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Why are the Ampeg Portaflex amps so cheap?

Jay Mastro

Jay Mastro

Jun 23, 2014
646
352
New York
#1
I was looking into getting a Little Mark III but then I saw the price of the PF500 and started wonder why the price gap is so huge, both are great companies, is there a simple explanation? Have I overlooked a huge difference in the amps? Any info would help, thank you

Edit: Was also looking at the Aguilar TH500 before settling on the LMIII, strictly for budget purposes, which is why the price gap between the three makes me really want to know why I should pay more for one or the other
 
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#6
beans-on-toast said:
They are popular amps that sell well. Selling in high numbers allows them to keep the price down and pass the savings along.

The amps aren't cheap, they are inexpensive. ;)
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This.

wave rider said:
Country of manufacture?

=wr=
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And this.

I wonder how much they'd cost if they were Assembled in the USA. A Portaflex Heritage 350/500/800 if you will.

However, GK's micros are Assembled in the USA from foreign and domestic components and don't cost that much more.
 
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#7
hdracer said:
Yeah, a cheap amp would have major reliability issues.....
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A year ago I was set on getting a PF500 and 2X10 cab but when I tried one out at the local GC, it was seriously wonky. It had nowhere near the volume you would expect, even when maxed out. The salesman and I both tried everything settings-wise. The head wasn't dead, but on serious life-support. Maybe not fair, but it soured me on current Ampeg stuff.
 
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#8
hdracer said:
Yeah, a cheap amp would have major reliability issues.....
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Good one.

I have no idea what their reliability numbers are. I do know from retail owners that the PF series is consistently a big seller for them and they have a lot of happy customers. Issues are part of any product life cycle. If the products had major reliability issues, they wouldn't be profitable and Loud wouldn't keep making them.
 
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#9
beans-on-toast said:
Good one.

I have no idea what their reliability numbers are. I do know from retail owners that the PF series is consistently a big seller for them and they have a lot of happy customers. Issues are part of any product life cycle. If the products had major reliability issues, they wouldn't be profitable and Loud wouldn't keep making them.
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Yeah, they would just tell the customers that there is nothing wrong with the product and it is just user error
 
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#11
beans-on-toast said:
I wouldn't be happy if that happened to me.
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To be honest that reply from Ampeg was with the 7 Pro melt down problems not the PF500 problems. But because of the way they have handled the 500 and 7 Pro problems I will never buy a Ampeg product.
All amps can have problems, it is how the manufacturer handles the problems.
 
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#13
I went to a Chinese food take away place today. It wasn't very good. Every time this happens I tell my wife that we shouldn't go back there again. For some reason, six months or a year later, we do. I don't know why.

I don't blame you for not wanting to deal with any company that leaves a bad taste in your mouth.

I'm lucky that I can fix my own amps.
 
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#14
Cheaper? If it's too good to be true, it's not true. You gets what you pay for, and takes your chances.

Have not played through those PF ampeg heads, but there seem to be a lot of reliability issues mentioned throughout TB, and not the kind of customer service kudos that GK get for dealing with reliability issues on their MB heads when made in China, and now with manufacture brought back to the US.
 
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#15
Jay Mastro said:
I was looking into getting a Little Mark III but then I saw the price of the PF500 and started wonder why the price gap is so huge, both are great companies, is there a simple explanation? Have I overlooked a huge difference in the amps? Any info would help, thank you

Edit: Was also looking at the Aguilar TH500 before settling on the LMIII, strictly for budget purposes, which is why the price gap between the three makes me really want to know why I should pay more for one or the other
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Markbass is made in Italy (EDIT: Looks to be all Indonesia now, but appears to be high QC/overwatch, which = higher cost). Aguilar is hand assembled in New York. These are not the cheapest places in the world to do that sort of thing, and neither are doing the volume Ampeg does. The local GC has a GK MB200 and a handful of Markbass heads that have been there for well over a year. Whenever they do get Portaflex heads in, they never last more than a couple of weeks. My guess is the price beats out Markbass and the name and form factor beat out GK...I think most people don't even realize the MB200 is an amp!
 
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#17
gln1955 said:
A year ago I was set on getting a PF500 and 2X10 cab but when I tried one out at the local GC, it was seriously wonky. It had nowhere near the volume you would expect, even when maxed out. The salesman and I both tried everything settings-wise. The head wasn't dead, but on serious life-support. Maybe not fair, but it soured me on current Ampeg stuff.
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Holy smokes could it be that everything on the floor of GC has been jacked up in everyway by knuckleheads that think they can play every instrument in the store. I would never base my opinion on something that was on the GC floor. I once picked up a bass that had a busted bridge! How do you break a bridge??

P.s. there's plenty of volume on my PF 500. I usually hang the volume around 12 depending where the gain is.
 
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#18
lifeoffroadbass said:
Holy smokes could it be that everything on the floor of GC has been jacked up in everyway by knuckleheads that think they can play every instrument in the store. I would never base my opinion on something that was on the GC floor. I once picked up a bass that had a busted bridge! How do you break a bridge??

P.s. there's plenty of volume on my PF 500. I usually hang the volume around 12 depending where the gain is.
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Clarify 12 o'clock when competing with drums in the home setting about 9 o'clock.
 

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