Studio preamp help

[sadowsky13]

Hey folks just wanted your opinions. I have been offered a trade for my Vox night train and cab. The guy has offered me a mesa boogie studio preamp from 1989. Is this a good preamp, are the tones good, are they close value wise? I have never used rack gear before, what else would I need ie: power amp, cab etc what additional costs would there be?

My main rig is a mesa stiletto with marshall cab. this would be a practice rig, figure I would look fo a lower powered power amp.

Any help would be appreciated
thanks in advance

 

[RectoStudioGuy]

It's a stellar preamp, in my opinion, but of course I'm biased. Very rich and versatile, with and incrediably diverse gain structure. (think MkII) You would need a suitable power amp to go along with it.

 

[tonefreak25]

It's a stellar preamp, in my opinion, but of course I'm biased. Very rich and versatile, with and incrediably diverse gain structure. (think MkII) You would need a suitable power amp to go along with it.

This pretty much sums it up for me as well. Like most Boogies you do need to tweak things for a while to get where you want to go, but in the end it is all worth while!!

 

[ytse_jam]

Great preamp with awesome cleans & distortion. Just one thing, $-wise I think your Vox + cabinet should cost almost twice than a Studio Pre.

 

[ryjan]

This is what it can do.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HpCc7_0Cmuc

 

[JT_Marshmallow]

This is what it can do.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HpCc7_0Cmuc

Ha! That's my video! Those were the first sounds I milked out of it, and they don't come close to how wonderful it sounds live in the room. For the life of me I can't quite capture it with a mic.

If you use the recording outs it doesn't even need a tube power amp to warm it up. I run it through a solid state Mosvalve power amp and the tone is incredible.

Speaking of Vox, this thing will get you there with the Fat/Bright switches off. For that glassy Vox or Fender raunch, turning these switches off opens up a whole new world of wonderful clean-ish sounds. (With either or both of the switches on, you get closer to a "Boogie" sound. Its amazing that this thing covers clean and lead sounds so thoroughly, and that's before you factor in the 5-band EQ!)

Here is that "Voxy" sound in a recording: http://zone.servegame.com Scroll down to Champagne to hear the clean-ish tone, and the next one "Always With Me" demonstrates the high gain sound.