mark v preamp

[braintheory]

Some people have have said they tried using the mark v's preamp with other power amps. I heard one guy on this forum say use the mark v preamp with a peavey 5150 power amp and thougth it sounded great. But how do you connect the mark v preamp to another poweramp? Does it involve using the slave out section on the back of the mark v? If not, what is that portion of the back of the amp used for?

 

[SteveO]

The slave out runs a line-level tap off of the output transformer, so it also includes the sound of the power tubes. To run just the preamp section, use the loop send jack. You will still need a load on the speaker output, though, so keep that in mind.

 

[braintheory]

So to run the mark v preamp into another poweramp I need to put one end of the cable to the send in the mark v fx loop and the other to the return of the amp I want to use for the poweramp? Also, What do you mean by having a load on the speaker output?

 

[SteveO]

Even though the Mark V power amp isn't being used, it is still powered up and needs a speaker load to keep the output transformer from frying.

 

[braintheory]

So, today I turned the mark v on, connected a cable from the send of the mark v to the return of my Bogner XTC 101B, turned the XTC on, made sure the fx loops on both amps were active, plugged my guitar into the XTC, and pressed the fx loop button on on the footswitch and played a few riffs and then turned the button off and played a few a few riffs and it didn't sound that much different than when I played the XTC without the mark v preamp. I then left everything as it was, but plugged my guitar into the mark v instead, which was still connected to the XTC poweramp, and the mark v sounded exactly the same as it would without the bogner xtc wether I pressed the fx loop button on or and yes I'm positive the loops on both amps were active and not hard bypassed. What am I doing wrong? Is it that one amp should be turned on and one should be turned off as opposed to what I did, which was to have both amps turned and NOT on standby? I also did not have anything plugged into the return of the mark v or anything in the send of my XTC.

 

[LPJunky]

What I would do to hear only the MarkV preamp and XTC power amp is connect the TUNER out from the MarkV to the Fx Loop return on the XTC. Pull the Solo button on the MarkV and you're in silent mode. Connect your guitar to the MarkV and blast away. That's how I do my silent recording with the SOLO pulled. You still need a speaker connected to the Mark! Although, this way you have no way to control the level of the signal going to the power amp... it should work....

 

[HaggertysMusic]

What I would do to hear only the MarkV preamp and XTC power amp is connect the TUNER out from the MarkV to the Fx Loop return on the XTC. Pull the Solo button on the MarkV and you're in silent mode. Connect your guitar to the MarkV and blast away. That's how I do my silent recording with the SOLO pulled. You still need a speaker connected to the Mark! Although, this way you have no way to control the level of the signal going to the power amp... it should work....

This won't work. The tuner out just passes the direct guitar signal, not the preamped signal.

The right way to do this is plug the guitar into the Mark V and connect the Mark V FX Send to the Bogner FX Return. I've read that the Ecstasy has both a series and parallel loop. :?: That could be messing things up. You would want to use the series loop for this. Is there a switch to select the type of loop? I've obviously not had experience with Bogners.

The series loop wouldn't use the 'mix' control, it's just patch in, patch out. On some series loops I've encountered, the return jack wouldn't be enabled unless something was plugged into the send jack, so on your Ecstasy you may try plugging an extra guitar cable into the send jack, and have the other end just hang loose.

 

[braintheory]

You may have just solved my problem because I had it on parallel. Thanks. Also, when I do this should both amps be turned on and not on standby?

 

[LPJunky]

This won't work. The tuner out just passes the direct guitar signal, not the preamped signal.

Yes it will! I've been using it for a year and a half. The tuner out is distorted by the preamp. What it allows you to do is disable the power amp by pulling the solo knob. On the MarkV schematic it's located at half and inch from the FX Loop connector so it's at the exact same place in the signal chain. Minor point anyhow. One way or the other is equivalent....

 

[HaggertysMusic]

You may have just solved my problem because I had it on parallel. Thanks. Also, when I do this should both amps be turned on and not on standby?

Yes both amps need to be on and not on standby, but as noted before you will need to have speaker loads connected to both power amps to avoid damage.

Yes it will! I've been using it for a year and a half. The tuner out is distorted by the preamp. What it allows you to do is disable the power amp by pulling the solo knob. On the MarkV schematic it's located at half and inch from the FX Loop connector so it's at the exact same place in the signal chain. Minor point anyhow. One way or the other is equivalent....

You're right about the schematic, but I can't get any level out of the tuner out, except to a tuner. Doesn't work for me running it to another amp, either into the front end or FX return.

 

[LPJunky]

You're right about the schematic, but I can't get any level out of the tuner out, except to a tuner. Doesn't work for me running it to another amp, either into the front end or FX return.

I assume you engage the mute button or pull the SOLO knob?

 

[HaggertysMusic]

Yeah. It feeds signal fine to the tuner... plug into anything else, nothing. :?:

 

[braintheory]

Today I successfully ran the mark v's preamp into the xtc's power amp and when I plugged my guitar into the mark v and played a few riffs it sounded like a combination between the two amps, but sounded a lot more like an xtc than a mark v. I messed around with the level control on the fx loop on both amps and no matter what I did it sounded much more like an xtc. Is this normal? I thought the preamp contributed more to the character of an amp.