Have You Or Anyone You Know Had Problems With Blackstar Amped 2 100W Pedalboard Amp + FX ?

[AFKAEjay(retired)]

But IMO they don’t really sound good enough to be appealing at all

The stJames was to me …but I suspect we look for different endresults, your at the higher gain department if I’m correct?
Admittedly, the weight icw 50w tubes was a buying reason, for the usecase of plugging modelers into the return.

Atm my references are Fender SuperSonics, Mesa express and a fancy hand build Dumble clone…and in that company it doesn’t finish behind per se.

 

[KingsXJJ]

The stJames was to me …but I suspect we look for different endresults, your at the higher gain department if I’m correct?
Admittedly, the weight icw 50w tubes was a buying reason, for the usecase of plugging modelers into the return.

Atm my references are Fender SuperSonics, Mesa express and a fancy hand build Dumble clone…and in that company it doesn’t finish behind per se.

The Fender SuperSonics are really awesome amps. I just love the way they sound and feel cranked a bit. They just come alive under your fingers! I’m sorry I ever sold that combo… might try to find a used head.

 

[AFKAEjay(retired)]

The Fender SuperSonics are really awesome amps. I just love the way they sound and feel cranked a bit. They just come alive under your fingers! I’m sorry I ever sold that combo… might try to find a used head.

Yeah they are. I landed on the 22 in my quest to get a deluxe with an efx loop. (Which allows the clean preamp to work a little on low volume) . I was really surprised by the dirt channel..so much I got its bigger brother 2 weeks later.
Nr 1 position has (at least temporarily) been taken by a new love (Dumble clone), but I’m not past the honeymoon yet

You’re not running QC or NC are you? I have some captures of the SS pre amp in the cloud…

 

[laxu]

No, not really tbh. Most production amps aren’t exactly boutique build quality. Something like an EVH is nothing special, and costs a bit to work on as removing the board takes quite a lot of work. But having surface mount components means a lot of techs won’t even touch it as you need different irons, a good eye, even more careful hand etc. And doing it without schematics can be even worse, especially if you are trying to find what the problem even is.

There isn't a particularly good reason for Blackstar amps to use surface mount components other than they are more available and cheaper. They don't make amps that are significantly smaller, or more complex than other tube amps made using traditional components. The digital cab sim section doesn't count, there's many amps that have a little Two Notes embedded board inside but are otherwise traditional.

By comparison there is no other way but SMD to make the BluGuitar Amp 1 for example, and that tradeoff gives you extremely small size and weight for an amp that competes with my 90W all tube Mark V in how loud it gets, and behaves exactly like a tube amp as far as I can tell.

Similarly the SMD approach makes sense for the Blackstar Amped range.

 

[laxu]

The Fender SuperSonics are really awesome amps. I just love the way they sound and feel cranked a bit. They just come alive under your fingers! I’m sorry I ever sold that combo… might try to find a used head.

I've only played them when they came out and I liked the clean channel a lot, but the overdrive channel was very noisy and kinda mediocre sounding to me. My understanding is that they have fixed the noise issues in later iterations, but overall I felt that e.g the push buttons were kinda cheap etc.

At 1599 € in Europe, pretty overpriced for what they are IMO. But that goes for all Fenders atm, when you are not far off from actual boutique builds in that price range.

 

[MirrorProfiles]

gut shot of a St James, as an example of what Blackstar’s are like. Lots of SMC and transistors. All fine for what it is/what they cost but it’s definitely a “Blackstar” way of doing things.

 

[la szum]

Man, I missed out on this latest Blackstar Hate Thread.

 

[la szum]

I’m still happy with my stJames, sounds good, 50w all tube a can lift with a finger, decent cabsim out, fairly priced for what it is.
Everyday is “pick on blackstar” on fora, personally I think it’s all a bit overblown.
IF this model has a reoccurring issue…it’s about how they handle it for the customers affected, and how they fix it in their production. Afaik, most brands that drop some volume on the market have had to deal with “stuff”.

Many people need a down and out dog to kick as a way to project and discharge their
own frustrations and limitations in life. Blackstar is that dog for some people.

 

[la szum]

The initial/debut run of Blackstar amps (Artisan series) were all hand-wired and point-to-point.

 

[la szum]

And Blackstar is not really just Blackstar---it is a subsidiary of Roland/Korg, which
also owns, builds, and services, Vox amps.

 

[MirrorProfiles]

The initial/debut run of Blackstar amps (Artisan series) were all hand-wired and point-to-point.

Artisan is a good amp, unfortunately it’s not really representative of anything else they make (for one it has a valve phase inverter, it’s all valve and no SMC ). I like that it’s the gut shots they show on their home page though.

 

[JiveTurkey]

Ignoring the obvious "fun" that is pooping on Blackstar ; the question becomes what are you going to get out of a Blackstar tonally that you won't get better out of anything else? I think the answer is going to be nothing.





It's been awhile. Forgive me @la szum

 

[JiveTurkey]

Artisan is a good amp, unfortunately it’s not really representative of anything else they make (for one it has a valve phase inverter, it’s all valve and no SMC ). I like that it’s the gut shots they show on their home page though.


View attachment 39436

That does look great!

 

[la szum]

Ignoring the obvious "fun" that is pooping on Blackstar ; the question becomes what are you going to get out of a Blackstar tonally that you won't get better out of anything else? I think the answer is going to be nothing.





It's been awhile. Forgive me @la szum

I don't care if this song is now one of The Gear Forum's Greatest Hits.

Side B. Song 3.

I have a couple of their pedals, and gigged 2 different Blackstar amps
and loved both of them. I still do. One of them had me taking it out
over Mesas and Marshalls there for a bit. A lot of that to do with the
built-in attenuator that let me dial in the volume and headroom of the
amp to the room we were playing in.

 

[la szum]

Artisan is a good amp, unfortunately it’s not really representative of anything else they make (for one it has a valve phase inverter, it’s all valve and no SMC ). I like that it’s the gut shots they show on their home page though.


View attachment 39436

I am pretty sure we could take ANY brand and compare the build quality of
that brand's cheapest shit to the best build quality of a competing brands
most expensive stuff---which would be really, really dishonest thing for us to do.

But, hey, that is more of a concern about us all being reasonable and rational creatures
than about Blackstar sucks or doesn't suck.


I feel like I can discover something to roll my eyes at from most brands, and also find
something I love and find useful from most brands.

Refraining from the absolutist world-view of all, none, always, and never is hard, but I
am trying, and doing my best.

 

[JiveTurkey]

I don't care if this song is now one of The Gear Forum's Greatest Hits.

Side B. Song 3.

I have a couple of their pedals, and gigged 2 different Blackstar amps
and loved both of them. I still do. One of them had me taking it out
over Mesas and Marshalls there for a bit. A lot of that to do with the
built-in attenuator that let me dial in the volume and headroom of the
amp to the room we were playing in.

The pedalboard amps Dave talked about in the OP I think are neat. I like the full size controls vs. the side controls on the Blug stuff for sure. I do like their cab rig (?) software as well.

 

[KingsXJJ]

Ignoring the obvious "fun" that is pooping on Blackstar ; the question becomes what are you going to get out of a Blackstar tonally that you won't get better out of anything else? I think the answer is going to be nothing.





It's been awhile. Forgive me @la szum

I’d say you’re going to get the tone midway from the raw Marshall tone to the smoothness of Friedman. A nice place to land for those who appreciate it.

 

[AFKAEjay(retired)]

Ignoring the obvious "fun" that is pooping on Blackstar ; the question becomes what are you going to get out of a Blackstar tonally that you won't get better out of anything else? I think the answer is going to be nothing.

You are missing the obvious…the brownsound offcourse!

Btw…I’m pretty sure fender sniffed on their designs before they came up with their brown face amps!

 

[GuitarBilly74]

they sell tens of thousands of these, I am sure a few will have issues, but I don't think it's a widespread problem. T
he BlackStars I had had been fine in terms of reliability. Not better or worse than anything within its price range. They sound ok too, for the most part.
I haven't really heard the Amped 2 in person though, only the first version. It was not bad but I wouldn't trade my BluGuitar ME for it. I think the BluGuitar is a better amp overall....

 

[MirrorProfiles]

Ignoring the obvious "fun" that is pooping on Blackstar ; the question becomes what are you going to get out of a Blackstar tonally that you won't get better out of anything else? I think the answer is going to be nothing.





It's been awhile. Forgive me @la szum

I am pretty sure we could take ANY brand and compare the build quality of
that brand's cheapest shit to the best build quality of a competing brands
most expensive stuff---which would be really, really dishonest thing for us to do.

But, hey, that is more of a concern about us all being reasonable and rational creatures
than about Blackstar sucks or doesn't suck.


I feel like I can discover something to roll my eyes at from most brands, and also find
something I love and find useful from most brands.

Refraining from the absolutist world-view of all, none, always, and never is hard, but I
am trying, and doing my best.

Ha well, if Blackstar having a solitary product that resembles an actual properly built valve amp gives them a pass to release any old bollocks then so be it.

I wouldn’t want to skew my perception of a company based on one product - Orange, Fender, Marshall, Mesa etc all make a range of products at different price points. The cheap Orange stuff is somewhat comparable to Blackstar but the majority of their other stuff is much more true to what you’d expect.

I don’t even have a grudge against Blackstar, I respect that they have their own niche in the market and have done something different. By all accounts they’re a nice company to work for too. But I don’t think it’s me just venting or piling on hate to say that most of their amps are built with massive compromises on cost and build quality in order to meet a price point. Lots of things that are cheap landfill fodder can still be fun.