Princeton 65 type amp for occasional home use?

octatonic

ICBM said:

octatonic said:

But it is too loud for home use if you wan anything other that clean from the amp, which isn't really the point with those amps.

I don't agree at all, the clean sound from them is fantastic and easily worth having at home volume regardless of what it sounds like louder.

That is fine, but I want more break up from the amp.

I use the Road Runner at home and it is ok. 
At rehearsal/gig volume it sounds better and I can run my pedals a bit lower.

markblack

Thank all for the replies so far I shall do some googleing

Winny_Pooh

HAL9000 said:

Delta King 10 or 12
Blackstar Studio 10 6L6

The delta king is good
Also:
Supro, medium sized
Vibrochamp reverb
Vox ac10
Morgan ac20

Less nice but still nice

Princeton 65, the SS one
Tonemaster princeton
Peavey red stripe envoy 110
Champ xd

munckee

I have a Princeton 65 which I use at home. I play mostly cleanish but I have an attenuator which has made it the perfect home amp, better than a tone king gremlin I had previously. 

I also have a super champ x 2 which sounds great as a clean amp on channel 1 or the modeling on channel 2, I take this to jams so I don’t have to worry about £800 worth of amp. 

chris78

I’m going to run for cover but a blues junior at £300-350 used will deliver classic fender tones with a master volume 

markblack

@chris78 excuse my ignorance... Why run for cover?

chris78

Because they’re so ubiquitous, they can get a bad press. Lots of people use them for smaller club/pub gigging. There are mods that make them better, such as a speaker upgrade - @ICBM has spoken before about what you can do to make them decent and maybe he’ll chip in

For me though, if I wanted a cheap valve amp for home use with fender style tones, that’s where I’d look 

markblack

@chris78 cheers for that.

ICBM

chris78 said:

Because they’re so ubiquitous, they can get a bad press. Lots of people use them for smaller club/pub gigging. There are mods that make them better, such as a speaker upgrade - @ICBM has spoken before about what you can do to make them decent and maybe he’ll chip in

The biggest - but most expensive - improvement you can make is a new cabinet… perhaps surprisingly, but it is so - a pine/tweed 5E3-size cab absolutely transforms them, even more than a good speaker. If you want to change just the speaker I would choose a Jensen P12Q. Do both and you’ll get a really great amp.

I did these for a customer who had two, so we could really compare the difference the two changes made - I would say 60/40 in favour of the cabinet, but the speaker by itself was a worthwhile improvement.

allen

Personally I can't stand the Blues Junior. 

I had a Princeton 65 reissue for ages. Great amp.

I agree with a lot of the previous posts, but would particular support the Vox AC10. Not the same as the princeton, but really great - and they seem to go for about £350 second hand which is a real bargain for how they sound.

donbot

Ibanez TSA15. 5/15 Watt, fx loop, small, footswitchable tubescreamer circuit, sounds great, looks great, cheap. Would need a reverb pedal though. Discontinued so would have to be a used one. 

Quilter Aviator Cub if you don’t mind solid state. A bit over budget though. 

Brunetti Silverman if you can find one second hand.

spev11

https://juketone.co.uk/product/juketone-royal-blood-10-guitar-amplifier/
Would something like this tempt you? The certainly look good, the spec seems pretty good too for the price, obviously can't try one out. I'm always a little tempted by them.

snowblind

If you are doing the Fender thing the budget mentioned is easy HRD territory. Bassbreaker 30r maybe?

Both suffer from the usual Fender all or nothing volume controls but that's nothing that can't be fixed.

Yorkie

wrinkleygit said:

I’ve just bought a Super Champ XD, after reading some of the comments on here, surprised at how well it performs, used it already at a small gig with another guitar player and bass player, light as  feather and great for playing in the house. Have to say I was put off the X2 version because of the lack of software support and any potential issues that might cause, good luck in your quest.

Hiya @wrinkleygit ;
How are you getting on with the Super Champ XD? 

wrinkleygit

Hello, I’ve just put up a NAD post!!!
 Honestly I couldn’t be happier with it, the range of tones and effects cover everything that I need, it works for me.

Yorkie

Sounds good! I'll ask a couple of questions on the other thread so we don't derail this one – apologies OP!

guitargeek62

Yorkie said:

wrinkleygit said:

I’ve just bought a Super Champ XD, after reading some of the comments on here, surprised at how well it performs, used it already at a small gig with another guitar player and bass player, light as  feather and great for playing in the house. Have to say I was put off the X2 version because of the lack of software support and any potential issues that might cause, good luck in your quest.

Hiya @wrinkleygit ;
How are you getting on with the Super Champ XD? 

I had the X2 for a year or so and it really was/is a superb home amp with a great blackface tone. The inbuilt reverbs and things are pretty good too, and there's a large range of drive tones on ch2.  I would definitely recommend looking at these as a home amp.

MattP

Do you amplify your helix at home, through monitors or powered speaker, of just use phones? If the former, I'd just use that and the Princeton model on the Helix which i think sounds fantastic. 

markblack

@ all thanks for the replies.

@MattP i just use headphones, i do like the princeton in the helix. Just sometimes it's nice to play without headphones and all the options the helix brings!

Fiddlesticks_

allen said:

I agree with a lot of the previous posts, but would particular support the Vox AC10. Not the same as the princeton, but really great - and they seem to go for about £350 second hand which is a real bargain for how they sound.

Sorry to add even more options, but if I were to go down the Vox route I’d consider an AC15 too. I’ve had both an AC10 and 15 and I found that the 15 sounded much fuller than the 10 at home volumes, so that’s the one I kept in the end.