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When I was amp shopping I had considered getting a Mesa 5:25 but the price was a little too high for my tastes. Then I found this for under $500. Seems like a good option. I can run it through one of my clean amps. More pics when it arrives.

download by Hentai No Baka, on Flickr

Kurtz

Looks like from the manual that I can run the preamp into a normal guitar amp input.

Mesa by Christopher Louck, on Flickr

Nice find! Funnily enough, I use my Boogie F50 as a preamp for my Matamp mini because the Boogie adds a brighter top end to the sound (I use the amp input and the FX loop send jack).

The main thing I like about Boogie preamp stages is, the eq knobs actually do something, unlike some other amp designs *cough* Marshall *cough*

Oh hells yes. Running this into a ~warm~ power amp would counter the traditional Mesa cool-bias bias, and would let you not have to lug around a giant heavy Mesa. Nice.

Pedals all set up to do teh kurtdz. LOL

2017-02-28_05-49-08 by Christopher Louck, on Flickr

So seriously though, anyone know how running a preamp in to a preamp input works? Does it bypass the slave amps controls completely? (Like tone, volume, reverb, etc.) Never done it. Going to use a Peavey Renown 212 as the slave since it has a preamp input on the back. Just not sure if the controls in the front will be bypassed in that mode.

Should bypass everything except possibly master volume.

In my experience, plugging into the return on FX loops (pretty much the same thing?) bypassed all knobs as the master volume was generally just the last preamp stage, but I guess it depends on the amp.

Basically, turn your preamp output volume DOWN/OFF to begin with and work from there

I used to have an old Peavey Bandit with preamp out/power amp in jacks on the back. That's probably what you've got. Plugging into only the power amp in disabled the amp's on board preamp.

You could use the preamp out and power amp in together like an effects loop to plug a new device into the signal chain in series with the on board preamp.

Cool. I will set all volumes to 0 to be safe and go from there. I will also set tones to noon and fiddle with them to see if there is any change.

Got this crate kit because I wanted to use it for smaller pedalboards. Works great!

It came in today so I went to work hooking it up. When I run it through the preamp jack in the back of my Renown it does indeed bypass all controls. Nothing works on the front when I play through the back of the amp. If I run it through the input instead, the tone controls work as usual. I was pretty impressed aside from one issue I was having. If I kept the preamp output at 0 the controls and stuff all worked fine on the Mesa. If I turned the output up to one or two it would get louder at first, and then it started to distort and drop out and back in. I called Guitar Center where I got it and they said I needed to call the store where I got it from online. (Cause they couldn't be fucked to transfer me to that store.) I call that store next and they tell me to bring it to the local store where I picked it up so they could take a look at it and maybe change out the tubes and see if that fixes the problem. I drive an hour to the Guitar Center closest to me. This store tells me that I need to call the service plan department and that they don't do in shop repairs. I call the service department and they will do a claim and tell me where to take the amp to be worked on. I go out to my truck and call the service department. They tell me my service plan doesn't cover any repair since the amp arrived damaged. They won't fix it. I needed to take the amp back in the store and return or exchange it. I say "They don't just have another one of these for me to exchange it. My repair plan really won't allow this to be fixed because it arrived with an issue?" Yuuup. So I bring it back in the store. The guy helping me before goes to talk to his manager. They decide to have it sent to their repair place that they usually use for equipment and will cover the repair for me as long as it isn't crazy. If it is high enough that I would need to cover some, they will call me and let me decide what rout I want to go. In the mean time they offer to let me hook it up in the store and see if I can show them the problem. I hook it up and it doesn't do the same thing in their store. Once it warms up there, it gets sort of oddly distorted and the output volume past 2 doesn't get any louder. Also my clean volume was effecting my lead channel volume. I guess that is normal for some amps? I thought the volume and master from each channel were independent of each other. The lead volumes don't do anything when you are in rhythm though...

They won't send it out to be looked at until Monday so I will be waiting to hear from them. Been a busy evening.

HNB wrote:Also my clean volume was effecting my lead channel volume. I guess that is normal for some amps? I thought the volume and master from each channel were independent of each other. The lead volumes don't do anything when you are in rhythm though...

That is by design. I don't know when they stopped doing it that way; the earlier Marks were also like that.

Sorry to hear you're having such a rough time with that thing.

Thanks. I will just have to wait and see what they tell me. Worst case I will just have to return it for a refund and buy a different one.

Back and fixed. Replaced the input jack which was likely causing the sound cutting in and out. I have to give Guitar Center in Tacoma a lotta credit. If they hadn't fixed it for me, I would have had to return it. Was super cool of them to agree to eat the repair cost so I could keep it since my purchased protection plan didn't cover it during shipping to me..... It is all hooked up and sounding great. I think the Sans Amp sounds pretty awesome, but with the online settings for the In Utero sound, it kind of sounds too bassy to me. Not sure what is up with that. I can get some killer feedback with it though....

20170311_115442 by Christopher Louck, on Flickr

20170311_113950 by Christopher Louck, on Flickr

20170311_113940 by Christopher Louck, on Flickr

What's the green sand blasted looking pedal in the middle?

My Sean Ryan Custom IC Joker Big Muff

IMG_1085 by Christopher Louck, on Flickr

Sorry, I meant the top picture.

Big Bloom Overdrive