good choice for pickup testing amplifier?

[John Carlsen]

Pretty self-explanatory...Just wanted to buy a good amp for testing pickups that will give me the transparency and clarity that is important. What do you guys use? I am borrowing a friend's Mesa F-50 and I hate it. It sounds really compressed and honky and I need something much better!!!!

[WolfeMacleod]

THD Univalve. It's an extremely "honest" amplifier. If your pickup sucks, it'll tell you in no uncertain terms...same goes for your playing,

[frankfalbo]

Lately we're liking the clean channel on the Mesa MkV, it has a Hi-Fi top end lift to it that exposes smaller incremental differences unnoticed through a vintage Fender style circuit. The 65 amps (London, Monterey) are open and clear, but they sound really good, which can be misleading if you're listening critically. That's part of the reason ProGuitarShop.com switched to a Fender for their demos. People said their demos made the pedals sound too good. Also a good tube mic pre with a high input impedance, into a high quality headphone rig is great for delivering nuance.

[FunkyKikuchiyo]

Something pretty "honest" like Wolf said about the THD. I had a Vox modeling amp that I sold because it was horrible for reference work... cool amp, but when it is so layered by effects and modeling stuff, you can't really be critical. Sometimes I get lucky and find a little Peavey or something that may not rock out but is very transparent that works great as a bench amp. Wish I'd kept that old one from way back...

Something you're familiar with and like is helpful, too. I have a Super Reverb (reissue) and a '65 Twin (real thing) that I have played for years and years and know like the back of my hand, so they are both very useful for testing pickups. They aren't incredibly transparent, but I understand how they react well enough and have played enough guitars through them (I don't want to even think how many) that I know how to interpret the results. If I feel really ambitious with a particular pickup, I go down to the local music store so I can hear it through a bunch of amps, and hopefully played by a bunch of people. I listen differently when I'm not the one playing. But, that relies on a good relationship with the music store, or else they'll get pretty annoyed with you fast!

There are stomp boxes I have kept around just for testing pickups. I may have sold them by now if I didn't have that one use for them.

Excellent question, I look forward to what other people have to say...

[big_teee]

Another important consideration, is price range?
The Mesa Amps, and Super Reverbs aren't cheap.
On another forum a cheaper amp that has been getting raves, is the VHT Special 6 amp.
I think it comes in a head or combo amp.
Good Luck,
Terry

[salvarsan]

NSF delicate sensibilities

Back when I labored under the misapprehension that it was actually important, I tested my stompbox mods through a cheap rack preamp and a decent pair of headphones.

"Ridiculous!", you shout, hastening to amend with the mantra,
"You must test a pickup/effect/? in a rig like the guitarist uses."

Fuck off.

A low-distortion amp revealed differences, if any, quickly and unambiguously. I preferred this as the triage test since a tube amp running half-cranked into a guitar speaker designed for a particular distortion signature obliterates any sonic nuances.

The neighbors didn't like it, either.

Once an effect get past triage, my friends got a whack at it with their Deluxe Reverbs, Marshall combos, and AC-30 clones.

In short, do the gross tests with a cheap rack.

Next, let the end users do your detailed testing.

Some of them are very good at it and, as Wolfe says, if your pickup sucks, they'll tell you in no uncertain terms.
They'll also tell you why.

[David Schwab]

Back when I labored under the misapprehension that it was actually important, I tested my stompbox mods through a cheap rack preamp and a decent pair of headphones.

Works for me.

[Mark Hammer]

For many years (and maybe even still), it was common practice for recording studios to have several different sets of monitor speakers in the control room for mixing purposes. One of those sets was, more often than not, a pair of Auratone speakers, using a single 5", in a small cab. The reasoning was that such speakers represented the real world listening circumstances of many consumers, be they table radios, car radios, or institutional public address or muzak systems. If it sounded good there AND in the high-end monitors, then you could have some assurance you had a decent mix, and possibly even a hit.

But of course, there is a difference between merely "sounding good", in a holistic or global-judgment sense, and more clinical examination of the characteristics of something like a pickup, and how pickup A might be different from pickup B. So, the guitar analogy of keeping a "populist" amp, like a budget Frontman, GX, or Valvestate, so as to mimic consumer circumstances the way Auratone cubes might, works for some things, but not necessarily for all the reasons one might wish to "test" a pickup.

Perhaps the query should be expanded to ask what speakers are good for testing pickups, since they can all have their particular resonances. Here, again, one probably wants both speakers that represent what is commonly used, and speakers that may be a little flatter in response and broader in bandwidth, for diagnostic/analytic purposes.

[Steve Conner]

My local guitar store do a lot of repair and modifying work. They have a whole store full of amps, old Fenders, Mesas, Marshall stacks, whatever, but the amp they keep in the workshop for testing guitars is a Fender Princeton 65 DSP set to clean.

I also used to use a preamp and headphones for testing circuits. I tried to develop a Class-D bass amp a couple of years ago (sadly it exploded) and my main testing device was a large power soak with a tap for headphones.

I could also hook the power soak up to an Alesis parametric EQ set to a rough emulation of a guitar cabinet, and a digital reverb set to "room", driving a stereo headphone amp. That worked remarkably well for tweaking tube power amps late at night, although it could make almost any kind of distortion sound good.

Re Mark's question, what about the Eminence Beta series. They have a flatter PA type response. I'm playing a little combo with a Beta 8 a lot nowadays, and the Henriksen Jazz Amp, a modern-day Polytone-type thing, comes loaded with the Beta 12. A Henriksen or Polytone would probably be a pretty good amp for testing pickups, in fact.

[Triad]

IMHO PA stuff is the way to go. Or, even better, recording in flat thru a DI and then you can re-listen for future comparison.

[mondo]

My Orange Rocker 30 has a clean channel without any EQ just a volume control and it makes a guitar sound like it's supposed to sound. A tele sounds like a tele and an LP sounds like an LP. It works well with acoustic instruments as well. If your guitar sounds manky or your playing poorly it lets you know. The dirty channel is a different beast altogether. The Combo comes with a Celestion V-30 which some folks object to because of it's high-mid voice. Swap the speaker or run a cab if you don't like the V30. You can get these combos and heads used for less than a grand now and I have had ZERO problems with this unlike some of the newer Orange products made outside the UK. It has been run for hundreds of hours and many shows and sounds better now than it did when I bought it as the speaker is broken in nicely. You could do a lot worse than an Orange Rocker 30 for a/b ing pickups.

[socalscott]

I got a sweet 1/2 watt Guytronix Gilmore Jr. kit head that is an ideal pup taster.

[Folkcafe]

Trace Elliot Vellocette SE (single ended version)

I have this amp loaded with telefunken 12AU7's and a black plate RCA 6L6. This amp is nothing but volume and tone control and does clean brilliantly. In many ways, I hate playing through this amp because it shines a flashlight on how badly I play but for listening for nuance details it is a great low wattage class A amp.

[copperheadroads]

I use a fender BJ & a orange tiny terror + a solid state Marshall & a solid state Randall
also i use a 1979 music man 212 hd 130 for testing
even though it never get to the MUSIC MAN here lately