VOX AD30VT super quick review

[deeaa*]

That is a good suggestion, duff...very good indeed. I had briefly thought about adding a speaker out jack, but I never realized it into a clear plan or idea...I think I'll have to do exactly what you suggested :-)

[SuperSwede]

Keep us updated on your results!

[deeaa*]

Okay here's a quick result: with a Marshall 1x10" cab the amp sounds WAY darker, and the drives a lot tighter.

With that speaker, there's even too much gain available, but I still don't like the high gain sounds much; still buzzy. But with this cab, I think some pretty good basic rock drive tones can be achieved.

Will report later on 4x12"...

[Duff]

By the same token, if you install quarter inch jacks between the wires coming from the amp section to the built in speaker; not only can you disconnect the amp from the speaker and plug a speaker cable into the amp section and run it to a properly matched speaker cabinet, BUT you can also disconnect the speaker from the amp at the coupling quarter inch jacks, and, WITH THE VOX AMP TURNED OFF, connect the Vox amp speaker to a different amp speaker out jack or an amp head with a speaker cable and use the Vox amp's speaker as an external or extension speaker to accompany the other amp or head.

NOTE: If you use the Vox speaker as an external/extension speaker for another amp, you MUST NOT have the Vox amp turned on.

Why? In case you are not aware, an amp should never be turned on unless there is a LOAD on the amp. A load in this case is considered to be the speaker that the amp is loading, or in other words, pushing. Otherwise you would get speaker level current running thru the wires and going nowhere, without a circuit to follow and a matching ohm target to hit. This causes the amp serious confusion and can do sometimes IMMEDIATE and PERMANENT damage to the amp section's various parts, causing a CATASTROPHIC FAILURE. You don't want this to happen and putting a piece of tape over the amp power switch to remind you not to turn it on in case you forget you have the speaker connected to something else, can help you to avoid mistakenly turning it on and messing things up. This also prevents or hinders "other people" from turning on the amp when it is not attached to a load. Other people might not be aware of what you are doing and think that it's just an amp sitting there, not a head or a cabinet configuration.

If you are lucky, you can sometimes accidentally turn on the amp without a load and not do serious damage that you would notice, if you only turn the amp on for a few seconds before realizing what you have done and turn it off.

So, the Vox when disconnected from the speaker will be just like any amp head - you will have to have it plugged into a speaker or other load before you turn it on.

Obviously, on the other hand, you do not want to turn on the Vox amp if you have the speaker hooked up to another amp or head. This would not make sense, because you are loading up the speaker from a different source unit and turning on the Vox would have no signal going to the speaker because it is disconnected, obviously.

I might as well be extremely clear here because someone might accidentally think that they need to turn on the Vox amp in order for the speaker to work, even if the speaker is disconnected from the Vox amp speaker output wires.

[deeaa*]

I just did it simple: ran the internal speaker cables from the amp onto a jack on back panel ONLY and the original spealer wires out of the chassis and ending in a plug. Now I can use the mph as a head with regular speaker cables, but if I want to us it as acab for other head, i can plug direct to another head. And no possibility for wrong connectilns in any way. Since its ss dknt even matter if there is no load by accident.

[Duff]

Oh yeah. I forgot that the "load" requirement only applies to tube amps. My memory is not what it used to be.

I have often thought about doing this mod to some of my amps but just never got around to it. I have even considered buying a cheap blown up twin speaker combo and converting it to a cabinet this way.

[deeaa*]

So here's the bottom line:

The Good:

I would well recommend this amp for playing somewhat poppy rock in a band setting; it sounds great played loud and really cuts thru. Cleans and semi-driven sounds all the way to '80's Brit' can yield really nice, jangly and strong sounds perfect for nicely rockin' tunes á la Counting Crowes, The Beatles, The Rebrants, most anything with no heavy thumping guitars. Also it has lots of volume for a 30W SS amp and is way more tweakable and versatile, than, say a real AC30, and isn't expensive.

The D/I out is passable, if you absolutely need to use it, but you cannot use it without cutting the amp output off totally, so it won't work onstage and you need to mike it. Which brings me to...

The bad:

What it lacks is indeed tight bottom and hard drives; you just can't get strong low-string riffs or that 'chugga chugga' feel from it at all, and the more driven the models, the buzzier and buzzier it gets. So forget about heavy and harder rock - the absolute hardest you can get and still sound good is some like old-skool AC/DC kinda sounds. No, not even with a distortion pedal. The internal speaker just won't deliver those thumps. It has no speaker out, but while I did use it with other speakers, it just gets darker, losing that marvellous jangle, and becomes quite the run-of-the mill SS amp sound and still no lows to really speak of with appreciation.

Also, the way it sounds quiet and then D/I and then played loud is infuriatingly different in each case, so you really need to use different settings for each use. So despite the adjustable master volume and D/I output I would not recommend it as a bedroom amp or for D/I recording purposes.

As an afterthought I'd say my experiences reinforce my feel in that if you want to play pop-rock, don't forget to try a Vox; for harder rock you need a Marshall-style amp, and for blues and country etc. a Fenders work usually the best. Just to draw some very rough lines here.

[guitars1969]

If you want to play hard rock and like using vox amps...you can enjoy hard rock sounds with the VT 100 Valvetronix amp it totaly kicks *** Im using it with a combination with my Korg Ax3000G multiprocessor from AC DC to Pantera you can actually choose witch amp you want to use and its all tube and it even comes with a load damper for wattage controlso you can enjoy better tube sounding amp all.. Im running EMG 81's in all my guitars and in this amp ..all the sustain you want so if you like playing Pink Floyd like myself you'll enjoy this amp


The Good:

I would well recommend this amp for playing somewhat poppy rock in a band setting; it sounds great played loud and really cuts thru. Cleans and semi-driven sounds all the way to '80's Brit' can yield really nice, jangly and strong sounds perfect for nicely rockin' tunes á la Counting Crowes, The Beatles, The Rebrants, most anything with no heavy thumping guitars. Also it has lots of volume for a 30W SS amp and is way more tweakable and versatile, than, say a real AC30, and isn't expensive.

The D/I out is passable, if you absolutely need to use it, but you cannot use it without cutting the amp output off totally, so it won't work onstage and you need to mike it. Which brings me to...

The bad:

What it lacks is indeed tight bottom and hard drives; you just can't get strong low-string riffs or that 'chugga chugga' feel from it at all, and the more driven the models, the buzzier and buzzier it gets. So forget about heavy and harder rock - the absolute hardest you can get and still sound good is some like old-skool AC/DC kinda sounds. No, not even with a distortion pedal. The internal speaker just won't deliver those thumps. It has no speaker out, but while I did use it with other speakers, it just gets darker, losing that marvellous jangle, and becomes quite the run-of-the mill SS amp sound and still no lows to really speak of with appreciation.

Also, the way it sounds quiet and then D/I and then played loud is infuriatingly different in each case, so you really need to use different settings for each use. So despite the adjustable master volume and D/I output I would not recommend it as a bedroom amp or for D/I recording purposes.

As an afterthought I'd say my experiences reinforce my feel in that if you want to play pop-rock, don't forget to try a Vox; for harder rock you need a Marshall-style amp, and for blues and country etc. a Fenders work usually the best. Just to draw some very rough lines here.[/QUOTE]

[Duff]

I don't believe that the VT100 is an all tube amp. You need to get into the AC30/15 line of Vox to get that, or the smaller all tube Vox amps. They even have an AC50 tube amp. The VT100 is what they call a "hybrid", meaning it has at least one tube and a solid state balance of the amp. You do not have a tube preamp stage and a tube power amp stage, separately, it has one tube that does the tube effect. Where the tube is in the signal path I'm not sure on the new models. I think it was moved to the power stage but I'm not sure, but it is not a power tube as such, it is a 12ax7 preamp style tube that is assigned various duties if I'm not mistaken. Power tubes are like 6L6'es and EL84's, etc.

Vox has been working on th "chromies" for years now, improving them and selling a lot of them. They are modelling hybrid amps.s

Does the nickel mining still go on in Sudbury? Remember driving thru there as a kid and the area was devoid of vegetation as a result o the nickel mining operations. Hopefully things have changed and it doesn't look like Mars anymore. Around where I live you can see the relics of the old days of Old King Coal, massive coal slag heap mountains. They are recycling the slag now and retreiving a lot of usable coal out of the slag, and cleaning up some of the areas, but the largest underground coal fire in the world is still burning near here in Centralia, Pa. It will probably never be put out.