600 watt 8 ohm amp heads

[_One//Man//Mutiny_]

Some solid options. I knew TB wouldn't let me down. I hear the Peavey has reliability issues. Anyone ever compare the D800 to darkglass micro tubes? I love my D800+ and don't see replacing it anytime soon. I'm on the fence with the B amp though, it's amazing but I think my ears prefer a more baked in color from the amp.

I’ve only played the Mesa in the store, I liked it but felt that my darkglass had more going on especially with the blendable vintage microtubes and b3k circuits built in. But one thing to consider about the darkglass is that it’s set up unlike most amps. It has layers to it. The main eq has tons of tweakability with the low and high mid frequency selector switches, then you either have the Vintage microtubes or B3k circuit to blend into your clean signal, you also have the ability to turn the dirty side on and off with the footswitch. They have a new footswitch out that you can toggle switch between clean, vmt, b3k and mute. The normal footswitch that it comes with is one button clean, dirty and hold to mute.
I think I can safely say that both heads can sound similar but the darkglass also does its own thing which is very very nice to have. Great clean sounds, then the ability to ever so slightly fatten up the tone in a vintage or modern flavor and it goes from slight tube saturation all the way up to really great overdrive and distortion on either circuit, it’s a nice trick it has in its bag. I usually run mine either clean or with the vmt set slightly gritty sounds very very good. You’re really able to bring out the nice warm lows and get as much treble as you want on the higher strings. Most amps I feel like when you really want that deep warm tone on the lows it throws a blanket over the treble, this amp doesn’t do that.

 

[agedhorse]

@Old Garage-Bander it would definitely be a very nominal difference. I guess where this is coming from is the chart from barefaced and the BB2 cab that I have coming. It shows that at its maximum loudness for 600w and maximum headroom at 800w. My curiosity is simply getting the best of me.

-edit, I actually have a D800+

IMO, 400 watts is a good match with your cabinet. It will sound good and have a long life powered this way.

 

[dBChad]

Carvin RedLine 1000

 

[Major_Rager_4MF]

Tecamp Puma 900

 

[two fingers]

If you don't mind it being heavy, Ampeg SVT 6-PRO has been serving me pretty well.

Maybe the most underrated head ever made. I usually have zero regrets letting gear go. But I sometimes browse here and Reverb looking for one of those. Unless I'm forgetting something, that would be my first repeat piece of gear if I bought one.

If you learn the mids and the voltage control you have a ridiculously powerful tool at your fingertips with an SVT 6 Pro.

 

[InhumanResource]

Maybe the most underrated head ever made. I usually have zero regrets letting gear go. But I sometimes browse here and Reverb looking for one of those. Unless I'm forgetting something, that would be my first repeat piece of gear if I bought one.

If you learn the mids and the voltage control you have a ridiculously powerful tool at your fingertips with an SVT 6 Pro.

It kicks serious butt! I have been tempted to downsize from the big rig lately, but if it wasn't for the weight there is nothing to complain about. Great tone and super versatile.

 

[Pulverizor]

The Peavey MegaMini must be about that at 8ohms, it's 1000watts@4 yeah?

 

[Hercules]

yes the Tecamp Puma 900 is rated at 600w @ 8 ohms and 900w at 4 ohms.

Tecamp Puma 900

 

[Thundar]

The Peavey MegaMini must be about that at 8ohms, it's 1000watts@4 yeah?

Yes, the MINI MEGA is 700 watts at 8 ohms, according to the manual...and yes there have been some reports of some reliability issues. I've had mine for a couple years and luckily have not had a hiccup

 

[arbiterusa]

I still have my old lead sled rig that is a solid 900 watts at 8ohms. The power amp alone is 44 pounds. You can always do something like that if you really feel you need the power. You probably don’t.

 

[TrevorG]

My Markbass K1 combo has a 600 watt head@8ohms(1000 watts@4ohms) but they don't sell the head separately.

 

[mmbass21]

IMO, 400 watts is a good match with your cabinet. It will sound good and have a long life powered this way.

I'm more than happy with my D800+ it has simplicity that I like but easily tweakable for any room. I know it's certainly loud enough and powerful enough. I wish it had a second channel for some gain and I know you guys at mesa would knock it out of the park if it had it. Just searching around I couldn't find much in the 600w 8 ohm power range and wanted to see what exists in the TB world.

 

[mmbass21]

@Erik herman thanks for that write up. I haven't heard a real negative think about the 900. I like the 3 switchable channel options with the footswitch. I'll have to check one out, I'm super happy with the D800+. I know some say the D800+ is a bit dark but once I spent some time with the EQ and eq on my bass I can get anything I want out of it. It's difficult to try good gear around here, it's either a 3hr drive north or the drive to miami which is a traffic nightmare and can take just as long.

 

[Old Garage-Bander]

@Old Garage-Bander it would definitely be a very nominal difference. I guess where this is coming from is the chart from barefaced and the BB2 cab that I have coming. It shows that at its maximum loudness for 600w and maximum headroom at 800w. My curiosity is simply getting the best of me.

-edit, I actually have a D800+

I have not seen these charts. And I do not understand your 600 and 800 watt comment.
Could you post, or link these charts?

To me loudness for any cab comes from power applied and SPL, and headroom for a cab is the power rating minus the power used. The cab’s SPL is a fixed number, the more power you apply the louder it will get, obviously, but the difference between 400 and 600 does not translate to a significant increase in loudness. With a cab rated for 800 watts you get more headroom with a 400 watt amp than with a 600 watt amp. If I could see these charts, maybe I would better understand what you are telling me.

 

[mmbass21]

@Old Garage-Bander by no means am I basing my initial question on this chart. I've been thinking on this for quite some time. It actually started with my bassman 410 neo cab. It always seemed to fart out before I hit the volume I was looking for. It started with a bassman 500 head and it was better with the B amp and D800+ but a quilter BB800 actually gave me the same results as the bassman 500. I've since moved on but was always wondering what more power would do and then I came across this and had to reach out here on TB to see what's out there. I'm definitely not knowledgeable about most of the technical details on all of this.

 

[Old Garage-Bander]

@Old Garage-Bander by no means am I basing my initial question on this chart. I've been thinking on this for quite some time. It actually started with my bassman 410 neo cab. It always seemed to fart out before I hit the volume I was looking for. It started with a bassman 500 head and it was better with the B amp and D800+ but a quilter BB800 actually gave me the same results as the bassman 500. I've since moved on but was always wondering what more power would do and then I came across this and had to reach out here on TB to see what's out there. I'm definitely not knowledgeable about most of the technical details on all of this.
View attachment 3194754

For my money, there are far too many qualifiers in most of the column headers to make sense technically.
Minimum for clean tone “when gigging with a drummer” is a subjective statement.
Maximum Loudness measured in “Watts”?? Watts is not a unit of measurement for loudness.
“Extra Headroom for better tone...” Again “better tone” is subjective.
Maximum Continuous SPL... SPL is measured with a reference tone a 1 watt and a reference mic at a distance of 1 meter from the sound source. I don’t know what they mean by “In half space.” And compression should not be a consideration in SPL measurements unless it occurs naturally in a speaker, which I doubt happens with 1 watt of power in speakers that are capable of handling hundreds of Watts of power.

Finally, “... is designed to let you hear what your brain, soul...”
The brain’s involvement is psycho-acoustic. The soul’s involvement is spiritual. Psycho-acoustics can be somewhat quantified, the soul, not so much... in fact, not at all. To be fair, since the whole statement is not included, I may be taking it out of context.

I have no doubt that the Barefaced cabs are among some of the best out there, and you really can’t go wrong with these. But the charts and comments include a lot of non-technically related information. It is great stuff for people who don’t understand the tech ins and outs of speakers cabs. But personally, I would dismiss this information in a decision making process if I were considering purchasing these cabs for my own use.

 

[mmbass21]

@Old Garage-Bander I understand what you're saying. I just took a screen shot from the manual and didn't even notice that line at the bottom. I agree most of it is subjective but like I said, since the fender cab issue and seeing this I just wanted to know of more heads with that power range. I always want more headroom on tap when needed, there is a point of overkill too.

 

[el murdoque]

The Orange Terror Bass 500 and Terror Bass 1000 heads have, If I remember correctly, a switch to set them from 4 to 8 ohm.
The 500 pushes a lot more than 500 Watts. I think a British magazine measured peak values exceeding 900 Watts.
I do play with two barefaced 112 cabs (SM and SC) and can hold my own against a drummer with an Ampeg PF50T head, as long as it's not full on rock. My other heads push 500 and 600 watts at 4 ohms and a single cab with a 500W head attached does some serious volume.

I do have to say, however, that in my personal experience, the bf cabs with 12" drivers can eat a lot of power and they keep getting louder while doing so. Other 8 ohm cabinets I've played often reach some limit where you can hear them starting to strain with a class D head that's rated 500W @ 4 Ohms well before the amp runs out of juice, no matter their power rating - I'm talking about 112, 212, 210 and 115 cabs here, most quality 410 cabs handle the ~300W from such a head quite well.

 

[agedhorse]

Note that the peak power rating of an amp is exactly twice the RMS rating, it's just a different way to describe exactly the same thing.

For example, the Subway amps are rated at 400 watts RMS and 800 watts peak into 8 ohms.

 

[Old Garage-Bander]

@Old Garage-Bander I understand what you're saying. I just took a screen shot from the manual and didn't even notice that line at the bottom. I agree most of it is subjective but like I said, since the fender cab issue and seeing this I just wanted to know of more heads with that power range. I always want more headroom on tap when needed.

For sure. I get what you’re saying now. I think the comments that you posted throughout this thread are pretty much right on track. It was just that one thing. When you posted the screen shot it made more sense because I was reading the same thing as you. We may use the information in the screen shot differently, but I at least think I see your perspective of that chart now.

Hopefully, everyone’s comments here are helpful for you to sort this all out.