NAD: TC BAM200

[tauzero]

Bought from Andertons when the price dropped. A minor annoyance was the jack-only output as I know I have a short jack-jack speaker lead but no idea where it is, so had to make one up when it arrived. Had a little test with the newly repaired house jam micro cab and all was well. I'm curious to know what other BAM200 owners have found with the signal LED - the instructions say to adjust the gain to just below where the LED occasionally comes on, but that would be about zero, and having the LED shining green most of the time doesn't seem to damage the tone. Does it turn red if clipping is happening? Should I just ignore it and go by ear?

 

[lemmywinks]

The LED turns red to indicate clipping on these I think, the manual has always been a bit misleading and they never changed it.

Edited December 19, 2024 by lemmywinks

[spongebob]

Would love to know more about how these really cut it, output wise…..the price is very tempting……😇

[tauzero]

An experiment was conducted to determine the nature of the signal diode's indication.

 

The master volume was reduced to just above zero and the gain was adjusted to maximum. A bass on full volume was connected via a multieffects unit with a gain stage which was adjusted to maximum. With all necessary personal protective equipment in place, the amplifier was switched on. The LED was observed to shine green simply from ambient noise from the multieffects. On playing some notes, the LED was observed to change from green to red. Reducing the gain to approximately the 3 o'clock position showed no red indication from the LED.

 

It was therefore concluded that the signal LED shines green for an audio input and red where clipping is occurring.

 

Ah, we knew how to write up our A-level physics experiments in the 1970s.

[Franticsmurf]

On 19/12/2024 at 17:13, tauzero said:

It was therefore concluded that the signal LED shines green for an audio input and red where clipping is occurring.

I set mine to just below the red clipping level when playing 'normally' - i.e. the red LED does not show, or shows very briefly now and again. With a pedal or two and an active Sterling HH, the gain control is between 2pm and 4pm depending on whether I use a pick or not.