Any H&K Grandmeister 36 Owners Here?

[demorior]

What's your opinion on these amps?

They seem extremely versatile and the midi capabilities are really impressive.

Look pretty awesome too

 

[Axewield31]

I played a Tubemeister a while back. I don't really remember what model it was, buy the cleans were sweet. I couldn't get a tone I liked out of the dirty channel though. I found it fizzy and far from musical. This was a fair while ago and I barely spent any time fiddling and tweaking it. I really should give it another go.

 

[Wolfhorsky]

1000 euro for small amp, that is MADE IN CHINA. Like a bad joke. More like a toy to me. Expect issues with QC and reliability. There were many reports about problems with Tubemeister (non-fx version). On paper it looks cool and promissing, in real life....meh....
I think that pro-grade amps and stuff should be made in USA or EU or Japan. If it's made in China, it should be much much much less expensive, cause it will eventually break. If product is expensive and made in China, You fill bank accounts of the boss of big company. We should buy products made locally to enforce our companys. Is it only me thinking like this?

 

[Fretless]

I'm not sure which meister my band has, but it's pretty epic. We use it quite a lot, and have had no trouble what so ever from it.

 

[demorior]

1000 euro for small amp, that is MADE IN CHINA. Like a bad joke. More like a toy to me. Expect issues with QC and reliability. There were many reports about problems with Tubemeister (non-fx version). On paper it looks cool and promissing, in real life....meh....
I think that pro-grade amps and stuff should be made in USA or EU or Japan. If it's made in China, it should be much much much less expensive, cause it will eventually break. If product is expensive and made in China, You fill bank accounts of the boss of big company. We should buy products made locally to enforce our companys. Is it only me thinking like this?

whoa.

 

[Kristianx510]

It's an awesome amp. Sounds good and it's extremely versatile. It doesn't have the best high gain sound but on the crunch Channel with an OD in front of it... Amazing. The effects and stuff are pretty good too, but nothing insane. my complaint is that the foot switch to work all the effects is also pretty pricey. If you ask my opinion, I say go with the tube meister and get individual stomp boxes.

 

[Casper777]

1000 euro for small amp, that is MADE IN CHINA. Like a bad joke. More like a toy to me. Expect issues with QC and reliability. There were many reports about problems with Tubemeister (non-fx version). On paper it looks cool and promissing, in real life....meh....
I think that pro-grade amps and stuff should be made in USA or EU or Japan. If it's made in China, it should be much much much less expensive, cause it will eventually break. If product is expensive and made in China, You fill bank accounts of the boss of big company. We should buy products made locally to enforce our companys. Is it only me thinking like this?

Do you own one? or maybe even played one once? no? So I think all these clichés are not that useful for the OP. Guess what, there are even good guitars made in... Poland! Well that's what I've heard...

To the OP, I actually own a Grandmeister. It's indeed a great and super versatile amp. Sounds really nice, clean, as said earlier sound awesome! You can then have a very wide range of dirty sounds. The amp will sound however quite modern, no realistic vintage tone there. It sounds quite classic and you may find it lacks a bit of character, that's one of the negative point of this versatility.

The other negative is that you really have to link it to the iOS app to tweak it, either it's kind of painfull...

The power selection is a nice to have to play it either in your bedroom or with you full band. It's plenty loud!

I haven't had any problem quality wise with mine... maybe I'm lucky

 

[Casper777]

It's an awesome amp. Sounds good and it's extremely versatile. It doesn't have the best high gain sound but on the crunch Channel with an OD in front of it... Amazing. The effects and stuff are pretty good too, but nothing insane. my complaint is that the foot switch to work all the effects is also pretty pricey. If you ask my opinion, I say go with the tube meister and get individual stomp boxes.

I second that.. .The Tubemeister with your favorite effects may be a good alternative... you will just miss the "ultra" channel, but it's not the best one in my view!

 

[Wolfhorsky]

Do you own one? or maybe even played one once? no? So I think all these clichés are not that useful for the OP. Guess what, there are even good guitars made in... Poland! Well that's what I've heard...

As the matter of fact i did play its little brother (Tubemeister 18) in well treated rehearsal room with H&K 2x12" cab (2xV30) and i was not impressed. Thin, fuzzy, ss-like-cold sound and without that valve low-mid-omph. Again - it is my opinion and my taste. I read a lot about this small heads and i wanted one, but.... - as I stated before.

I don't know why are You so impolite. I just shared MY OPINION. You should not attack people because they think differently than You.
Cheers.

 

[Casper777]

I don't know why are You so impolite. I just shared MY OPINION. You should not attack people because they think differently than You.

Take it with a grain of humour didn't meant to offend you... just wanted to say that sometimes, we are surprised by the quality of gear or instruments that we could take for lower quality because of their origins. Let's think Boden OS for exemple. And if we would have thought just 15 years ago that some of the most hyped guitars would come from Poland (Mayones, Skervesen, Ran to a lesser extent), some people could have found it unbelievable... I just think gear from China is quickly rising in quality (still a long way to go indeed)...

Sorry if I was misunderstood

 

[Wolfhorsky]

Take it with a grain of humour didn't meant to offend you... just wanted to say that sometimes, we are surprised by the quality of gear or instruments that we could take for lower quality because of their origins. Let's think Boden OS for exemple. And if we would have thought just 15 years ago that some of the most hyped guitars would come from Poland (Mayones, Skervesen, Ran to a lesser extent), some people could have found it unbelievable... I just think gear from China is quickly rising in quality (still a long way to go indeed)...

Sorry if I was misunderstood

No problem, bro. I understand fully Your statement, now. Peace.
BTW i'm waiting for my first Skerv

 

[viesczy]

I love the idea of it!

The Switchblade/Coreblade in a smaller format, but its execution at a total price of $1400 w foot switch (USD) leaves me wondering why anyone would go that route rather than the Switchblade or Coreblade.

Especially when you can get a Switchblade 100 for $1100 is WITH the footswitch.

Derek

 

[HighGain510]

I actually HAVE spent a lot of time with one, I owned a Grandmeister 36 for months (which is a long time if you know me ). I thought it was pretty awesome honestly. The clean channel was excellent, the gain channels were all great for different applications and the onboard effects were pretty darn good. It was a small chassis that was light in weight but had a ton of stuff crammed into it.

My only fear (which was part of why I didn't hold onto it forever) was that with all that stuff internally-housed that with time SOMETHING was going to die and then I'd be in for an expensive repair since H&K doesn't have a ton of presence in the US and the last time I had to get my TriAmp MKII Lifeson Edition repaired it cost me a crapload. Love the tone of their amps but if/when they need repairs, it ends up being costly and I'm not sure how bad it is for their MIC stuff. I had a TubeMeister 16 and a GrandMeister 36 and neither of them had issues whatsoever, but I have also heard a lot of folks posting online that they had encountered reliability issues with time so I'm still not sure about that.

All of that being said, I did really dig the tone of the amps and it has a tiny footprint so all I needed was the amp, a 1x12 OS cab and my Rocktron MidiMate and I was good to go which was nice in terms of rig portability!

 

[Bish0p34]

I have the Tubemeister 18, 36 and the Grandmeister 36. In my experiences I would never call any of them fizzy at all. I use them all through a Mesa 4x12 + 2x12 recto cab, and my Red Bear 4x12. There's plenty of massive low end coming out of them.

In response to Viesczy, I have two Switchblades (50w combo and the head). There's a major difference in the sound. The TM/GM series just sound big, something I couldn't get with either of my blades. The GM also has an FX mix knob, something the Switchblade desperately wanted. The TM36 and GM also do much better low gain tones that the Switchblade. The SB was weak there. I never played a Coreblade, but at $2400 I wasn't interested.

Some said the price is a bit steep, but if H&K Germany made the amp it would be close to $3k. Any midi controller/L6 Pod floor unit with midi will work with it as well. So for ~1200 you get 4 channels, fx, a power soak, 128 presets, noise gate, automatic bias, full midi implementation, and great tone. Well worth it in my book. Did I mention it's schazzy looks?

As also mentioned, they're modern sounding. Clear, refined, and hi-fi. They have the typical H&K upper mid thing. H&K amps are also very unforgiving with sloppy playing, and this is no exception. It's got great tone for me, and I consistently get compliments on it. This and my GM36 put my Triamp MKII, Mesa Triple Rec, and 6505+ on the bench.

Their customer service has been top notch to me (go through the FB page, not their site). They've fixed out-of-warranty issues that I caused for free. There's 2 local H&K dealers that I dropped stuff off at, and I get a call when they're done. Hopefully they last a long time. I know there's been some issues with them, but every manufacturer has issues with new things. Hell the 5153 has issues with their early runs, and everyone gushes over them.

It's definitely worth trying out.

 

[VBCheeseGrater]

Cool thread - I've been curious about these as well especially being midi capable at a low price. Came close to buying one at one point

 

[Jugghaid]

Love mine. tons of versatility and great tone after great tone. The onboard effects are good, but I use a TC G-System for my midi control and effects thru the serial loop. I run this through my Egnater Vengeance 412 cab and it sounds fantastic. Had this one since december and I'm still finding great tones. My main gig is an original hard rock/metal band but I also have some side proects doing blues/funk/rock stuff and that is one of the main reasons I got this amp. That and recording. The red box DI in tandem with a miced cab makes tracking really easy and perfect tone.

I've played a ton of guitars throuh it from EMG loaded ESP Eclipse and Scheter Garza 7 strings to my Les Pauls, PRS 513 and Fender Strat. My Fender Chris Shifflet Tele through the cruch channel has one of the best straight up rock tones I've ever heard.

I actually broke down my big rack I was using with my Egnater Vengeance head or my Blackstar Stage 60 combo to make gigging simpler. just head/cab/G-system/Wah pedal and I'm good to go.

I also did do a tube swap after a few months and it improved the tone slightly with JJ EL84's and Groove Tube 12ax7r preamp tubes. Not a huge difference but a noticeable improvement over the cheapo stock tubes.

Honestly, If you can't get good tone out of this amp, your'e doing something wrong. My other guitar player uses the Engl E570 preamp and power amp combination in a huge rack setup with his effects and is now thinking of buying one of these to make gigging a ton easier and lighter.

Although I would still take the Engl Invader 2 over this amp, it's 3x the price.