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Mesa Boogie Walkabout Mega-thread part Four!

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#661
TC Electronics does some decent tube emulation.
The GK MB-Fusion has three pre tubes fed decent current, like the Streamliner does.
The Baer Valkyrie reads nice.

There are "rumor grade things" that will come out from under the covers at namm...

Lastly, Mesa is working on junk that won't be at namm.

Really, as much as I grouse about the Walkabout being underpowered at points-and I stand by that!-if I take a Big Gun Cab like the Epi UL410 or Henry 8x8, it stands up pretty well.

I have a friend with an NV610, and it sounds killer thru that.

My arguments for more watts/headroom are these:

-there are plenty of smaller cabs that will open up and be plenty loud enough for bigger jobs, if the Walkabout could only hit them harder.

-with more headroom, "the amount of tube in the tone" becomes more optional. this is especially important to me for DB use (and I'm a freak there, I know). it's also important in terms of compression. if you want the bigger, lower notes to Hammer At Volume, they kinda can't, cause they compress.

I want those to be choices, not mandates.
 
#662
The guys at Mesa have said, directly, that doing this does indeed change tone, perhaps for the worse, when asked this q by several of us in the past....


derrico1 said:
On Thursday I was talking to Rich at Mesa about modding the DI so that its output level is fully independent of the Walkabout's master volume.

This conversation was born of a weird NYE gig that started me thinking that such a mod would be useful on a mostly-silent stage (where, say, everyone is wearing in-ears except a mulishly stubborn guitarist who wants "just a whisper" of bass--and the monitor engineer can't/won't give him a wedge with a custom mix).

Has anyone else here liberated the DI from the master volume? After considering it, I suspect that the mod would rob the DI tone.

After a couple hundred gigs with the WA, this is the only time I've been in a situation where I wanted to run the master just barely cracked open (as opposed to at normal stage volumes or else silent, w/ no speaker plugged in). If modding would hamper the DI tone just to gain flexibility in this odd circumstance, I'm inclined to leave the DI routing alone.
Click to expand...
 
#665
So.....any hints about what kinda junk is Mesa working on the won't be at NAMM? Are they really listening to all the requests for a beefier WA? Or are they going to concede that niche to GB if the Streamliner lives up to the super-WA speculation? The intrigue is killing me!
 
#667
Tom Bowlus hinted that there is no indication of a Walkabout "Stomp" edition this winter.
Mesa seems (to me) to be a bit of a Luddite as far as neither posting here nor corresponding with customers by email. On one hand it sucks (waiting 1-3 days for a return phone call when a 2 line email could easily suffice and be much faster and more efficient) but on the other, I think it's positively reflected in the way they seem to overbuild stuff. I'm also looking fwd to a micro head from them-it's gotta happen eventually IMO.
 
#668
It might be that in their opinion, the Walkabout *is* micro.

It's micro enough for me.

It also might be that Mesa feel too much is compromised to build anything smaller, and, they might well be right.

This is all IMO, and based on nothing.
 
#669
kevmoga said:
So.....any hints about what kinda junk is Mesa working on the won't be at NAMM? Are they really listening to all the requests for a beefier WA? Or are they going to concede that niche to GB if the Streamliner lives up to the super-WA speculation? The intrigue is killing me!
Click to expand...

Both Randy and Dan hint at some new products in my interviews with them in BGM #5 (which will be available online by next week and shipping out in print form at the same time). :cool:
 
#671
I'd be willing to bet a Walkabout Smackdown Edition would move to a full size, two space rack unit.
There's no room in there for bigger.

I'd be fine with that, actually.
 
#674
Chef said:
.
My arguments for more watts/headroom are these:

-there are plenty of smaller cabs that will open up and be plenty loud enough for bigger jobs, if the Walkabout could only hit them harder.

-with more headroom, "the amount of tube in the tone" becomes more optional. this is especially important to me for DB use (and I'm a freak there, I know). it's also important in terms of compression. if you want the bigger, lower notes to Hammer At Volume, they kinda can't, cause they compress.

I want those to be choices, not mandates.
Click to expand...

Well said and my exact sentiments.
Don't mind the 13 lbs at all and all the weight is in the torodial transformer and the 2 massive aluminum heat sinks. Even if you had to add 75% to the weight in order to double the output power, it would be killer. I'm trying to go from great sounding full range, 100 lb cabinets to same tone at 50 lbs and it seems like it takes well more than 300 watts to get there for most applications.
 
#676
Well I just received my WA. 4 ohm cab, Black face WA with the latest features and is in "New" condition as described by the GC salesman. Nice!

I started experimenting with the Factory Sample settings as described in the user manual. As I explained in a previous post, my goal is to use the WA Scout as a standalone rig. So far, the Factory Sample setting that comes closest to what I am looking for is the Scouped R&B sample. With WA gain at 11:00 (in Passive mode) and my Godin A5 volume @ 75%, onboard eq set flat, the sound was very close to what I need. Just need to tweek a little more punch out of it, which should be no problem.

While experimenting with the WA Gain >12:00 I achieved a wide range of tone changes. Extremely versitle! But I do have a question. I've read that people start to experience some distortion in the >2:00 position. With the above setup, I wasn't able to get above 1:00 without distortion. Now I do know that the gain of the bass (which is fairly hot) will have something to do with this, but I just want to be sure that this is normal. Moving to the Active setting gives me more room to move, but I like the tone better in the passive position.

I was able to get to 12:00 on the master and 11:00 on the gain (without the distortion), before my dog started going crazy! This thing is a beast! No sense in even A/B-ing my Promethean with it, but for giggles, I'm sure I will.

One more question, is the distortion a sign of clipping? I'm used to playing amps with clip indicators, but the WA doesn't have one. I just don't want to damage the speaker because of clipping.
Thanks!
 
#680
Don't think there is any need to be cautious
Historicaly the active input was used to have a lower gain input for active basses with very high outputs so that:
* You wouldn't be only at the bottom end of the gain pot which would make it harder for finer volume control adjustments
* You wouldn't overload the input electronics of the amp

My active Stingray works great with the passive input and the gain up to 12:00
 
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