Friedman BE100 HBE vs Marshall DSL 100H vs Peavey VTM 120

[MirrorProfiles]

They each have their own quirks and differences, but they're all a sort of take on a high gain modded 1959. Friedman has channels, a nice FX loop, tons of useful switches and is in general a nicely built and finely tuned amp. VTM is single channel, has dipswitches which are cool but maybe less useful than how the Friedman is laid out.

The DSL is 2 channel with 4 modes, but one shared EQ for everything. Its a bit like a Mesa Mark III in that to get every channel and mode sounding good, you have to compromise somewhere.

I love all 3 pretty equally, hard to argue with the tones you can get from some cheaper amps out there.

 

[James Freeman]

Yes very similar in character/texture of clipping, kind of raspy and not very tight, too much power amp gain?

 

[MirrorProfiles]

Yes very similar in character/texture of clipping, kind of raspy and not very tight, too much power amp gain?

I had the Friedman louder than I normally would to match the VTM a bit, although the tapers are all quite different. Settings are what’s in the video but VTM was by far the loudest. DSL changes tone a lot with volume too, Friedman has way more of a gradual taper

 

[mk5]

By these clips and the chord you hit for each amp at around 2:07, 5:00, and 7:42, my favorite is the Marshall.

 

[mk5]

Is the VTM set up with the Jose settings?

 

[MirrorProfiles]

no diode clipping on any of the amps, I might do a video like that though. The sat switch sounds best on the BE channel to me, on HBE it gets too much. The diodes on the VTM are more subtle than the BE and JEL, guessing they let more signal through before they clip.

I had gain 1 and gain 2 switched on (I think these are cathode bypass cap tweaks), as well as high 1 and high 2 (which shift the presence frequencies lower). The switches for lows, mids, and diodes were off.

 

[laxu]

They all sound nice! What cab or cab sim are you using with these?

I remember when I tried the BE50 Deluxe, it had a thump to it that I wanted to get rid of, it sounded too modern so I went with the Bogner Goldfinger 45 SL at the time because it sounded more "vintage" to my ears.

To me the nice thing about Friedmans, Bogners etc is that they don't need to be cranked to ungodly levels to sound great like some Marshalls and other older amps. I always liked the JCM2000 DSL50 I had much better turned to about 6 or 7 through an attenuator.

 

[Deadpan]

Dig the Friedman most here. The VTM has a nice character is pretty clear but a little less gain. What guitar and pickup was used?