New Combo-Amp Day!

[Kiichi]

Hi guy,
I have made a habbit of checking sever ebay categorys every day on the lookout for a really nice deal (which have become very rare I think). Recently I spotted on, and even though I am still waiting on an HTH amp to come in, I felt I had to pull the trigger on this one.

So now I got a Hughes & Kettner Edition Tube, which I shot for less than 150 pounds.
For that money I got: A german made all tube 20w amp, 2 channels, spring reverb, Celestion G12F-60 Speaker, Effects loop, option to use with external cab (nice to use this with my good 2x12" cab)

Also I can use the package material to build something to disconnect my speaker from the ground as suggested in the 1w marshall thread.

Now this little combo is for one much more portable then my usual 2x12" speaker cab which is nearly the size of a 4x12" and gives me lot of nice sound options it seems.
I have not yet been able to try it out properly, cause this thing gets loud fast and my neighbor...well.
But I really like the  clean channel so far, especially with the spring reverb.
The lead channel sounds very nice too, gives me kinda Steven Wilson esque sounds, very cool for Dream Theater stuff too (compared to my Orange TT) as well, since it is Mesa Boogie like in a lot of ways to me.

Also as a TT user the options here are real nice. TT = one channel, Gain, Volume, Tone.
H&K = 2 Channels, 1 volume, 1 gain, one master, one reverb, 3 band EQ
Also the EQ works nicely in a way that treble and mid influence each other. So more mids will take out shimmer of the treble and more treble takes out honkyness of the mids. Hard to describe, but it works nicely, giving a lot of tonal variety I think.

At least for the price I think this was really good shot, even though my paycheck for next month has kinda been hurt xD

Really looking forward to a chance to turn this thing up and take it to jams.

[Telerocker]

Congrats! Nice catch. I had the H&K Statesman Quad. Very nice amp, but too loud even with the drivevol on 1 for our rehearsels.

[38thBeatle]

That looks to me like a bargain.

[Kiichi]

Congrats! Nice catch. I had the H&K Statesman Quad. Very nice amp, but too loud even with the drivevol on 1 for our rehearsels.

I can see that, this one gets loud extremely fast, but the drummer I usually play with thinks my TT hardwired with OD in front into oversized 2x12" marshall cab is too quiet....so this might be a really good thing.

[dave_mc]

is it all-tube? the one i tried had a fair whack of preamp distortion, and i only see two preamp tubes there (and odds are one of those is probably used for the PI).

Not to rain on your parade or anything- i really liked the one i tried, and for £150 it's a steal. and the clean channel is probably all-tube (?)...

[Kiichi]

is it all-tube? the one i tried had a fair whack of preamp distortion, and i only see two preamp tubes there (and odds are one of those is probably used for the PI).

Not to rain on your parade or anything- i really liked the one i tried, and for £150 it's a steal. and the clean channel is probably all-tube (?)...

You kinda confused me a bit with what you were trying to say (only rather basic knowledge of amps^^), so if my reply seems strange I did not get you xD

Far as I have heard it is all tube, says something like that in the Manual and every other source i have found (which is not a giant amount for this old version). Would there be away to be sure how this works?

Also my TT only has two preamp tubes as well, and it is all-tube as well (the second tube being PI as well if I recall...no real sound or gain problem there as well).

[roland_rat]

Looks a great bargain you picked up there. Enjoy.

[dave_mc]

You kinda confused me a bit with what you were trying to say (only rather basic knowledge of amps^^), so if my reply seems strange I did not get you xD

Far as I have heard it is all tube, says something like that in the Manual and every other source i have found (which is not a giant amount for this old version). Would there be away to be sure how this works?

Also my TT only has two preamp tubes as well, and it is all-tube as well (the second tube being PI as well if I recall...no real sound or gain problem there as well).

yeah i think the TT is all-tube ok. Never heard about it not being, anyway. IIRC, though, it didn't have a ton of preamp gain, though (could be wrong). and also it doesn't have a full TMB tonestack (which normally loses you a bit of gain that you might need to make up later with another gain stage).

I mean two preamp tubes is enough to make a fairly low gain, vintage-style tube amp all-tube, but normally more modern, cascading gain type high gain amps need more gain stages.

I definitely see some op-amps from your pic, but they might just be to drive teh reverb and loop (which is fair enough). diodes, again might be for solid state clipping, or they might just be the rectifier.

Don't take what i'm saying as gospel, though- I mean i'm no electronics expert (far from it). just when i come across a pretty high gain push-pull amp with a full stack and more than one channel, i start to get suspicious if it only has two preamp tubes.

EDIT: as i said, i know very little about electronics, but i managed to find a schematic for an H&K tube 20 (which i think is similar to yours, though i could be wrong), and it seemed to have an op-amp at the input in the signal path with what looked like clipping diodes to ground (so, a distortion pedal, basically) at the same part in the circuit where the lead gain pot was.

it did only seem to use one triode for the phase inverter, though.

whether yours is similar (or whether, indeed, i've even correctly interpreted the schematic :lol: ), I have no idea.

[Kiichi]

Very interresting dave_mc.

I hope to be able to let this thing run hot tomorrow and then I can get some real data about the level of distortion.
I believe the ET is more rock than metal orieted, but we´ll see.

And in the end I do not care that much about it being all tube or not (though a little pride of course goes out the window if it is not), as long as it sounds nice. After all Dimebag could make a solidstate amp work beautifully.
Would be nice to know though.

And as far as my early testing showed this amp seem pretty responsive, so even if there is a "distortion pedal" in there, it has qualitys of the tubes amp. Maybe it is as you suggested an all tube clean and the dirty being pushed more or something.

Anyway, I appreciate any info and don´t be afraid to rain on my parade or anything. Even if this was all solidstate, with this sound and the options I got it´s still cool.^^

[dave_mc]

oh yeah, i mean i'm not trying to make you hate it or anything :lol: Just thought it was worth pointing out- apart from anything, in case other people read your post and buy it thinking it's all-tube.

if you really care that much, the clean channel seems to be all tube ok.

and yeah i mean it could still be "tubey". I mean if you plug a solid state pedal into a tube amp it still sounds and feels "tubey".

:)