Crate V58?

Karl Hungus

I was looking at this little Tube amp by Crate.

It's a 5 Watt amp with 1 EL84 in the poweramp section, 1 12AX7 in the preamp, and an 8" celestion speaker. Basically a real tube amp suitable for practice/jamming/bedroom playing. Have to say, I'm both impressed by reviews, and very tempted to add it to the collection.

Any thoughts?

Eoin Madsen

It looks nice for what it is. How much does it cost?

You can't really run a preamp with a tone stack on one 12AX7/ECC83 so I assume it has an opamp/transistor pair in one of the gain stages, probably the first. Not necessarily a bad thing, unless you're specifically looking for an all-valve amp or you have a preference for a valve driver.

david

I doubt its any better than a ValveState

Karl Hungus

Eoin Madsen wrote:

It looks nice for what it is. How much does it cost?

You can't really run a preamp with a tone stack on one 12AX7/ECC83 so I assume it has an opamp/transistor pair in one of the gain stages, probably the first. Not necessarily a bad thing, unless you're specifically looking for an all-valve amp or you have a preference for a valve driver.

Whoops! Massive blooper on my part! It is definetly 2 12AX7s, just double checked the manual online to be sure. As for the price, it's a little steep at €459 from www.musik-produktiv.de but I suppose what do you expect for an all-tube amp?

Freak, I'd say it would be a hell of a lot better than a valvestate, and it's had some shining reviews online.

Doctor J

It has valves, for a start

Karl Hungus

Doctor J wrote:

It has valves, for a start

Mmmm... Valves.

Oh no, I'm coming down with a dose of GAS! :eek:

david

Not ALL valve, just valve preamp methinks. You can get a Laney LC15r for €260 with upgraded tubes and speaker in adlib, carlow

Karl Hungus

Valve pre-amp and valve power-amp, freak.

Although, that Laney sounds damn good too.

david

Really? I though 12AX7's were only used for preamps. But yeah that Laney is very nice. Check it out if youre ever in Carlow. Same amp is 399 in musicmaker without the decent valves and speaker.

Karl Hungus

No, it's an EL84 in the poweramp section, freak.

david

Oh ok. The Laney still looks like the better deal to me TBH

Eoin Madsen

Yeah, I had a look at the block diagram - it is an opamp in the driver, so it's not all-valve unfortunately. You were right the first time, it is one 12AX7. The 12AX7/ECC83 is a dual triode, so you can have two valve gain stages in the one valve, which is what's on the diagram (one half is before the tone stack and the other is after it, I presume to make up for gain loss over the stack). Tbh, I'm not sure I'd be that pushed about a hybrid amp with a single-ended EL84 powerstage, given the money. You can pick up a Fender Blues Junior for not much more - it has an all valve preamp, and a pair of EL84s in push pull config.

Karl Hungus

Ah in fairness, I was just a little bit dazzled by the concept of a little 5watt tube combo with an 8" speaker. I doubt I'd really buy any other amp at the moment.

Eoin Madsen

Yeah, it'd be a great idea if it had another 12AX7 and it was as cheap as it should be.