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I'm thinking of buying one of these for my solid body electric guitar for playing around home and going on holiday. Just interested in knowing their limit for example
- if I was just having a living room jam with 2 acoustic guitars + my solidbody would a 5w mini amp handle this? (artec ma3 tino mini amp) being designed for rockers, but I'm wanting clean...
being small, portable and quiet is what made them stand out to me I've seen them around for years but never considered getting one until today
seems like a neat little toy
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12-29-2010 01:45 PM
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I've got a Pignose, which is great but it's better for rock or blues, and it works in situations like you've described. For clean tones, I'd go with a Roland MicroCube (it also has a headphone jack).
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I use a microcube for teaching. Works great, and has enough juice to play along with a piano player.
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AER Alpha is small...very good but expensive.
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Yeah I thought it might swing toward the cube!, slightly more expensive I have resisted for a while probably just cosmetic, but I know theyre loved here.
theres a 'mobile cube' I just looked at, it may help sway my wife as a mp3 player amp. its got stereo chorus.
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I'd bet that MobileCube would be perfect for your needs. I haven't played through one, but it looks fantastic!
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Here's my cheap low-watt rig: Marshall headphone amp (about 5" wide and 3" high) producing 1/2 watt and powered by a 9v battery and has an AC adapter input. These micro amps come in several flavors -- "Fender Twin" etc and cost around $50.00 US or less new. I unscrewed the rear cover and unsoldered the two amp leads to the tiny speaker and ran them to a 2 x 8" Panasonic audio bookshelf speaker that was given to me for free. The amp output wants to see 8 ohms and that is the total impedance of the speaker cabinet. I use a 9 volt AC adapter. The little "Marshall" has a volume control and two settings-- normal and distortion. The normal setting produces a nice clear generic transistor clean that I wet a bit with digital delay and reverb from pedals. The distortion (OD) setting sounds fairly authentic, albeit at a bedroom volume low, if that's your thing. The overal volume of this rig on the clean setting is about as loud as the early 1970's 5 watt Fender Champ amp I used to have. Quite sufficient for keeping up with a couple of flattops and sensitive enough to play at 3 am and not wake up the household.
Originally Posted by elrond
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I tried the mobile cube side by side with the Cube Street and the Micro Cube. Originally Posted by elrond
The mobile cube didn't stand up to the others, it sounded like a cheap radio, or a toy. (Maybe it's because that speaker enclousure is so tiny).
The Cube street also has an input for mp3, I got the Cube Street and I'm really happy with it.
I'd suggest not buying the mobile cube without trying it side by side with your other choices.
The micro cube and the Cube Street can be much much louder than acoustic guitars, of course you can just turn them down.
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Electro Harmonix makes a little amp head call the 22 Caliber, just need speaker cab.
Buy Electro-Harmonix 22 Caliber Power Amp | Power Amps | Musician's Friend
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I read up on those a little while ago, and I'm stoked about them. Heck, I may just get one to run it through a 12" cab. Originally Posted by docbop
Last edited by Stackabones; 12-29-2010 at 03:47 PM.
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Aah, every idea I have heads this way
starts small/simple and gets bigger/expensive! with me and gear I guess so far I got 1 acoustic, 1 electric 1, 1 amp. so my wife dosn't know what G.A.S. is yet (I only found out myself a few months ago, thanks google.)
What if we get out of the living room... then I'll need a cube street? guess I'm fond of the idea of having stereo now,
but.
what is the lowest watt farmers market sized cube? single speakers I guess
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A micro cube or cube street would be fine for a farmers market, at least for the situations I've seen at farmer markets in my neck of the woods (San Diego) Originally Posted by elrond
Aah, every idea I have heads this way starts small/simple and gets bigger/expensive! with me and gear I guess so far I got 1 acoustic, 1 electric 1, 1 amp. so my wife dosn't know what G.A.S. is yet (I only found out myself a few months ago, thanks google.)
What if we get out of the living room... then I'll need a cube street? guess I'm fond of the idea of having stereo now,
but.
what is the lowest watt farmers market sized cube? single speakers I guess
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I 've been using 2 years and still have a Microcube for home practice.
While I really enjoy it playing with my Telecaster (single coil PU's), it is disappointing and not really usable when I plug a humbuckers equiped archtop or 335 using the clean sound settings (JC120 and Black face).
Kind of veiled an dirty sounds are coming from this amp as soon as I hit lower strings.
I don't know if it comes from COSM artefact or cheesy stock speaker.
My next Home/ small gig amp might be a Cube 40XLLast edited by mambosun; 12-29-2010 at 08:02 PM.
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I've got a Microcube and I notice the exact same thing with the lower strings. I think it is simply due to a very small speaker not being able to reproduce those low notes. Too bad, cause it sure is handy.
Bill
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The VOX DA5 and DA10 (both discontinued?) are good (better than the MicroCube IMO - no low-end issues) if you can find them. The MicroCube sounds better through headphones, though.
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I tried the Cube Street the other day, and have to agree with, fep. I liked it quite a bit. Sounded pretty good given the size and price.
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I've been cutting heads, based on specs, price, reviews and avalibility I'm now looking toward* either a
* vox mini3 3w (after tried a 'microcube' but felt like I wanted it a little louder hopefully that 1 extra watt would make a difference) ,
*vox da5 5w, and a bigger speaker than the mini 3 and micro cube, the 'mobile cube' did not have adjustable chorus.
*vox da10 5w+5w (won over 'street cube' based on its price being just out of range, actually only just cheaper than a deal on a 'zt club'. Now I got to decide if I will ever need the battery option because the.
*'zt lunchbox' is within range! just. Whew this amp hunting is hard work. Amp modeling is not a requirement for me I would rather just plug in and play, I have some pedals.
I only need 'just enough' clean headroom and nice tone in an amp to plug my electirc guitar into for practice and low level jamming preferably in a small portable amp that will serve me well. Thanks for your input so far guys, some suggestions have not been easily avalible where I am and/or too expensive but it all helps me to sift through whats out there.
Anyone tried the vox mini3?
Is the zt lunchbox a good substitute for a low powered amp?
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I have a Vox Mini 3 and love it. I tend to use the clean channel that changes the gain knob to bass and the tone knob to treble. It's a very nice little amp for $99. It also has a 1/4" hi-z mic input with trim and rev send control, AND the 1/8" aux input for mp3/iPod. The micro cubes don't have both, just the 1/4" aux in.
Last edited by woyvel; 01-05-2011 at 07:56 AM.
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Good afternoon, elrond (hmmm... that rings a bell...)... Originally Posted by elrond
I am at exactly the same point, and am awaiting delivery in the next day or two of the Danelectro 'Hodad' pocket amp. I'll post again when I've tried it out; it may fit your bill, and costs little.
I've been using a Vox Amplug; very convenient but I'm not a 'Vox sound' fan, and I think (hope...) the Hodad built-in echo/vibrato will please me more.
I'll be back... (note the 'schwartzy' deep voice...)
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All small amps are good maybe for practising in home.
If you start to play with live drumer you will see...!!!
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Our 'group' gear is indeed different from our home practice or quiet jamming. It includes Hiwatt DR203 (200w valves...), Mesa 2-90 (180w valves...) and Marshall half-stack (100w valves...). None of this gear can be used for home practice (or would even fit into the lounge...). Originally Posted by kris
All small amps are good maybe for practising in home.
If you start to play with live drumer you will see...!!!
A 'plug-n-play' autonomous 'pocket' amp is a very useful, and inexpensive accessory, but when playing to a public, you either need other gear or micing through the PA (I have sometimes seen musicians plugged 'DI' into a PA console without an amp at all...).
Incidentally, some drummers can play music, even at 'low' levels, it basically comes down to repertoire and technical skill. We are not all 'lumberjacks' ('bucherons' in the original French; I've forgotten the English equivalent...)!
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I've owned a Pignose, a MicroCube, a DA5, and a DA10. Don't have any of them anymore, because I just don't need them. But ...
The DA10 was the clear winner. It's basically a double DA5 (10 watts with 2 6.5" speakers). Good clean tone (didn't use any of the 'dirty' models) and effects and loud enough to play live with a singer-songwriter running her acoustic guitar and vocals through a PA. However ...
When I had the MicroCube, I was playing a rock gig when my gigging amp blew its speaker. I plugged my guitar into the MicroCube and fed the headphone output into the PA, and I got through the night in pretty good shape. And as I said above, the VOXes do not sound as good when used in this manner.
All that having been said, if you can get the ZT Lunchbox for a good price and you don't care about built-in effects or battery operation, I'd go with that (don't own one, but did test it extensively).Last edited by Tom Karol; 01-05-2011 at 09:29 AM.
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Whenever me and Humphrey paddle the boat out into the swamp with our Guild Starfires to play "Gazzeloni" or "A Love Supreme", we ALWAYS grab a couple of these Fender Tweeds.
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Hmmm it seems I missed the note on the online store saying the DA10 is "currently unavalible / out of stock" oh well that narrows things down so my list runs at *vox 'mini3' or *zt 'lunchbox'
to battery or not to battery... the mini3 does fit my portable, not quite a toy criteria.
Where as the lunchbox can be added to in future - cab -pedals- boss micro br or similar.
Also of interest were the 'crate profiler 5', not avalible here. 'Axl thin amp' looked great, 10w 2x speakers, fx, avalible for the same price as the mini3 but sounded tinny on youtube and no good reviews.
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