First week with my new Mark V and I'm completely Overwhelmed

[mightypudge]

I bought my Mark V on Monday last week and since then I've played an open mic and full gig with my band and spent several hours at a friend's house today just jamming. All I can say is that this amp is everything I'd hoped for and more. All three channels are the best in its class. And having that Mark IIC+ mode is practically worth the price of the amp.

Musically I have to cover a half dozen styles each gig and the Mark V did not disappoint. I'm sure I'm not telling you happy MV owners anything you don't already know.

What DID surprise me however was how easy it was to dial in the amp. I started with the John Petrucci settings from his very helpful video and just tweaked from there. Surprisingly I settled on settings quite different from my starting point, but that's why we tweak.

Anyway just wanted to share. After a few gigs under my belt to road-test these settings I'll post them for all to check out.

 

[smd24fan]

Awesome, congrats!

 

[MBJunkie]

Congratulations!! I certainly understand your delight! :mrgreen:
Enjoy

 

[parabola]

Welcome to the Mark V family!

 

[purpledc]

thats awesome. Im a relatively new mark V owner myself. And I have to agree with the ease of use. It seems to me there are two types of people. Simple control people and mesa mark V control people. To me this amp makes more sense to me in how its laid out and how the controls work. I actually get more lost trying to dial in an old marshall because im looking for controls it simply doesnt have yet I wish it did. The Mark V isnt for everyone and that is more than ok.

The only thing I dont like are the guys out there who will call the amp crap or say that it sounds horrible just because they couldnt wrap their head around it. Its no matter though. The people who love these amps understand them and thats who they are made for. I think my favorite thing Is I never feel like im compromising with the mark V. Most amps that claim to do it all only get you half way to the tone your looking for. For instance the peavey 6505 amps have some great dirty tones but the cleans are lacking. Marshalls have the roar but seem to lack in the low volume territory. And many high gain amps are very fizzy and noisy. Not the mark V. I have never had an amp that had the rich lush clean tone of a fender twin and then in an instant be melting faces the next.

One thing I would recommend to you just for fun is to experiment with different pickups. This amp is so responsive to pickup choice its amazing. Some amps like (again) the peavey 6505 arent very responsive to high or low output pickups. The preamp is so gainy that you really dont get the individual characteristics of the different guitars you use. To an extent but not nearly as much as the mark V. I just found it amazing that with low output humbuckers the mark V had a great classic rock feel across the whole board. Then with a guitar with some really high output pickups it breathes fire. Its really as if the amp is an instrument all in its own right.