Transform Your Tube Amp with Harley Benton's BUDGET Power Attenuator!
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 12 ก.ย. 2024
- Want to use your beastly tube amp for bedroom practice or home recording? The Harley Benton PA-100 power attentuator you can blast your tube amp but at comfortable "inside voice" volume levels! Don't believe me? Let's listen to it in action!
This also works as a load box with a speaker emulated output!
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Rubric: -5 points for Danzig references. -5 points for not reading the description. -5 points for not watching far enough into the video to answer your own question. -5 points for misquoting me in your comment. 20 points possible. Everyone starts with an A!
![Comment avoir LE GROS SON à la MAISON ? [TUTO GUITARE]](/img/n.gif)
Great, now I need a tube amp
damn the vascularity of the forearm and the deffinition of brachiallis in the thumbnail!
He got those..................Gains 😳
I'd like to add something here that a few people seem to be confused about as Max is busy making fantastic reviews for us, so may not have time to keep coming back.
Master Volume vs Attenuator
These are absolutley completely different animals They both will make you volume go down but that's the only thing they have in common.
"Just plug a volume pedal on your FX loop does the same thing"
I want to clear up the confusion so someone who is starting out doesn't blow up their amp! I'm not an electrical engineer nor am I an amp builder but I've had tubs amps forever and misunderstanding this can cause great damage to your amp, and even greater damage to your wallet.
There are basically 2 types of master volume circuits and they both come AFTER your preamp section. Most amps derive a lot of their tone and character in their preamp section. After this, the signal splits off and goes to an effects loop if you amp has one. The signal is routed thru the fx send and comes back thru the fx return. I wont go into it but deeply, but if you wanted to bypass your amps preamp section (all those 12ax7 tubes) you can plug in to your fx return. If you have a standalone preamp for example I have a Diexel VH4 pedal I can do this and basically I'm then only utilizing the power section of the amp. You will lose the character of the amps original design doing this.
Ok so, after the FX RTN your signal moves on to the phase inverter tube which gets the preamp ready for the power section ( again, this is an over simplification) Signal then moves on to the power tubes hits your tranny and leaves the amplifier.
So master volumes come either before or after the phase inverter tube. A lot of amp manufacturers place their master volume circuit here before the phase inverter. Marshall JCM800 is a great example of this.
Then there is a PPIMV master volume which comes AFTER the FX loop and AFTER the phase inverter tube. This is POST PHASE INVERTER MASTER VOLUME (PPIMV). basically this allows 1 more tube in the chain before taming the preamp section. I have a PPIMV installed on my 4 hole Marshall. If you wanted fo hear a difference you could plug a volume pedal in the FX loop and essentially have a pre and post phase inverter master to A/B.
So class, these are the different types of master volume circuits. Many products are marketed as attenuators or percieved to be attenuators but if they don't dissipate heat they are not attenuators but simply a volume pot placed in the FX loop. If they would market these items as master volume circuits instead of calling them attenuators a lot of beginners would not have blown up their expensive tube amps, but attenuator is the buzz word so that's what they call it.
Attenuators are placed after the amplifier before the speaker. The energy from the amps transformer has to go somewhere or boom boom smoke... dead amp. Usually this energy is transfered to your speaker but an attenuator placed in the middle of this chain is taking on some of this energy and then it moves on to the speakers at a reduced volume. Effectively this allows the power tubes and transformer to do their job, where a master volume circuit (pre or post phase inverter) does not. The "sweet spot" everyone talks about is the place where the transformers and power tubes are allowed to work as the designer intended. So it's not just allowing power tubes to alter the signal it's also the transformer and a lot of magic happens here. Your amp was designed for this and transformers usually have different outputs (4/8/16) . By plugging your speaker cabinet into your 8 ohm transformer tap the amp is expecting to see an 8 ohm cabinet. If you mismatch the amp here your are changing the builders circuit and you can also damage your amp.
So, a master volume will not allow your power tube or transformer to get to this sweet spot. This is why plugging your Carl's Attenuator or JHS black box in between the amp and cabinet, where an attenuator/laod box is supposed to go is BAD.
So it's pretty simple no matter what it says on the box, if it's made of plastic it's not an attenuator! If it doesn't disapate heat it's not an attenuator! If you're lucky you'll blow up your little black box,but you can also destroy your amp it's usually the transformer which is gonna run you a few hundred, probably blow out some caps as well and you've got yourself a $400 visit to your local amp tech all because someone called it Eddie's attenuator, stuck a volume pot in a box and the beginner knowing an attenuator goes between the amp and speaker is out of luck.
Sorry this ended up being so long. I do hope that this clears up why a master volume and an attenuator are not the same thing and that no tube amp beginners end up without their expensive amps.
Thanks for all your videos Max! You're awesome. I hope this keeps some of your subscribers out of the repair shop and in front of their amps instead. I just ordered one of these myself. For the money if used properly I think it will be a great new tool. These are the exact same design as the more expensive Jet city attenuators. Remember to always get an attenuator that's designed for twice the output of your amp and probably dont turn everything up to 11! I'll try this on my less expensive amps first though lol.
thanks for this man, can't find such a simple explanation of these subjects anywhere
Thanks for the info, so if you were to use this product on a 20 watt amp and 2 by 12 cab, how would you connect it to the amp?
I'm curious as mine is way too loud for home use
@@adamwilliams1980 it's pretty simple really. Come out of your amp speaker out. Even if it's a combo most amps have a speaker out.
Be sure to match the ohms if you amp is an 8 ohm out then it will go into the 8ohm in on the Attenuator.
Then come out of the attenuator Into the speaker cab
@@lamusician1 what would you suggest for a marshall combo amp like the sv20c? do you think the jhs little black amp works or does it blow up the amp
@@selfsupremacy7816 as long as you do not try to place those between the speaker and the amp those are ok. the is a big difference between an attenuator an the JHS. The JHS basically serves as a master volume and you amp already has one of those so that's is kind of redundant in my opinion. An attenuator is a complete different animal The HB one he reviewed is working great for me. I'm running a 50 watt plexi into a 4x12 cab and Im getting great results.
Harley Benton just endorse Max, already.
If he gets endorsed by HB, I imagine it'll probably be hard for him to review cheap gears from obscure brands
I've got six tube amps and I can't run any of them above 2 on the master volume because I live in an apartment. This will be perfect! Great demo!
erichensley67 I cant go above 1 1/2 on my 5150 haha
Wow this is actually a very useful component DI capabilities and the allowance to run an amp as hot as possible to actually push the tubes
BUT still keep all that volume control Wow!
Cool man ! I need an attenuator, will definately check this one !
Yeah one day I will get a real tube amp in my apartment with one of these. For now I love my multifx pedals. 😁
Max i think the shipping to US is like 48 US these days. the total weight is 31 kg which is close to 70 lbs. So like you mentioned it would wise to piggy back a few orders to max out on the weight. I purchased a 1x12 cab and guitar and was still well under the max weight threshold.
Great video Max! Thanks so much. Stay safe! Bene.
Thanks Bene! You too!
@FalconerPhoto Depends on how long the hard wired cable from the amps speaker cable is.
Waiting for you to get your own Harley Benton signature
Oh nice, a affordable attenuator.. I started with the Tom Sholz power soak in the 80's with my 77' 100 watt twin Marshall combo. Now I have a Rivera Rock Crusher, its the best I have found, but it is around $500 last i looked. A lot of these cheaper ones work great with light attenuation, but after turning them up more you loose tone/high end.
Outside of the Two Notes stuff, the Rivera stuff is the BEST on the market right now.
Wish I still had my Power Soak
Lose.
Just ordered mine for my Marshall amp!
Very cool! Thanks for all you do Max!
best guitar review channel on the entire youtube!!!
That was a rocking tune when you were demoing the attenuator
Oh wow.
This is so Amazing and the Solution.
Finally i can have a Great Sound without abusing the Neighbors.
Man Thank you so much.
I am going To buy this .
By the Way The Intro music is awesome.
Do you have any Link of what Song this is?
Excelent! I have a question ... should the inputs and outputs jacks use a speaker cable?
Yes speaker cable would be best, especially for the input on this.
Thanks young John Travolta!
Max so what you're saying it's a power soak like the type Eddie Van Halen used to use.
Eddie used a variac to reduce the incoming voltage down which reduced the volume of the amp. He would turn down from 110v to sometimes 60v he said in an article and recorded at 89v.
Do not use a Harley Benton attenuator without confirming the resistance on a multimeter. I have the same box and the ground was bad on the 16 ohm input... It needed more solder, after the fix works perfectly.
Thanks for the tip!
Sounded great. I use a Bugera on my DSL 100. I’m going to get this too for a comparison. Curious to see if it can choke down 100 watts without a meltdown. My Bugera gets toasty! Thanks Max great video great tones
It will melt down don’t use this one w anything more than half of it’s rating which would be 50 w
I wish I had one of these long ago, or I would never have sold my Peavey XXX!
Very well explained, for someone who doesn't know anything about attenuators this is great! Does the attenuator also work for transistor amps? Or bass amps that are not tube amps?
Sweet. I really need one of these. I have a 20w Marshall in the front room but the tone only starts to fill out and get some body at about 9 o'clock which is quite loud. Less than that and the amp sounds kind of thin and fizzy if you go high gain. Seems like something like this would be perfect.
I did make a cheap volume pedal and put it in the loop so I could cut the peamp signal before it hits the power amp and turn the power amp up. Kind of works, but it does raise the noise floor and isn't that great. Thanks for sharing your thoughts on the HB one :)
I think the Bugera PS1 Power Soak is the same thing as the HB attenuator just with different branding. Could be completely wrong though. That costs a little over $100.
I've got a 20 watt marshall to the sv20c and like you sounds perfect at 9. On the forums there is something called the john h attenuator but thats a kit you have to build yourself. There's a guy on there that says he can do it for 300. He seems very knowledgeable and legit and I was ready to have him do it but he said it would be. A couple weeks and it's been a month now. He also told me he has so medical stuff going on and I'm still open to having him do it. Also considering trying to build one myself. I'm also wandering about the marshall power break used for like 400. Have you got anything yet and are you happy with it
Holy Shit is that Glenn Danzig?!?!? Yes
-5 points.
dammit
I want to be Max when I grow up
Love my Tube amp + 4x12 + attenuator.
Great video/review, as usual.
Going to check this out.
Tks.
I have an old rockman attenuater i need to see if it still works, ill probably order that harley benton
Love your work man keep it up
might just be what I'm looking for, that new Ox box is over a grand.
Can you do a review of the new Amarok 7 string guitar?
So you connect your guitar to the input of the amp and conneft the Attenuator to the jack for the speaker? And the speaker directly to the Attenuator
Yes. The attentuator goes between the speaker and the amp. Everything else is like normal.
Price is right! 👍
It all goes to eleven? Except the attentuator volume? That is what I remember.
I have an Orange rocker terror 15. Only 15 watts max and it's still TOO LOUD at 25-30% for my apartment. I actually just ordered the Bugera PS1 which is based off the same circuitry as the one the PA100 is cloning, the Jet City Jettenuator.
Actually just bought this. Good choice I guess
How did it go?
Been checking out Harley Benton electrics. I want a single cut (LP) and double cut (SG). Which models do you suggest?
Don't forget to work out before and after playing guitar. Never skip your cycle. Only rage on Fridays, drink water.
Haven't had a tube amp since the 79's, but still cool!
So, for church setting, you're saying, if I understood, you can run this out if your amp w/o speaker hooked up & get the amp sound directly to board?
Yes, you can hook this up to the amp, and then use the XLR line out to a PA, and not have a speaker hooked up. I've done this many times. Works great.
@@GuitarMAXMusic Max, I have a dsl 20 cr Marshall tube amp. It's not a separate head and cab unit. Can I still use something like this? How would I connect it? I have a pedal board and a Moore cab sim pedal at the end of my board but the 20 w Marshall is too loud to play at home
@@GuitarMAXMusic also what is the difference between this and the jhs little black box passive attenuator?
Thanks... I mean that's awesome and ridiculously affordable
"You're gonna piss off your neighbors".. ha ha, and also lose your earing more importantly.
Nice! And switchable between 4, 8 and 16 ohms? All for only $62 USD? Sold!
Without sacrificing the tone? (5:45)
My output Transformer did not like this attenuator.
like a scholz power soak!
I had a Marshall Bass 100, 30 years ago, a lot of people would still have their hearing if we had such things. These are great now everyone dumping old tube amps to buy Katana's. Some bargains out there.
Can these handle a Marshall 1959HW?
I have a Behringer power soak. I want the two notes one.
Hello,
i have questions :
Does volume level of Line output and Speaker output are totally separated ? you can reduce speaker cab to very low and have good line out volume level ?
Can you also totally unplug the speaker cable from the Attenuator to cabinet to have a sort of loadbox (no sound at all goes to the cab) and just use the Line output of the PA-100 box to plug into audio interface for using IRs ? No hazard to do that for the amp ?
Thanks you !
Will it work with any Wattts.... would it work with my black star 5w
I know that sounds ridiculous, but when I turn it up to where the tone is ripping it’s still pretty dang loud
Yea it will work with 5 watts.. bugera makes one too that like 125 bucks that I hear is pretty good. I think this one goes up to 100 watts so your good
matt wood
Thanks!
Five watts is pretty loud for home if you are cranking for crunch. I’m gonna use my Bugera version on my Greta and Tiny Terror! The Greta is like two watts but loud with a 12” cab and it must be dimed!
It´s like the power soak from the 80´s.
Pretty damn cool
Buy the best , copy it and send it back .
Is it a multi-resistors type(PowerSoak™) or tapped transformer type(PowerBrake)
Can I use both outputs at the same time? So I can plug my cab and my interface at the same time?
Hey Max, Did you ever go to CRAS recording school in the early 2003ish?
No. I was in Seattle in 2003.
@@GuitarMAXMusic Ok, thanks, you look like someone I went to school with at that time, you must have a twin out their, LOL. Do you know if it's possible to run a guitar amp into a guitar attenuator, but instead of going into an speaker, go into a Suhr reactive load/IR instead? I have a Suhr reactive load, but it does not have a attenuator on it, so if you crank your amp, the Suhr units clip light goes crazy, so you can't crank it. I know that the OX has an attenuator on it, not sure why Suhr didn't put one on theirs, but would love to find a solution so I can crank my 5150 III head into to an attenuator and then into the Suhr with out clipping, thanks again!
Show how it is wired
This dude could probably break the guitar with his hands
It certainly Attenuated his biceps.
to the MAX
@@Rose.Of.Hizaki 😂
I've got a 60w fender hot rod deville 3 combo . . . Use it in my bedroom!! . . . Can't even get near 2 on the volume!! As you probably know, Max, there's a gadget called a 'lion tamer' which is basically a volume pot with 2 jacks which you plug into your effects loop sockets - bit as far as I can tell, it only works on certain models NIT including mine. As far as I can tell, the accessory in this video does the same thing? Does it work with combo amps????
×× replace 'bit' and 'nit' with 'but' and 'not' 😎
Adding a volume knob in the effects loop doesn’t allow you to push the amp any more, it just makes it easier to find a usable master volume level in amps that have a problem from going really quiet to insanely loud with just a slight turn of the master knob.
This attenuators allow you to crank up your amp by converting a chunk of the energy leaving the amp head into heat and letting it dissipate before it gets to the speaker. It reduces the volume after the amp has shaped the tone and sends it to the cabinet. A volume knob in the loop does exactly the same thing the master volume is already doing, it just makes it easier to control how much you increase or decrease the volume by giving you more wiggle room when adjusting the master
Hi,
I want to connect my amp head to an interface to try out different IRs . I dont have a real speaker cab. So this should do the job what I want to do?
What do you think about this product? I mean there are expensive ones.. whats the difference? (Two Notes Torpedo Captor 8 for e.g.)
Thank you!
How is the onboard fan powered? I see no power supply jacks on it or in the manual.
Tom Schultz called it a power soak
Wasn't the power brake by Marshall?
Can I use this for my Marshall solid state head?
Unfortunately you can't crank solid state heads/amps to get better tone, their tone is consistently the same at any volume. Power attenuators are for tube amps/heads. Hope that helps!
Can you get it to work with a combo amp?
On my deluxe reverb the speaker plugs into my tone king Ironman man2 speaker jack then I run another speaker cable into the INT SPKR input jack on back of the amp. This attenuator will run samebway. I have a tone king Ironman 2 mini for my deluxe reverb on the amp there's another input jack deal next to it that says EXT SPKR which I spose would be to run a cab from the combo. Make sure you have both of those on back of your amp. You also need a connector for when you Un plug speaker from amp female female so you can plug your new cable I to it to the sttenuator and another cable to go back into the INT
max, can this be hooked up to a tube combo amp? and if so, how? thanks
Will this set a one watt amp on fire ? 🔥 🔥 🔥
No. But if it's only 1 watt, you don't need one.
How do we power hb pa 100 I have bought it yesterday. I tried to hook using a trs cable from speaker out of amp to input from the amplifier of hb pa 100. And another cable from the out of the pa 100 into the input of the speaker. And it seemed not working. Can anyone help please?
Can I use my 10A Variac as an attenuator?
My amp combo speakers 4omh but
Have put amp switch on 8 omh
Which input to use 4 omh 8omh 16 omh
If the amp switch is set to 8, then use on 8 on the box.
Would this work on a Katana Arstist 100?
Can you hook it up to xlr and the cabinet so you can used it as a monitor?
Would have been nice to explain the other knobs, plugs and settings. Ohms in this situation are important to not blow up my Bluesbreaker on a $65 gizmo. But loved the demo😁
Question: would this device make an amp louder? For example, if I've got a 5 watt tube amp, but i wish it was louder for band practice or for live performance, would this device boost the volume? Or is it just limited to the wattage from the amp?
It will not make it any louder.
@@GuitarMAXMusic thank you! Do you know if there's any device that would make an amp louder?
1000 buck amplifier through a 60 powersoak? I'd be surprised if it didn't affect the tone
It does affect the tone, but in a preferable way. That's a big part of the reason to use it.
Can you use it on a tube amp that already has the speaker built in
yes, it will require some extra work from you if the amp has the speaker hardwired in, but it can be done pretty easily. You can google how to do it or take it to a tech who will do it and show you how in about 10 minutes
Can I still use pedals with one of these attenuators?
Yes of course! It doesn't change anything with the pedal signal chain, etc.
I need one for a jcm800 2210 what do u recommend
Can you use this with a tube combo ?
You could, provided it had a pluggable speaker jack in it!
Would this work with a laney irt 120w full stack (wedge cab and straight cab) or would I need a certain one in regards to power\ohms ect
I think it only goes to 100W.
you know you can just use a $50 variac to turn the volume down and it can do any amp from any country
@Stephen Bradley well the point is it's true that it's the cheaper option if you wanted to make your amp quiet
@Stephen Bradley also for me shipping wouldn't be worth it if i ordered a harley benton attenuator by then if i doubled the money of the product=shipping i could make one that can do any amp up to maybe 100w or more it i look hard enough
at least that's the last time checked the shipping costs
👍
killer
So it’s not a reactive load. Just an attenuater... how’s the direct out? Is it only simulated speaker output? I wouldn’t want a simulated output unless it had an IR loader or a switch to turn off the simulation. Definitely inexpensive and a decent value for home/practice volumes. I’m probably going with Two-Notes Captor X once it starts shipping.
There is a direct out, and then a separate emulated output.
I use a volume pedal or compression pedal to get away with the same thing.
What volume pedal do you use?
@@alistairhomewood7344 I use a simple boss fv-30h. So for bedroom tone it is just a matter of chain placement.
@@alistairhomewood7344 the clear advantage with the equipment maxx is using is the optional direct out, that is a nice touch. It puts two functions in to one.
If I have a combo amp, can I put it in the effects loop? And where in the effects loop?
Use a volume pedal, man. Simple fix.
Nope. I figured it out. I can put an attenuator in my speaker out and plug my amp speaker in the other side.
Wouldn't want it to plug it into an expensive amp for long periods....
Why is that? I'm just learning about attenuators.
@@NeoRichardBlake $50 attenuator into a $3k amp no thanks! If the attenuator fails... It could damage the amp
Is it reactive or resistive? I'm guessing resistive at this price point. Resistive is not good for your output transformer.
It's passive, so it would be resistive. As to being not good to your OPT, neither is a speaker really.
@@DMSProduktions What? In a tube amplifier... the speaker actually completes the circuit. That's why you're warned not to operate a tube amp without a speaker or load attached. You were aware of this right?
@@scottdunn2178 Yep, seems you misread.
This biceps is the best clickbait
Eww weirdo!
Is anyone able to tell me if this can be used on tube combo amps? Or does it just works with heads?
If the amp has a speaker output jack, then this can used with it.
@@GuitarMAXMusic awesome, thank you!!
Does it work with a combo Amp?
No, since this has to go between the amp and the speaker, and on a combo amp there's usually no way to do that.
@Guitar MAX I have a deluxe reverb and a tine king IM2 mini. Speaker plugs in and has INT and ENT for speaker in and out I attenuate that. Just unplug speaker run into the attenuator and back into the Ironman. I assume this Harley benton works the same way. The deluxe is a combo. Now I have a marshall combo sv20 and I'm gonna attenuate that to but my Ironman 8 ohms and I need 16 for the marshall. Both are combos. - Al from Seattle
Cool gadget sadly no good for me I have 120w laney iron heart full stack
its a sketchy piece of gear. it just blew something up in my mesa boogie lonestar combo 1x12.... likely a transformer as no lights power on now.... this is just with moderate use and dialing in some gain and master volume. in my opinion a really sketchy piece of gear
What does creamy mean i didn't know creamy and warm hade a sound or tone lolhahaha
Creamy describes a tone that has less attack on the beginning of the notes and strong mid-range frequencies.
I got a marshall jcm 2000 TSL100 head with a 4x12 cab. I'm already using a VPR button that knocks it downfrom 100 to 25 watts within the head itself, I would like to hook up an attenuater, but I'm afraid it might damage it knowing that the VPR button is pushed in. Just wondering if I should leave it out to a 100 watts and then use it.
Would one of these be worth it I have a orange micro dark + joyo 1x12 v30 cab
An Orange micro dark has a 20w solid state power amp section with 1x 12AX7 valve in the preamp. This product is designed to be used with amps that use valves in their power amp section to be able to drive them harder. Therefore not required for the micro dark. Hope this helps.
Guitar dude on trt
Now if they could only make them in Germany instead of China
That's what I say about the Epi Gibson copies!
Sabbath Bloody Sabbath riff! (kinda)