Tone settings survey

elvis · Sep 22, 2011

OK, my ears are bleeding...

I just spent a few hours last night and today trying out the modes. I also went back and forth between a recto 1x12 and a half-open 4x10, as well as running both.

The longer I have this amp, the more I run it with all the tone controls at about 12:00. The treble is at 12:30 or so, but that's it.

Where are the rest of you running your tone controls (including presence)?

Interestingly, I found I get more low end from the 4x10 than the 1x12, and the overall tone is better, too. Running both cabs in parallel is nice, but not really necessary.

I have noticed that several people claim that at high volume the treble drops off and the bass becomes overwhelming. My experience is that the tone balance stays pretty stable, but the amp just gets a lot louder. I went to 12:00 on the master today (at 90W) and about deafened myself, but still no tone issues. If anything, I have been bumping my bass up and treble down because the treble tends to be a bit overwhelming.

elvis · Sep 22, 2011

By the way, I watched a few Andy Timmons videos, and I like his focus on tone and dynamic response. I think the Dyne is really good at that. I also changed my OD808 settings to get a bit more dirt and less volume jump. Now I have it set to

Drive 10:30
Tone 9:00
Balance 2:30

It's not much different from vintage LO, but has just a touch less gain and is has a bit less low end. It does a great job of giving some dirt, and equalizing the volume of the 2 and 4 positions of my pickups to the high gain settings.

It's really nice to be able to add a bit more sustain to each of the modes, plus the 808 clears up the tone a little as it has less low end. In any of the 6 possible settings, every position of my pickup selector sounds COMPLETELY different. It's amazing how well the character of the guitar comes through. Now each of my guitars sounds totally different as well, so I have a huge variety of tones to work with. I also find that the bass holds together so well that I can play all the way down to low B on the neck pickup with high gain.

With my other amps, I tend to stick to one pickup setting because they have so much gain that the guitar tone is lost, and the neck pickup is really muddy below the 5th fret.

I also picked up a MXR micro amp for solo boost. It works great. Now I use the GE7 set to a heavy scoop, much like "contour" on the F-series amps, to get a Mark tone. Works great, I can get a good Metallica tone, though it's difficult to get quite enough gain. But it allows me to play more styles with the amp. Now my pedal board is a bit out of control:

Guitar
G50 Wireless
Boss TU-2
EB VP Jr Volume
Bad Horsie II
EVH Flanger
EVH Phaser
Maxon OD808
Amp Input

FX Send
Boss GE7
Boss DD3 set for short delay with lots of repeats ("Run Like Hell" - style)
Boss DD7 set for medium delay with 2-3 repeats for general purpose use
MXR Micro Amp for clean boost
FX Return

This is really right on the edge of "out of control", but it's been fun to play with. I can get just about any tone or sound I want. Now I just need a bigger pedal board :mrgreen:

I'm really GAS-ing for the Andy Timmons BB Preamp after watching him talk about it, but frankly I can't imagine having more than 6 possible gain settings. Does anybody know if the Lone Star lead channel has more gain than the Dyne vintage HI?

J.J · Sep 23, 2011

The Lonestar does have a lot of gain and certainly more than ED vintage high. It is very different sounding though and has two controls, drive and gain. As good as the LS clean tones are, I am not a fan of its OD.

The ED gain seems to be tied to the note, high notes seem to have alot more gain than the lower notes on the wound strings.

I'd like to try the BB, but want to keep things simple.

Current setting:

Volume: 2:00
Bass: 9:00 or 11:00 if I can get the cab off the floor
Mid: 12:00
Treb: 12:30
Pres: 12:30
reverb: 9:00

45 or 90 watt mode is bassed on mood. If using 90 watt I usually add a bit more treble.

Effects are a TC flashback and a TC Corona in the loop. I also have an EB VP Jr in the loop, but I have found the reverb is parallel with the loop. As volume goes down the reverb becomes more apparent which I don't like.

screamingdaisy · Sep 23, 2011

Gain/Treb/Mids are all between 1:00 and 1:30. Presence has floated between 9:00 and 12:00 as I learn the amp, although I've been liking it more towards the 12:00 end lately and suspect that's where it'll finish. Bass gets adjusted based on my guitar and volume. I find that at higher volumes I can run a bit more bass to counteract the way the speakers lean the bottom end out and push the mids, and with humbuckers I have to cut the bottom end back (10:00) compared to where I'd have it with single coils (P90s/12:00)

I'm not a big fan of using pedals, but when I do I've been using a Fulldrive 2. I like that it gives me two boosts in a single pedal and due to the nature of the ED's gain I can boost all three channels with it.

This assumes I can get the amp moderately loud. With the amp turned down the FD2 sounds like a pedal instead of an overdrive, which kind of sucks.

jeffp · Sep 23, 2011

I gotta check out this Fulldrive 2. Sounds like a winning combination the way you use it?.I really hope my Dyne works out. The tech has recognized but cannot find the problem....he`s enlisting Marcus @ MB for a reference since Marcus confirmed amp not working properly. Can`t believe i`m the only one with this problem!(see clean/Lo/Hi volume balance topic)

screamingdaisy · Sep 23, 2011

jeffp said:
I gotta check out this Fulldrive 2. Sounds like a winning combination the way you use it?

I'm running the amp's gain just a hair past 1:00, and with the level on the OD set right I can boost the clean channel for a nice mid gain crunch that differs from Vintage Low thanks to the pedals mid boost/bass cut.

It's cool because I can "boost" my boosted clean channel by switching to Vintage Low with the pedal still turned on. It's a nice option.

The FD2 is basically a really tweaked Tubescreamer type pedal, and I'm pretty sure just about any tubescreamer style pedal could achieve a similar result. Having the second boost in a single pedal is pretty handy. Particularly for dudes like me that don't want a whole lot of stuff going on at their feet.