Hartke Bass Amplifiers

I had been wanting a Hartke system for a couple of years. My father, (also a musician), found this nice deal where he lives, (Tenn.--I live near Chicago), at a place called Pot 'O Gold, in Paris, TN. I paid $900.00 for a Hartke 3500 amp, a 4-10 cab, and a 1-15 cab, all new, all Hartke. Not to shabby at all. Plus, they gave me a great deal on a 2-10 Hartke cab, that I put on an angled amp-stand and use as a monitor....real nice! I love just about everything on the Hartke 3500 amp. It has inputs for either active, or passive bass. Both tube and/or solid state pre-amp controls, (nice). Compression LED, (visual indicator of the status of compression. Compression control knob, (off-"oo"), Grapic EQ in/out switch, (your sound-man will love this feature), 10-band graphic EQ sliders, (with lights on each slider). A contour low control, a control high contol, and a master volume control to keep this beast under control. In the back, you have a fuse sled, an AC input, two speaker outputs, small fan, effect send jack, effect return jack, balence control knob (use this to adjust the relative amount of effect send (dry), versus effect return, (wet). A direct out post/pre switch, (again, your soundman will love this one), Direct out normal/ground lift switch, (for those anoying places with neon lights, dimmer lights, ect..). And, a direct out jack. This amp has just about everything you will need, to shake the dandruf off of everybody's hair. The reason your soundman/woman will love the EQ switches are in case your EQ on stage isn't sounding well thru the main's..you can have the sound-person EQ your bass sound while still keeping your EQ settings on stage. Very nice feature. Althou, my soundman loves my EQ settings anyway, it's nice to have. All in all, if you can't find a tone you like with this beauty, it doesn't exist! To be nit-picky, there is only two things about this amp, that could be better..1) the weight. If I had to guess, I'd say it weighs about 25 lbs. Now, that by itself doesn't sound bad, but you put this thing in a rack, along with two other items, (I have a Hartke 3500 amp, a Korg DTR-2 tuner, and a Furman RR power conditoner in my rack), it's a pretty heavey rack. 2) the compression could be a tad better then it is. I usually either have it off, or real low. But, I still would trade my ex-wife for another one of these amps, so these two items can't bother me to much, huh? LOL Oh, and one more thing...this amp is not bi-ampable. It's the only feature missing, that I wish was on it...I should have bought the 5000, or 7000 for that. excellent construction. Perfect condition straight from the store, shipped 500 miles, to my door. I instantly slapped it in a rack. I got 'in to it' with a guy here recently over the quality of this amp...He said knobs are loose, slider tabs were missing, lights on 3 other sliders didn't work. I asked him how old his amp was....he said about 3 years old. Then, I asked him if it was ever racked...HE SAID NO! No cover, no nothing. This isn't rocket-science here, folks...if you take care of it, this amp will last you many, many years. But, if you just throw it around, don't rack it, don't even get a cover for it, in a short time, it's going to look it. Don't forget, there is a tube in this unit, so you can't just bang it around at will, (whose Will?) LOL. To make a long story short, (to late for that now, huh?), I'd buy another one of this babies in a heart-beat. The first night I played it out, it took me less then 5 minutes to get the tone, seperation/tightness I wanted with the kick drum, and the volume just right. It's all right here, on this unit. Very highly recommended. This review was originally published on http://www.musicgearreview.com