Electric guitar straight into PA?

Lebarque

Electric guitar straight into PA obviously sounds pants, so is there a cheapish pedal to put in between which will make it sound bearable? Only need clean sounds. Thanks.

jimmyguitar

Any sansamp pedal or get a joyo AC Tone for £20 odd, very good! I use a Sansamp Flyrig.

impmann

+1 for the Sansamp Fly Rig. Sounds great, has lots of toneshaping options, has a good delay (with tap tempo and mod). Personally speaking I think the Plexi distortion is a touch harsh and can be a bit one dimensional, but then I'm not a Marshall fan so perhaps thats just me.

crunchman

Depends on Budget.

Cheap: Joyo / Harley Benton knockoff off the Sansamp character series - e.g. the AC Tone as mentioned by @jimmyguitar. ; There are other pedals in the series.  The AC Tone is meant to be an AC30 type tone, but there are similar pedals to give Fender and Marshall type tones.  For clean sounds the American Sound might be better than the AC Tone.  The Harley Benton ones are the Thomann house brand but they are rebadged Joyos.

The other cheap option is an older Line 6 Pod from Feebay.  The Pod 2, Pod XT, and Pod X3 can all be had very cheaply these days.

At a slightly higher cost, you can get the Sansamps that Joyo / Harley Benton are copying, or possible something like a Line 6 HD500.  I think various multiFX have cab emulation these days as well.

At the higher end of the market you get into things like Helix, Kemper, Axe FX.  These are absolutely stunning.

Whatever you use, you need to think about how you will monitor it.   Without an amp on stage, you will need stage monitoring.  If you don't have a properly competent sound engineer, then you want a powered floor wedge with a pass through.  Plug the output of whatever you are using into the floor wedge, and then take the pass through into the PA.  If you have a competent sound engineer that you can rely on to not remove your guitar from the monitor, then you can chance going direct.

Kitsune

Boss HM-2 should do the trick

ICBM

Lebarque said:

Electric guitar straight into PA obviously sounds pants, so is there a cheapish pedal to put in between which will make it sound bearable? Only need clean sounds.

It actually depends on the guitar - many semi-acoustics actually can sound pretty decent with a bit of EQ. I've often used my Rickenbacker like that. It's the mix of harmonics on overdriven sounds that make proper speaker emulation essential (if you don't want to sound like Mike Oldfield ).

Any basic amp-simulation pedal like a SansAmp/AMT/Joyo will work fine for clean sounds too though.

CountryDave

I picked up the Valeton Dapper. A cheaper version of the Flyrig. My mate has a flyrig and prefers the drive sounds on mine as they are a bit smoother. 

LuttiS

Someone mentioned the Line 6 HD500 which is great (i've got one) - you can also get the even cheaper variants with same quality but less buttons HD400 & HD300.

Lebarque

Many thanks, all. Some great suggestions to look into.

Legionreturns

Zoom g3n?