Hey,

I’ve played for about 30 years, but I basically stopped for the last 10. I’ve rediscovered playing since lockdown.

I’ve got a Les Paul Special with p90s and an ES-339, which is just for noodling at home playing blues and 50s/60s rock. No gigging!

I’ve got a wee Sub Zero 15w practice amp, but want something nicer for clean, warm and fat tones.

I’m thinking a small valve amp would fit the bill. I don’t want to spend more than £200, which limits my options!

On the list at the moment are the SubZero Valve 5 or 10, Vox AV15, Vox VT20.

What else do you think I should be considering?

Cheers

Ricks

Asking here – the guitarists of Singletrack thread:

https://singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/guitarists-of-singletrack/page/38/

It’s quite busy so you should get some good input.

Don’t discount something like the Yamaha THR10ii – really small and portable (one model can be battery powered), but plenty loud enough, and with bluetooth for steraming backing tracks, and loads of (decent) effects and amp models built in.

Back when i had an electric my pignose was basically all i used.

I don’t have a guitar yet but the one amp that keeps coming up in every search is the Boss Katana 50. It seems to be unanimously well reviewed and there’s loads of YouTube demos on it.

Saying that, I’m trying not to dig too deep until I actually need to buy one.

I agree with comment about the Yamaha and have a THR10ii that is 20w.
Great sound for one person at home or amping an acoustic for a quietish jam.
Also acts a decent USB interface for recording to computer/tablet.
You’d struggle to find one for £200 thougheven second hand.

The guitarist in my band had a vintage vox something or other. It broke regularly and he borrowed my vox valvetronic amp for the odd gig.

I couldn’t hear any difference between the two, there were two guitars, keys, bass, drums and 3 of us sang.

The valve tronic has a attenuator switch on the back so you can get it to break up at a low volume.

I was going to recommend the Yamaha until I saw the budget. I have a thr10 MK1 and love it for home use. Extremely versatile, but over your budget..can you stretch?

I have a Fender Mustang GT40. Unlike it’s name suggests, it’s not a 40W, it’s a stereo 20W+20W with 2x 6in speakers. It’s not huge, not loud but perfect for home use. 200 presets of which 120 are loaded with various amp models, including Fender Princeton, Fender Twin Reverb and many more

It has one 1/4in input and a 3.5mm aux input for any suitable playback device e.g. iPad, and a 3.5mm headphone socket.

Cost about £200 new

I’ve looked at the Yamaha thr10, but at over £300 it’s a bit too spendy. The THR5 looks like a good option at around £160.

I’ve been trying to find decent sound clips of each, the THR5 sounded a bit tinny and treble heavy… Is that the case, or just a dodgy recording?

I’ve got a Vox VT15. its quite good with the inbuilt effects.
I recently got a positive grid Spark as well. Obviously fully solid state but the app and tone cloud are really useful.
That said the Vox just has a slightly better sound. If you just want reverb, and a crunch/gain tone you’ll get it. It also cleans up quite nicely if you roll back the guitar volume, the spark is just a quieter version of the tone you have!

Marshall Origin 5 is available for sub £200

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Marshall-Origin-5-Combo

Fender Mustang GT40
+1 for your budget

I’m another Mustang fan, the V2 versions of the previous range are the amps I use most. The Fender models are pretty good as you’d expect and the others highly useable. The 80s Marshal model sounds better than my 100W JCM at living room volume. The Boss Katana sounds like a Boss katana with varying levels of drive which is great if you like that sound, but not so great if you’d like to sound like other amps too.

Marshall DSL1?

1w is enough for home!!

I’ve got a vox Av15.

They call it a hybrid – tube amp and a modelling amp combined.

I can’t compare it to any other options – but I’m very happy with it. Good range of ‘amp models’.

The two clean channels are lovely (as you’d expect from a vox)

I’ve looked at the Yamaha thr10, but at over £300 it’s a bit too spendy.

Still over budget, but £279 at Andertons https://www.andertons.co.uk/guitar-dept/electric-guitar-amps/practice-amps/yamaha-thr10ii-desktop-guitar-amp

I think I agree with Educator. I borrowed a Mustang before I bought my Katana. I didn’t spend enough time learning how to use the Mustang and got annoyed by not saving the presets so spent more time making noises than playing.
I love my Katana, I can make a wide range of very agreeable (not necessarily authentic) tones with my P90 equipped guitar and spend all my time with it playing tunes. And making my fingers sore.

I have a mustang gtx 50, and gt40 (I got the gt 40 first, but then wanted the option of plugging in effects pedals.. although I haven’t cos the modeled ones are pretty good. the GTX 50 is louder, and fuller, but if you are in a small place then it might be a bit loud. If you hook up the amp to your iphone/ipad/android then you can use an app to set up amps and pedals etc. Just ignore the presets as they aren’t great.

I’ve recently sold my Yamaha THR10II which was fantastic, but I spent too much time playing around with settings rather than just playing my guitar.

I then picked up 2 small valve amps to try – the Blackstar HT1R and the Marshall DSL1. Both are plenty loud enough for home – I’ve never been beyond halfway on the volume on either. Both sound much more ‘full’ than the Yamaha’s smaller speakers.

I’ve ended up keeping the DSL1 (I only ever planned to keep one of them) The clean tone is really crisp, and takes pedals really well. The gain channel gets very crunchy very quickly, but I didn’t buy it for that.

The Marshall is just over £200 new, but both can be found used for sub £200. I’ve also seen the 5W version of both for sub £200.

No ones mentioned this yet, but it would deffo be on my shortlist:

Though, it would probably look better/ sell more if it was finished in a yellow tweed.

Someone has a THR10ii up in the classifieds here for £199…

Not any more. I pulled it as I decided I couldn’t live without it.
I have other amps but it is the only one that sounds great at room volumes.

Similar to OP, long time player, fell out of the habit though got back on the horse a few years ago. Have a wee Vox AC4TV which I’m sure were available for about £200 when I bought mine – maybe 5 years ago or so? It’s a good little amp, has a decent growl if you wind up the volume and hit the strings hard, but it cleans up nicely if you tickle the strings. If you want to go properly fuzzy/fizzy, you’ll need to start adding pedals to the front end, I’ve found it plays nicely with any of the Boss and Electro Harmonix stuff I’ve fed it with. Plenty loud enough for home use – mine is usually switched down to 1W mode. On the one hand, some reverb would be nice, but it’s a small box which would mean a small reverb tank, so perhaps for the best that they left it out. Coming from a background of big 2×12 combos like Twin Reverbs and AC30’s, tiny wee reverb tanks always seem a little underwhelming…

Disregard previous suggestion – it seems the AC4TV is long since discontinued, and the current non-TV AC4 doesn’t have the switchable output, but does have separate gain and volume controls – in theory, this should achieve the same or similar overall effect, but never quite seems to. Also worth noting that I either mis-remembered prices or they’ve got expensive in the intervening years…

Just out of interest, I’ve had my Orange Rocker 15 for a while now and it’s switchable Headroom/Bedroom feature is bloody marvellous.

It sounds excellent on the 0.5/1 watt settings as well as at full power.

Goes whisper quiet and retains a great tone, both overdriven and clean.
Remarkable little amp.

I never tied this thread off.

I bought a Vox Odio Air GT. Really beautiful bit of kit to play, the range of tones it offers is pretty immense.

From warm and tubey, to bright and sparkly.

@rickon – Very nice !

I still miss my Vox VTX20 – it had a great sound, and I’ve got half an eye out for another one. Assuming that the Adio is based on the same / similar circuity I imagine it sounds fantastic.

For some reason that always reminds me of a Louis Vuitton handbag

Got a feeling I’ll get savagely burned for this but………..
If it’s strictly just for home and volume is an issue then I’d get Guitar Rig 5 from Native Instruments for your Mac or PC. Then you’ve got all of the amps and all of the fx you’ll ever need. Sounds incredible.
If volume isn’t an issue, it’s hard for me to see past a DSL.

The thing I love about the Vox Odio is the portability. It takes a bunch of rechargable AAs, and weighs probably a kilo. It means I can take it to the lounge, sun room, my den or outside whenever I feel like a noodle.

I could do with something similarly portable for the bass. I tried a Blackstar Fl3 Bass; I’m not sure if the unit I had was duff, but the sound was shocking.

I have these really cool made-in-the-uk cabs from Barefaced.

https://barefacedbass.com/product-range/one10.htm (but with nice silver cloth grill)

And the guitar amp:

https://barefacedaudio.com/products/upsetter-110

They have really made amazing developments with amp design which is pretty extraordinary for such mature tech. Read some reviews if you don’t believe me!

https://www.soundonsound.com/reviews/barefaced-audio-reformer-112
https://www.guitarworld.com/features/how-barefaced-audio-revolutionized-the-guitar-cab

The barefaced stuff really is lovely. Ideally I’d like to pair it with an Aguilar or Darkglass head – it’s a shame my playing is more Ashdown Tone Pocket

I just have them paired with fairly cheap s/h heads at the mo but they still sound fantastic, incredible really for the size/weight.