Rocktron Prophesy

[khabibissell]

I'm considering picking one of these up. Anybody have experience with this unit? There are none locally to try out, but all the reviews seem very positive, and it has a ton of features (effects, etc...).

[Top Jimmy B]

That's a serious piece of gear. The second guitarist in my band has one of the newer ones, Prophesy II, and he just kills with it. When he first picked it up he brought it to rehearsal without ever playing through it and within five minutes his tone was just incredible. He plays a Wolfgang through a Mesa 50/50 into a 5150 412.

From tinkering with it for a short time, I can tell you it is deep. If tweaking is your thing you'll love it. Having said that, straight out of the box, some of the artist presets are amazing. One of the Mustaine, and especially a couple of Gary Hoey patches, jumped right out at me.

I don't think the unit was cheap but he is loving it and I enjoy hearing him play through it.

[siggy14]

i know the guys in machinehead use them going through there 5150's, i believe they just use the power section of the 5150's.

[kokostrollet]

i know the guys in machinehead use them going through there 5150's, i believe they just use the power section of the 5150's.

So basically if you just use the power section it is something to consider with any cheap amp as well then?

[Bert]

I picked one up late last year and recently sold it. While it is a nice piece of gear it wasn't for me. It does get very good shred & death metal tones, and has very deep effects & EQs. But the basic preamp was not what I was looking for. I have a Rocktron Piranha and was hoping the Prophesy was basically the Piranha pre with the massive effects system built in, but it's a different beast entirely. The Prophesy has a couple of tubes in it but they seem to be run at a low voltage unlike the Piranha which uses them more like a real amp head. As a result lower gain tones were somewhat flubby... Cleve suggested running the pre EQ with the bass taken way down and put it back in the post EQ, and this did help tighten things up quite a bit, but I was still not entirely happy. The direct outs are also not that good -- speaker simulation is mostly just some kind of EQ, does not seem to be a real simulation like you get from a POD.

IMO for the amount they cost (I sold mine used for $630) I expected more versatility. I'm sticking with my Piranha for now for my "live" rig and picked up a Behringer V-Amp Pro for direct recording, which it does pretty well considering how damn cheap the thing is.

[akoch]

I've been using one for the last 6-8 years. Loving it. It is not 100% for everything, best for shred imho and I'm loving it for that. I use it either for recording, or practicing most of the time. When I need a bit more complexity/dynamics - I go to my VHT rig, or other tube amp you like (put you pick here).

Since I am not playing live anymore, can't comment on this too much, but I can't image it not delivering well in a live situation. There must be a reason that a few seasoned guys are using them in their rigs to this date.