Want to start an Ace users / fans thread?

[FPFL]

I just got my first Mesa, the Stiletto Ace, and am learning how to dial it in. Its been a long journey, but I feel like I'm finally there.

I've gone from Line6 AX2 (broken), to DSL 50 (sold) to Carvin Legacy (bought used and is moody) to VHT Deliverance (sold) and am FINALLY done.

I'm finding the clean harder to dial in than the dirty channels but am up for discussing anything.

My favorite tone is currently the tite gain with the bass and presence at noon and the mids and highs at 11 o'clock.

I'm playing a Carvin CT4 with Seymour Duncan Custom Custom into the Ace and it sits on a VHT Deliverance 4 x 12 with 4 Eminence P50E speakers. I like the P50Es a lot more than the whatever is in DR cabinets. The highs on the amp, which is bright, are smoothed out a little and that really helps the tone.

-P

 

[TheRazMeister]

Good news bad news...

Good news...you just picked up a great new Mesa amp
Bad news...you may be one of the 1st to get the Ace so your user group is going to be mighty small 8)

I just got my first Mesa, the Stiletto Ace, and am learning how to dial it in. Its been a long journey, but I feel like I'm finally there.

I've gone from Line6 AX2 (broken), to DSL 50 (sold) to Carvin Legacy (bought used and is moody) to VHT Deliverance (sold) and am FINALLY done.

I'm finding the clean harder to dial in than the dirty channels but am up for discussing anything.

My favorite tone is currently the tite gain with the bass and presence at noon and the mids and highs at 11 o'clock.

I'm playing a Carvin CT4 with Seymour Duncan Custom Custom into the Ace and it sits on a VHT Deliverance 4 x 12 with 4 Eminence P50E speakers. I like the P50Es a lot more than the whatever is in DR cabinets. The highs on the amp, which is bright, are smoothed out a little and that really helps the tone.

-P

 

[FPFL]

Really? I knew it was a new amp but I didn't know it was still so scarce.
The store I bought mine at, Matt's Music in Weymouth MA had way more Mesa gear than I've seen at any Guitar Center. They had just sold the Ace combo so I rushed down to try the head before it went away too. I guess I was smart to hurry.

I couldn't be happier to finally be kicking out the jams with a Mesa. I've loved them from a distance for a while but this is the first Mesa that really spoke to me as in "OPEN THE WALLET FOOL!" I suspect as it becomes more available The Ace will steal many of long time Marshall die hards who aren't brand slaves.

-P

 

[Humbility]

Man I have been reading up on the Ace since I read your post about it. I gotta tell you...I have a thing for 50 watt amps. I own a Single Recto, I Used to have a Fender Bassman, an JCM900 that I ran in 50 watt mode all the time, I had a peavey Classic 50 that I absolutely Loved, and the Ace is looking mighty tempting. Stupid Sexy Mesa making amps that make me wanna get them and own them and play them. Nice buy dude.

 

[musicbox]

my advice would be to close your eyes and turn the knobs. if the ace is ANYTHING like the deuce, it's going to require some unconventional settings to sound it's best. enjoy the new amp...

any way you could record some sound samples for us to enjoy??? :wink: :wink:

 

[FPFL]

musicbox,

I don't know what generation and version of the stiletto you have used but I disagree with your sentiment about knobs as it applies to the Ace. That said I have no idea what "normal" settings are for your gear so its a very relative thing of course.

My ace on the tite gain channel has the all the EQ knobs within an hour of noon on the dial on way or the other. I'm playing a Carvin CT4 with a Duncan Custom Custom pup in the bridge (great pup for the Ace if you've got a closed back cab), to the Ace and out thru a VHT 4 x 12. Through a DR cab I'd have to cut the highs more.

I'll have a lot of clips in a couple weeks, in fact I'm going into the studio to record a three song demo. I'll post links to mp3s here when its done.


Humbility,

Thanks man. I am a very happy camper.

-P

 

[Guitarzan]

...or you can just read this thread.

 

[raingram]

I have tried out one of the combos a couple of times at a local Mesa dealer and I have them holding it for me for a couple of weeks while I sell some stuff to buy it. I have been looking for a "great" amp for a while and was sold on the Budda SDII 45 until I tried the Ace. Man, it is one cool amp and is alot easier to dial in than any other Mesa I have tried in the past. I believe this amp will be with me for many years!

 

[inkwachemis]

I just got my first Mesa, the Stiletto Ace, and am learning how to dial it in. Its been a long journey, but I feel like I'm finally there.

I've gone from Line6 AX2 (broken), to DSL 50 (sold) to Carvin Legacy (bought used and is moody) to VHT Deliverance (sold) and am FINALLY done.

I'm finding the clean harder to dial in than the dirty channels but am up for discussing anything.

My favorite tone is currently the tite gain with the bass and presence at noon and the mids and highs at 11 o'clock.

I'm playing a Carvin CT4 with Seymour Duncan Custom Custom into the Ace and it sits on a VHT Deliverance 4 x 12 with 4 Eminence P50E speakers. I like the P50Es a lot more than the whatever is in DR cabinets. The highs on the amp, which is bright, are smoothed out a little and that really helps the tone.

-P

HI,

I currently have a DSL50 and am looking at the ACE head as a replacement. since you have also owned the dsl50, how would you compare the two? how marshallish can the ACE get? thanks!

 

[FPFL]

The Ace gets Marshsally for sure but it is not a Marshall clone. Its honestly a much better amp than the DSL 50 all around in my opinion. Better tweakability, better build quality, better tone.

I don't my the DSL one bit. Its not a bad amp, I liked mine a lot, its just that the idea of the DSL is better executed by the Ace.

Please try before you buy if at all possible - I learned more in a long weekend of trying amp after amp after amp than I did in a year of reading online.


-P

 

[inkwachemis]

The Ace gets Marshsally for sure but it is not a Marshall clone. Its honestly a much better amp than the DSL 50 all around in my opinion. Better tweakability, better build quality, better tone.

I don't my the DSL one bit. Its not a bad amp, I liked mine a lot, its just that the idea of the DSL is better executed by the Ace.

Please try before you buy if at all possible - I learned more in a long weekend of trying amp after amp after amp than I did in a year of reading online.


-P

thanks for the info. I have tried the Ace head a couple times at Mesa Hollywood. each time I'm impressed but trying out an amp and low to moderate volumes is never the same as playing the amp full bore with your band. thats when i really get a feel of the amp IMO. I'm very likely gonna pick up the head really soon. i"ll let u know when i do!

 

[FPFL]

Had my first gig with the Ace last night at the Middle East Club in Cambridge, MA.

As usual everything was harder live, the floor was slippery as hell, the previous band spilled beer all over the floor and the stage lights we so bright I played half the set with my eyes closed. Good thing I have learned the value of being able to play "in the dark" before.

But on to the important things, The Ace was a champ! Sounded great and I got some compliments from other players about the sound. The Duncan Custom Custom really hits this amp in the guts and gets it screaming. It also responded really well to split humckers for cleans when needed. I think I prefer the tite clean to the other clean choices but I will also try some more extreme EQ settings before really commiting.

We got a CD ripped right from the mixing board line out of the whole show. Sweetness! My bass player took it home but later this week I'll post links to mp3s so people can hear one take of the Ace sound live.

-P

 

[raingram]

Okay, I'm an official member now. I picked up my Stiletto Ace 1X12 Combo this past Saturday. Wow! What a GREAT amp! I had been GASing for it for a few weeks and finally secured the funds to get it. I have been having a great time the last couple of days tweaking around and getting a wide variety of cool tones from my Les Paul, Tele and Strat. The first channel has some great clean options that can go to vintage overdrive pretty easily. The second channel can go from a plexi to a hot rodded JCM800 tone and beyond that to a Mesa Rectifier type tone. I'm loving it right now and very satisfied with my new amp.

 

[FPFL]

Raingram,

Welcome to the club! I'm glad there's somebody besides me at last!

The thing I love about the Ace, among others, is that its easy to dial in and yet there are lots of other good sounds in there when you go looking for a certain one too - you are in for a real treat.

I just spent 6 hours on Sunday tracking a three song demo with the Ace in a local studio. The engineer at the mixing board said he'd never heard a better 'out of the box' hard rock sound. I have to say, with the amp opened up wide it sounded startlingly good.

I tracked most of the rhythm parts with the tite gain channel and almost all the EQ knobs at 11 o'clock. For leads I went to liquid gain and rolled the bass and the treble down but the mids up for a great violin lead sound (I'm a big Iron Maiden fan and I love to ape both Dave Muuray's and Adrian Smith's lead sounds)

I've never sat in the mixing room after the fact and heard tracks that needed so little work to sit right in the mix. The mid crunch of this amp is outstanding and yet it holds the drop d chugging tightly in place as well.

What, if any, doubt I had about this amp being my personal grail is now over and done and I wish you the same luck!

P

 

[raingram]

Hey, I've spent another few hours after work today dialing in different tones and I really can't get over the range of possiblities with the Ace.

I spent probably a couple of hours just fooling around with channel 1's Fat Clean and Tite Clean settings. I could come up with so many cool vintage amp sounds it is unreal. I went from a Bassman-type sound to a Vox AC30-type sound with both the clean and the overdriven type tones from both of these amps. Then I spent another two hours just on the Crunch setting getting all kinds of classic Marshall-type tones from a Bluesbreaker to a cranked Plexi to an 18-watter. I need to make copies of the blank settings sheet in the manual and chart some of these for when I am going to record.

On channel 2 I have dialed in a great, hot-rodded JCM-type tone on the Tite Gain setting and I haven't explored much beyond that yet. I've always wanted a JCM800 until now, because this amp is so much more flexible.

I would like to hear the tracks you recorded, I hope you put them up somewhere.

 

[FPFL]

I'm with you!

Forgive the cross-link but this thread is expressly about clips and has some...

http://forum.grailtone.com/viewtopic.php?t=5169

 

[inigo montoya]

I just bought the amp less than a week ago. I have not yet had a chance to really crank it in my studio too much. At lower volume--incredible versatility. From Marshall smoothe to Fender jangly. Very sweet crunch/distortion.
My only concerns--no reverb--makes me have to run to my Kurzweil KSP8 processor (or get some shitty reverb pedal). The other is the fan. I am concerned that the fan will get into the recording when miced. (Not necessarily now, but any house fans that I have had tend to make noise when they age a bit.) Anybody else have this concern?
Otherwise, no regrets on this purchase. Everything and more.

 

[FPFL]

Congrats! The amp records as well as it plays in person.

As for the reverb, I'm not a fan of amp reverb myself so I'm not unhappy that there isn't some SPLONK! noises every time I try to move the amp.

What settings are you using for cleans? I find the clean side of the amp trickier to dial in than the dirty side so any favorite settings will be appreciated. I have to run the presence and the treble quite high to get enough sparkle and cut.

As for the fan, I cannot imagine it getting that loud or me recording at a level so low that even if it did get louder it would be audible over the amp with a 57 pointed at the cab on the other side.

I keep the dust jacket over the head 100% of the time I am not playing so this might help the fan and the rest of the amp age more gracefully.

-P

 

[cvansickle]

I finally got to play one yesterday. It was a 212 combo in green (ughhh!).

Without a doubt, it was the best 50 watt EL34 combo I've ever played. My favorite setting was Tight Gain. I found myself riffing off ACDC and Free stuff for about an hour!

Am I going to get one? Not sure. If I do, it most likely would be a head, and definitely NOT green!

 

[inigo montoya]

I actually love the green. I think they make it in black also.
I have a 1x12. I wanted something smaller than my 4x10 Super Reverb (I love the reverb tank on that amp.) To FPFL. You're right about it probably not being a problem with recording. I might just need to have the amp turned off if recording vocals or acoustic guitar with a condenser. Probably won't be a problem when putting an SM57, SM7-b, AT 4050, or Charter Oak condenser in front of it (my current mics). I have yet to get the cover, since it was left out of the package by GC. The guy promised to send it in the mail.
I had to move my Super Reverb to the other side of the studio because the bass resonates so much out of that amp that it rattles one of the tubes of the Ace.
I'll post for settings. I tend to go up high with presence, low on bass, medium with treble. Gain up to about 6 on the clean channel, middle setting. Les Paul Standard with volume output adjusted to make things perfectly clean. I got a nice jangle on it. I'll post more specifically when I get more experience with the amp. Send any settings you like.