Am I mental for considering ditching my jcm800 and going full boss katana ?!!

riffpowers

I’ve been using jcm800’s for decades.I love them. Currently I have the 20 watt one , I love that one too. 

However , I bought a boss katana to play at home and  I think that’s great too. Easy to use , sounds great , and does everything I could ever need and more .

I’m not playing in any bands right now , so looking at what gear I have and what gear I need. 

so with my jcm800 I generally need to have some kind of solo boost (something in the fx loop) a Wah , a delay , a drive or 2 . And obviously it’s heavy and all that. The issues I have are the same as everyone has with these , often needs a drive  in the front , no useable solo boost etc . 

And also it means carrying an amp head , cab, and flight cased pedal board.  

It occurred to me that the boss katana and the boss foot switch could do all of that and more .
I could get jcm800 sounds out of it (and probably pretty much anything else) and use a boss footswitch to give me a solo boost , and any other fx I’d ever have on a pedal board like delay , drive , and maybe even Wah, and I’ve got access to anything else I’d need too. And it’s lighter , and there’d be less stuff to carry round. I’d need a smaller board with a wireless and tuner on it and that’s it !! 

I have the 50 watt mkii combo and tbh I’d need to get the 100watt one , maybe the head / cab or the artist one. 

Is this a step too far ? Has anyone gone down this route ? 

Danny1969

I had the Artist in for a firmware upgrade and some EQ tweaking. I can honestly say I thought it was one of the worse amps I have ever played through. it has a kind of synthetic cloak to the sound that you can't seem to get rid off no matter what you do. 

A decent solidstate amp and a few pedals is a far better and still cheap way to go. IMHO 

p90fool

Yes. 

Musicwolf

riffpowers said:

I’m not playing in any bands right now

I have the 50 watt mkii combo and tbh I’d need to get the 100watt one

Might I humbly suggest that sir is putting the cart before the horse?

Fiddlesticks_

ICBM

Danny1969 said:

I had the Artist in for a firmware upgrade and some EQ tweaking. I can honestly say I thought it was one of the worse amps I have ever played through. it has a kind of synthetic cloak to the sound that you can't seem to get rid off no matter what you do. 

A decent solidstate amp and a few pedals is a far better and still cheap way to go. IMHO 

It’s odd… some people hear this, and some don’t.

I think they sound terrible too, although the Mk2 is less so than the Mk1, which I found unusably grating. (And the 100W less awful than the 50, although I haven’t tried the Artist.)

So add me to the ‘yes’ column.

rossi

Lets face it everyone ears are different which negates any tone talk on the wobblynet ..I can say this as I am very old and very  cantakerous

Petepassion

I had the 100w Katana head and through my Marshall 4x12 and I could get it pretty close to my 1959SLP.
I used to use a 1959SLP with a Marshall powerbrake. Awesome sound but as you say, no solo boost.
   Now I use my old AC50 clean into my 2x12 or 4x12 cab and use pedals for the sound. Or sometimes I use a good valve combo if my backs playing up. This then opens up all possibilities.
Here's a vid I put up recently, its a Vox vs Selmer comparison, but also shows the difference between using an attenuator vs pedals...not much in it really.
https://youtu.be/KtFSClcPD8c?si=4LbP2GsljlLBiyMH

fretmeister

I'm a convert to my Helix, but at the same time I had the mini JCM800.

I sold the JCM as I wasn't gigging on guitar. But I still regret it - I still want to go on little jams occasionally and don't want to disassemble my rack, and although I don't often play clean, a good Marshall valve clean sound is still not able to be duplicated by any modeller.

I'm particularly annoyed with myself for selling it as now I have 1 kid at uni and 1 about to go I have no spare money to get another. Otherwise I would have bought another already.

I used it with a Weber Minimass attenuator to knock even the 5W down further and a Pedal Train Jnr with some fun pedals. It was an ace little rig.

Keep it.

I also had a Katana - it was no more than ok.

CHRISB50

Yes. Don't do it.

Barney

You will probably hear a lot of difference in a band situation ....I would keep the Marshal

HAL9000

Don’t do it. I’ve had the Katana 50 (MkI), and agree with those that say that its ‘base’ tone grates somewhat - and that no amount of tweaking fully gets rid of it (admittedly I never tried hooking it up to a PC).

Fingers657

Personally I think the Boss Katana Mk2 100 1x 12 combo sounds brilliant as does the Matching Mk2 Head with built in speaker for practicing.
The Artist combo and Head are even better. 

Using the heads with different speaker cabinets makes a massive difference.
I love mine.
Ive also got an excellent Boss Katana Bass combo that also works really well with guitars.
Using both the Boss GA-FC and GA-FC EX Pedals with them gives one some great options.

Yorkie

riffpowers said:

I could get jcm800 sounds out of it (and probably pretty much anything else)

Can you really? I spent two years tweaking the EQs, trying pedals, downloading other people's patches... all it took was one power chord through a 40W Marshall and the Katana went 'out the window'. 

ElectricXII

If you're not gigging at the moment, then the bulk and weight don't matter do they?

Not A JCM800 example, but our other guitarist gigs a Katana 100 when his Mesa Mark V is broken (often), and for rehearsals. It sounds OK, but not as good in either situation.

noisepolluter

I have the mini JCM800 head which lives round at my mate’s soundproof cave along with a Zilla 1x12

At home I have a DSL40CR, which is much easier to use at lower volumes, has a much better FX loop, wider range of sounds and, with a speaker swap, sounds very nearly as good for the JCM800’s range of sounds. 

Nikc

I had epiphany this evening - my youngest son has stolen my Boss Street Cube and was playing Master of the Puppets on a crunch setting - honestly it sounded ok you know kinda cool.

Then I plugged in to mess about and play along - nope thats why I play through my Orange all the time, ok is ok but more is more

DrJazzTap

I am a helix convert. In hindsight i should have got the hx effects as I don't touch the amp modelling side really. 
For as much as I love the power of the helix, plugging into the vyse head is special. I'd be the first to admit the helix is 90% as good it's just missing something. 

I've only played a katana at a practice room. I thought it was pretty good. I still think the old peavey stuff is better. 
My suggestion is buy a second hand peavey for fifty quid, keep the marshall and get some cheap miab pedals. 

BillDL

DrJazzTap said:

I've only played a katana at a practice room. I thought it was pretty good. I still think the old peavey stuff is better. 
My suggestion is buy a second hand peavey for fifty quid, keep the marshall and get some cheap miab pedals. 

So do I.  I like my Katana 50 MkII, but I prefer the sound and simplicity of my Peavey Bandit Transtube 1x12 and the Studio Pro 1x12. They are both heavy amps though.

ICBM

BillDL said:

I like my Katana 50 MkII, but I prefer the sound and simplicity of my Peavey Bandit Transtube 1x12 and the Studio Pro 1x12. They are both heavy amps though.

Admittedly I’ve put a neodymium speaker in mine, but I wouldn’t have described the Studio Pro as a heavy amp even before. It’s an easy one-hand lift and I can walk quite a long way with it.

monquixote

I switched from a MJW to a Katana when I stopped gigging and it was fine but I noticed I got less interested in playing. I then switched to a DSL and for me it's a massive upgrade and I'm just always delighted with the sound rather than trying to constantly tweak because it's not quite there.

All that said I think the Katana is a great bargain for what it is and the FX are superb.

So my vote would be stick with the JCM800