Bognor Ecstacy Mini Amp Head * PART 1*

BillDL

I bought this to fill a gap and to satisfy my curiosity.  I have a 1x12 Celestion 100W cab that isn't being used much at all but can sit out of the way in my livingroom, so I parted with £199 to see whether the glowing YouTube reviews are worth their salt.  I am really pleased, but not totally surprised, that this little solid state head does indeed kick ass and I think I chose well because it does what I need and want.

This amp is one of four single channel solid state 30 watt "mini" amp heads (named "micro" for the Diezel) bearing the brand names of Soldano, Friedman, Diezel and Bogner, and each one has been modelled on a specific amp and/or channel of those manufacturers' flagship amp heads, i.e. Bognor Ecstacy "red channel", Soldano (Super Lead Overdrive) SLO100, Friedman BE (Brown Eye), and Diezel VH4 Channel 3. They all run from a universal 24 volt power adapter, have rear effects loop sockets, and have two 8-16 ohm speaker output sockets (1 x 8 ohm or dual 16 ohm cabinets).  They are all housed in a wooden case that is a little bit wider and about the same height as 6 Boss pedals stacked in two layers and are about 4 lbs in weight.

It was a toss-up between this, the SLO mini and the Friedman mini.  The Diezel is clearly designed for much heavier stuff than I play.  None of them offer a proper clean sound, but the Bogner seems to be able to get a sightly cleaner sound than any of the others and has more voicing options, hence my choice.

It is unclear who actually makes these amps.  They are marketed in America by a company named Boutique Amps Distribution, otherwise referred to as "MINIAMP" https://www.miniamp.com/, but they are also shown on the websites of the respective amp brands.  It is clear that the owners/designers of these respective brands (Reinhold Bogner, Peter Soldano, Dave Friedman, and Peter Diezel) have been consulted and "collaborated" on the design and build, but I'm not sure what came first - the pedal or the mini amp.  Each company already had an overdrive pedal to mimic the amp, so it sounds as though an independent company approached the owners and suggested using the design of the pedal to combine with an amp in a mini head.

The Soldano SLO Pedal
The Soldano SLO Mini Amp Head on the Soldano website

The Friedman BE OD Pedal
The Friedman BE Mini Amp Head on the Friedman website

The Diezel VH4 Pedal
Diezel Amplification doesn't seem to be so keen on showing the VH Micro Amp head on their own website.

The Bogner website seems to be a bit of a shambles and is probably undergoing an update.

The Last of the Mohicans has a video about his Bogner Ecstacy Red OD Pedal on YouTube, but none about the mini amp.

The Build

I like to see what I have just spent my two torturous extra Friday night shift payments on, and to that end I disassembled it.  This would likely void the 2 year warranty if ever needed, but I accessed and egressed quietly and sneakily leaving no trace other than that which might be discovered by a forensic examiner.

The metal chassis is held to the bottom of the case using the bolts through the four rubber feet that have metal washer inserts.  The underside of the chassis is open, so there is a metal film stuck to the base of the enclosure under this for shielding.  The actual chassis is less than half the internal height of the enclosure.  There are ventilation holes drilled in the upperside of the metal chassis above where the power amp section lies, so this provides some empty space to dissipate some of the heat, and the cut-out on the upperside of the back panel that serves as a lifting handle also serves as a vent hole.  When lifting it with your fingers through the aperture they are nowhere near the amp chassis and couldn't reach it even if you had fingers like a gibbon, so you can't zap yourself on anything.

BillDL

*** PART 2 ***

Due to constraints on the number of characters I've had to split this.

The circuit boards are all the individually soldered component type, as opposed to the miniscule SMT - Surface Mount Technology - manufacture.  All the bezel nuts for what look like good quality sockets were tight and screws throughout were all snugged down, which makes a pleasant change from other equipment I've bought that invariably has loose nuts and screws somewhere.  It all looks very neatly arranged inside.

The case seems to be thin plywood dyed or sprayed black internally, and the external covering has been applied neatly.  The wicker front "grille" is just plastic stuff that looks like wicker stuck onto a backing of wood, so it doesn't "breathe" through it.  The white piping is your usual plastic extrusion stapled onto the wooden panel along with the "wicker" before the wooden panel is secured into the front.  The dinky chicken head knobs seem to be push-on ones rather than the grub screw type.  they are a little bit fiddly due to their size, but there's enough space between them to allow thick-fingered people to turn them without moving adjacent ones.  The white lettering below each knob is as large as it can be for the spacing, but could be difficult to read in poor light and would be obscured if the amp wasn't up fairly level with your eye line.  The for mini metal-handled DIP switches above the knobs slide horizontally and make a positive click when slid between settings.  You would definitely have to remember which was which and what way to slide each for the settings, because the writing is tiny.  The rubber feet are sticky enough to hold the amp head fairly still on a surface while changing settings, unlike the hard slippery plasticky feet found on some small amps.

Controls

The front panel knobs are: Volume, Presence, Treble, Middle, Bass, and Gain.

The mini sliders in the upper part of the panel are:

• Variac: Off / On to simulate reducing the voltage.
• Gain: - / + (supposedly the - gives a "plexi-ish" style of gain and the + boosts it to a "modern hot rod" gain.
• Mid frequency: L / N / H - Allows you to select the frequency controlled by the "Middle" knob.  L = 800Hz, N (Neutral) = 1.6kHz, H = 3.2 kHz.
• Pre-EQ switch: B1 / N, B2 - Gives a pre-EQ frequency boost.  N = Neutral default, B1 = high frequency boost for added detail, B2 = Mid and High frequency boost.

In Use

The supplied 24 volt 2 amp power supply comes with a universal 3-pin IEC C13 kettle lead that is almost 6' long, and a fixed cable just short of 5' ending with a 5.5mm barrel plug, so it's more or less a laptop charger in size and a universal spare would be easy to obtain if the supplied one was lost.  The DC power supply cable is thicker than your usual 9 volt PSUs and is reasonably felexible.  The PSU itself has a green "on" LED that's bright enough to be seen, but not so bright as to be annoying.

The rubbery feet are sticky enough to hold the small head in place with the 4lb of weight on it for moving switches and knobs, but a guitar cable's weight while being moved around tugging it would pull the amp off a cabinet, so it's best to loop the guitar cable through the cab handle first.

The slider switches do make a slight clunk through the speaker when the volume is up, but not enough to pop your ears or speaker cone.

This amp is NOT one that you could play every evening in the livingroom of your suburban house even slightly cranked unless you live alone or with somebody that likes loud guitar, or if you are in a detached house, or if you were in a studio.  I think I may have to use it with a power attenuator box on the speaker cable in the house unless the neighbours are definitely not at home.  You are NOT going to get sparkling clean sounds from it, even with the Gain down low and guitar volume backed off.  It does what it is designed to do, and that is provide a nice crunchy overdrive through to pretty high gain sounds.  It doesn't have a direct out socket other than the effects send socket, so it might be slightly limiting for some people, and neither does it have a headphone socket, because it's not designed to be used for headphone practice.

Basically it's a tiny amp head that you can take to a studio or a gig and and try different mic'd cabinets, or a little rock machine to use in your home as long as the neighbours aren't home.

One little anomaly I noticed was that if you turn the Gain knob down to the absolute minimum until it can go no further, it cuts the sound no matter how high you turn up the volume knob.  I don't know if this is a fault or just a feature, but it seems odd.  Immediately you turn it up from the stop position it works again.

A heard some reviewers talking about it being small enough to carry in a gig bag.  Certainly not a guitar gig bag, but in an accessories bag.  One thing of note is that when looking vertically down the front, the knobs protrude a little bit beyond the edge of the casing, so if you were bundling the amp into a bag with other stuff they will likely be moved.

BillDL

** PART 3 **

Sounds

I have never had the chance to play a full sized Bogner amplifier, nor played through the Bogner overdrive pedals.  My overall experience of playing through a variety of different larger valve amps is probably also slightly more limited than many people here and I am not one of those people that could identify different models of Marshall or even guess if somebody was playing through a Matchless or SLO or Friedman.  I can often differentiate between a Fender, Vox, and Marshall sound though, especially on clean(er) settings.

There are a few video reviews of the Bogner Mini head on YouTube.  Many of them concentrate on full gain drop-tuned "metal" playing, but the following people that do know their typical amp sounds explore it more fully.

GuitarGuitar Promotional Review.  Quite lengthy and riddled with clichés, but covers everything.
Review by Pete Thorn
Review by Rabea Massaad

I am surprised by how loud this amp is for 30 watts of solid state power and haven't yet gone beyond about 2 O'Clock on the volume with Gain at 12 O'Clock becaue it shook the windows in my back room  I don't know whether part of this is psychological while looking at the diminutive size of the head, or whether it is actually louder than other similarly rated solid state combo amps I've played in the past.  The hiss and hum level is pretty low even when played loud on fairly high gain settings, and certainly no worse than any similarly powered amps I've used..

The addition of the slide switches for tailoring the sound are definitely a good idea because it really expands the range of sounds you would normally get if it only had the knobs.  I have often heard people talking about the "sag" you get with a large valve amp that has had the input power permanently reduced or run through a variac, and I have to say that I didn't really know what they meant by "sag".  IF the variac simulation switch on this little amp is realistically reproducing that typical sound, then I like it and I will probably be inclined to leave it engaged.  The best I can describe it is that the response is less direct and punchy and feels "softer", but not floppy.

The "Pre-EQ" switch that boosts a range of frequencies is probably the most useful, especially when swapping guitars with different pickup types.  You can inject some midrange and higher frequencies to compensate for pickups that might be too woolly or bassy when overdriven.  Similarly, having the ability to tell the "Mid" knob what range of frequencies to act on can make a lot of difference and the Mid pot becomes very wide-ranging for different styles of music or guitar.

Through a 1x12 speaker cab with a fairly stiff Celestion 100w driver it is very direct and punchy.  Putting a reverb and delay pedal in the effects loop "softens" this punch a bit and spreads the sound.  I would love to play this through a 4x10 or 4x12 cab because I think the sound would be more "open" (albeit louder), but that's not feasible for me in the house and it's not how I will be using it most often anyway.

The amp doesn't get too hot even when used for a while at higher settings.  I added a speaker attenuator box in the speaker lead and ran it at high settings at tolerable volume and it only got marginally warmer to touch.

So, does it sound like a 100 watt EL34 four grand Bogner Ecstacy 101B from the 90s on the "red" gain channel?

I really don't know, but in my opinion it does as reasonable an approximation of the range of tones available from the real thing as is possible for a 30 watt solid state mini amp, and I base this observation on somebody playing one on the red channel that starts at 15:28 in THIS VIDEO and at the start of THIS VIDEO.

What I like about this amp is that it manages to retain a lot more of the individual string clarity and separation even at fairly high gain settings, and it is very responsive to picking intensity unlike most other solid state amps I've had.

[EDIT ... added ...]

I've just had the chance to test 8 different guitars through it with the gain on 10 O'Clock and the volume wound up quite a bit.  All apart from two, that have "woofy" pickups anyway, sound great.  A Telecaster with overwound pickups neally snarls while retaining the snap.  Strats on position 2 are nice and nasally the way I like them, and on the front pickup they sing while playing lead.  A DC Junior type with P90 dogear "barks" with clarity and I think that's my favourite guitar through this amp. [/EDIT] 

It's not a toy, unless you're used to paying £200 for a toy, and I'm pretty sure I could gig with it using a 4x10 or similar, but it's fun and does fill a gap for me quite nicely.

DrCornelius

Great review , thanks for posting . I’m curious and I can see one appearing on my doorstep at some point (especially after reading this)

BillDL

Thank you.

Just remember - it doesn't do "clean", but does overdrive very well.