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**New SWR headlite™ Mini-Amp**

#161
jokerjkny said:
tried both the headlite and shuttle 9.0 into a berg ht112er, and frankly, the swr smokes the shuttle in terms of responsive feel. the swr is much punchier and faster feeling under the fingertips right outta the box w/ no EQ. and maybe its cause of the more advanced eq section of the headlite, but it was *easier for me to find a great sound on the swr. and dare i say, i liked using the aural enhancer! w/ the 600hz mode, i could get a thick fingerstyle/slap sound in a jiff w/ my sadowsky's onboard pre. and the compressor was mighty handy. also, didnt pump and breathe too bad for such a small unit.

swr did their homework on this one. too bad the execution isnt up to par, i.e. the only problem i found on the swr is the crappy/shoddy workmanship. knobs felt rather loose and too easy to spin, and not nearly as tactile and solid as the shuttle. and the power plug of the swr had a little too much play and felt like it was glued in properly.
Click to expand...

I could see how the Headlight might work better out of the
box with the HT112ER than the 9.0. The 9.0 made the smaller
boxes (UL112, HT112) sound bigger with its low end extension
that the HT112ER doesn't need. It seems like the upright bass
is much more sensitive to matching all the parts just right.
The electric bass seems less fussy.
 
#162
B String said:
We just got through a/b'ing the Shuttle 9.0 and the Headlight
with an Epi UL110 and Berg HT112 to use for upright bass, as
well as some larger boxes for electric gigs. We used two
different basses. One had a Full Circle, one had a Realist.

One of the main issues that bugged us (and everyone I know)
is that as much as we love three bands of parametric eq,
there is virtually no way to see where they are set without
picking the amp up and searching for the little black dot on the
silver knob. We finally had to put tape on all the knobs just to
see where things were set. Two of my friends have used this
amp on gigs and said this is a MAJOR design flaw.

Having said that, the amp sounded very good for electric
bass. The switchable aural enhancer is a real winner. Very nice
We would have liked a tuner out jack, since a number of us
"lazy" types using micro amps, have gone to using a Korg gb1,
tuner. Its about the length of one finger and the width of two.
It plugs in the tuner out in back of most amps and sticks up
behind the amp. Small, easy, accurate. Ahh technology...

The bottom line is.... the Headlight sounded (SWR) great for
electric bass. The Shuttle 9.0 sounded just as good, just
a little different. The big difference was that the 9.0 sounded
MUCH better with the upright basses. Less ringing and more
accurate, even with all the eq of the Headlight. We did use
a 10 megohm pre with both basses. It just sounded better
when we used it. Even with the Realist.
Click to expand...

totally missed your review, and a nice one it is...

i'll admit the EQ markers are annoying, but didnt really hamper me too much. i spin knobs by ear regardless. again, my only gripe was the flimsy feel.

and interesting you liked the shuttle for upright stuff more. i would have thought the extra eq on the headlite do the job better.

and all this pickup talk is giving me gas...
 
#163
I just picked up a new swr headlite. Needed something easier and more portable for small jobs than my svt or v4b. My first impression was that i couldnt believe how loud this little thing can go. I was afraid i would miss the sound of my all tube amps but this thing also has great tone. Just out of curiosity i plugged it into my 810 to see how loud it could get and it seems as loud as my svt through it. Not a big fan of jj preamp tubes so i changed it to a tungsol with better results i thought. The only negative i found was the dots on the control knobs are hard to see so i had to put bigger dots on them with a felt pen. This amp actually turned out to be better than i expected. It also fits in the pocket of my gig bag which is nice. I hated the aural enhancer on another swr i used to own but this one in the other position actually is usable. No buyers remorse here.
 
#164
I just got mine in today. Great little amp. I absolutely love the marcus aural enhancer.

Im playing it through my golight 210 8 ohm at atm. it has gobs of tone. i gotta add another 8 ohm 210 before i can fully see its power, but so far its pretty ballsy. I like the little bag it comes with too. Now i just need the foot switch!
 
#165
i'll have to try one. i have to say the amplight interests me more but if the tone is allright then maybe a good deal.

I'm definitely a fan of the standard rack spacing. Likewise, i think what has been missing from the mini market is standalone poweramps. With pedal mods (or straight out of the box) to make a pedal line level, if you have one you like the sound of, who needs a preamp? That might be over the top for me, but one of my pals uses a seymour duncan preamp pedal into an old HK poweramp about the size of a walkman. only 150 watts but not bad. Bag End powered speakers are available and i think they will sell you the poweramp seperate but i also think it's more expensive than the swr unit (the amplight anyhow)
 
#166
Yea the amplite is a pretty sweet deal too. I'm guessing its great for double bass where you might not need a preamp at all.

I just sold my svt 7 pro for this to a fellow Tb'er, and i really liked that amp. I prefer the swr hands down tho, I love the ampeg tone, and the svt 7 pro delivers it. I just like the swr tone so much better.
As for the tone of the headlite, I think its great, you can dial in a wide variety of tones with just the parametric eq, then when you use the AE's it gets even better, and you can compress it all too. For the price, its really a great deal. I personally think it should have just came with the foot switch tho. And of course the knob issue,(cant see the little buggers) but i think that can be remedied and is purley cosmetic. Id say 9/10 over all tho. where as the svt was more like a 8.5/10 sound wise. If you compare power the ampeg takes it tho. But thats what the amplite is for!

cheers
-jon
 
#168
OhulahanBass said:
I think swr ia my next stop on amp quest. How does the headlite compare to the bigger swr rigs...tone wise that is?
Click to expand...

its better, cause frankly, was never ever a fan of the swr sound until now. the eq is "Q'ed" just nice, and makes the most of the variable frequency section. always felt like the frequency points were in the worst place for tailoring a nice bass sound.

AND, surprise surprise, the aural enhancer knob sounds great. doesnt completely suck out the all important lower mids like the older style knob did. rather, just merely adds those higher highs and lower lows for a bigger sound.

i'm a fan.
 
#169
jokerjkny said:
its better, cause frankly, was never ever a fan of the swr sound until now. the eq is "Q'ed" just nice, and makes the most of the variable frequency section. always felt like the frequency points were in the worst place for tailoring a nice bass sound.

AND, surprise surprise, the aural enhancer knob sounds great. doesnt completely suck out the all important lower mids like the older style knob did. rather, just merely adds those higher highs and lower lows for a bigger sound.

i'm a fan.
Click to expand...

It is a marvelous head and the upright sounded good through
it. The 9.0 just worked better right away with the upright. We
left the 9.0 pretty flat. Just a 10 megohm buffer pre for the
Piezo's on the basses.
 
#170
Has anyone had a chance to test the DI? I heard a bass chat review with examples that seemed pretty noisy. Though the tester did say he tested with a noisy bass. A quite di would be important to me incase I gig it needing PA support or use it to record at home with an IO interface.
 
#176
Just tried the Headlite out and I gotta say the tone is awesome!! I was comparing heads (Markbass LittleMark II, Genz-Benz Shuttle 6.0, Hartke LH1000, SWR Headlite) through a Hartke HyDrive HX410 and between the micros the LMII and Headlite killed!!! I wish I had more time to play on it but I'm honestly considering trying to pick one up if I can find a good price.
 
#178
Just spent the afternoon comparing the Headlite with the Markbass LMII and LM250, and a Mesa Walkabout.

In a store known for somewhat quirky, erratic pricing, they stacked up like this (all prices are in Canadian $$$): LM 250 $550, LM II $700, Headlite $750, Mesa $1100.

The Headlite's EQ was powerful and quite flexible. The new Enhance circuit is more flexible than the one that was in my old SWR Studio 220. However, with so many tone shaping options, I found it fiddly. The Markbass heads trumped it for ease of use, because their 4 EQ bands are already dialed in for my most common problem frequencies. Who needs a parametric? Similarly, the tiny knobs and pale grey script on the faceplate of the Headlite made it harder to read and adjust than the large, well-marked Mesa.

The SWR sounded loud on sustained notes, but there was something a little processed and compressed about the note envelope. I played around with gain staging, EQ, etc., but couldn't get it to sound as open and dynamic as the Mesa or the Markbass heads. Even at low volumes, the others had more "thump". For this reason, I didn't even try the compressor on the Headlite.

Overall, I would say that the feature set and power-to-weight ratio make the Headlite an awesome micro head. With a good Neo 4*10 or a 2*12, it could be the basis of a super-portable rock rig.

If I absolutely had to have an amp small enough to slip into the pouch on my gig bag, the SWR would be it for me, at least until I get a chance to compare it to the Genz Shuttles and/or the Ibanez Prometheus. Although the Markbass heads are pleasingly light, they're not compact enough for that kind of grab-and-go convenience, and the larger, 13lb Mesa is clearly out of the running.

However, the "good for a micro" tone and quirky dynamic response killed the deal for me. I would rather suffer the inconvenience of needing a backpack or shoulder bag, and enjoy the full-sized tone of the Mesa or the Markbass heads.

The little Markbass 250 really surprised me. Within it's available dynamic range, it sounded just as open and punchy as the LMII. For quieter gigs, I would call it the value leader out of this group.

The other surprise, was the Mesa. I was only shopping for a low power head for coffee house gigs, so I really wasn't intending to look at $1100 amps. However, the Mesa has something, a combination of warmth and clarity, that the others lacked. In this company, it definitely sounded more expensive, and after playing through the Walkabout, the Markbass heads sounded a little "fuzzy" in comparison.

I have an appointment to check out a first-generation AI Clarus next, and I'm desperately hoping that it will do the job. I really don't want to lash out $1K plus on a head for my "little rig".
 
#179
I tried the Headlite a while back in a store with my main bass (Reverend Rumblefish 5L), plugged into a Ampeg 1x12 cab they had it on in the store. I was impressed! I have never liked the Aural Enhancer on SWR amps in the past, but they changed it for the better in this amp. The E.Q. was nice, although I found that I didn't need to use it much in that room with the AE circuit in set to Marcus mode. SWR tamed the clicky highs in this amp that I always thought their other amps had. Big plus!

The volume was astounding for that small of an amp! I did notice at higher input gain settings it sounded more like it was clipping than getting more tube drive. I backed off the input a little and all was fine. I do wonder what changing the tube out for another brand of 12AX7 would do to the tone.

The compressor was nice at lower to medium settings (for my taste). I still prefer my Ashdown multiband comp to it, but for being one compact package, no complaints. It was capable of squashing the life out of the tone a higher settings if you are into that sort of thing. It handled the B string of the Reverend beautifully, I was quite surprised, this is where I was expecting it to fart out. But it did great!

Overall, I was really impressed with it! Seriously considering buying one of these for the smaller jazz gigs that my Mesa Big Block is just a little much for. Next trip to the store, I'll bring my 1x12 Aguilar cab and see how that combo sounds. Anyone tried this head/cab combo yet?

Good work SWR!
 
#180
Hi guys! I'm fom Portugal:hmm::hmm::smug:
I compared the two amps - SWR Headlite and Genz Benz 6.0 - I have both - with a MarkBass 4 x 6 " 600w 8 Ohm - so the SWR deliver 200 and something watts and the Genz Benz deliver 375 watts. The Genz has the thinnest sound but muscle is noticed more. Is more difficult to obtain a pleasure sound (for me) than with the SWR. The aural enhancer gives a hi-fi sound with fat lows. The Benz don't have that low sound. Maybe has more definition in sound, but the sound it's more thick.
The very negative SWR's feature, are the knobs... the knobs are an authentic disaster, since I can see nothing at all about his positions. And in the stage darkness it's worst.
About the power - even with the Epifani, 500w 4Ohm, (so the amp delivers 400w full power), I have to put in the limits, which does it clip frequently. My conclusion is this: little power for stages. My hesitation now is to buy the swr amplite to pair with the headlite or the Genz Benz 900w.
I like the SWR sound very much, but not the digital 400w... Are those watts different from the analog ones????
I hope this help. I thank you for your help to.
Regards,
 

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