Marshall valvestate 8100

[porsche928]

Hello,

I can get a marshall valvestate 8100 for just €120
Does anyone have experience with this amp head

The only thing about it are the pots..
Are these easy to clean?

Thanks

[Rich#6]

I had one from when the camse out in the early 90's to last year. I wish I had it back. The reverb never worked but other than that I never had any problems. cleaing the pots might be some fun the slot is towards the board with little space. I sold mine for $175 becuase of the reverb. Great head IMO.

[porsche928]

Cool! nice to hear that it's a great head!i
Cleaning the pots isn't really a difficult job?

wow 175.. so 120 is a nice price!

[Twitch]

I had the 8200, freekin rocked.

[porsche928]

Cool =), I also heard that the valvestates are the most underrated marshalls..

True?

[toejam]

Those old first series of Valvestates are great. I still have my stereo chorus 8240 2x12 combo that I bought new around '92. It's my living room rig!

[Chief_CrazyTalk]

I remeber them sounding pretty good, lots of people gigged them back when.

[RacerX]

...like Chuck Schuldiner of Death (RIP)

[bibz]

Yep still have my 8240. Had a 8100 for a little while, mates got it now, loved that thing.

Funny, I've been through pretty much every versatile amp on the market recently looking for 'the' amp for a new band and it was in my storage room the whole fuckin' time! Valvestate + my mutt = perfect tone! Whoda thought? Clean, crunchy, solo. All I need.

[loose Cannon]

Had a similar problem with mine when i had it replacing the reverb tank cos it clapped out after a couple of years of use.Other than it was a decent amp and had some decent gain also for what it was.

[Sunbane]

Yeah, the 8100 is a great amp for the money. My current one is actually my second 8100, since I stupidly sold my first when I was younger.

It doesn't quite hold up in a really loud environment; at higher volumes the tone loses "crispness" and definition, and due to that it doesn't cut through well enough - you get lost in a muddy wall of sound. This tend to happen with most solid state amps I believe; that they get fizzy at high volumes. But as long as you keep it down to moderate levels, the 8100 really delivers. The preamp in it has a very nice, tube-driven Marshall tone.

I've used mine onstage when I've played with a pre-recorded drum track, a bassist, singer and a second guitarist. Worked great! Since we could easilly adjust the level of the drums, getting a good live sound was really easy, and I loved my tone. I tend to use my Charvel Model 6 (poplar Soloist), with a J-80C (close in sound to a Duncan Custom I think), and I plug straight in. I sometimes use a stomp box to boost the gain for solos. The amp has enough gain as it is, but I like to have a little less gain in the rhythm tone. The reverb still works in mine, but I prefer to keep it off to prevent it from muddying down the sound.

I've never cleaned the pots in mine, but I really should. It's never been done, and there's crackle city as soon as I even breathe on the knobs. =P Maybe I should get my lazy ass together and get it done during my vacation. I should get a neck pickup for my M6 as well and rewire the guitar.

[hunter1970]

Anyone have any comments on the Valvestate2000-AVT150 head.

[Twitch]

Its got its own sound, thats all Ill say.

[MartinBarre]

Anyone have any comments on the Valvestate2000-AVT150 head.

I've got the newer model AVT150 combo and it's a fantastic amp for the price. I used it for rehearsal the other week and my tone was WAAAY better than the other guitarists who was using an old JCM (I'm not saying the AVT is a better amp, just that I'd set mine up better than he had).

The footswitch is brilliant, lots of options, I'm really really happy with the amp.

The one thing with the combo is that it's not as loud as the 150W suggests - you need a cab attached to get the full power from it, but you won't have that issue with the 150 Head.