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Carvin BX500: Pt. 3

#361
thanks much, all!
really seems like this is the way to go.
thx especially jarrett for the clip, that souds great.(and yeah, i never really go for that sound completely, but its a nice reference point. your clip sounds great. could you post what your eq was set at for recording it?)
 
#366
Does anyone know how the limiting works in the BX500? I had a loud practice yesterday and I swear it felt like the amp was compressing or limiting or something. Can anyone shed a light on how that piece of the equation works?
 
#368
where is your drive knob set? I sometimes feel like adding drive also induces a light compression. This amp is stupid loud through most sensitive cabinets, from what I hear, and I doubt it ran out of headroom, but it might be a character of your signal chain and the interplay of your amp and cab.

Or you might have had the comp knob on accidentally. I've done that before. But I assume that you checked for that.
 
#369
I turn my up to half on my MB10, but that’s a small combo and I play rock. Love DRIVE knob!
So are most of you BX500 owners convinced that the early bugs in this amp have been worked out?
Seems as if Carvin isn’t the only manufacturer to have trouble with the lighter weight, class D amps.
Once my new band starts playing out, I could see getting the BX500 as my main amp and the BX250 as a backup.
 
#370
Just got my BX500NT (No Tube) yesterday. Just like the folks at Carvin said, I popped in a 12AX7 I already had and it's just like all the rest of 'em... except $30 less.

The main PCB is now at rev G. It seems they've had some trouble taming this beast. So far, so good...
 
#371
Just tried my guitar (335 semi-hollow body) through my BX500. Interestingly, although I rarely have the volume past 3 with my P bass, I had to move the volume to 5-6 with my guitar. I usually play through a 60 watt guitar amp, so I was expecting to be blown away by the BX500 volume. Anybody have an idea why the volume drops when I play guitar through the BX500?
 
#372
MooseLumps said:
where is your drive knob set? I sometimes feel like adding drive also induces a light compression. This amp is stupid loud through most sensitive cabinets, from what I hear, and I doubt it ran out of headroom, but it might be a character of your signal chain and the interplay of your amp and cab.

Or you might have had the comp knob on accidentally. I've done that before. But I assume that you checked for that.
Click to expand...
I had the drive knob cranked with the tube in. Compression was off. Carvin support said the same thing. Disengage the tube, bring the drive down a fuzz, bring the master up and all should be well.
 
#373
The drive knob is your friend, just use judiciously. I'm not actually a fan of the drive's over driven tone, so I run it at noon, which is where the dirt starts. Before that, it's a clean boost, to my understanding. Also, I never noticed an issue with the tube compressing notes, but it's sound advice. Are you getting better results?
 
#374
I just got one of these amps today , it's replacing my LMII I've had a few years . So far I love the tone . I had a R1000 head about ten years ago and the flat voice of these is way better than what the Redlines were . I used it at practice with my band tonight and didn't need to tweek it much to get a good sound .

I don't have the manual and one thing I noticed was with the compression turned up to 9 oclock or so the red light above that knob was lighting up quite a bit . The drive was at noon and I didn't hear anything bad going on , it sounded very clear . Just wondering what that LED is for .
 
#375
Blues Bass 2 said:
I just got one of these amps today , it's replacing my LMII I've had a few years . So far I love the tone . I had a R1000 head about ten years ago and the flat voice of these is way better than what the Redlines were . I used it at practice with my band tonight and didn't need to tweek it much to get a good sound .

I don't have the manual and one thing I noticed was with the compression turned up to 9 oclock or so the red light above that knob was lighting up quite a bit . The drive was at noon and I didn't hear anything bad going on , it sounded very clear . Just wondering what that LED is for .
Click to expand...
It just gives you a visual on when the compression is kicking in. A green or blue light might have been a better idea there, imo.
 
#377
At last nights gig all was going well. I was pushing it pretty hard, but not necessarily any more than usual (we are LOUD). Anyway, as I go for the mute switch as we go for our second break of the night, there is really loud white noise (static) coming from the speakers. .. Crap.. After fiddling a bit, (the mute wouldnt kill it either) I found that disengaging the tube made everything fine. The night finished fine in this mode with no issue. Before I tore down, I played with the switch a bit, and couldn't duplicate the problem. :confused: All is fine today as well. So what gives? Also, as I was messin around, this thing does have a fair amount of hiss as I crank the volume. Its really always been there, and not much different than other amps I've had in the past, but now just increases the paranoia. My board is REV C. The unit is 14 months old. Thoughts?
 
#379
Jarrett said:
Maybe try out a new tube. They go bad. I haven't had that happen personally.
Click to expand...
At least you can switch the tube out, not something I could do on my SWR. I have a BX 1200 that wasn't equipped with the tube (and has the old torroid power supply so it weighs like 36 pounds). I have a small Tube Preamp that I put in the effects loop to warm it up, I discovered it wasn't really needed. The amp sounded great without it. The BX series was much better than either the PB or Redline series.

IMAG0562.jpg


All the cabinets in this photo are Carvin excepting the SWR combo of course. I have three Carvin amps here, a BX1200, a PB500 and an FET1000. They make good stuff and their modern stuff is (IMHO) world class.
 

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