barrymclark Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 Ok, so I have been playing them both now for a couple of weeks. Done some back and forth playing. Hi-gain (think mid-90's high gain. A hot-rodded Marshall) As you might expect, the tube driven Jet City, although sounding good, sounds a bit on the thin side turned down to bedroom levels. At the those same volume levels, the Cube sounds wonderful. Nice full bloom to the tone. Start to turn it up... and the Jet City, as you'd expect, comes to life. It starts to fill the room quickly. The Cube starts to mud out. Really don't care for how it acts in high gain at high volumes. Classic crunch (think AC/DC Hell's Bells or Rush's Lime Light) Again, at low volumes, the Cube takes the cake. At high volumes, the Jet City smooths out the tone and it has a nice creamy feel to it. The Cube starts to feel... grainy? If that makes sense. Jazz to Rockabilly tones. This is where the competition got hot. At all volumes levels, the Cube sounded great. It also didn't change much with change in volume. It was just more of the quiet tone. The Jet City, was simply not capable of such clean tones especially the louder it got. However, it is an unfair comparison here. Two completely different animals intended to act completely different. The Jet City REALLY loves solid bodies but worked well with hollows once I got the dials tweaked in. Conclusion: If you want any sort of gain at low volumes, the Cube is great. If you want band loud with any sort of gain, Jet City. If you want clean... well... you are going to just have to decide what sort of clean you want. Do you want that old clean where it wasn't really all that clean? Then Jet City. If you want that crazy clean, Roland. I did discover something about my Roland though. I thought there was something wrong with the extension jack or it was just wired wrong. Nope. Works perfectly. I must have had something goofy going before with a cable or had a bad cab or something hooked up to it. Anyways, that Roland on the 212... with all three 12's going... was just CRAZY loud. HOLY CRAP. haha. Anyways....... That's my feelings on the matter. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FredZepp Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 Interesting observations there... It makes sense, I suppose. So the Jet City is the best to rock out on. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DetroitBlues Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 If you want a cleaner Jet City, trying removing the 2nd preamp tube with different tube. There are some mod's out there for that amp, but as you should expect, that amp was never designed to be a clean amp. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Genericmusic Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 I did a similar comparison between my Roland 80XL and my Vintage Fender Super Reverb. The Roland is definitely my jazz amp. The Super is not too fond of my Eagle but loves the vintage Thinline Tele and the solid bodies. You are absolutely correct about the volume levels though. I had a '65 Twin for a few weeks in the fall also. I had to get rid of it before I fell in love with it. The profits from it financed the Roland, extension cabinet, and some mods to my Eagle. I love the SR for the Rock-Country-Blues thing but when it come to my current love of jazz, the Roland is the only way to go for me. It is portable, three channels, with built in effects and tuner. The SR and Twin were and are great but too heavy to drag all over tarnation. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
barrymclark Posted February 17, 2012 Author Share Posted February 17, 2012 If you want a cleaner Jet City, trying removing the 2nd preamp tube with different tube. There are some mod's out there for that amp, but as you should expect, that amp was never designed to be a clean amp. I was actually after something a bit more Motorhead-ish. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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