Good backup situation if your amp dies?!

ICBM

Kebabkid said:

Whilst we're here, and OP I don't wish to hijack your thread, but what about having a H&K Red Box or Behringer equivalent handy so you can just plug your board into it and go out to the PA. Does anyone do this? I have a Red Box inbuilt to my H&K TM36 but I've never used it.

I did, I think I only used it once though. I didn't like the sound that much - better than nothing, but nowhere near as good as my Mesa V-Twin, which also doubles as the amp itself for going direct. If you get all your drive sounds from other pedals normally it may be worth considering though.

Also remember that if the desk has powerful enough EQ - usually three-band with sweepable mids at minimum - and a soundman who knows how to use it or is willing to listen - you *can* get a tolerable sound just by going direct. (Start with mids up full, mid frequency around 3KHz, bass a little below halfway and treble fully off, and adjust from there. Not perfect, but not terrible.) I'd actually rather do that than use some of the 'backup amps' I've tried.

ash96

I thought the Red Box was designed to go between the head and the cab to give a speaker emulated out but with the sound of the head still.

I used the DI feature on the Tubemeister a lot and it worked really well. Tempted to get the 5W version as my backup amp!

Cacofonix

Tubeman.  Plug and play.  Designed as a DI out from the ground up.

Possibly a Cream Machine or Crunch Machine instead.

monquixote

ash96 said:

I thought the Red Box was designed to go between the head and the cab to give a speaker emulated out but with the sound of the head still.

I used the DI feature on the Tubemeister a lot and it worked really well. Tempted to get the 5W version as my backup amp!

The Redbox is recommended for connection to a poweramp output, but it can do line output as well (it has a switch to select).

I'm using the clean channel of an AMT C2 at the moment and I'm amazed how fab it sounds recorded considering it's a bonus feature with no EQ.