JSX vs RECTO

[Humbility]

I remember I was playing in a cover band a while back and we jammed at a pay by the hour rehursal space at the time. The guy had a Peavey Ultra Plus in one of the jam rooms and I got to play on it from time to time. 120 watts, 6L6's. I have to admit...I absolutely LOVED the way that thing sounded. I BEGGED him to sell it to me. No dice. Even offered to trade him my whole amp, which was a peavey classic 50 4x10 with a 1x15 cab at the time AND cash...just for the Ultra Plus head. Still wouldn't do it. A year later I found out he sold the **** thing for a smile. Needed the cash he told me. I HAVE seen those heads on ebay for REAL cheap from time to time. 300-400 bux they have gone for. If I ever see another one on there I might even get it. There was just something about it man. And like was mentioned earlier, its was the predcessorto the XXX. But for some reason I didn't like the XXX. No idea what they did differently but I guess thats the way it goes. In anycase...that Ultra Plus was a sweet head. Nice to see someone else agreed.

 

[Tonestack]

I know what I am about to say borders on heresy, but I like my solid-state Peavey Transtube Supreme XL more than my Series II Rect-O-Verb. I do not know how Peavey arrived at the design of this amp, but it sounds and feels more tube-like than all of the Rectos that I have played.

IMHO, the Recto is a fucked-up tube design. Mesa runs the power amp so cold that it might as well be solid-state. The preamp distortion is so buzzy that it affects the clarity of single-note runs. The preamp is also so scooped that it one is forced to rely on volume instead of amp voice to cut through the mix on solos, which leads to band volume wars.

IMHO, the pinnacle Mesa achievements were the Mark IIC+ w/ graphic EQ and the original Studio .22 w/ graphic EQ. These amps have warm clear voices that scream tube tone.

 

[Russ]

So you don't like the Mark IV?

 

[Russ]

The guy who does my guitar setups says the JSX slaughters the Recto too.

 

[Anonymous]

I can't say a JSX "slaughters" a Recto - they sound very different. I have a Triple X, so I checked out the JSX when they came out. It had a little more life to the cleans, less gain on the lead channels, and maybe a little more flavor to the gain than the Triple X. But I like the tones from my DR more than the Triple X and/or JSX on most if not all occassions. This what the mic tells me when recording - my ears agree!

 

[Howitzer]

I put this thing through its paces before I bought my 6505+. It has its good and bad sides. But let me preface by saying that I ended up with the 6505.

The day I was trying this amp out at guitar center, one of my friends had brought in his Diezel VH4. Let me say that is one of the most amazing amps I have ever heard.

After screwing with that amp for a while, I went in to try the JSX. I was immediately surprised at how good the thing sounded. It was maybe a little muddy, but with switching to V30's, and messing with the presence a great deal, it was possible to dial it out. Great clean, Middle, and lead tones. The fat switch was very powerful also.

In about 5 minutes, my sales rep/friend came in and ask why I was being a pussy, and had not turned the amp past 2 on the master. When we did this, everything went down hill. The amp completely lost all of its Balls. Bass went to hell, no note definition in chords, it felt like somone had pulled all the pre-amp tubes out, or sucked the life out of it. This is the exact opposite of what is supposed to happen, as push the tubes harder - In my opinion.

As I was looking for an amp to play with live, This lost any chances there would have been to buy it. It was honestly horrifying. Two of the bigger gear heads at the store that day, cancelled orders/brought theirs back.

My final verdict? It would be great as a bedroom amp. For any use outside of that, it completely blew. Ive considered getting a valve king combo for bedroom practice, and that amp even sounds better than the JSX cranked.

Again, these are just my opinions. But they were also the opinions of everyone else in the store that day. We were all horrified, and went about trying to Re-EQ the amp, to no avail. And we tried a lot of combinations.

 

[frankencat]

All I know is that I played my ROV last night after changing out the speaker to a V30 and it just absolutely ruled. I run SED EL34's in it and it has more of a Marshall chunk than any Peavey I have ever owned or played.

 

[disassembled]

I had a Triple XXX too and thought it didn't have any volume but there are lots of factors that determine the volume on that amp (as well as the JSX). First off, if you don't know how to EQ an amp that uses Active EQ then you're probably going to be lost at first. The more you cut the less volume you have as well as cutting away from the frequencies. The effects loop send/return not properly set will reduce the volume dramatically. The last thing I found was that tubes running a low bias are not going to be as loud. When i had the Triple it had JJ 6L6's that I would run in "EL34" mode biased to about 40 mA's and it was plenty loud. If i had it around 25 mA's it was a bit quiter. I think PV's distortion is too harsh and eventually why I went with Mesa to get a smooth tone. I just recently sold a PV Rockmaster preamp that I played right before I boxed it up to ship out and man does that thing have a good tone. Unfortunately I don't want extra amp stuff laying around so it had to go but, if I had to recommend a PV it would be the Rockmaster preamp or the old Ultra 60/120 heads.

The noise gate feature of the JSX has been in the Ultra series of PV amps since the early nineties so it was not a last minute addition. The triumph PAG, Rockmaster preamp, Ultra 60/120, Ultra Plus, Triple XXX, and other Ultra models all have the built in noise gates for the lead and crunch channels that aren't adjustable. They are simple circuits using a couple of diodes to block the signal if it is below a certain voltage/level. The JSX is the only model that has an adjustable noise gate.

Greg

 

[Schmoog]

why can't peavey make a high gain amp without serious feedback trouble? the jsx has feedback problems, my buddies XXX has feedback trouble, and so does the ultra plus. as far as the JSX, its a good amp, but next to my mesa's it sounded good, but as if something was missing. like a pit bull with no teeth kinda

 

[disassembled]

What is feedback trouble? I never had any feedback problems and I worked with just about every high gain peavey.

Greg

 

[allstar1234]

For cleans and Leads i prefer the Peavey JSX. IMO it has the perfect head room for cleans and i havent had a single problem when i crank it. It has stayed nice and tight.


For chunky Rhythm and some leads-
Recto-i liked the tightness it kept with it. And the more i cranked it the better it sounded.

and yea it can get a bit noisy but with an ISP decimator the JSX cleans up nice and plays great.

 

[disassembled]

Peavey uses a lot of gain in their amps so that is probably what the problem is for some people (turning the gain knob too high like they would on an amp with less gain). I don't like a lot of gain so this wasn't a problem for me. I really don't care for the gain structure that Peavey uses in their Ultra series amps (besides the Rockmaster pre I do like that one!) as it just sounds soo harsh to my ears.


Greg

 

[allstar1234]

mr randall used alot of thing to base his designs off.

and yea a 6505 is brutal. I like it better than some rectos. Its my next amp purchase after a jcm 900.

 

[disassembled]

At home i have two 5150 heads and two 5150 cabs. One of the heads is the original EVH blockletter style and the slant cab has the EVH blockletter written on them as well. I bought this for investment purposes as it will probably keep going up in value (it has already doubled in value from the original price that I paid). My second 5150 head....well I wouldn't call it a 5150 anymore as I made it into a 3 channel head with seperate EQ, a switch to bring the lead channel to sound like the 5150 II, a bright switch boost for the original bright switch, cooling fan, EL34-6L6 bias switch, adjustable bias circuit, and a cooling fan. The tone stack for the added channels is not the same as the stock tone circuit so I will probably change that when I go home one day.

The amp I modded was my first real amp so it is special to me. All in all they aren't bad amps but the cleans really blow out of the box.


Greg

 

[allstar1234]

well if you purchase a 6505 now, chances are your not out for cleans

 

[disassembled]

well if you purchase a 6505 now, chances are your not out for cleans

If you know what you are doing with mods then you can make that amp better for cleans but in the end is it worth it? Nah. Just get a boogie in the first place!

Greg

 

[allstar1234]

thats if you're into cleans if you use no cleans at all a stock 6505 is prefect for full out gain at a "cheap" price