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Post subject: Jumping ship
Posted: Fri Feb 19, 2016 3:32 am
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Well, I've had my Mustang 3 V2 for a year now, and it's been a love/hate relationship.

*Some* of the amp models have been brilliant - especially the cleaner sounds and of course especially the Fender models. But despite tweaking I've never really got a drive sound I'm happy with. It might just be my amp (or my electricity - I live on an island in the Atlantic with dodgy supplies!) but I find the level of background noise using the stomp box models to be simply too high - and the hi-gain amp models have a fizzy harshness that I just can't dial out.

Perhaps the biggest disappointment was the modulation effects. They're just a bit flat and lifeless. I don't use much (a little chorus and the occasional flanger) but in my head I hear something that's just a bit more vibrant than I can tune in on the Mustang.

In fairness, I've used the amp live a number of times, and it's held up admirably. Watching back on video the tone is good - but not quite good enough.

So, what am I doing? Well after toying with the idea of a simple valve amp and a few pedals I've gone and jumped the other way entirely and pulled the trigger on a Line 6 Pod HD500. I could be opening a whole new can of worms - but the purist in me was overruled by the "ooh look, flashing lights and lots of buttons" kid.

We'll see how that works out. But for now, my Mustang has taken up residence in someone else's home, and I hope they get everything out of it that I thought I would.

Fingers crossed!


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Post subject: Re: Jumping ship
Posted: Fri Feb 19, 2016 6:14 am
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Joined: Fri Feb 05, 2010 4:31 am
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Location: Province de Québec, Canada
For most experimented guitar player, a good clean amp with not effect but with some good effect pedals at the input jack is a winner.


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Post subject: Re: Jumping ship
Posted: Fri Feb 19, 2016 7:54 am
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stratele52 wrote:
For most experimented guitar player, a good clean amp with not effect but with some good effect pedals at the input jack is a winner.

+1

This is the path I recently took by trading my MIV for a Super-Sonic 22.

I think the Mustangs are pretty good, but after a year or two the critical ear finds something missing. While we can find lots of YouTube blind tests of say a MIII versus a DRRI, it is interesting to note that the creator of many of those videos dumped his MIII.

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Post subject: Re: Jumping ship
Posted: Fri Feb 19, 2016 2:44 pm
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Did you ever try changing the default signal path of the mod in fuse so that it is PRE amp rather than after? Makes the chorus literally sound 2-3 times better. Went from a chorus i didn't even want to use to a very good sounding one.
As to tone, it's a matter of a LOT of tweaking. I've had plenty of high end and vintage amps and if you can't get a really great tone out of the mustang you just haven't found it. 2 years in i'm still finding new and better ways.


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Post subject: Re: Jumping ship
Posted: Sat Feb 20, 2016 5:13 pm
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oczad wrote:
As to tone, it's a matter of a LOT of tweaking. I've had plenty of high end and vintage amps and if you can't get a really great tone out of the mustang you just haven't found it. 2 years in i'm still finding new and better ways.

As others have said it is all about fine tuning *TWEAKING*, like an audio engineer to get really good sound, but face it folks the versatility kills my tube amps in so many ways I could write a short book. I don't get it when someone says there is just something missing because there are just so many things *ADDED* that you cannot do with a typical tube amp that far outweighs some minor difference in sound.

*VERSATILITY* is what the Mustangs bring to the table and it is the future like it or not for a myriad of reasons and modelling is going to continue to improve. Look at how many guitarists that are turning. Alex Lifeson was using fake amps on stage as props. Don’t be fooled but many of these artists are losing their amps. http://www.fractalaudio.com/artists.php

My Mustang's Twin preset sounds glorious and sounds better than the Twin I owned and my two Deluxe Reverbs are gathering dust. Yes, I needed two Deluxe Reverbs to do what I needed to do along with a bunch of effects and switching. Plus the Twin and the Deluxes had to be really *loud* to sound good when using an overdrive/distortion pedal. Also, no more tubes to be replaced from Russia and China.
IMHO

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Post subject: Re: Jumping ship
Posted: Sat Feb 20, 2016 7:56 pm
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HIO wrote:
oczad wrote:
As to tone, it's a matter of a LOT of tweaking. I've had plenty of high end and vintage amps and if you can't get a really great tone out of the mustang you just haven't found it. 2 years in i'm still finding new and better ways.

As others have said it is all about fine tuning *TWEAKING*, like an audio engineer to get really good sound, but face it folks the versatility kills my tube amps in so many ways I could write a short book. I don't get it when someone says there is just something missing because there are just so many things *ADDED* that you cannot do with a typical tube amp that far outweighs some minor difference in sound.

*VERSATILITY* is what the Mustangs bring to the table and it is the future like it or not for a myriad of reasons and modelling is going to continue to improve. Look at how many guitarists that are turning. Alex Lifeson was using fake amps on stage as props. Don’t be fooled but many of these artists are losing their amps. http://www.fractalaudio.com/artists.php

My Mustang's Twin preset sounds glorious and sounds better than the Twin I owned and my two Deluxe Reverbs are gathering dust. Yes, I needed two Deluxe Reverbs to do what I needed to do along with a bunch of effects and switching. Plus the Twin and the Deluxes had to be really *loud* to sound good when using an overdrive/distortion pedal. Also, no more tubes to be replaced from Russia and China.
IMHO


Personal taste, room acoustics, the guitar and playing style all go into this. I play pretty clean finger-style jazz and pop. I do not use pedals. The vintage channel, based on the Deluxe Reverb, on the SS22 sounds better to me than the Deluxe Reverb model from my MIV V2. On the burn channel on the SS22 I was easily able to dial in just enough crunch for some Freddie King-ish blues. I found the Super-Sonic on the MIV unusable.

In my case, something was missing after a couple years with the MIV V2 and I found what I was looking for with the SS22, but I always was a tube snob on a solid state budget.

YMMV

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Post subject: Re: Jumping ship
Posted: Sun Feb 21, 2016 3:12 am
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Mustang 3 V2 must be a very good amp for a beginner or for a guitar player who want to gig "light" and live their high end amps / vintage amps at home.

Let's be realistic, to have "good" tone with a 100 watts amp with multi effects for $400 it is another story.
For $400, you can buy only one good effect pedal.

Enjoy you amp like it is and save your money for a better one.


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Post subject: Re: Jumping ship
Posted: Mon Feb 22, 2016 8:02 am
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I have two mustangs, III and a IV v1 that I scooped up when they were being blown out when the v2s came out.

I like what they do offer, and they are fun amps, and in certain "situations" they're hard to beat...

but they've never replaced my tube amps (3 different ones) and pedal board setup.

right now, my band is in the studio, and I have really no plans to use either of these mustangs.

If push came to shove, as much as I do enjoy using them, i'm not emotionally attached..


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