Help me choose! Ampeg svt-410he or Gallien Krueger Neo-410

That Neo is really sweet! I played one just yesterday at GC in Sacramento. The sound was phenomenal!

 

Both companies are known for quality goods. The 410he, believe it or not, had some pretty serious problems fixed when Ampeg moved to overseas manufacture in 2007. The US versions were almost all made with OSB chipboard, which is a higher quality chipboard but still wood chips and glue that's prone to puncture wounds and moisture-related swelling and weakening, and the ones from 2000-06 had real muddy speakers with no real highs to speak of. Nowadays they use real plywood and much better sounding speakers.

As for the power handling ratings, I have yet to play a 410 that can take much more than 400-500w without farting out, not a single one, and cabs with neos are no exceptions. They may claim 800w in the GK, but that is the point that the cab will blow the voice coil, not the point where it starts to distort and only heats up the voice coils, which is more of a long-term damage thing rather than blowing right away. The 410he's 500w rating is for when they start to distort, not when the voice coils blow. The rating at which the voice coils will blow is 1000w. So both cabs will let you dump fairly equal amounts of wattage into them, and if you plan on being so ungodly loud that you're in danger of blowing a 410, you should be looking at 810 rigs instead.

As for sound, I prefer the Ampeg, some others prefer GK. That's up to you. But as far as build quality, they're both fine examples.