Marshall Hybrid Combo Guitar Amps

I got this amp six months old off a well known internet auction site for £345. It retails for £560 - bargain! I bought it because I was looking for a powerful combo for gigs. I love this amp. I looks brilliant, and the range of sounds you can get out of it is frankly terrifying. The four channels - acoustic simulator, clean, overdrive 1 and overdrive 2 range from jangly piezo acoustic to the most metallic metal. Each channel has a seperate gain and volume control, so the channels overlap nicely. There's a master volume and master prescence knob, too. There are two FX channels - one for acoustic simulator / clean, and one for overdrive 1 and 2. These sound really good, especially considering they're inbuilt. This combo weighs as much as a small cow! It doesn't have wheels, either, so get a roadie, or get down the gym. Also, the power cable is only about a metre long, so it needs to be close to a power point. The number of knobs on the front means that you'll have to be on top of things if you want to change settings during a gig. I think this was actually hewn out of stone, or perhaps made from the remnants of a collapsed star. Everything is sturdy and possibly bomb proof. Some of the knobs feel a bit wobbly, though. If you've got the cash, this is a brilliant amp. The range of sounds is great, and it is loud enough to fill a decent sized club without needing to be mic'd up. Genius! This review was originally published on http://www.musicgearreview.com

Marshall has to be one of my favorite guitar amplifiers because they have such a great thick warm tone that is very conducive to my playing style. Marshall has built some of the best amplifiers for hard rock and metal tones and a sometimes build very inexpensive budget friendly amps as well. This is one of those amplifiers that is tailored towards the budget friendly musician or someone who doesn't have a whole lot of money to spend on a guitar amplifier. This is not good to be here great sounding JCM 2000 or JCM 800 amplifier at all. This is good to be an amplifier that's can basically be home around practice amp for you. UTILIZATION Features * 100 Watt Valvestate power stage driving 1x12'' speaker or 2x12'' speakers . * ECC83 Pre-amp valve active on all 3 channels. * 3 independent footswitchable channels, 'Clean', 'Overdrive 1' and 'Overdrive 2'. * Clean channel with Treble, Middle and Bass controls, plus Tone Shift switch for extra tonal options. * Overdrive 1 channel with its own Gain and Volume plus shared EQ with Overdrive 2. * Overdrive 2 channel with its own Gain, Volume and sweeping Contour control. * Power Dimension switch to give the effect of the greater saturation of a valve power stage of lower wattage being driven hard. * Built-in spring Reverb with separate level controls for the Clean and Overdrive 1/2. * Effects Loop with front panel Mix control. * Headphone jack . * Line Out jack with Speaker Emulation for connection to external equipment. * Extension speaker jacks SOUNDS I'm not really a fan of the tone of this amplifier . It has a very thin raspy fuzzy tone that sounds like garbage to my ears. You have three channels to choose from and none of them really speak volumes to me. You have a clean channel an overdrive one channel and then in overdrive to channel 2 to increase of gain and solo lead playing. The lead channels do not really sound that great and it is hard for me to understand why you would need essentially a practice amp sound with 100 W of power. There's no way that you're going to need hundred watts of garbage tone. This does sound like Marshall and a sense with its voicing endgame structure but the feeling and tone of it just flat-out terrible. I would recommend this guitar amplifier to anyone because it sounds terribly raspy . OVERALL OPINION I would not recommend this amplifier to anyone because of hundred watts of power for a terrible selling amplifier and it simply just does not do it for me. If you need a good practice amp then I suggest going with something it's around 15 to 20 W of power. That is enough suitable volume for someone is playing in the bedroom/ garage or in a quiet space. These amps have been discontinued for a while so you'd only be able to find a them in the used classified sections.

I have used this amp for all kind of styles. Even clean channel which is pure solid state is good sounding and much better than some regular solid state amps. It is classic MArshall sound and you can barely notice the absence of tubes. But Overdrive channel is simply great ! To this day I have not find so beautiful, powerful, smooth, deep, consistent etc overdrive sounds ! Overdrive 1 is excellent for all types of hard rock, including ACDC, Led Zeppelin, 60s old rock, Black Sabbath / total rip off of Black Sabbath with overdrive 1 to max and use of contour. Contour is magical. It create such Eq that cannot be matched with any Eq pedal, racks etc. You can only find such powerful Eq as contour with some tube powered Eq racks ! This contour is magical. It can shape sound amazingly, even more so than expensive eq pedals. Together with overdrive channel and contour you can get all kind of sounds. With overdrive 2 you can get very close sound to Metallica Black album and also Master of PUppets and ..And Justice for All, if contour + eq is precisely set. For Metallica overdrive 2 is enough to be set to noon position and for sound of Chuck Schuldiner Death the contour must go towards 3 afternoon and overdrive as well more than noon position. Then you get quite precise sound of Death and Chuck use Valvestates exclusively throughout his career at the suggestion death metal Florida studio wizard Scott Burns who endorsed metal sound of Marshall Valvestate. No pedal and no amps could get me same power and beauty as overdrive 2 together with contour, stereo chorus and reverb of Marshall Valvestate S80 ! And yes reverb is spring reverb and stereo chorus is simply magical. Oh, yes I forgot to mention that overdrive 1 can get you very precise sound of Eric Clapton Cream era with overdrive set around 2PM and with Overdrive still higher you can get Led Zepp sounds very well, but do experiment with eq and contour as Led Zepp require quite precise settings due to many versatile sounds of Jimmy Page ! And to get sound of Jimi Hendrix you need some vintage sounding fuzz pedal in front like fuzz face and overdrive 1 will get you very close to all kinds of Jimi Hendrix sounds. But it must be overdrive 1. Of course for wah wah you also need some vintage sounding pedal. If you are still not satisfied with sounds for classic rock and hard rock use the Boss Sd-1 with vol at max and gain very little less than 9 Am. This will do the job for most of classic rock sounds. But for Metallica or death metal, trash metal, you dont need no pedals. Just overdrive 2 and contour will do the magic. Overdrive channel of MArshall Valvestate, both head and combo version (of course those must be 50w and louder versions) is magical and cna get you all kinds of Marshall sounds.

The Marshall AVT150 amp utilises 'Advanced Valvestate Technology' which basically means it's a combination of a valve/tube amp and a solid state amp. It delivers 150watts of power and has connections for an external footswitch, 2 external speaker inputs, a line in and an FX send and return insert section. In terms of controls, effects and settings, this amp head gives you plenty boosting 2 rows of 12 knobs controlling 4 different channels which are selectable via the footswitch. These range from the usual bass, middle and treble through to DFX mix and adjust for the digital effects section. The 4 different channels to choose from are Acoustic Simulator, Clean, Overdrive 1 and overdrive 2, these are also available on the footswitch as well as are 2 buttons to switch the FX section for Acoustic simulator/Clean on and FX section on/off for Overdrive1/overdrive 2. Along the top row of knobs/controls are the OD1 and OD2 section which are controlled by the same EQ knobs. (bass, middle, treble) and along the bottom row of knobs/controls is the acoustic simulator/clean channels which is controlled by the same (but separate from OD1 and OD2) EQ knobs. UTILIZATION The manual is very detailed but not overwhelming for this amplifier. Marshall know guitarists as good as anybody having been created amps for legends such as Jimi Hendrix, Pete Townsend and Slash, so they know how to put a decent manual together without making things difficult to figure out like some other companies do from time to time. It clearly explains how to set up the amp for any situation, using the FX send and return section, adding additional cabinets, how each channel works and about the built in digital effects section. It is very easy to get a good sound from this amp in fact it's harder to get a bad sound from the amp in all honesty, the manual even explains the inspiration for each channel and some recommended settings to dial in to achieve certain tones from famous bands/guitarists. SOUNDS This Marshall can produce a really good tone, especially the overdrive/distortion 1 and 2 channels. The acoustic simulator is very impressive, the only thing i have heard that beats it is the Boss acoustic simulator pedal but the avt150's is very close indeed, especially convincing on single coil pickups on guitars like the Fender Stratocaster, plus there are controls for the 'top end' and 'body' so you can dial in your perfect setting for the Acoustic simulator. The clean channel in my opinion doesn't quite live up to the other channels, it is still perfectly usable but i've found on Les Paul and Gibson guitars it can sound quite muddy and not cut through the mix well live, however if combined with certain effects such as the chorus effect then it can be more flexible, but a better option for a clean sound from this amp would be to use the overdrive 1 channel and have a very low setting on your guitar's volume pot as in 1 or 2. Moving onto the Overdrive channels, OD1 is more of an 'old school' crunchy type of distortion with more of a high mid range bite to it. Very flexible when used in combination with your guitars volume and pickup selectors. You will achieve a nice smooth bluesy tone with the neck pick up, and a driving rock sound from the bridge pick up as you might expect. On the gain control, as a rough guide - a quarter will give you a jangly indie rock tone, half way will give you AC/DC, about 3/4 of gain will give you Guns N Roses and up full will present you with a 'Ride the Lightning' style Metallica sound as described in the manual preset, and to go along with this you will need to press the 'scoop' button in which takes out the mids of the tone leaving you with more bass and treble and an overall aggressive sound that actually reminds me more of the 'And Justice for All' album guitar sound also by Metallica. The OD2 channel was designed with modern metal in mind, mostly aimed at the Nu-Metal crowd of the early 2000's, and when combined with the scoop switch button (separate from the OD1 channel scoop switch) can produce heavy and brutal sounding results that suggest Slipknot, Korn, Hatebreed and nowadays Slayer. Although with that said it is definitely not pigeon-holed in that genre, having the scoop switch unpressed and the gain set at a nice halfway-3/4 point will give you a great solo tone that has a dominating, thick mid range punch that can bully it's way through the mix to shine through. This setting on a dual humbucker guitar always reminds me of the guitar solo in Crazy Train by Randy Rhodes. When combined with the footswitch and the OD1 channel, you can use this to great effect when playing live, dial the OD1 for crunchy rhythm and then set the OD2 to have more gain and volume to switch to for blistering lead parts or even a louder 'Chorus' distortion setting is a lot less hassle than having a load of pedals with power adaptors and cables etc on the floor to have to switch to. The digital FX section is a highlight of this amp, and it is utilised very well with no 'cheap' sounds to be found anywhere. It has a lot of different reverb settings to choose from such as hall, room, gated and plate, which can all be tweaked with using the 'adjust control' and then subtly or not-so-subtly blended in with the dry signal using the DFX mix control knob. This method can be used for the other FX such as chorus, flanger, modulation, and delay. Set right, the flanger can be very effective for a 'Hotel California' type effect, the delay also sounds great and is a personal favourite for the overdrive channels along with chorus on the clean channels. The FX do not have the same degree of options as say a dedicated pedal would do, but you would need a spend a great deal on each pedal to get the same basic quality as the FX on this Marshall, a fantastic addition and big selling point for this amp. OVERALL OPINION To sum up, The Marshall AVT150 amp head and AVT150A cabinet are a great combination of quality, flexibility and value for money. The tone is very good, although a true Marshall valve amp will better it in this sense but at more of a cost and with much less built-in digital effects. Compare to other manufacturers take on the same type of amp with built in effects such as Crate etc, the Marshall AVT150 wins hands down. So if you have the cash and a large guitar pedal board already and need the best Marshall valve/tube sound possible then i would probably recommend you look at some of Marshall's more expensive 'All valve' offerings. However, if you can live with a valve pre-amp and flexibility for playing live and budget are part of the equation when choosing your next amp, then i would strongly recommend you look no further and definitely try this out.

2 Channel Valvestate Marshall Amp. Tube in the preamp with a solid state power amp, and a 12' Speaker. Looks like a classic Marshall in combo form. Volume and Bass/Mid/Treb on the clean side with a 'Tone Shift' that notches the treble EQ to a higher frequency for a more glassy tone. Then Gain Bass/Contour/Treble on the Overdrive Channel. Rounded out by Master Volume, FX Mix, and a Reverb knob. Comes with footswitch and power cord. I dig the gold front panel too. Kinda looks professional. As a musician I've been largely a bassist and a keyboard player, but I've also played a fair amount of guitar in my day for sure. I got it for $150 in a package deal with an Ibanez RG570 from Chris, the owner of Music Gear Review. I got it because I was getting into guitar pretty heavily (it was my first fretted instrument) and I really wanted to get an electric setup, mostly because I longed for that distorted sound that I just couldn't get playing my acoustic or the nylon jobs at the Convent where I took lessons (don't dock it...those Nuns were really good players). <a href="http://www.shutterdownmusic.com">http://www.shutterdownmusic.com</a> I like the smoothness of the reverb that isn't overbearing. It's a spring reverb that doesn't ring out too much or sound like somebody dropped the amplifier like some other tube amps can get, I think. I also like the clean tones I can get. I think Marshall picked the frequency centers well for the EQ, so your guitar sounds warm, but just a little punchy. The distortion sound is VERY traditional JCM Marshall tone, too, and I'm still very impressed with it after almost 10 years of using it. I played a Les Paul and the Ibanez through it for a long time, and both felt very present when playing solo. ...but when I wasn't playing solo, the amp didn't seem to have much presence to it, and like Chris has said about it before, it really didn't have much underlying bass to it's sound, either. It just doesn't feel like a full 65 watts. And the tone shift on the clean channel makes your guitar shimmer...but it can also make your guitar sound like it's being sampled through a cat clawing a chalkboard as a scratching post. Not that great at all. It just needs more balls, more presence, more punch, and it'd be a great amp. Maybe it needs tubes in the power section, too, but this is just...kind of a downer in the long run. No complaints here. I take care of my equipment. And this Marshall has stayed perfectly in one piece in return. I'm really disappointed in the overall sound of it. Sure, it sounds great in a practice room, and it can feel awesome just jamming in your room, but take it out on stage, and it just gets lost in a mix that you can't dig yourself out of. It's kind of a disappointment overall, although it has redeeming qualities as a practice amp. So I give it a 2. This review was originally published on http://www.musicgearreview.com

I've been gigging for about 20 years. I play heavy electric blues. I run both an SSS strat with 3x Dimarzio H2s in a single coil mode and another HH strat with 2x PAF Humbuckers. My rig is pretty simple relying only on a wah, boost, compression, and some time based effects depending on the mood. I bought this at PMT in Birmingham UK, for about £250 about 7 years ago to gig in smaller venues so I didn't have to lug around my plexi. I love the distortion and the two channel switching. The effects loop is a nice. It's great for practicing and for small rehearsal spaces. I found it most useful if you use it for a dirty tone with an a/b to a Fender Twin for clean. Also, I like the fact that you can drive a cab if you need to. I found that through a 4x12 slant it really came into it's own. The single speaker. I've never really liked the tone of it. It kind of just gets lost in the mix at higher volumes if you are pushing it so it needs to be mic'd. The PAFs really tend to drive the unit hard and the amp really can't keep up at higher volumes so either gets really muddy or really harsh. I am not too fond of the clean tone (hey, it is a Marshall) To my ear I would rather use the direct out to the PA than the main speaker. Excellent construction however the reverb went on me unexpectedly in a gig taking the rest of the unit out with it. I put this down to a freak accident. It's heavy for the size and needs a good set of castors if you want to save your back. You get what you pay for. I think it is a very good practice and small venue amp, but a bit dodgy for any major gig unless you have a good PA to back you up. I'd probably buy it again, but I would only buy the head and then either use the DI or mix and match cabs. This review was originally published on http://www.musicgearreview.com

I bought this amp at Sam Ash Music for $659 because I needed an amp that I could do small gigs with. The sound is good, when it works. I play a Strat, and I can get pretty good Marshall/Strat sounds out of it (Jimi, etc) considering it's a valve amp. You can get a nice dirty blues sound out of channel 1 and the onboard reverb sounds are very usable. You can get a really nice bluesy sound out of it with dist. channel 1, but I couldn't get that nice screaming lead sound that you need to really rock out. I found channel 2 is useless unless you're playing metal power chords or something muddy. Also, you can only select one on-board effect at a time, so you can't for example choose a reverb setting + delay or chorus, which is annoying. The Boss petals I have are much more adjustable and sound better than this unit's effects. I only used the reverb settings regularly. I don't know whether or not I just ran into some bad luck with this one or if they all suck, but after two months it crapped out--I couldn't play it at more than 1/8 max volume without it popping and crackling. I sent it in for repair, and when it came back (6 freakin months later!) it broke again after 2 weeks. I didn't even play through it that much or anywhere near gig volume during that time. I met a guy who had the same problem with his AVT10, so I'm pretty sure its not just me. For sound quality, I'd give it a 4. For diversity of a sound, I'd give it a 3. 'Cause it keeps breaking, nothing else really matters. Don't buy one. This review was originally published on http://www.musicgearreview.com

i got this amp second hand from a freind well at the time i thought it was a really good amp. I mean it had two channels, one is clean and the other is the overdrive channel. They are handy if you like playing the blues, or getting a simmaler sound...Apart from that there isnt a lot more on the amp. Its quite loud and its got a marshall name on it. its got a big twelve inch speaker...thats about it. the fact its a bit limited and the clean channel keeps cutting in and out. its alright buy this amp if youre a marshall fan, but not if you like the sound of your guitar This review was originally published on http://www.musicgearreview.com

I bought this amp in Colorado Springs about a year ago from Pro Sound music for $279. I originally purchased it to use for rehearsals and recording. I love the portability and the absolutely awesome tone of this little amp. The range and depth of tone is really remarkable for an amp of this size and price. I have since been using it at small gigs and some larger rooms with a lot of success. Nobody can believe that this amp is producing all of that sound. Wish it had channel switching and was quiter in the gain mode. It is really noisy with the gain switch on. The construction is like every other Marshall I've ever owned--SOLID ! Quality is way above the level you would expect for under $300. All in all, if you need a small amp for small gigs, rehearsals or recording use and still want that Marshall tone, go buy this sucker! Oh, the DI is speaker emulated, so you can go straight to the board or snake ( it works nicely I might add as I have used it on a bunch of gigs ) and the headphone jack is nice for working out parts without disturbing anyone at 2 am. This review was originally published on http://www.musicgearreview.com

These amps pretty much sound like crap. They have a preamp tube and no power tubes. So the back end section which is the power section is still solid state. This means that they went a cheap way of getting you a "tube amp" and no real change in tone. Most of the feel and tone of a tube amp comes from the power section. These amps cam in different formats with wattage and different size combos, but note of them sounded worth playing in front of people with. They have a tube voicing but the overall feel and the most important thing, well it just doesn't feel like a tube amp. This is the 100 watt version with a single one 12 inch speaker. Same lame tone a the rest of these amps in this series, but now you have 100 watts of it blaring through a single speaker. UTILIZATION Features * 100 Watt Valvestate power stage driving 1x12'' * ECC83 Pre-amp valve active on all 3 channels. * 3 independent footswitchable channels, 'Clean', 'Overdrive 1' and 'Overdrive 2'. * Clean channel with Treble, Middle and Bass controls, plus Tone Shift switch for extra tonal options. * Overdrive 1 channel with its own Gain and Volume plus shared EQ with Overdrive 2. * Overdrive 2 channel with its own Gain, Volume and sweeping Contour control. * Power Dimension switch to give the effect of the greater saturation of a valve power stage of lower wattage being driven hard. * Built-in spring Reverb with separate level controls for the Clean and Overdrive 1/2. * Effects Loop with front panel Mix control. * Headphone jack . * Line Out jack with Speaker Emulation for connection to external equipment. * Extension speaker jacks SOUNDS Marshall's sound their best with a Gibson guitar. Well at least that is my personally favorite sound with these amps. Whether that be a Gibson Les Paul or an SG these amps just come to life when a Gibson is played through one of them. These two instrments just have a connection that get bigeger and better when coupled together. I also like the way a Fender Stratocster sounds through this amp. Even though it is solid state it does have a decent enough tone for practicing at home or in an office. This isn't an amp I would ever take on stage but it will do behind the scenes. OVERALL OPINION These amps have been fizzled out of production. So the used market is the only way to go at this point. I have seen then for around the $300 for a used one. Not a bad price for this amp but not worth the money in the long run. I would suggest getting an all tube amp instead of this thing. There are plenty of all tube amps out there and even some Marshall's that will cost about the same as this amp is used. I would recommend Marshall JCm 2000 DSL 100 or a PEavey 5150 over this amp any day. You can go along way for about $500 if you look hard and study up on some proper gear.