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Another Red Flag On The Ampeg PF-500.....

#461
Mine arrived today brand new from Sweetwater. The unit has a copyright of 2013 on the back of the head so I think it's safe to assume the board is a rev newer than C. It sounds good but seems quiet for a 500 watt head. Maybe it's my cab? Love the tone and vintage vibe this head and matching can brings! After all these years I think I've come to the realization that warm tone is my favorite.
 
#462
kirkm24 said:
Mine arrived today brand new from Sweetwater. The unit has a copyright of 2013 on the back of the head so I think it's safe to assume the board is a rev newer than C. It sounds good but seems quiet for a 500 watt head. Maybe it's my cab? Love the tone and vintage vibe this head and matching can brings! After all these years I think I've come to the realization that warm tone is my favorite.
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Don't be afraid to turn up the gain. There is a lot of volume on tap when your gain is set high enough.
 
#463
kirkm24 said:
Mine arrived today brand new from Sweetwater. The unit has a copyright of 2013 on the back of the head so I think it's safe to assume the board is a rev newer than C. It sounds good but seems quiet for a 500 watt head. Maybe it's my cab? Love the tone and vintage vibe this head and matching can brings! After all these years I think I've come to the realization that warm tone is my favorite.
Click to expand...
Agreed with Bitterdale about the gain. I always crank the gain at least up to the point where audible clipping starts and then I back it down slightly. Or not...sounds kind of cool with a little bit of grind ;)
 
#464
Just replaced failed rev d amp board with rev j board.
There are some obvious differences in the output part of the circuit.
 

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#465
Bitterdale said:
Don't be afraid to turn up the gain. There is a lot of volume on tap when your gain is set high enough.
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The midrange control is also very good. This amp is very warm and on the dark side I would say. It's hard to push that kind of sound through the mix unless you've got an 8x10 or two :-)

Experiment with the mids a little it might help you cut through more.

I like the Ultra Low switch but I know it's just pushing a lot more power with only minor gain in low end output from the pair of SVT210AV's that I'm using.
 
#469
B-string said:
That's only revision 9 or 10 for an amp with no more than an average failure rate? ;)
Hope "J" is the last needed.
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I counted 10 if you start at 1, but that isn't really right. The original model should equal zero. So that would be 9 revisions. But...if they counted the first one as zero, then started labeling revisions, that would mean there are 10 on top of the first one, which would actually equal 11 different versions of this amp. Because there are 11, (or even 9), I can assume there is something wrong with the previous 8 (or 10) ?

How do they count this stuff anyway? Is it like starting your serial numbers at 10,000 and couting them by 9's, 13's, or 17's, so it seems like they're more popular than they are?
 
#473
rocksmoot said:
There are lots of reasons for revisions beyond dealing with design problems, like part supplier changes, mods made to reduce costs in assembly or packaging and so on. No doubt several changes are design mods to address failures, but some may not be.
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Well let us hope the pf revisions are due to the design problems that are causing the cutting out and dying issues these amps are plagued with and not a cost cutting effort on an already cheap throw away product
 
#475
You know, with this PF line, I think that Ampeg took a pretty big risk to try to build that big Ampeg sound into these lightweight amps at such very affordable prices, and by and large, depsite the issues they've had, I also think they've pulled it off pretty well. These amps sound fantastic and do a great job and allow us not-so-rich wannabes an opportunity to get that high-dollar sound for a very reasonable price.

They also have a reasonable warranty, and the fact that it is non-transferrable is pretty much in line with the positioning of this amp in the market place. To my knowledge, no one has ever shown an occurrence in which Ampeg did not honor that warranty in the face of customer problems.

On the other hand, to the OP's original question, potential customers need to be aware that Ampeg has not altered the laws of physics with the PF line. Ampeg achieves these low prices by designing highly modular, easy to manufacture units consisting of low cost components built in factories with low labor and operating costs. These amps are not engineered to last for decades, IMHO (though I sincerely doubt that any amp actually was - business drivers haven't changed that much since the 60's. Keep in mind that $300 today is about $55 in 1966 dollars.)

This significantly affects the post-warranty period service story for any low cost amp, not just Ampeg's, and if no transferrable warranty exists, I'd think really hard about buying a used model that isn't priced to take the situation into account, and even then expect that if it breaks it will cost as much as you paid for it to repair.

So to sum up, if you think 300 bucks or so is a decent price to pay for completely awesome sound with two years of guaranteed support followed by an unknown and possibly short lifespan after that with a heavily discounted resale value, then buy this amp. If you don't, pay the higher price for some other amp with a warm and fuzzy lifetime transferable warranty.

All of this hoopla, IMHO, is a consequence of taking a quality, blue ribbon brand name like Ampeg and offering what are essentially budget line products. Fender uses Squier to insulate the Fender brand from issues that inevitably arise from low cost processes and materials, and if LOUD had taken the same approach with this line, I don't think they would be getting bashed quite so heavily over the issues.
 
#476
JimmyM said:
How many revisions has the SVT undergone?
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Since it came out in what..........1968?

The PF-500 has "probably" had as many revisions (11 so far) in the few years since it hit the market as the SVT has had in the 45 years of it's release.

With the SVT, it's revisions has been additional features added to a almost, originally perfect design, (XLR outs, master volume, bias controls, ect.)

With the PF-500's it's been changes to design/componet flaws.









.......
 
#477
B-string said:
You would need to know what rev level was released for first production to start any "official" count. No guarantee the base # board didn't have artwork errors in the pre-production run?
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Ya, that makes sense. Some could just be for a type of font on a label, type of handle or foot mount location, etc. So it doesn't really mean there are that many revisions of the amps actual function.
 
#478
rocksmoot said:
You know, with this PF line, I think that Ampeg took a pretty big risk to try to build that big Ampeg sound into these lightweight amps at such very affordable prices, and by and large, depsite the issues they've had, I also think they've pulled it off pretty well. These amps sound fantastic and do a great job and allow us not-so-rich wannabes an opportunity to get that high-dollar sound for a very reasonable price.

They also have a reasonable warranty, and the fact that it is non-transferrable is pretty much in line with the positioning of this amp in the market place. To my knowledge, no one has ever shown an occurrence in which Ampeg did not honor that warranty in the face of customer problems.

On the other hand, to the OP's original question, potential customers need to be aware that Ampeg has not altered the laws of physics with the PF line. Ampeg achieves these low prices by designing highly modular, easy to manufacture units consisting of low cost components built in factories with low labor and operating costs. These amps are not engineered to last for decades, IMHO (though I sincerely doubt that any amp actually was - business drivers haven't changed that much since the 60's. Keep in mind that $300 today is about $55 in 1966 dollars.)

This significantly affects the post-warranty period service story for any low cost amp, not just Ampeg's, and if no transferrable warranty exists, I'd think really hard about buying a used model that isn't priced to take the situation into account, and even then expect that if it breaks it will cost as much as you paid for it to repair.

So to sum up, if you think 300 bucks or so is a decent price to pay for completely awesome sound with two years of guaranteed support followed by an unknown and possibly short lifespan after that with a heavily discounted resale value, then buy this amp. If you don't, pay the higher price for some other amp with a warm and fuzzy lifetime transferable warranty.

All of this hoopla, IMHO, is a consequence of taking a quality, blue ribbon brand name like Ampeg and offering what are essentially budget line products. Fender uses Squier to insulate the Fender brand from issues that inevitably arise from low cost processes and materials, and if LOUD had taken the same approach with this line, I don't think they would be getting bashed quite so heavily over the issues.
Click to expand...




Nothing to disagree with here.

It's great to see a well thought out, intelligent post for a change.
 

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