August 1st, 2010 | 
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http://www.oldtonezone.com – Part 3 of this series of videos where I try to explain the basics of tube amps for people without engineering or technical backgrounds. This video explains the difference between preamp and power tube distortion.
Duration : 0:8:18
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@SavageDutchman : …
@SavageDutchman : There are two ways to accomplish this. First, use a very low wattage amp. Depending on how quiet you need it to be, maybe as low as 5 or 3 or even 1 watt. The other way is using an attenuator, which lets you run the amp however you want to get the tone saturation and/or distortion you want, but then it lowers the signal before passing it to the speaker, so the speaker volume is low…which some people don’t like because part of “good tone” can be driving the speaker hard also
How can you get the …
How can you get the power tube overdrive without the volume ?
This video clip …
This video clip stops playing at the 33 second mark when I try to play it. None of the others do, so I’m not sure what’s going on with this one. Any thoughts on this?
I trust that after …
I trust that after all the explanation, I can hear a recommendation about a kind of blend of tube & Power combination that will work well for different environments. A sort of “Consumer Reports” version (non-biased) recommendation. something that says, “Hey, if you are playing only in your family room, and don’t need a ton of stuff, here’s what’s out there, and it has everything you’ll ever need” sort of advice.
For some reason, I …
For some reason, I could really hear the difference on the Distortion chain clip but on this one the difference wasn’t that evident. The A/B here wasn’t as powerful as the other clip. Just FYI. Of course could just be my headphones.
@gr8bluesgtr thank …
@gr8bluesgtr thank you someone can finnally answer my question. You are very Padawan lol
@Taygoo15 Remember, …
@Taygoo15 Remember, the power tubes will only distort when there’s enough signal level ‘hitting’ them. Even with the master volume all the way up, that only allows whatever is coming from the preamp to ‘hit’ the power tubes, so if that’s not very high, the power tubes won’t distort. So you really need to crank both the input and master volumes to distort the power tubes, which of course makes it very loud.
@gr8bluesgtr Ok so …
@gr8bluesgtr Ok so I played an amp and turned the master all the way up and it was still clean. So how do you distort the power tubes.
@usernameraba You …
@usernameraba You can’t. See the lesson on attenuators.
@usernameraba It …
@usernameraba It really comes down to how much volume you can have. If you need low volume, then cranking the preamp, and keeping the master lower is better, but if you can use more volume, it becomes a balancing act between the two,
@usernameraba …
@usernameraba However, my question is now how does one keep volume at a reasonable level if the master knob is cranked?
This was great dude …
This was great dude, very informative and insightful. I just recently bought a Fender Blues Jr. NOS amp so I guess I’m fairly new to how these types of amps of work. Before, I was raising the volume knob and keeping the master knob lower thinking that I was getting a good break-up/distortion tone, but I wasn’t into it. I thought maybe my amp wasn’t meant to do this. Thanks to your video though I’ll try the reverse and see what it gives me.
your guitar sounds …
your guitar sounds amazing
yeah man, finally …
yeah man, finally someone to break it all down.. incredible tone/guitar btw
great and …
great and informative video! i was wondering, what where your amp settings when you got the power tubes to distort?
finally, someone …
finally, someone has demonstrated the difference between preamp/power tube distortion. as a bass player (with solid state amps) just starting to get his feet wet in the guitar world, this is something i’ve spent the last couple months trying to find! thank you
Really useful …
Really useful videos. Thanks a lot.
what a tone! love …
what a tone! love it!
very good …
very good expanation.God bless.5
Thank you. You’ve …
Thank you. You’ve clarified me.
He’s a serious guy …
He’s a serious guy – anyway cool instructional stuff
I wish someone like …
I wish someone like you had been around 20+ yrs ago when I started playing! Good job man, very insightful especially for newbie just getting a tube amp.
I have never seen …
I have never seen you smile
Do you know any …
Do you know any good, cheap tube amp heads?
The blues junior is …
The blues junior is not really designed for “high gain” type preamp tube distortion. A mesa-boogie or other modern hi-gain amps can have more pleasing preamp disto. And, it also depends on your guitar and settings. I can get really nice preamp distortion tones out of my bjr with warm humbuckers and the correct setup.