Mesa Boogie Owners help me out

[SpudBoy]

Mesa Rules all of mankind

I will admit that I was not impressed when the power tube went south on my Lone Star Special combo (2 months old) was covered and replaced pronto. It did give me the chance to A/B it with my old amp though. The sound of the Mesa was much better. Ive had a year to tweak the tone and I'm so happy. I'm considering a Dual amp rig (for home(how self indulgent is that?)). My second amp could be an Express 50 watt or maybe something else from Mesa. I'm convinced... SPEND MORE... SOUND BETTER (marginally).

My fingers are ok with this kind of cash outlay.

Graham

[Firebird V]

hey John...long time no see...how you been man?

+1

Did you miss us?

[charvelguy]

The thing with Mk3's, they have good flexibility with the push pull options. They can dial in nice cleans or killer gain but the shared EQ section for channel switching rather blows when trying to go between the two.

[khabibissell]

Well I got this thing dialed in with an MXR 10 band EQ in the loop , really getting a good
Dream Theater "Train of Thought" tone...

I'm curious how you are getting an EQ to have much of an effect on the tone with a parallel loop. I tried that a long time ago when I had my single and it didn't work out all that well. Now that I have my Dual I've been thinking about getting my loop modded for series operation so that I could use an EQ in the loop. I'm curious what kind of sounds I could get that way...

[kmanick]

I need to keep the Channel level (Master on this amp) at or below noon and the loop mix at 100%. I keep the level and the gain at zero on the EQ and it's working great. (If I go go up on the level or gain on the EQ it overloads the send so I can't use it as a boost)
If I go above noon on the "master" it overloads the send to the loop and it turns into noise as well.
I'm actually using the level on the EQ to kill volume so I'm sliding it down, so I can turn up the Output on the amp itself. (sounds clearer that way) Now if I try to add my Boss ME-50 effects unit I've been told that I have to turn the loop mix down and that may render the EQ useless. I haven't tried that yet, but I'm going to try it today. I hope I can get them both to work because the EQ just let me fine tune the tone enough at lower volumes where it really sounds amazingly good.
I was jamming to "Dead Heart in a Dead World" last night and I had a big shit eating grin on my face because my tone was sounding so close to what Loomis got on that CD.

[khabibissell]

I need to keep the Channel level (Master on this amp) at or below noon and the loop mix at 100%. I keep the level and the gain at zero on the EQ and it's working great. (If I go go up on the level or gain on the EQ it overloads the send so I can't use it as a boost)
If I go above noon on the "master" it overloads the send to the loop and it turns into noise as well.
I'm actually using the level on the EQ to kill volume so I'm sliding it down, so I can turn up the Output on the amp itself. (sounds clearer that way) Now if I try to add my Boss ME-50 effects unit I've been told that I have to turn the loop mix down and that may render the EQ useless. I haven't tried that yet, but I'm going to try it today. I hope I can get them both to work because the EQ just let me fine tune the tone enough at lower volumes where it really sounds amazingly good.
I was jamming to "Dead Heart in a Dead World" last night and I had a big shit eating grin on my face because my tone was sounding so close to what Loomis got on that CD.

Awesome! I'll have to try that. You are using a stomp box EQ right?

[kmanick]

MXR 10 Band , my old trusty reliable workhorse.

[khabibissell]

I don't know what happened, but I have been running stomps in my loop all night. I haven't tried them in the loop in probably four years. My DD3 sounds great in there, as does my MXR 6 band. Go figure... I have a Rocktron Xpression, but I never really liked it all that much and have been running dry.

All I have to do now is get something to switch them in and out via, and I'm straight.

[kmanick]

cool!

[Firebird V]

I put my Boss PEQ 50 (parametric eq) and NS-50 (noise gate and compressor) in the loop and they work great... Hmmm. They are the old half space rack units made in Japan. They have send and return levels on the units and it was a snap to dial in. I can run them at all volume levels and just adjust it accordingly.

Honestly though i just put them in there to see how it worked. I like the tone of the amp without them just as much.

How does the hotplate sound with it?

[kmanick]

I couldn't use the rectoverb in my house with out it.
cut back to -8dbs and it sounds great.
At -12 , -16 it sounds "squashed" but at -8 I can turn the amp up enough to get it to sound good without pissing off the wife too much.
the JSX is a much more "home friendly" amp so I'm going to hang to to that for a while.
Plus I can get a lot of sounds out of the JSX that just aren't in the Recto and Vice Versa.

[Firebird V]

Sound like they compliment each other well then. Cool. i might end up getting another Hotplate. I am sorry I sold the one I had.

[KINGSFAN]

Mark IV takes the cake IMO