My new toy

[billstein]

Just picked this up used at Guitar Center. My Laney VC30 was purchased in the UK when I lived there and so I wanted something I didn't have to carry a huge step-up transformer around. Plus 30 watts of tube power is way to loud for most situations I find myself in. I never get to turn it up and hear that natural overdriven sound. I miss that!

I have 60 days to return it if I don't like it. Any of you have any experience with Blackstar amps. It is the HT5 a 5 watt tube amp.

[Scruffie]

Other than replacing the speaker possibly being an idea (dunno what it's like on the HT-5 particularly but some of the speakers they use that I've heard or heard of aren't the nicest) they're great little amps!

Although i'm not sure if this has their horrible 'patented' tone control thingy, which I find near useless.

Get some great high gain and cleans out of them and if it has the built in reverb that's definitely useable quality.

[billstein]

Get some great high gain and cleans out of them and if it has the built in reverb that's definitely useable quality.

Your right, it does have a nice clean tone with single coils and for a little guy the chunkiness of the high gain is pretty amazing. It doesn't have reverb but I've built the rub-a-dub.

I paid 279.00 for it and it looks new. Like I said, I do have 60 days to try it out. I am open to other suggestions around this price point.

[juansolo]

I had the head. It has LOTS of gain on tap and can quite easily get it's chunk on at surprisingly low volume. Changing the pre-tube for an RFT made mine nicer.

It is a hybrid amp (essentially a HT Dual on the front of a 5w power amp), but plays nicely with most pedals. Saying that, mine hated the Tonebender, so it might not like older fuzzes.

For the money they're just about untouchable, I think I paid £200 for mine when they first came out.

[Cortexturizer]

I wanted to hate that amp for the reasons that juansolo mentioned [essentially a pedal into a tiny poweramp] but when me and my friend got to the music store the intention being him buying a new amp, I was really pleasantly surprised. It crushed any Bugera, or anything that was even a little bit more expensive than this. It's a good amp, my impression was that it won't work so well with fuzzes as well, but if you need a small amp for apartment use you would struggle hard finding a better one.

[juansolo]

Yep, you need to spend nearly 3 times the money to do better. If you can stretch to it and are in the UK, I highly recommend an MJW Goldstar, but as I say, a lot more money.

[marmaliser]

I have the HT5 Stack and with a bacon boost or a ts9 in front of it it screams. BUT since the other month when i bought a Cheap ENGL Screamer it does not get much of a look in

[billstein]

Been playing with it a little bit now and it's a strange little amp. There are things about it I really like. I love the chunkiness of its overdrive channel. I've never played one but I imagine it's what a Chunk Chunk might sound like. I like the tone, especially with single coils. I like the ISF circuitry, probably a gadget but it's a one knob tone adjustment that I think works.

The frustrating part is that it's not that peddle friendly. I haven't tried that many but I've noticed that it handles a Tube Screamer well like marmaliser said. But it destroys the sound of a Rangemaster, probably same dynamics as quansolo was saying with the Tonebender.

I'm glad I have the 60 days to decide on this one.

[juansolo]

Range masters, fuzz faces, tone benders, etc. All the same family. It was my biggest gripe with it also.

If you decide to return it and go for something else, I recommend something all valve (where it matters, solid state loops are just fine). IMO, for the low wattage stuff you need to go one of two ways. Genuinely quiet like my 5w 6V6 Goldstar, which works really well in a small room at low levels. It'll never have the headroom of a more powerful amp, but then even the 10w Goldstar is way too loud for my room.

Or something with a bit more grunt that's really clean and get your dirt from pedals. If you're feeling adventurous, you could build yourself something. Otherwise my money would go on a 2nd hand Princeton Reverb and swap out the speaker for a Ragin Cajun.

[Cortexturizer]

Hm, well if you wanna use Rangemaster and other fuzz stuff, maybe get some of those little VOX ACTV amps?
Or their little night train?

[angrykoko]

I have a HT5R too.   Bought it back when I first started playing again after 25 years and had no idea about anything and just wanted something with tubes in it. (I seem to be taking this approach to life a lot lately... point, grunt, buy, learn)

I love the line out for headphones but using the speaker it's not so great (so I have an OR15 for doing that now).  It's been a while but I'm pretty sure I hooked it up to an external cab and it wasn't much better but, the line out really is amazing sounding and the reason why I would never give this amp up.

As of late, I've also stopped using the gain channel as I found the tones I like better with pedals like cosmo, tonebender, bloviator, fatpants.  The clean channel tone isn't as full and massive as the gain channel but.. it works well for me and playing along with my iPod using the line in.  I could probably even fix the fullness issue by putting my eq pedal in the effects loop as the clean channel doesn't go through the same tone stack as the gain channel.

In short, I would never sell this amp.  Not perfect but once you find your groove with it you'll feel the same I bet.  And there is nothing else out there even close to the features and versatility for the money.

Enjoy it, it's loads of fun.