Thanks! Having fun with it already. I've been trying to dial it in for my Sensei 290 and my Ibanez hollow; this thing definitely favors my Sensei RA, but I've gotten some good sounds out of all 3. When I got it home, it really didn't take me long to get a good '80s crunch out of it.
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Is the x100B it's own 'thing' or could it be compared to a known reference? i.e. Mesa, Marshall, Fender, Trainwreck, D-style type?
I have a line on one somewhat locally about the same price and was pondering giving it a whirl...
Edit for clarity: I'm aware the X100B is the Vai amp of choice late Zappa era and into Passion and Warfare. I've read it's sound is JCM 800, or early Boogie or even Wreck style... curious to what you're hearing when you play yours. I've yet to plug into an X100B myself.
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This is a tough one for me to answer. There have been four revisions of the X100B, all of which I'm under the impression of having some pretty different voicing, depending on EL34 model, 6L6 model, etc. The Series IV that I have has a switch to run either in. The only thing all four hold in common seems to be the clean channel's remarkable tweakability and overwhelming headroom. For cleans, it's definitely more Rivera-era Fender than Blackface/Blonde era to my ear, but that could just be the case of using modern ceramics with it instead of older, even more high-end-biased JBLs, Jensens, or Utahs. You can dial in a lot more (believe it or not) "chime" than you can with any Fenders I've dealt with. You can sail WAY into "ice pick" territory if you're careless with the Presence and 5-band.
The biggest problem I'd found was most of the demos I'd find online featured Carvin's GT12 speakers. These things add quite a bit of that high-frequency fizz/sizzle to pretty much anything played with more than very mild overdrive on. I know, I have a single GT12 in a Carvin 1x12. It's amongst my least-favorite speakers, period. The Reaper is blissfully free of that top-end sizzle sound. You *can* still get that sound by dialing the gain up past about 8 or so (so I don't!), but between 3 and 6, you're looking at some good JCM800-ish levels of gain. Slightly different character - possibly because the EQ combinations between the TMB controls and the 5-band graphic can make different settings sound awfully disparate. I'd say it's overall closest to the 800, and if you scoop them out a bunch, you can get a bit more on the Mark side of things, just without the very high gain levels without hitting that dreaded hiss range. But again, it's a different voice/"character" of overdrive than what you end up with on a Marshall or a Mesa. I'd put it thoroughly in the "its own thing" category. This is really the part of the amp that people tend to despise or really like. You'd really need to try one yourself if you're interested in them.
I'd forgotten to note, as well - the reverb (digital, I believe) is
way good. It's actually better than about 1/2 of the pan reverbs I've had on amps before! Definitely better than the pan on my Nomad!
Another amazing thing : These things are $800 brand new, free shipping, right now. That's staggering for a fully-featured channel switching, US-built amp of any sort.