jet city 20 watter

mickie08 · Post by **mickie08** » Fri Dec 18, 2009 5:18 pm

I just ordered the jet city 20 watt head and matching cabinet that saves the day was discussing in the HT5 thread below. Using a coupon at music 123 I got 15% off of it so around 400 for the 20 watt head and the matching 1x12 emminence loaded cabinet. We will see how it works out.

here is a shot of one from the sight.

endsjustifymeans · Post by **endsjustifymeans** » Fri Dec 18, 2009 5:23 pm

sexy... didn't you just get a bugera though?

mickie08 · Post by **mickie08** » Fri Dec 18, 2009 5:30 pm

I got the bugera early this summer when they first came out but want something alittel more than 5 watts. 20 watts is way more useable to me and this thing sounds like a cool little amp.

Plus, if trend continue this thing will be alot more expensive in a few months. Look at the ht5's I bought the full stack (head and 2 cabinets) for 500 cash out the door new when it came out and noe they are 8-900. I figire at 400 shipped to me, I am not taking too much of a risk and a separate 1x12 cabinet is alwasy nice to have around.

endsjustifymeans · Post by **endsjustifymeans** » Fri Dec 18, 2009 5:33 pm

mickie08 wrote:I got the bugera early this summer when they first came out but want something alittel more than 5 watts. 20 watts is way more useable to me and this thing sounds like a cool little amp.

Plus, if trend continue this thing will be alot more expensive in a few months. Look at the ht5's I bought the full stack (head and 2 cabinets) for 500 cash out the door new when it came out and noe they are 8-900. I figire at 400 shipped to me, I am not taking too much of a risk and a separate 1x12 cabinet is alwasy nice to have around.

true enough. I'm looking to pickup a Handsome devil at some point to match my blackheart cab... but I really only want to pay like $200 for it. Watching the bay like a hawk.

Thom · Post by **Thom** » Fri Dec 18, 2009 5:38 pm

Looks nice Mickie. Interested to hear what you think of it as you've had the TT and HT-5.

endsjustifymeans · Post by **endsjustifymeans** » Fri Dec 18, 2009 8:17 pm

Handsome Devil is $260 at Victor Litz this weekend... still too much for an amp I don't really need. But tempting none the less.

SAVEStheDAY · Post by **SAVEStheDAY** » Sun Dec 20, 2009 3:21 am

Spent less on this than the HT5, what a steal.

kim · Post by **kim** » Sun Dec 20, 2009 9:31 am

jet amp ! haha

[youtube][/youtube]

robroe · Post by **robroe** » Sun Dec 20, 2009 4:08 pm

this thing looks really cool.

if someone i saw at a show was using one, i would go up and ask them about it. alas no one plays anything here in buffalo except jcm800s

kypdurron · Post by **kypdurron** » Sun Dec 20, 2009 7:27 pm

the demos I've seen so far were really promising. Please keep us updated about this thing

mickie08 · Post by **mickie08** » Sun Dec 20, 2009 8:16 pm

should be here mon or tues.

mickie08 · Post by **mickie08** » Fri Dec 25, 2009 12:01 am

quick one off review.

I got the cabinet in yesterday and the head in today.

Cabinet. Very quality feel and construction. 16 ohms emminence loaded, closed back cabinet. Fairly large for a 1x12. Bigger than the epi valve cabs I am pretty sure, or the egnater. I think at least. I have not directly compared.

Head. Seems well built. All knobs seem very secure and steady when turned.

Sound. Great. Not quite as full as the tiny terror I think and will not overdrive/distort as much as the ht5. This amp does sound more full than the ht5 but I am not sure how much of that is the larger cabinet. I never played the ht5 through a proper cabinet, only the small 1x10's it comes with.

Clean is nice. reminiscent of the TT where you get a little dirt in the clean at gigging volume, but it sounds good. THis amp is VERY responsive to touch and volume knob on the guitar. Like I said, to my hears the TT was fuller and had more drive on tap. But I will also qualify this later.

Drive is good, not quite as full as the TT or heavy as the ht5, but a nice sounding overdrive. Not amazing or phenominal, but good. Again, I will qualify this later.

All in all, I pulled a brand new amp, a brand new cabinet, and a brand new guitar (CV tele) out of the boxes and started playing (after tuning up the tele). Even without any breaing in of the tubes or the speaker and with shitty 9's on the tele I had great tones in under 5 minutes. I paid 405 for the head and cabinet with express shipping and for that amount of money it is a killer little amp and cabinet. You could gig with it (unless you need pristine clean at high volume), it feels and looks solid, and sounds great right out of the box.

NOW.

I think this amp is a prime candidate for new tubes. The one area they went really cheap on was the tubes. I have heard this in the reviews, and I just got the same impression in about 10 minutes of playing time. I will hold off before ordering a bit, but I def see new tubes in the future for this thing. I am pretty sure (as I have read in reviews), that it will open up the clean a little bit more and give the amp dome more usueable headroom and a small improvement in overall tone. Especially v1 and v2.

Also, I want to qualify my TT observations. I always played my TT through a 2x12 open back avatar cabinet with 2 emminence tonkers. It is not exactly a fair statement to keep saying the Jet City amp is not as full since I am using half the amoutn of speakers. I think no matter the cab, the TT is probably a better head overall as far as pure tone, but would really have to compare the TT and the Jet City through a similiar setup to be fair.

That said, HT5 head and cabinet runsa bout 600 over here now and I was not fond of the cabinets and I did not feel it would really be a gigging amp. Of course you could mic it, or for low volume gigs, but it just did not quite push enough air. And at 5 watts and a shallow 1x10 cabinet that should be expected. The TT is about $900 over here with the matching orange cabinet. From a price perspective (having owned all of these and an epi JR at one point or another), the Jet City is a cool amp at a great price that I think with some new tubes will be better than the ht5 by far (I use pedals anyways if I want heavy OD/distortion) and not quite equal to, but in solid competition with the TTs

SPOILER

For those who have not checked out the companies website, they are about to roll out a version of the THD univalve amp and the head will be under 300 as well. The whole philosophy of the company is to work to get the best connection for prices, high end parts, and construction overseas and then find builders (like Mike Soldano who is one of the 3 founders of Jet City) to design a boutique style amp for them to mass produce at import pricing. Pretty Cool....

lorez · Post by **lorez** » Fri Dec 25, 2009 12:46 am

Nice review Mickie, especially as I am looking for something similar. Does anyone know if there are any distributors in the UK?

Sloan · Post by **Sloan** » Fri Dec 25, 2009 2:02 am

I would love to have a 20-30 watt amp again to gig with, but i can't get over my obsession with my ampeg.

JSutter · Post by **JSutter** » Mon Dec 28, 2009 3:50 pm

My buddy just ordered the 20 watter. I cant wait to hear the hype. Id need an fx loop however.

SAVEStheDAY wrote:Spent less on this than the HT5, what a steal.

Whoa you got both maps! Any chance you have clips comparing the 2?

SAVEStheDAY · Post by **SAVEStheDAY** » Tue Dec 29, 2009 12:14 am

JSutter wrote:Whoa you got both maps! Any chance you have clips comparing the 2?

Sorry dude, I don't have any recording equipment. I like the Jet City better, but they're very different amps.

The bells and whistles are cool on the HT-5, but to be honest I hardly ever find myself switching channels or using the effects loop when I'm playing at home, so for me they're not necessities.

I've never had a simple set-it-and-forget-it amp before, and the Jet City fits that bill. Just dial in your dirty tone, then roll back on the volume to clean it up. In a world of $2000 4 channel 100-150 watt heads with more switches and features than anyone could ever need, it's kind of refreshing.

Sloan · Post by **Sloan** » Tue Dec 29, 2009 7:49 pm

that sounds great, i've been trying to use just one channel forever it seems and amazingly enough a lot of amps can't seem to do it too well.

mickie08 · Post by **mickie08** » Tue Dec 29, 2009 8:00 pm

I may get another volume pedal to take advantage of the way this amp responds to the volume knob (I prefer the pedal to the guitar knob)

Also, the amp takes pedals pretty well. I used the Timhulio green muff and my plane ticket through it and they both sounded great.

mickie08 · Post by **mickie08** » Thu Dec 31, 2009 7:49 am

I just got back from the studio I record at and took the Jet City in with me. Did nto record it as we were doing vocals, but I got to plug it into a marshall and a mesa cabinet and then we A/B'd it with Andy's (the owner/engineer) Dr Z Mazarati 18 watt head. I have to tell you, the Dr Z sounded a little bit better at anything except higher gain levels, but it was pretty damned close (and that was the stock Jet City tubes verses the Z having new JJs in it). Then I too some extra JJ's he had and threw them into the Jet City just to check it out. While not earth shattering change, it definitely made it sound fuller and more gain. Then switching out the V1 with a 12at7 gave ti more headroom (but of course cut down its overall gain).

Only problem I have found is it hums quite a bit with both volume and gain over 5. As you get higher up, the hum gets a litte louder than it should really be. I am going to email the company and see what they say. It was probably more than double the "noise" that the Dr Z was putting out at similiar volume/gain levels. There is probably a small grounding issue or something.

robroe · Post by **robroe** » Thu Dec 31, 2009 7:21 pm

next time i see you you will sell this to me