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NAD - Ashdown CTM30


jimbartlett

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I bought this on here from Tonic and it just got delivered all the way from Croatia!

It sounds great, just what I hoped it would be. I can’t wait to gig this amp, I’m going to DI straight out the back and this setup is for onstage. I’ll report back after my next gig.

BCAF3924-1265-46E0-90CB-B5A24B11C416.jpeg

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  • 2 weeks later...

REVIEW AFTER FIRST GIG:

I gigged the amp for the first time yesterday.

Pub gig, roughly 150 people with my 6 piece 2Tone band.

I used an Ashdown 212T cab and my 70s Limelight P Bass.

As started above, this amp would be ok for a small gig but an efficient cab is critical. I ran out the DI on the amp into our PA and my on stage setup was my monitor. Perfectly fine for monitoring but I wouldn’t want to gig without PA support. The volume was set just under 12 o’clock and was perfect.

The tone out of this amp is absolutely amazing. A Fat, warm, vintage valve tone which “breathes” at you in an organic way. I have the Mid set 12 o’clock, Bass set at 2pm, High set at 10am and all the switches engaged. My tone on the P Bass is set about 1/3 on. Beautiful tone, I am in love!

If you are after a reliable, solid built, not too heavy (14kg), all valve tone monster and you have PA support to run out to, I highly recommend checking one of these bad boys out! I wouldn’t rely on this and a cab to do anything other than a small gig though.

I will be using a 1x15 Ashdown as in the original picture for the next gig instead of the 212T. A bit more compact seeing as it’s only for monitoring 👍🏼

Edited by jimbartlett
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Anyone able to offer a comparison between this and an Ampeg PF-20 - I'm a home player so not really looking for volume, but I'm feeling I need a bit of a rounder tone than I'm getting from the Ampeg (this is into an Aguliar 112 cab) 

 

I'm not saying it's a bad amp at all, but it needs more midrange to tingle my tastebuds !

 

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Don’t dismiss valve guitar amps. I picked up an early 2000s 50w Carslbro Top for very (very) small money. It’s powered by 4 x 12AX7 valves in the front and 2 EL34s at the back. Plugged it into a barefaced two10 and it sounds amazing. A bonus is that it has a dirty overdriven channel that sounds wicked with bass. If you like a chunky p bass with plenty of attack this it for you . If you’re after silky smooth low end with crystal clean top end, look elsewhere...but you won’t have as much fun !

0C2F0DB4-3978-4135-BAD5-B08D9A9E21CA.jpeg

Edited by Quilly
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2 minutes ago, jimbartlett said:

I’ve never played an Ampeg PF-20 so I wouldn’t know I’m afraid. The new version of my amp is the Ashdown CTM30 Little Stubby. It has a couple more features such as Input Gain and a Feedback dial to fatten the tone even more. Looks great!

https://ashdownmusic.com/collections/heads/products/ctm-30-little-stubby

I actually prefer your one over the,  little stubby 🙂

 

4 minutes ago, jimbartlett said:

I’ve never played an Ampeg PF-20 so I wouldn’t know I’m afraid. The new version of my amp is the Ashdown CTM30 Little Stubby. It has a couple more features such as Input Gain and a Feedback dial to fatten the tone even more. Looks great!

https://ashdownmusic.com/collections/heads/products/ctm-30-little-stubby

 

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Toroidal transformers in the Little Stubby, I guess for it to be that low profile?

Not a bad thing by any means (I know amp builders who swear by them) but less traditional

..there’s no replacement for displacement after all

Good shout on guitar amps too - I have ne or three around I could give a try

Edited by Sir Spence
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26 minutes ago, Sir Spence said:

Toroidal transformers in the Little Stubby, I guess for it to be that low profile?

Not a bad thing by any means (I know amp builders who swear by them) but less traditional

..there’s no replacement for displacement after all

Good shout on guitar amps too - I have ne or three around I could give a try

Apparently you can modify a valve guitar amp at the input stage to bypass a high pass filter (or something🤔) to get more bottom end but I like the sound of it unmodified. I already have a ctm 100w bass head, that does warm round bass tones to a T, so this is something different.. there is ‘enough’ bass from the guitar head (if you crank the bass to 10 😂

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Yup - if you swap out the coupling caps for 0.1mfd rated ones, I believe you get the full frequency spectrum 

A lot of Fenders have that value anyway, but once the gain started to go up, the coupling cap values come down to reduce oscillation and focus the power on easier to juice frequencies, to get loud and nasty

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10 minutes ago, Sir Spence said:

Yup - if you swap out the coupling caps for 0.1mfd rated ones, I believe you get the full frequency spectrum 

A lot of Fenders have that value anyway, but once the gain started to go up, the coupling cap values come down to reduce oscillation and focus the power on easier to juice frequencies, to get loud and nasty

It has a fair amount of bass as-is and the option to use it as a guitar head is there. I don’t really intend to gig with it but it’s tremendous fun!

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19 hours ago, Sir Spence said:

Anyone able to offer a comparison between this and an Ampeg PF-20 - I'm a home player so not really looking for volume, but I'm feeling I need a bit of a rounder tone than I'm getting from the Ampeg (this is into an Aguliar 112 cab) 

 

I'm not saying it's a bad amp at all, but it needs more midrange to tingle my tastebuds !

 

 

If the PF-20 is anything like the Pf-50t and other Ampegs, it shouldn't be mid-scooped with all the EQ knobs at noon, and should be capable of boosting the mids.  From what I've seen of the Ashdown LB30/CTM30 schematics, I'd expect the Ampeg to have more mids on tap than the Ashdown.  So it might not be a change in the direction that you're looking for. 

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