The amp has a separate volume and presence control for each side. I ran the presence on five and the volume on about 7. I was playing outdoors in a redwood grove, and the speakers were sitting on the ground. I expected to have to push the amp, but discovered to my delight that I had plenty of power in reserve.

This amp has a pair of 6L6 output tubes for each channel. I bought it used, but the previous owner (Tommy Alexander) took such good care of it that it's like new. Mesa has been making this amp for over a decade. I opened it up and found a very simple, servicable design, and solid construction. I think this amp will last forever.

Thumbs up for the Mesa/Boogie Fifty/Fifty!

With a solid state amp, when you reach the rated power the waveform clips abruptly with a hard edge. This gives a very ugly distortion sound. You need to have enough power so that you never hit that point.

By contrast, when a tube amp reaches its rated power the waveform starts to gently flatten. The effect is actually very musical. If you push it really hard you get close to a square wave, but with rounded edges. This is the tone that blues players die for.

Generally speaking, a tube amp with half the wattage of a solid state amp will deliver the same performance. But beyond that, Mesa tends to underrate their amps. They use the level at which a sine wave starts to flatten as their benchmark. They test it against a resistive load instead of a speaker, because you can't stand in the same room as a standing sine wave pushing 50 watts!

I think that Mesa's ratings are about 40% of an equivalent solid state amp's rating. This 50 watts "feels" like about 125 watts per channel of solid state power. But beyond that, at dance band volumes the low end sounds "rounder" than most solid state amps I've played through, including my Webb which is rated at 225 watts.

You're probably right that most EL34-based amps have more midrange. Traditionally, EL34/EL84 amps have been aimed more at rock/metal players and 6L6/6V6 amps have targeted country/blues players. The metal guys use more midrange.

Bob

The only thing that doesn't work for me are the multi fx with pre amp units. To much stuff inbetween my fingers and the air I'm trying to move.

Bob

Steve

[This message was edited by Steve Feldman on 18 May 2000 at 08:02 AM.]

Cheers, Robert

[This message was edited by ToneJunkie on 19 May 2000 at 06:49 PM.]

My friend Andy Marshall at THD tells me that there is no wonder the VHT sounds 'Hiwattish': those guys are all Hiwatt fans.

Bob

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biggbob@home.com
http://members.tripod.com/biggbobmartin

Nice to hear that they are still holding up.

At the time I repaired it (late Fall, 1997), the amp's owner (& guitarist in the band, who had loaned it to the bass player for the gig) owned half of a commercial-client only computer service & network business, including an ISP division with no dial-up modem pools, two T1 lines, a small Sun mainframe & workstations, some behemoth server bays, and the necessary network routers.

I bartered that repair, for a then state-of-the-art motherboard & 233 Mhz Pentium chip, a Teac (very heavy-duty built) 24X CD Rom drive, four 32-Mbyte EDO simms, a Windows keyboard, a top quality mouse, and a bunch of software.

The amp repair soon lead to a profitable job for my electrical contracting business, upgrading their electrical system to allow backup operation on generators, including a code-correct (this is rare in the field, due to its complex technical and safety issues which generally fall above the skill level of most small electrical contractors) transfer switch installation, substantial facility rewiring to make it all work, and a follow-on service agreement.

In late 1998, I traded that board, chip, & half of the ram...for a 1962 Fender Blonde Bassman head that had slept in the swapper's closet since 1980. All it required for re-commissioning was cleaning the pots and a nominal "check-up".

I don't think I've ever played out with it, where someone didn't offer to buy it.

I've finally learned my lessons about seeking that etheral Holy Grail of better tone, when I aready have it.

NO WAY am I letting this one go!

It's hard to believe that this nearly pristine Bassman will very soon be 40 years old!!!

So...You built the amp, the computer guru bought it, the bass player "smoked" it, I fixed it, (and got a computer)...and now we're discussing the entire meandering path of events, here on YOUR website!

Is this a matter of Serendipity, or one of probability & statistics? :>)