Small gig amps

Some questions:

what sort of music do you play?
Do you want a floor shaking sound or something more punchy?
What does the guitarist(s) play through? How distorted?

depending on the answers, you would need something between 50 and 1000 watts....

 

Bloody hell! 600 watt guitar amps. I need to sit down! a 4x15 for guitar? You are having us on....oh, a 4x10....the difference is you can pick up a 4x10 off the floor.

rent a PA.

How loud do they play? I use 30 watts on guitar....

Seriously, it sounds like you need a lot of power. Carvin might be the most cost effective. Perhaps concentrate on 15" speakers and trust to running through the PA for the mid range and top.

600 watt guitar amps. What on Earth FOR? Ritchie Blackmore once had a 500 watt Marshall built for him...but his gigs were not weekend warrior stuff...

 

[The guitarists both play through 600 watt heads one has a 6x10 the other has a 4x15 I think (might be a 4x10). We use SOME distortion, not alot.

I'm w/ Andy on this. You're joking. Right?

 

Last night I got to hear the Carvin PB200-15 combo. It is 160 watts driving their PS15 15" speaker with a tweeter. It is typical Carvin... the 15" requires 11 cubic feet, and is stuffed into about 2.0 cubic feet net volume. This cuts the nuts off the bottom end, but Carvin is honest about it and rates the PB200 as a 41 Hz cabinet.

This thing was plenty loud and really cut through. The owner uses a MIM J-Bass std and turns the tone down to Kinda Thud. Not my cup of tea, but he was easy to hear. Their band was playing especially loud, and with two guitarists with Fender Twins.

I was very impressed on how small it is, and easy for the owner to cart around.

 

600 watts!?!?!?!?!?!?!

are they running like preamp poweramp setups?!?!?

I don't know of any guitar heads that are 600 watts.

That's major loud. on 4 that'd be deafening...btw: it's probably a 4x12" - that's the standard cab for a guitar.

Yes. You mau never need it, in that case it's head room, and your amp is that much cleaner and punchier. If you ever need it though (and with 600 watt guitarists...yep) it'll be there. Helps to have it when you really need to shake things down low too

I can't get over this -
maybe you meant 60 watts?

 

our guitar player uses a little marshall combo i dont know how many watts it is on small gigs i use my 200 watt nemisis which has 2 10s in it never had to play it that loud i usually keep my volume @two oclock and my gain like 2 notches up which works fine for bigger gigs we have a pa. where i run through some nice homemade bass bins i take my swr silverado out for that.

 

Trust me, JP, the guitarists amps ARE NOT 600W and they DO NOT have 4x15s or 6x10s.

Why don't you ask them about their gear. They'll probably tell you they're using 50W heads w/ 4x12s or something like that.

If you played a 600W guitar amp with the gain at 4, you'd rupture the eardrums of everyone within a hundred feet of you.

p.s. To my knowledge the most powerful power amp, not even a head, that Mesa Boogie has offerred as part of its standard production line was 250W per channel for a total of 500W.

 

And that's with the guitar volume on *0*

Just the hum off of that thing at 4 would be deafening

 

Anyone remember that bit right at the beginning of 'back to the future' where McFly hits one powerchord through some absurdly large amp? That's what it would be like.

Also, a thought strikes me...many amps have a wattage rating on the back by the power cord. This refers to power consumption, not output. But lots of people think it's the output rating. Might this be the source of a misunderstanding here? I have checked all the amps I have in the house, and discovered that power consumption rating is around 3 times output rating. If this is the case, then the output rating would be something around 200watts. Still Wembley Arena level stuff, but more believable.

 

All the Carvin stuff I have seen has been good for the price. You can order it direct from the factory, as well, cheaper.

With big bass rigs, portability becomes a serious issue...


Hmmmm, yet another thought strikes...all my amps here are solid state. In tube amps, you get MUCH higher voltages than you ever get in SS amps. Maybe they have higher power consumption anyway, with all that heating of triode valves.. would 600 watts be a normal power consumption for a tube amps?

Anyway, for portability I really like the Fender Bassman 400, and would buy one if I needed one. I use a 100 watt Fender bass combo, which so far has done me for everything.

 

BREAK OUT THE EAR PLUGS OH MY GOD!!!!!!600 watts guitar u going to play at wood stock with out a pa hahahhahah

 

Simple math.
2 guys with a 50 and a 60.
2(50x60) = 600

Sorry, what was the question? Oh yes, small gig amps. I use a Super Redhead.
Doc

 

Damn buddy, just to be on the safe side, I would recommend this. REMEMBER, this is just the MINIMUM of what you would need:

*preamp*
Crest 10001 (@10000 watts)
Eden 810XLT
Eden 810XLT
Eden 810XLT
Eden 810XLT

With that setup, you might be able to cut thru all those 600 watts of guitar. Remember, I've never tried this setup. I do recommend ear plugs as well. Good luck.


edited: what to would

 

holy heall!!! thats like wayyyyy too much for a guitarist i believe for just little shows like you were saying, ,,, but for you, i would say if you dont have alot of money goto www.speakerhole.com and buy two 4x10 for bass for 168 each, then i would buy a power amp from carvin and run it through a mesa boogie 800, each one of those 4x10's is evidently 1600 rms watts, hope this helps