Surely the TSL is a better amp than the Marshall AVT range. That would be a small step backwards on the amp thing.

You could still buy a used POX XT Live and plug it into the 'Return' of the loop at the back instead of the amps main input. That would bypass the amps pre-amp and go straight into the power amp section.

Myrddin

darrenw5094 wrote: »

Surely the TSL is a better amp than the Marshall AVT range. That would be a small step backwards on the amp thing.

You could still buy a used POX XT Live and plug it into the 'Return' of the loop at the back instead of the amps main input. That would bypass the amps pre-amp and go straight into the power amp section.

Yeah the TSL is a better amp in every respect, I just think I overdid it as its far from a bedroom amp. To experience the proper tone of this amp, you really have to be hearing the power amp, which unfortunately comes on at a level too high for a bedroom. Just from listening to the various amps on youtube, the avt50 seems to sound really good at lower volumes, but poor when loud - but this suits me On a side note, has anyone ever listened to that guy Kobiba on the tube? However he is doing it, my god its a powerful tone. "Apparently", all he uses is a Gibson LP Standard '82 (with stock pickups, whatever they may be) and an AVT50. I find it very hard to believe that though - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tV86vHn38VI - thoughts?

So the return jack, is obviously the input from the effects center back to the amp - what is the send jack for then?

Paolo_M

EnterNow wrote: »

So the return jack, is obviously the input from the effects center back to the amp - what is the send jack for then?

The send is used when you plug your guitar straight into the main input of the amplifier.
Here you'd run a cable from the send jack into your FX. The output from the FX is then sent back to the amplifier return jack. Basically your guitar signal is processed by the preamp and then sent to the FX unit.

As the Pod is a amp modeller you want to skip the preamp of the amplifier and so you'd plug guitar into Pod and then into the return of the amp. The send jack would not be used in this case.

Myrddin

Paolo_M wrote: »

The send is used when you plug your guitar straight into the main input of the amplifier.
Here you'd run a cable from the send jack into your FX. The output from the FX is then sent back to the amplifier return jack. Basically your guitar signal is processed by the preamp and then sent to the FX unit.

As the Pod is a amp modeller you want to skip the preamp of the amplifier and so you'd plug guitar into Pod and then into the return of the amp. The send jack would not be used in this case.

So the send jack is when you want your amp's pre-amp sound sent to the effects loop?

demanufactured

Yes.

NoQuarter

Also, when you plug guitar > Pod > Effects loop (return) you'll need to plug a "dummy" lead into the amps normal input or you wont hear any sound, as in youll actually need to plug in a spare cable with nothing on the end of it into the amps main input! Dont ask me why though!

One more thing, the Pod is perfect for playin through a PA system so another option to consider would be to buy a PA from thomann.de or somewhere else and run your pod through that, thats exactly what i do, i have a little PA set up in my room and it works a treat, with the option to hook a mic or whateer else up to it!

-=al=-

the pod can be output to anything really its a rather versatile handy device, even yer stereo aux in

handy things

NoQuarter

-=al=- wrote: »

the pod can be output to anything really its a rather versatile handy device, even yer stereo aux in

handy things

If your stereo has the power that is! As i learned when i nearly blew up my surround sound in my room!

Paolo_M

king-stew wrote: »

If your stereo has the power that is! As i learned when i nearly blew up my surround sound in my room!

How is your SS system powered then, by the TV?
Don't know SS that well but any I've seen have power amps built into the sub woofer.

NoQuarter

Paolo_M wrote: »

How is your SS system powered then, by the TV?
Don't know SS that well but any I've seen have power amps built into the sub woofer.

No the SS is hooked up to my laptop, its powered by its own power cable, theres a subwoofer and 5 other speakers, when i hooked up the pod it was ok if i played soft but a power chord would make the SS crackle, it just couldnt cope!

Paolo_M

king-stew wrote: »

No the SS is hooked up to my laptop, its powered by its own power cable, theres a subwoofer and 5 other speakers, when i hooked up the pod it was ok if i played soft but a power chord would make the SS crackle, it just couldnt cope!

That's weird.
I'd guess that the output from a Pod is line level?
Any power amp should handle line level signals cleanly.

Is there a pad output on the Pod or is there a -4/+10dB setting on your SS power amp?

darrenw5094

king-stew wrote: »

Also, when you plug guitar > Pod > Effects loop (return) you'll need to plug a "dummy" lead into the amps normal input or you wont hear any sound, as in youll actually need to plug in a spare cable with nothing on the end of it into the amps main input! Dont ask me why though!

Never heard of this before. Fired many preamps into the combo loop return and was no need for the spare dummy cable.

Paolo_M

darrenw5094 wrote: »

Never heard of this before. Fired many preamps into the combo loop return and was no need for the spare dummy cable.

Yeah, I was gunna ask about that too.
Surely putting a dummy cable into the main input in that case would be both pointless and introduce a bunch of noise while you're at it?

darrenw5094

Paolo_M wrote: »

Yeah, I was gunna ask about that too.
Surely putting a dummy cable into the main input in that case would be both pointless and introduce a bunch of noise while you're at it?

Maybe stick the other end in your gob for a new type of sound.

I wonder what kind of amp needed a dummy cable in the input jack for the volume to be normal? My money is on an MG.

Myrddin

Interesting stuff guys. I know this thread has evolved from its origins but Ill keep posting here as its related. What is the difference between the Pod XT Live, and the XT Studio?

NoQuarter

darrenw5094 wrote: »

I wonder what kind of amp needed a dummy cable in the input jack for the volume to be normal? My money is on an MG.

Line 6 Flextone III

No extra noise at all from the dummy cable, i dont understand the reason behind it myself! must trigger a bypass or something!