ENGL e530 preamp

[InAbsentia_]

I'm thinking of getting one of these soon - what is the general consensus on it? I've seen some horrible reviews and some amazing reviews - but nothing in between. Some people say it's muddy, too shrill and has terrible cleans - others say the cleans are glassy and mindblowing and the hi gain tones you can achieve with it are incredible.

I've tried one out, and it sounds amazing through a VHT poweramp and a mesa cabinet, but I do not own a poweramp or a cabinet, and I'll be either recording direct into an interface using impulses or monitoring through speakers using the built in pre-amp.

Is this pre-amp worth it with my setup? Thanks!

 

[TMM]

It's definitely one of the nicest tube preamps in it's price range. If you're also into the Engl tone, I'd say it's tough to beat. Whoever said the cleans were terrible was probably playing a Hello Kitty Strat into it with computer speakers hooked up to the headphone out. Or maybe not... I could see the cleans sounding good even in that situation.

 

[skeletor88]

Whoever said the cleans were terrible was probably playing a Hello Kitty Strat into it with computer speakers hooked up to the headphone out. Or maybe not... I could see the cleans sounding good even in that situation.

hahaha this is great!!!


But yeah man I've heard one in action and they're fucking awesome. Sadly didn't hear it's cleans though, so I can't comment on that.

 

[InAbsentia_]

It's definitely one of the nicest tube preamps in it's price range. If you're also into the Engl tone, I'd say it's tough to beat. Whoever said the cleans were terrible was probably playing a Hello Kitty Strat into it with computer speakers hooked up to the headphone out. Or maybe not... I could see the cleans sounding good even in that situation.

At the hello kitty strat comment.

So do you imagine this sounding good through an interface with impulses?

 

[raximkoron]

I use one that currently goes through a VHT 2/90/2 into a cab with a couple Eminence Swamp Thangs and a couple more rounded speakers.

Cleans are amazing and ultimately the reason I kept it as I was thinking of selling it off for quite a while.

However, with as amazing as it sounds now, if you don't have a good matching power amp, or speakers that can't deliver the thunder, it won't give you the warm fuzzies right off the bat. Haven't really played around with impulses, but I found the headphone amp to be pretty useless by itself, at least I didn't like the sounds coming out of it.

One thing to keep in mind with the lead channel is that they say it's a 4-band EQ that's labeled: Low, Low-Mid, Hi-Mid, Treble.
It SHOULD be labeled: Low, Mid, Treble, Presence

 

[Larrikin666]

I had one for about a year and loved it. The cleans were actually quite good. I've heard some pretty brutal clips of that thing recorded direct. You might also want to consider picking up a decent 1x12 to use with it.

 

[wlfers]

Fantastic cleans and Distortions, only reason I sold it was because I moved up to the 570

 

[El Caco]

I loved my E530, I miss it.