Jet City... Amplification

[Coyote]

So I've been looking at these for a while now...
Apparently it's a Mike Soldano designed amp (who also owns a third of the company), manufactured in China (to keep the costs down).

JCA100H:



Later, this came out (basically the same head with a "depth mod")





The prices? Local market prices the first one at a little under 400€. The HDM is a bit under 500€.
Needless to say I'm interested...

[Nitro Express]

Chinese quality can be hit and miss. I bought some machinist tools made in china but they were made for their own industry and not for export. The quality is very high and just as good as you would see in German or Swiss made tools but the price is far below what you would pay for those. It's all about how good the quality control is. You can get good quality out of china but that has to be a goal of management. China is like the wild west. It's grown so fast it's hard to regulate anything and some cash in the right palms makes heads turn the other way. People take advantage. It's starting to clamp down. They are intentionally slowing their economy down to deal with their pollution problems.

[Hardrock69]

I like the sound. Good grind, with just the right attack, and a reverb that sounds realistic, but is not (as it is set in the demo) too overbearing.

But I would expect nothing less from something Mike is associated with.

[kentuckyklira]

I have a 2x12 cab of theirs. The speakers were run of the mill but the cab itself is well made. It looks like it could take a beating.

[jhale667]

Sounded pretty cool in the demos... I figure it can't suck too bad if people are bothering to emulate it - it's a model in one of the amp sims I use.

[ELVIS]

Amp sims fucking suck donkey dicks, dude...

Stop fooling yourself...

[jhale667]

Wasn't the point, asshat. But they still sound better than just throwing a mic in front of your shit anywhere... as we've heard.

[jhale667]

The point was if the Jet City totally sucked no one would be bothering to emulate it.

[ELVIS]

I wouldn't mind a Jet City amp...

But seriously, the sims are fun to play with but there's no real dynamics that breathe and push air...

I recently sold all of my Behringer stuff and have been steadily replacing everything in my audio recording chain...

I now have two completely analog tube driven channel strips complete with compressor, EQ, limiter, de-esser, exciter, expander and gate...

Those are then sent to another tube preamp with optical output straight to a mac...

I'm currently looking for a multi effects unit with zero digital noise...

[Nitro Express]

Wasn't the point, asshat. But they still sound better than just throwing a mic in front of your shit anywhere... as we've heard.

Most the recording now is digital so really. Does it make that much difference that the amp sound is modeled? It seems to be the live sound isn't as good with modeling as opposed to a real tube amp. That being said, you can get a whole lot of tone variety for the buck and the convenience of moving it around easy. It would be interesting to do an experiment in a club and see if the audience can actually tell the difference.

[Coyote]

Most the recording now is digital so really. Does it make that much difference that the amp sound is modeled? It seems to be the live sound isn't as good with modeling as opposed to a real tube amp. That being said, you can get a whole lot of tone variety for the buck and the convenience of moving it around easy. It would be interesting to do an experiment in a club and see if the audience can actually tell the difference.

Something to do with the physics of sound...