Marshall MG?

[Wana_make_a_guitar]

I own a MG30 People say it's a bad amp, I have no idea why. MY friends got a Fender 100 watt (not sure what it is though) and i gotta say my MG has almost the same volume, it's got FX unlike the fender, it's got better tone and nice cleans. Whats bad about it? It's cheap, reliable (from some of what i've heard), and cheap.

Whats your say on Marshall MG's?

Soon enough though i'll sell it and get a nice tube amp, maybe a trace ellitot.

 

[GoDrex]

I've never heard one, but I've heard so many people say the build quality of it is not so great. Also they say the distortion sucks. A lot of people are tube snobs though so it's hard to know what's up without hearing it and checking it out. If you like it that's all that matters. I'm sure it will serve it's purpose for you for a number of years. I bet it's better than some of the stuff I used when I was starting out. Try not to worry about what other people say. Just keep playing and enjoying yourself. If at some point you decide you don't like your amp, I'm sure you'll be able to get something else later on.

 

[Ted]

As you get older you'll play nicer kit simple as that.

 

[nathan a]

I've owned both the MG15 and MG100. Never played the 30 watter. The 15, to me, is tolerable on clean settings; the distortion is just miserable, worst I've played. Really really dry sound both clean and dirty since no reverb. The 100 is definitely better, okay cleans and okay distortion. It can at least do a decent variety of distortion sounds. The built in effects I thought were okay too, but nothing special. Useful for 'once in a while'. My main complaint about those amps is they always seemed lifeless to me. The sound had no vibe, and wasnt very responsive to my touch and dynamics. I like an amp that is sweet and clean when I pick light, then screams if I pick heavy. I take advantage of those dynamics a lot, and the MG amps don't pull that off well in my experience.

 

[tallman]

Well, I don't know if that older = nicer gear relationship is necessarily true...
with a summer job any high school kid can buy a really good amp or guitar.  I did, and I'll never regret it!
My philosophy on gear is try everything, find the one you really want and that works best for you and don't settle for anything else.  You'll just end up loosing money if you buy, then sell, then buy, etc...
And buy used -IN PERSON.  Not on the internet.

 

[Wana_make_a_guitar]

Well i think it's pretty good. It's got a tube amp simulator thing on it so it gives a TINY (Not much at all) bit of volume when pressed. But other than that i usually have my amp's distortion set to something like a Metal, Heavy metal. High gain.But i love the cleans.

 

[GoDrex]

I love my Fender Cyber Deluxe, and it's not a tube amp. I bet 99.9% of people wouldn't be able to tell it from a Blackface or Tweed in a blind test.

 

[guitlouie]

It's always hard to be happy with what you have got, that won't go away when you get older, but my advice is to try.  When I was 13 I had the worst hunk'o'junk excuse for an amplifier in the world.  Seriously, I have never since seen anything worse than that plastic covered, balsa wood, made in the depths of hades piece of trash.  But here's what happened, I wanted to play guitar soo badly anyway, that I made do.  I started playing through my mothers stereo when she wasn't around, because that sounded better than the amp.  Then when christmas or a birthday would roll around, I'd tell my parents I wanted a new amp, and they would say, "show us what you have learned lately".  And I would show off all the new stuff I was practicing, and they would say....Ehhhh.  So another year would roll around, and we would repeat this performance...and well eventually they spent a little more to get me some other hunk'o'junk, but hey it was better than he first one....and so on and so on......Here I am an adult now, buying my own toys, and while I can't just go get anything I want, I do have a great amp and a trunk load of effects, and some cool guitars.  Well, the point is, if you can practice on that thing, don't worry what some tone snobs are saying.  Make do.  Persevere.  And most importantly, if you like that amp, well your doing alright, probably better than what most of us older guys started out with. 

 

[nathan a]

Wise words right here from guitlouie.

 

[jackthehack]

"And most importantly, if you like that amp, well your doing alright, probably better than what most of us older guys started out with. "

That would depend on your definition of "older guys"....  If you're in the bracket like CB and I, we started out with with "vintage" Fender tweed/blackface tube amps; that's what was laying around pawn shops and other places to pick up used music gear on the cheap...

 

[guitlouie]

Point well taken.  We sorta older guys then. 

 

[DocNrock]

Point well taken.  We sorta older guys then. 

+1, I started out on a Gorilla.

 

[Wana_make_a_guitar]

Well at least i'm starting out on a respected company's amp, most of my friends have samick amps and nobrand amps that they bought off ebay.But still it's true the quality of the sound doesn't matter so much when your starting out, it's when you get better at playing then you might need good sound and tone.

 

[dbw]

Well at least i'm starting out on a respected company's amp, most of my friends have samick amps and nobrand amps that they bought off ebay.But still it's true the quality of the sound doesn't matter so much when your starting out, it's when you get better at playing then you might need good sound and tone.

Thing is Marshall has slapped their respected name onto a line of beginner's amps.  This doesn't say anything for the amp, it just says a lot about the big cheeses at Marshall. 

The MG is ok... it's cheap, at least, and I imagine they're very durable.  To me they sound very solid-state and not Marshall-like at all.  Harsh, clippy... sort of chemical sounding.  There are better solid state amps out there.

It's not quite a piece of crap but it's certainly not a very good amp.  Of course, as louie pointed out, it doesn't matter in the least if you're just practicing!  A "real" Marshall or similar tube amp won't sound really good until you achieve deafening volume anyway.  Don't sell the MG, you may want it one day.

Edit: Drex, a Cyber Deluxe is a digital modeling amp, and it has a tube preamp IIRC, so it's not really a fair comparison.

 

[GoDrex]

The Cyber Twin has the tube pre-amp. The Deluxe doesn't.

And yeah it's not a comparable thing, but I was just saying it's possible to get good tones without tubes.

 

[riverbluff]

I've played through the MG series and they are OK amps.  It is solid state and will be very durable.  The important thing is, are you happy with it....

I have a couple solid state amps (Crate MX65R and a Line 6 spider 30)  Both sound great but my Marshall JCM 800 is so much better (and much more expensive)

When it comes to music, it is all in the ear of the player.  Play what you like and tweak youo tone accordingly.

 

[onedrop]

Well I'm not really an "older guys" but was lucky to get an old fender deluxe pretty cheap from my first guitar teacher when I was starting out. I eventually switched out the speaker, but man I had trouble finding anything I liked better, unless I needed something louder for larger venues.

But.. even before that, my very first amp was a hotwired boom box. I learned how to play bass on that thing by copying john paul jones till I could afford $100 for the cheapest bass amp that was loud enough to jam with a drummer. And that thing (a traynor i think) served me just fine for quite a while. I think I even used it as a guitar amp for a while till I got the deluxe.

Bottom line is, always target the weakest link in your chain. If you're even halfway satisfied with your amp, stick with it until you can't live without an upgrade. Or maybe you'll still be playing it in 15 years, who knows. Everyone's taste is personal, so your amp doesn't suck unless you say it sucks.

 

[rahimiiii]

I been to a practice room that has Marshall MG's.... Honestly I like the Roland JC-120 they got in the same room better than the MG. The JC-120 are at least somewhat touch responsive although its distortion isn't as full as a real half stack (it's a 2x12) but the MG cleans sounds ok, but its either real clean or distorted (if the headroom is exceeded) and the distortion button is really just a simulated valve distortion (think BOSS DS-1 here) so forget touch responsiveness if you got a MG...

By the way both amp is solid state...

 

[crow55]

just like any other marshall , you have to drive them hard! turn that f*&ker up!
ive used for about 10 gigs and it was pretty great(100watt HS)
not very cutting though
you have to tweek the mids and bass to really give it some boom if you know what i mean
my buddy has a fender deluxe and it cuts through my tone like a knife(of course it would the fender is tube loaded)
i am a tone freak so i sometimes i got frustrated because of the sound
i got a jcm800 now though