NAD (kinda??..) - Amplug 2 (clean)

Well, that was a pleasant surprise.

I've been on the lookout for a noodling/practicing setup for the living room when the missus is working late in the home office (which is where my desktop PC with amp sims lives and where I do 99% of my practice).

Requirements were:
- cheap
- minimum setup fuss as it can't be setup on a permanent basis, and I want to also use it to check electronics work as expected when doing mods on guitars, so preferably something battery-powered
- takes an aux in so I can jam over stuff
- needs some sort of reverb (preferably) or delay as I hate playing completely dry
- headphones out
- a decent clean tone

I initially went for a Blackstar Fly 3 but to be honest wasn't bowled over. It's a neat little device for sure but I wasn't enamoured with the tone through the small speaker (and realised that if I want to play without headphones I can always use my bigger amp on "TV volume" setting). And even through headphones I found it a bit meh - didn't find the ISF feature very useful, delay was OK but I do prefer reverb, overdrive was also a bit meh, etc.

Then I had a look at the amplugs and thought "hey, that could fit the bill". Youtube demos sounded decent so I took a punt on a used one, the "Clean" model. Wasn't expecting much.

It's really quite impressive, actually!

- sounds really good for a cheap transistor amp
- there's quite a lot of tones to be found with the three channels and three controls (the tone control itself is much more useful than the ISF thing on the Blackstar, I find).
- the second channel is really neat for jazz, got that warm/dark, super-clean solid state amp thing that works well in that genre
- even the third channel (a mild overdrive) is pretty OK with humbuckers
- the effects are very serviceable and it's great to have three different presets for each
- super practical: no cable, just plug it straight in, headphones in, and away you go. Ideal for a couch setup. Runs on just two AAAs too
- it remembers settings! I wasn't expecting that but basically each effect will remember the last setting (out of three) you had on. So you could cycle to a different effect, turn it off etc and the next time you go back to the reverb it will be on the setting you left it on. That also applies to the device overall. Turn it off and when you turn it back on later, it will be on the last channel/effect combination you used. This is great as the process of cycling through effects in particular is fiddly, so once you've found a base sound you like it's good to have that "set and forget" feature.

Overall, for £26, it's a very niftly little tool. You could just leave that in your gigbag and be ready to play anywhere you fancy, too.

I'm now quite tempted by the Lead model, which seems to sound quite good for that 80s solo tone... :)
Click here to see me butchering some classic solos!
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Comments

  • Rich31kRich31k Frets: 776
    On the strength of your post I bought the AC30 version. It’s excellent as a practice aid. I’ve connected a small Bluetooth receiver to the aux and it works well. 
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  • Good idea with the Bluetooth receiver! Will look into that
    Click here to see me butchering some classic solos!
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  • Got one of these for my birthday to complement my AC15C1X.


    It's pretty good, far better than something this size has any right to be. As it's based on the TB channel and I prefer the normal channel, it's not quite the best match for my playing, but it makes things possible at least. I find it sounds great with the gain cranked, and pretty good clean, but kind of weird in the usual edge-of-breakup sweet spot. Might be able to get better results through further balancing of the gain, volume and guitar volume knob.

    Effects-wise, I'm basically leaving it on the lowest reverb setting. Having the main modes reserved for tremelo seems like a bit of a waste to me, I'd rather have had the option to switch between Normal, Top Boost and Jumpered.
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