Busking amp recommendation please

[Davis Webb]

My super portable busking setup, I have used this for years.

1. Amp, Traynor TVM10 for street, TVM50 for markets. First one is easy to carry.

2. Ovation guitar in soft bag with shoulder straps.

3. Battery powered multi effects unit set to clean with reverb. Something like the Korg micro, about the size of a cigarette pack.

4. Headset microphone going into the TC Helicon duplictator (doubling, reverb, pitch correction).

5. Short cables

The amp goes in one hand, the Simon and Patrick guitar case goes on my back, it has a big pocket for the vocal fx and guitar fx and cables.

Whole thing has me carry just a light 10 watt PA with vocal and guitar inputs, plus the guitar on my back with the effects. I can walk 20 blocks with this and not feel tired. Buskers often have to move to find a better pitch or when the rain comes down.

The car battery idea is not so good for most of us. To have to carry a huge thing with wheels to a possibly 1 hour busking pitch...not....

Light, light, light is where I am at now. I have tried many setups, its amazing how much punch the TVM10 packs. 10 hours of battery life.

Good thread, its great to see what others are doing.

Now go find a good pitch and open that case. Rent is due!

[dannyg1]

Originally Posted by Davis Webb

My super portable busking setup, I have used this for years.

1. Amp, Traynor TVM10 for street, TVM50 for markets. First one is easy to carry.

2. Ovation guitar in soft bag with shoulder straps.

3. Battery powered multi effects unit set to clean with reverb. Something like the Korg micro, about the size of a cigarette pack.

4. Headset microphone going into the TC Helicon duplictator (doubling, reverb, pitch correction).

5. Short cables

The amp goes in one hand, the Simon and Patrick guitar case goes on my back, it has a big pocket for the vocal fx and guitar fx and cables.

Whole thing has me carry just a light 10 watt PA with vocal and guitar inputs, plus the guitar on my back with the effects. I can walk 20 blocks with this and not feel tired. Buskers often have to move to find a better pitch or when the rain comes down.

The car battery idea is not so good for most of us. To have to carry a huge thing with wheels to a possibly 1 hour busking pitch...not....

Light, light, light is where I am at now. I have tried many setups, its amazing how much punch the TVM10 packs. 10 hours of battery life.

Good thread, its great to see what others are doing.

Now go find a good pitch and open that case. Rent is due!

I'd love to see photos of your set-up, if you get the chance. For me, I'm usually far afield when I'm working and need to recharge at the local starbucks. This makes it really inconvenient for me to use most lead acid stand alone gear as it typically takes 6-12 hours to charge. I could run AA or C/D cell powered systems but there aren't really any that can compete with what I do use, an inverter/lithium cell/fast charger powered Loudbox Mini (this one is my everyday, I have larger ones for larger events like you do as well).

Soon I'll have place local to my pitch but until then, I wheel my system with me. The lithium makes it far lighter than you might think. I'm at around 32lb's with the cart included now, and an honest 40ah that averages 11 hours runtime.



Is the little Traynor you use a variation of the Crate Taxi 15? I used that for a couple of years before I killed it. I never loved the sound or the lack of reverbs but I got quite a lot of compliments for its sound by some people who really know good sound. It was quite powerful for the money. The most real power for under $250 I could find at the time.

[lkingston]

Originally Posted by roylor4

Yeah Hunter, we use our Cube EX on pretty much every gig we have gotten since it's purchase. It's not perfect - the combined channels of 3 & 4 are substantially weaker than 1 & 2 - even using preamps.

I use the 3 & 4 input for my Boss VE-8, which gives me really nice guitar and vocal sound for me, and two free channels for the singer I work with plus a spare channel for a third singer or second instrumentalist. I had no problem programming the level on the VE-8 to be exactly where it should be with this amp.

I have a second Street Cube EX as well and when wired together it doubles the channels for a nice little hundred watt (peak probably) PA system which actually sounds pretty good.

I should mention that I replaced the stock speakers with Jensen Mod 8-4 speakers which improved the sound considerably.



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[roylor4]

Originally Posted by lkingston

I use the 3 & 4 input for my Boss VE-8, which gives me really nice guitar and vocal sound for me, and two free channels for the singer I work with plus a spare channel for a third singer or second instrumentalist. I had no problem programming the level on the VE-8 to be exactly where it should be with this amp.

I have a second Street Cube EX as well and when wired together it doubles the channels for a nice little hundred watt (peak probably) PA system which actually sounds pretty good.

I should mention that I replaced the stock speakers with Jensen Mod 8-4 speakers which improved the sound considerably.



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Thanks for the info, I have heard that a lot of folks changed the speakers over to Jensens and it improved the sound/tone.

[lkingston]

The sound with the Jensen is very good. A set of two is about $60. With the stock speakers I really can't recommend the Street Cube EX. With the Jensens, I can recommend it highly.

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[paulin]

How difficult is it to change to the Jensen speakers for the Street Cube EX? Is it a DIY project? Soldering required?

[lkingston]

On the stock speakers, there are two different sizes on speaker connectors so that you don't mix up the polarity. On the Jensens, both connectors are the same size (which is the same as the larger size). The wires are also different colors. I just bought the connectors from the local Radio Shack (which has since closed) and put them on with a crimping tool. All the holes where in the same place. I took a quick cell phone pic to make sure I reconnected it right.

A couple of asides. The stock speakers are rated at 15 watts. The Jensens are 20. Each amp side is supposed to put out 25 watts. The Jensens are slightly lighter and don't look heavier duty. You could also solder the one small lead on each side in place if you didn't want to bother with the crimping tool.

On the Street Cube EX, the cosm modeling is pretty useless. No overdrive level (though you can adjust with the guitar volume control), and too bright for my taste.

The acoustic guitar simulation is silly.

The chorus is ok.

The digital delay is useless because of the one knob approach.

The tuner on mine doesn't work very well either.

The three band EQ on both channels is fine.

The high frequency driver is just a cheap small speaker and I believe the crossover is just a single capacitor. If you don't push the highs too much they sound decent in spite of this. If you push the highs though they fall apart. The amount of highs I like works ok.

The iPhone input seems like the bass has been lowered a bit. My guess is that this is because there is also an extra mic connection and lowering the bass minimizes induction between the playback and recording leads.

Connecting two units together to make a PA system works as it should with inputs from both showing up on both units.

Stereo inputs give you stereo between the two speakers on one unit, and on right and left speakers with two units.

Sound with the Jensens is quite good but volume tops out at mid volume level.

You can get extra battery cases from Roland for about $12. They are considerably more from Full Compass. I have one extra one for each unit. I use 2700 mAh rechargeables from batteries plus and after a four hour gig at full power they are down from three to two bars and seem fine.

The pole mount is a bit bigger than standard size. I have a little adapter but it is silly to have to use it. If you buy the Roland Case that stays on, you don't have access to the pole mount. I have the Roland case on one unit but I use that one on the ground doubling as a monitor. I got a Tuki case on eBay which is padded, and has a big useful pocket, and lets me take the unit out to mount on a pole stand. Also, because of the orientation of the knobs, they would be on the far side away from you if you mounted the stage left one. With one on the ground and one in the air, all the knobs are easy to get to, I can hear pretty well, and so can a small audience.

All in all, this is a pretty good sounding practice or small event PA and I enjoy using it in spite of the flaws. Buying used is a good idea since you want to replace the speakers (which will void the warranty).


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[ricdoug]

Traynor must use better battery technology than their predecessors the Crate Taxi 15 and the Crate Limo 50. My Taxi 15 runs about 3 hours on a charge on a new battery (I've replaced the battery twice over about 10+ years of ownership.

Originally Posted by Davis Webb

My super portable busking setup, I have used this for years.

1. Amp, Traynor TVM10 for street, TVM50 for markets. First one is easy to carry.

2. Ovation guitar in soft bag with shoulder straps.

3. Battery powered multi effects unit set to clean with reverb. Something like the Korg micro, about the size of a cigarette pack.

4. Headset microphone going into the TC Helicon duplictator (doubling, reverb, pitch correction).

5. Short cables

The amp goes in one hand, the Simon and Patrick guitar case goes on my back, it has a big pocket for the vocal fx and guitar fx and cables.

Whole thing has me carry just a light 10 watt PA with vocal and guitar inputs, plus the guitar on my back with the effects. I can walk 20 blocks with this and not feel tired. Buskers often have to move to find a better pitch or when the rain comes down.

The car battery idea is not so good for most of us. To have to carry a huge thing with wheels to a possibly 1 hour busking pitch...not....

Light, light, light is where I am at now. I have tried many setups, its amazing how much punch the TVM10 packs. 10 hours of battery life.

Good thread, its great to see what others are doing.

Now go find a good pitch and open that case. Rent is due!

[Davis Webb]

Originally Posted by dannyg1

Is the little Traynor you use a variation of the Crate Taxi 15? I used that for a couple of years before I killed it. I never loved the sound or the lack of reverbs but I got quite a lot of compliments for its sound by some people who really know good sound. It was quite powerful for the money. The most real power for under $250 I could find at the time.

Its passable, not great, but passable. The problem for my tone is that I wont bring an expensive guitar with me to pure busking stops, so I get a quacky tone no matter what. My experience is identical to yours, the sound is meh but its light and works. I far prefer my busking setup with power! A J45 through a body rez and zoom multistomp then to a 300 watt PA...superb. The rest is like you said, disappointing but passers by focus on the music.

There really aren't any great sounding light busking amps. The closest we could get is buying a good Celestion or similar quality speaker to upgrade the thing. I do get a full day charge on the TVM though to answer the other question.

[Davis Webb]

Originally Posted by ricdoug

Traynor must use better battery technology than their predecessors the Crate Taxi 15 and the Crate Limo 50. My Taxi 15 runs about 3 hours on a charge on a new battery (I've replaced the battery twice over about 10+ years of ownership.

Yeh, the TVM10 and 50 both run a full day no problems. 6-8 hours easily.

[lkingston]

Originally Posted by Davis Webb

Its passable, not great, but passable. The problem for my tone is that I wont bring an expensive guitar with me to pure busking stops, so I get a quacky tone no matter what. My experience is identical to yours, the sound is meh but its light and works. I far prefer my busking setup with power! A J45 through a body rez and zoom multistomp then to a 300 watt PA...superb. The rest is like you said, disappointing but passers by focus on the music.



There really aren't any great sounding light busking amps. The closest we could get is buying a good Celestion or similar quality speaker to upgrade the thing. I do get a full day charge on the TVM though to answer the other question.

Actually, my Roland Street Cube Ex with the Jensen speakers and Boss VE-8 sounds pretty fantastic. I expect the Elite Acoustics Engineering / Sunburst Gear amps sound even better. The only problem in both these cases is the maximum volume, not the sound quality.


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[dannyg1]

Originally Posted by lkingston

Actually, my Roland Street Cube Ex with the Jensen speakers and Boss VE-8 sounds pretty fantastic. I expect the Elite Acoustics Engineering / Sunburst Gear amps sound even better. The only problem in both these cases is the maximum volume, not the sound quality.

I think that if were going to compare SPL in use, theres got to be a way that we can bet closer to an 'apples to apples' approach. When it comes to watt ratings, Roland might just be the most optimistic of all the majors so why not look at the power supplies of the two amps in question and compare their current draw to get a better idea of what the amps can put out (which assumes that they're all very efficient, though that can't really be true for all).

In this instance, the Roland Street Cube EX has a brick that is rated at 13v/730ma (9.49w max rated power draw)

The Elite Acoustic A4BR8 8"/40w is most closely spec'd to this Roland in all but price (its priced at $699) and its supply is 12v/2000ma (24w max rated power draw)

Given similar efficiency specs, the EAE should deliver around 5db more max SPL than the Roland, but neither is delivering anything close to its RMS rating. It would require much higher power draws from either.

[lkingston]

The brick power supply on the EAE system would also have to charge the lithium battery, supply phantom and Bluetooth power. It makes sense that it would be higher rated than the Roland Street Cube EX even if the amplification specs weren't higher.


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[dannyg1]

Originally Posted by lkingston

The brick power supply on the EAE system would also have to charge the lithium battery, supply phantom and Bluetooth power. It makes sense that it would be higher rated than the Roland Street Cube EX even if the amplification specs weren't higher.


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Could be that the brick is a raised voltage to charge the battery, they'd probably design the amp with that in mind though so its probable that running the amp full out is the biggest power draw and the brick covers that to the minimum MFG cost.

Im thinking that converting power supply ratings to available watts tells us, at least likely, more about the actual power of the amp than blindly believing the makers RMS claims.

It's just a thought.

[lkingston]

If I was an EAE engineer, I would spec a power supply that could run the amp at full while supplying phantom and Bluetooth and quick charging a fully discharged battery. A Street Cube EX power supply would just have to have enough power to run the amp at full.

By the way, I run my Street Cube EX in low power mode when I practice and it is more than loud enough for home use. That gives crazy long battery use out of my 2700 mAh AA batteries.


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