Please Please Pleas Please give us a 800 watt class D version with the same tube front end!!!!
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Mesa Boogie Walkabout Mega-thread Part 10
- Thread starter Chef
- Start date
Please Please Pleas Please give us a 800 watt class D version with the same tube front end!!!!
Hi Andy. For personal interest, I wanted to know if I should find a new example of a WalkAbout to collect now. Also I thought that others would be interested still, as they were at least a year and a half ago.
Looking at it from outside the company, the trajectory of Mesa Boogie bass amp product designs, it seems to me obvious that there will not be sufficient demand to justify sustained production of the larger, heavier, older models that the Subway models effectively replace.
I searched the thread, but may have missed it; how is the WA on top of the Subway 1x12 + 1x15? I'm interested in trying it out, but as usual, if you want to try it you have to buy it.
- Feb 12, 2006
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- Development Engineer-Mesa Boogie, Development Engineer-Genzler (pedals), Product Support-Genz Benz
We are always listening, but also being aware of paying attention to the legacy of the Mesa bass amp history. We are not rushing to the market with something new without considering all of the options, including where player's tastes have evolved to.
For example, and maybe you guys can help me with this, some folks love the WA preamp, but others find frustration with the "always tube sounding" and the word hair and fur come up often in your discussions about not enough "clean" tone. Are you guys looking for more ability for clean tube preamp tones or is the distortion "always" desired?
For example, and maybe you guys can help me with this, some folks love the WA preamp, but others find frustration with the "always tube sounding" and the word hair and fur come up often in your discussions about not enough "clean" tone. Are you guys looking for more ability for clean tube preamp tones or is the distortion "always" desired?
Depends on the gig or session. Referencing the extremely clean preamp of the Buster, it would be amazing to be able to recreate that with a controllable range starting there and able to go up the WA preamp tone (with power to back it of course.) Just my two cents having relied on a 400+, Buster, WA and Prodigy as my main amps over the last xx years.
I have never found the Walkabout to be too distorted-sounding, especially when I dial the gain back. Mesa has tons of clean, sparkling, punchy options. I sold a Carbine M6 in favor of the Walkabout because of all the compliments my band and audience gave me on the "improved sound". To have that tone in a class D amp with higher output would be an excellent 2nd option to the Subway D-800, so that folks have a choice, or incorporate all that goodness into one amp and give folks the option, via a channel selector or similar A/B toggle. I cannot remember anyone ever saying anything negative about the Walkabout sound. The only negative I've read is about the output, and why Mesa never made a more powerful version.
Chef wasn't the only player to want more clean SPL, but I think he was a minority. What I've seen most in the WA megathreads over the years is players wanting the WA's convincingly tubey "fur" on louder stages.
I'd be interested in a Walkabout preamp—even 2u would be okay, as long as it sounded like the WA's DI out instead of the FX send.
I'd be interested in a Walkabout preamp—even 2u would be okay, as long as it sounded like the WA's DI out instead of the FX send.
I talked to mesa and there will not be a higher powered walkabout.......then he tried to sell me on a d800, which I've already owned, saying it would be the closest thing in their line. I don't think so.
...Or DI to the PA. Or mic to the PA.
I've been watching this conversation all morning.
Although I don't have lots and lots of gigging experience, and when we do gig it's in a bar or legion, I've never had the situation where a 2x15 and a pair of 1x15's (running at 2.77 ohms total load) wasn't more than loud enough...
I wouldn't trade the tone for more power. Love me my Walkabout...
Well, I do gig and bringing 3 or 4 15's isn't an option. And, in most clubs, you get a better sound by not going into the pa. Anyway, it would be nice to have a higher powered version but, it's not going to happen.
Hi all
Just in case this is of interest to anyone...
As a long-time WA lover (and contributor to this thread) who still yearned for a bit more power in a Walkabout-ish package, this is where I ended up. I've had it a year now, and I adore it.
New amp from Poland - HandBox R-400
Just in case this is of interest to anyone...
As a long-time WA lover (and contributor to this thread) who still yearned for a bit more power in a Walkabout-ish package, this is where I ended up. I've had it a year now, and I adore it.
New amp from Poland - HandBox R-400
Sorry Agedhorse, but if Mesa is actually listening to customers, so read again the forums. Just like everything else on the market, the WA can't be for everyone, but the main reason why it is so revered by musicians is its tone. Almost all comments about the WA refer to its wonderful tubey tone, clean or dirty...well, this is the reason because there is a gain knob, or not? For uber hi- fi clean as a surgical room without significant colouration, there are plenty of options out there, and in Mesa catalog too. Even the m-pulse 600 does not capture the nuances of the WA, go figure a subway. The tubey tone of the WA is due to the rich harmonics that the high voltage tube pre provides, but even the power amp is special in adding something. For what I have heard in demos and tests, the subway 800 is a great amp but a different thing nonetheless...I'm pretty sure I would not like a subway so much...
The absolute vast majority of potential customers of a WA substitute, I can estimate 80% or more, would like the same glorious big tube amp tone with added power and a quiter fan, or better, an improved chassis and improved heat dissipation design that doesn't amplify such noises significantly. For this kind of amp, with, let's say, 500-600 watt at 4 ohm load, I would tolerate the obliged weight increase. Tone is everything for a lot of us.
The absolute vast majority of potential customers of a WA substitute, I can estimate 80% or more, would like the same glorious big tube amp tone with added power and a quiter fan, or better, an improved chassis and improved heat dissipation design that doesn't amplify such noises significantly. For this kind of amp, with, let's say, 500-600 watt at 4 ohm load, I would tolerate the obliged weight increase. Tone is everything for a lot of us.
svtb15
Inactive
- Mar 22, 2004
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- I play it all. Whatever works for the gig. Q+
- Feb 12, 2006
- 60,960
- 5
- 220,630
- Disclosures
- Development Engineer-Mesa Boogie, Development Engineer-Genzler (pedals), Product Support-Genz Benz
I assure you that we are listening. I am trying to understand exactly what folks like and what they do not like. The one thing that has come up from time to time is that it's maybe a little too tubey for some, in that they struggle (or appear to) with the cleaner side of things. How real this is for how many players is hard to determine because some camps are more vocal and passionate than others.
Maybe a better question would be if you could change any performance aspects (other than power of course) of the WA, what would these be AND where you you want to see them go?
Some of the perceived fur or hair is due to the smaller power amp... so just increasing the power is going to change this even if no changes were made at all to the preamp. You can't double or triple or quadruple the power yet keep the overall tone identical because by definition you have added a ton of potential headroom to an amp that enjoys the very benefits of encroaching on it's limited headroom.
Help me understand.
Maybe a better question would be if you could change any performance aspects (other than power of course) of the WA, what would these be AND where you you want to see them go?
Some of the perceived fur or hair is due to the smaller power amp... so just increasing the power is going to change this even if no changes were made at all to the preamp. You can't double or triple or quadruple the power yet keep the overall tone identical because by definition you have added a ton of potential headroom to an amp that enjoys the very benefits of encroaching on it's limited headroom.
Help me understand.
very late to this party, just picked up a walkabout from the classifieds. it was delivered today. holy crap it's awesome. easily as loud as my gk1001 through a single 212 and it's so "bassy". not bass heavy, just like what i think bass should sound like. end gush.
Exactly. These threads come back to this point every couple years or so.
What I'd want is what I think most of the WA+ folks want: the sound of a WA in its "somewhat pushed" range (that is, gain and master in the 10-to-1 o'clock range), while keeping—and this would be the hard part—the interaction you get from pre and power amp stages. Given the market, I'm not sure it makes sense to engineer that in a hardware preamp in the age of IRs.
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Oh, good lord. I just spent TWO HOURS going through that entire thread, watching every video, even the review in the other thread. I can tell you that:
1. I NEVER want to hear the bass line for "Sittin' on the Dock of the Bay" again. EVER.
2. I MUST have a HB R-400. I will be contacting Leszak tomorrow.
3. I think I'm gonna get one and use both it and my Walkabout regularly, and let time and tone help me decide what to do.
I'm interested to see how the R-400 will sound with my 12" Mesa Scout Radiator cabs. That, and my pair of Berg 12s.
EDIT - the biggest takeaway: it's only 10 kg. (22 lbs.); 11 lbs. lighter than the WA. That's the best of both worlds: a class A/B amp that is only slightly heavier than a class D amp. WOW!
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