software

Sorry about deleting the previous thread and taking a couple of days on this.

The amp as you all know that I picked up Friday is a new Crate V32 exclusive to Guitar Center.There is the V30 which is similar. Once I finally got over my Crate phobia I went and picked this little tone machine up and have been rocking it since. I am not as technical as most of you guys, but I have a good ear and I can distinguish amps that rock from amps that suck! Given that this amp rocks. Here goes:

First of all the specs:
Power: 30 watts all tube Class A
Speaker: 12' Celestion Palamino Series 8 ohm
Tubes: 4 EL84 and 3 12AX7 Groove tubes
Asthetics: Blonde tolex with gold badging
Features Spring Reverb, Switchable Presence, Effects loop, On/Off with Standby.

Channels: Clean w/ Footswitchable boost amp; Overdrive with footswitchable boost. Both channels are footswitchable.

Controls: L/R Clean Volume, Overdrive gain, Treble, Mid, Bass, OD Level, Reverb

When I played this amp in the store I fell in love with it. I always dial up the clean channel out of habbit 1st and when I did my ears were very pleased. This amp is very rich and brings out the tonal bliss of my Tele. It can go from punchy twang to shimmering chords and funky ryhthm all the way back to smooth jazz. There is a good bit of head room but beware of blues bliss at about 5 on the volume.The reverb is really nice, but don't go past 5 on clean because it seems to decay (is that the right word?) for way too long. The verb is lush but not as nice as Blackface Fender verb, but there again very usable. Another cool thing about the clean channel is that it has a footswitchable boost which is very useful. It's not too much and doesnt change the tone to where it's unusable.

I am not an expert on class A, but the spongy, harmonically rich and compressed sound is in this amp and I love it. Theses charecteristics are what my ear really wanted to hear on my quest for Class A.

On to the dirty Channel:
I am not too sure if this is a true 2 channel amp or if the OD just taps into the gain stage. Again I was very impressed by the OD side of this amp. It is quite a bit gainier than my Blues Junior. You can really crank the master volume to smoke some serious rock/blues or if you need you can crank the preamp for some bedroom level OD that is very rich! I don't know what to compare the OD to, but it will mely your face off. DOn't expect metal, but be ready to crank out just about any classic rock or smooth neck pup sustain. I will say that too much of this bad boys verb on the OD is a nightmare...yuck!! Also since this amp shares it's EQ it's really easy (for me) to have too much bass dialed in when switching from clean to OD.

The amp takes my pedals well and I must say it sounds so killer when I step on the TS9DX with the gain and tone at 0 and and level at 10!! Watch out!!

Likes Affordable; I got mine for $549 and they threw in a free Levi's leather strap ($34.99 on the tag), Quiet, Tone monster, footswitchable channels with boost option, good cleans and good OD!! Feels nice and sturdy.

Dislikes: You have to remove the chasis to access tubes (10 screws) Reverb above 5 is usesless (clean side) verb above 2 on OD is useless IMO.
Not too crazy about the blonde on gold. Wish it didn't share EQ. SOme of the tolex joints are pretty bad not to mention the owners manual rubbed of black ink on the top of the cab as you can see in the pics.

PS I play a Tele, but just for you LP and other bucker guys I plugged in a LP Stan. at GC and after adjusting the EQ for the hotter pups the amp sang like it did with the Tele!!

I highly recommend this amp!! It might take a while to buy a quot;Cratequot;, but if I blindfolded you and said here play this $1300 amp you would love it and believe me!! I'll post whatever I missed later.

I'll post the pics in a new thread since I have rambled too long.

That's right purty!

I have to say that I like the blonde/gold - guess I'm just tired of black.

Congrats on a great find!

Rick

S W E E T ! ! !

Real sweet. If it were a car I'd throw change under the mat. In other words, best of luck.


Originally Posted by B Bent

I am not too sure if this is a true 2 channel amp or if the OD just taps into the gain stage.

Anyone know the answer to this?

yummyriffic

I love my V-series. I'm almost tempted to pick up the EL84 variety sometime, or a lower wattage one than I have now.

Nice. I like my V-Series as well, though I think I'm about ready for something else...maybe more high gain.

Very nice, as we do not have a guitar center in town I have never tried the Palamino series but based on my experiences with the normal edition 30 watt V-series and the V15 that I recently bought you have a sweet amp. What is the Palamino speaker like? as far as I know it isn't a standard production Celestion. I love the Blonde/gold setup even though my personal tastes lean more towards black (its my favorite colour and i'm not even goth). How much did it cost you?


Originally Posted by schecterplayerHow much did it cost you?

It sounds awesome. Nice low end, can crunch, shimmer, smooth OD!!! $549 and tax.

love the color...congrats on it! NEW STUFF ROCKS!!!