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Big Monster Valve Amps - what’s the king of them all?


Sean

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What’s the highest power all-valve bass guitar specific monster out there?

We have the VBA400, Laney Tube 400, Mesa Strategy 8:88, Mesa 400+, Trace Elliott V8 and a Matamp 8 x KT88 one-off made for Julian Cope.

is there anything bigger?

What else is there that equals or crushes these leviathans? 

Edited by Sean
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3 hours ago, Kevin Dean said:

Ashdown CTM400.  Licked my Mesa 400 into next week .

Should that be BTA400? 

At £3,249 it makes the Laney Tube 400 look like an absolute bargain at £1399!  Great EQ on the Laney too.

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200 watts or 400 watts, that means a gain(!) in output volume with 3 dB. Should you have - God forbid! - an 800 Watt tube amp you win another 3 dB. Not worth breaking your back for...

We did some shootout tests with an Ampeg SVT and the Ampeg mini solid state SVT some years ago: the little one played LOUDER but not prouder... xDxDxD

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Valves the size of big coffee jars requiring kV of HT are really something quite magical - even the most hardcore 'lightweight / class D' stalwarts on the forum can surely appreciate the beauty of these thing however impractical they may be. B|

I love the glow of my 6L6 and KT88 / 6550 amps!

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5 minutes ago, VTypeV4 said:

Valves the size of big coffee jars requiring kV of HT are really something quite magical - even the most hardcore 'lightweight / class D' stalwarts on the forum can surely appreciate the beauty of these thing however impractical they may be. B|

I love the glow of my 6L6 and KT88 / 6550 amps!

Absolutely. Japanese audiophiles build some beautiful creations, such as this:

.

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5 hours ago, VTypeV4 said:

Valves the size of big coffee jars requiring kV of HT are really something quite magical - even the most hardcore 'lightweight / class D' stalwarts on the forum can surely appreciate the beauty of these thing however impractical they may be. B|

I love the glow of my 6L6 and KT88 / 6550 amps!

Sure, I grew up working on tube stuff and have always greatly appreciated the aesthetics of Big Iron. And I love using them for guitar,  just not bass. Same as for so many other music production tools: great for others, not so much for myself. Vive la difference.

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On 18/12/2017 at 05:14, Passinwind said:

The biggest one I've personally played through is this 2 X 500 watt build a friend of mine did: InsanityAmp1.jpg

 

InsanityAmp2.jpg

 

InsanityAmp3.jpg

 

 

 

That’s absolute bonkers!

What’s the set up? Master/slave?

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