NAD: MESA/Boogie Mark VII
- Thread starter TubeStack
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Life Eats Life
Shredder
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They will be virtually one day.
JiveTurkey
Goatlord
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EOengineer
Shredder
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This is basically where I’m at. When I’m throwing down $$$$ for a Mark, I’m looking for legendary Mark tones, and hoping I can get more than one of those tones simultaneously.
If I can’t do that, have we REALLY moved much beyond the limitations of the old shared knob design of the II/III amps?
Mesa needs to refocus on the problem they were trying to solve by iterating on this series. It shouldn’t be the kitchen sink that it’s become.
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I think the "Mode" problem is an engineering one, and not because Mesa has never wanted to. 
Be nigh unto impossible to put all 3 modes from Channel 3 on 3 different channels,
because the different channels are about gain-staging while the Modes are about the
tonestack. All the Modes on Channel 3 share the max gain-staging/stacking.
I've personally never had a beef about the modes not being footswithcable, because
I don't need 3 flavors of high gain accessible with a FS.
Be nigh unto impossible to put all 3 modes from Channel 3 on 3 different channels,
because the different channels are about gain-staging while the Modes are about the
tonestack. All the Modes on Channel 3 share the max gain-staging/stacking.
I've personally never had a beef about the modes not being footswithcable, because
I don't need 3 flavors of high gain accessible with a FS.
EOengineer
Shredder
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Why can’t every switch and mode just know the sound I want when I press the button and make it happen. It’s 2024. If we can have flying cars we can have that.I think the "Mode" problem is an engineering one, and not because Mesa has never wanted to.
Be nigh unto impossible to put all 3 modes from Channel 3 on 3 different channels,
because the different channels are about gain-staging while the Modes are about the
tonestack. All the Modes on Channel 3 share the max gain-staging/stacking.
I've personally never had a beef about the modes not being footswithcable, because
I don't need 3 flavors of high gain accessible with a FS.
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It's just a nice dream to have really. I did posit to my friend today when we were coming back after picking up the Mark V, that it'd be cool to have 2 of them, each channel using one of two favourite modes... and use my GigRig G3 to switch between them and change channels!I think the "Mode" problem is an engineering one, and not because Mesa has never wanted to.
Be nigh unto impossible to put all 3 modes from Channel 3 on 3 different channels,
because the different channels are about gain-staging while the Modes are about the
tonestack. All the Modes on Channel 3 share the max gain-staging/stacking.
I've personally never had a beef about the modes not being footswithcable, because
I don't need 3 flavors of high gain accessible with a FS.
Could do that with my Recto as well I suppose!
EOengineer
Shredder
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- 1,383
Good lord you can run a Mark and Recto in stereo. If you survive it probably sounds awesome.
I’ve yet to sit down and do this with my revision G and Mark III. Like a dummy.
TubeStack
Rock Star
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- 2,870
All right, that was relatively painless! 
I have the Ampero selecting between the three channels on switches 1-3 (along with corresponding on/off status of effect loop and reverb), with switch 4 turning the graphic EQ on/off.
Woot woot!
When I get the right cables, I’m also going to have the VP4 select certain channels for certain presets (as well as specific effects on the HX One).
This is wicked!
And was very easy for a midi simpleton like myself.
I have the Ampero selecting between the three channels on switches 1-3 (along with corresponding on/off status of effect loop and reverb), with switch 4 turning the graphic EQ on/off.
Woot woot!
When I get the right cables, I’m also going to have the VP4 select certain channels for certain presets (as well as specific effects on the HX One).
This is wicked!
And was very easy for a midi simpleton like myself.
and then later I’ll set up my gigging presets on the VP4. 
Life Eats Life
Shredder
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- 1,038
That’s awesome man!!All right, that was relatively painless!
I have the Ampero selecting between the three channels on switches 1-3 (along with corresponding on/off status of effect loop and reverb), with switch 4 turning the graphic EQ on/off.
Woot woot!
When I get the right cables, I’m also going to have the VP4 select certain channels for certain presets (as well as specific effects on the HX One).
This is wicked!
And was very easy for a midi simpleton like myself.
laxu
Rock Star
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- 5,210
Looking at the Mark V schematics (and I'm not sure how accurate they are), from what I can understand of them a lot of the mode switching is basically swapping components in multiple places in the circuit via relay switching. These are marked as M1-8 in the schematic.I think the "Mode" problem is an engineering one, and not because Mesa has never wanted to.
Be nigh unto impossible to put all 3 modes from Channel 3 on 3 different channels,
because the different channels are about gain-staging while the Modes are about the
tonestack. All the Modes on Channel 3 share the max gain-staging/stacking.
I've personally never had a beef about the modes not being footswithcable, because
I don't need 3 flavors of high gain accessible with a FS.
The differences in the channels are things like how many gain stages there are and where the gain knob and treble/middle/bass controls are located in relation to them. For example ch1 is "EQ first, gain knob after" setup, whereas ch2 is "gain first, EQ after". Meanwhile ch3 is "EQ first, gain knob after the 3rd gain stage."
I agree it's hard to get all that to work across all channels when e.g those tone stacks have different values and whatnot. Could maybe be done via full digital control over the different combinations of bits and pieces, but that is not a thing here.
To me Mesa opted for a more Road King -> Roadster style approach where they stripped down the complexity from V -> VII, which allowed them to have more of the same modes on channels 1 and 2.
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Ooooo where did you get schematics from??
laxu
Rock Star
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el34world, just googled "Mesa Mark V schematic".
Note that apparently Mesa sometimes puts out incomplete or incorrect schematics in case they leak online. That's why I said I can't say how accurate they are, like don't try to build your own Mark V with these!
Desertdweller
Shredder
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- 1,047
I think the solution is much more like on the Rectifier amps. Green is clean and then you have 2 mid/high gain channels with 3 identical modes each. When I played live with a rectifier, I had a clean sound, a heavy rhythm sound in Red Modern, and a smooth lead sound in Orange Vintage.I think the "Mode" problem is an engineering one, and not because Mesa has never wanted to.
Be nigh unto impossible to put all 3 modes from Channel 3 on 3 different channels,
because the different channels are about gain-staging while the Modes are about the
tonestack. All the Modes on Channel 3 share the max gain-staging/stacking.
I've personally never had a beef about the modes not being footswithcable, because
I don't need 3 flavors of high gain accessible with a FS.
IDK, do most people that buy a Mark VII need 2 clean sounds or do we want IIC and IV duplicated? I’d think replacing Fat on channel 2 with a duplicated IIC mode would have shut us all up.
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Oi !! Get off my Fat mode!!!
Channel 1 - Fat is my favourite cleans on this channel. Tweed is cool if you want to set to 10watts, crank the gain, and have a nice driven kind of thing.
Channel 2 - Edge and Crunch switch really nicely between each other. Mark I mode is basically useless to me.
Channel 3 - Mark IV is the only mode I need on this tbh. IIC+ is cool, but I'm not sure it gives me anything I am missing from Mark IV mode. Extreme is cool, but same thing there really.
EOengineer
Shredder
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- 1,383
The amount of ground you can cover with a MK V and MW Recto is laughably absurd.Oi !! Get off my Fat mode!!!
Channel 1 - Fat is my favourite cleans on this channel. Tweed is cool if you want to set to 10watts, crank the gain, and have a nice driven kind of thing.
Channel 2 - Edge and Crunch switch really nicely between each other. Mark I mode is basically useless to me.
Channel 3 - Mark IV is the only mode I need on this tbh. IIC+ is cool, but I'm not sure it gives me anything I am missing from Mark IV mode. Extreme is cool, but same thing there really.
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100%
In fact, if I was really arsed, I could get an amp switcher and use both amps and be able to switch between 6 channels!!
