Revamping my setup, amp advice sought!

[rawchuck]

Hi!

I am a full time gigging musician, and I play a lot solo and with groups. I am looking to revamp my setup to simplify setup/tear down without sacrificing quality of tone.

Right now, I am using the Grace Design Felix into a powered PA wedge (Atomic CLR) to amplify my HD28 with a Sunrise pickup, and also my Banjo with a Pick Up The World pickup.

I am thinking of abandoning the Felix/PA setup in favor of a high end acoustic amp to run as a backline at larger gigs.......but also for for solo shows that require me to provide all sound reinforcement (using the amp as a mini PA)

As much as I love the Felix, I like the idea of an amp to free up p dalboard space, and simplify setup

Looking at the Schertler Jam 400 or the Mesa Rosette. I am more attracted to the Jam 400, but live very close to Mesa Boogie, which might make service easier should I need it.

Opinions?

Other suggestions?

Thanks!

[troggg]

Acus One For Strings. Pick your size.

[krisls]

A disclaimer first... I am not personally familiar as a 'user' with the gear you are using.

But from a generalist performer perspective I very much doubt you are gaining anything at all by changing out the gear you have already. Sounds like a vague problem in search of a possible answer.. mostly ''spending money''''. Take this as you see it... accept or reject as you will

Kris

[Cuki79]

Agree with krisls.

All you get by puting out the Felix and a Full Range Flat Response (FRFR) speaker, is less dynamic (Felix has 30V dynamic) and colored tone.

If you want to go Schertler you have to try the upper range new Unico or Roy to get proper preamps but I doubt they reach the Felix quality + FRFR speaker.

Cuki

[Cuki79]

Question from Walt Szalva (link):

There are a lot of preamps being developed and marketed these days, ranging from clones of vintage gear to new variations of tube-based preamps to "Made in China" $200 bargain-basement preamps. What does Grace Design bring to the table that is not being done by other gear developers?

Answer from Michael Grace:

The final test of any piece of audio gear is how it sounds. I think that is something that's not achieved through a singular design criteria like "discrete" or "Class A". It's something that is achieved through a holistic approach, taking a careful look at every aspect of the signal path, from passive components to power supply layout and grounding as well as amplifier topology. All of the amplifiers in our products in the critical gain stages use an amplifier topology called a current feedback amplifier, or a trans-impedance amp, and these types of amplifiers use a different kind of negative feedback in the current domain instead of the voltage domain. They are able to track really complex waveforms, resolve rich harmonic structures and track transients without the various aberrations of slew rate limiting and things that are associated with textbook op-amp designs. I think people's problems with IC [integrated circuit-based] designs are that most are using standard op-amp type amplifiers that have these problems, and that is the characteristic solid state, integrated circuit sound that people are used to. I think the use of trans-impedance amplifiers gives our products the ability to have a very musical, very transparent sound and still be really linear and accurate, without having a solid-state characteristic. In a lot of our listening tests, when we'd compare our products to other types of preamps (our competition and vintage pieces and such), we were always kind of amazed that we found our preamps sounding closer to the higher quality tube preamplifiers than the ones you would expect to be aligned with, like other high-end solid state preamplifiers. There are so many other circuit decisions that have an equal effect on the overall sonic characteristic of the product. That is why we use only ultra precision metal film resistors and there are no electrolytic capacitors anywhere in the signal path. We try to direct couple as much as possible to keep the number of components in the signal path as low as possible. If you're following a design process with your ear, you're going to come out with something a lot different than if you follow a design process with analyzers and scopes.

You can try Schertler Unico or Roy with the no Negative-Feedback class-A preamp... But I guess most other products will be full of standard IC and decoupling capacitors as usual.

[Beagle1]

rawchuck,

I also have an Atomic CLR wedge, they are great amps. Lots of volume and headroom, and very flat response. Do you have the CLR Neo version? If not you can have Atomic upgrade your CLR to the Neo speaker. It is much lighter and easier to carry.

The CLR is such a versatile and good-sounding piece of gear, I would probably find a way to hold on to it for larger gigs and find something smaller and more portable (Henriksen Bud?) when you don't need as much volume.