Fuller more rounded tone (more bottom and top end) and better headroom. What makes the Bugera V5 sound so much better than the Crate V5? The Crate V5 has an op-amp in front of the 12AX7 preamp tube I assume for conditioning the incoming signal but it also contains the tone circuit which sucks. I like the op-amp being there because I can work around it while leaving the tube portion of the circuit pretty much intact. I hope I'm saying that right.