Hey,

this is probably a ridiculous question to some of you, but I've been looking at getting a new amp, and i've been wondering...

what sort of volume will I be able to get from an AC30 Head (30 Watt) or an Epiphone Valve Jr (5 Watt) when pushed through a 4x12 cabinet? can it hold its own a live situation with the rest of a band or will it still have to be put through a PA?

cheers

pete

An AC30 Combo would be easily enough for a small venue or practice room if you have it up off the ground. Vox actually designed some funky amp stands back in the day for this very reason. Pete said:

Wow, thanks! Super helpful replies everybody! I actually have a 150Watt Marshall Valvestate already (http://www.zzounds.com/item--MSHAVT150H) because I wanted something versatile at the time, but I quickly learned its limitations (there's no denying that it isn't a true valve amp and the effects are entirely useless).

I really like the AC30 because of the tone of the top boost, as well as the blend of the top boost and normal channel. Real spring reverb is nice to have too! The clean channel is nice too and sounds like it would react well with a some fuzzzzz!

From the sound of it, an AC30 combo on top of say, a flight case would be fine for a band in a small venue / practice room?

Wow, thanks! Super helpful replies everybody! I actually have a 150Watt Marshall Valvestate already (http://www.zzounds.com/item--MSHAVT150H) because I wanted something versatile at the time, but I quickly learned its limitations (there's no denying that it isn't a true valve amp and the effects are entirely useless). I really like the AC30 because of the tone of the top boost, as well as the blend of the top boost and normal channel. Real spring reverb is nice to have too! The clean channel is nice too and sounds like it would react well with a some fuzzzzz! From the sound of it, an AC30 combo on top of say, a flight case would be fine for a band in a small venue / practice room?

The AC-30 is a super loud amp. Most people don't think the combo versions have enough power cause they have them on the floor pointing at their ankles, if you elevate them you'll notice that your ears start to hurt. They also pump out the high frequencies so they tend to cut through really well in a band situation. A bit about wattage: Don't let the wattage on the back panel of an amp fool you either. On some amps there are two wattage's shown, one is how powerful the output of the amp is and the other is the power consumption. Don't let the power consumption fool you into thinking how loud your amp will be. I've seen guitar shop retail retards get this one wrong. If the wattage rating is printed near a voltage/hertz rating say: 110V-120V 30Hz-40Hz 180 watts, then it relates to how much power your amp consumes or for a real world example; how hot your amp gets. if you compare an AC-30 to say a solid state 30 watt you will notice a huge difference. This comes down to how the output wattage rating is worked out. Solid state amp wattage is usually worked out via RMS (root mean square), remember that one from school? boring shit really. It's not really the true output wattage at all. If you see a wattage with RMS after it you can do some very rough math to work out loud it will be in real world terms. So say you are looking at buying a 100 watt Marshall Valvestate amp (please don't, they're a bit shit eh) you can work roughly what a quarter of that will be, so 25 and that about how many watts it is. Suddenly the AC-30 looking more powerful and it is. You can use this simple non-scientific method for most solid state amps to find out how loud it will really be. If your looking at getting an AC30 and putting it through a quad then your gonna have a very loud setup. Don't look for the amp to provide any output valve distortion/overdrive cause you won't be able to stand anywhere near it and it will drive any people watching you play out the door! Freddi was right when he mentioned the type of speaker you use, this has a very big impact on the tone your going to get. Another thing to watch is matching the ohm's for the amp and speaker cab. You can do all sorts of expensive damage to you valve amp by miss-matching these. I've seen burnt out output transformers, brunt out tubes and melted circuit boards. As far as I'm aware Mesa-Boogies are the only amps designed for deliberate miss-matching of the ohms.

Yes,the volume is the same for any speakers configuration,with a 4x12 you will gain more headroom.
The difference is in the sound:it will be hard to overdrive 4 speakers with a lower wattage amp and it will play almost only clean.You may need a good fuzz/distorsion pedal in that way.

Anyway,I think valve amps play good when they're pushed at least.If you play in locals,clubs a 100 watts is too much for push it.
A 40/50 watts amp is good enough or an AC30 head with a 2x12 is a good solution,but they "must" be 2 Celestion Blue Alnico speakers for the joy of your Vox.(and yours)

Get a 100 watt head if you're using a 4x12 cab.

Pete,

AC 30 is fine for a band, b ut remember it will sound only like an AC 30....epi jr is built for recording, and it is going to overdrive, so forget about clean. Not sure what you are trying to accomplish, but short of a Fender Showman head, if you are playing surf, any 100 watt + amp will fool the masses if it has a lot of clean headroom. Solid state bass amps are the way to go. They are cheap and plentiful on the used market, and usually have great eq features, THat and a new fender 63 reverb pedal thru your 412 cab, and you are in business. And remember to have fun when you play.

Remember, put two beers in the audience, and anything sounds good.

Mel