DSL's rawk!

siraxeman

For the first time in ages I did a gig on Saturday with just my DSL50 and ran the amp using the clean chanel with the boost button engaged thus my clean was more a classic rawk crunch...and then had my drive channel for my leads gain about 1 o'clock. had my presence and treble low with the bass on 6 n mids on 7 and I got to say I was lapping it up...what a sound when its pushing some volume out! Loved it....forgot just how good the DSL can sound. My usual way is AC30 and DSL and run both amps clean and get the dirt from my pedals on my board. Still a great sound and probably will remain my mainstay but its nice to just take one amp and get a solid rawk tone with little help from pedals.

John_A

I concur! The rehearsal room we use usually has a jcm800 in, at the last rehearsal they wheeled in a DSl and my initial " oh no!" Soon disappeared, it sounded great

timmysoft

Mine has always sounded awesome.

ICBM

I love the smell of DSL in the morning… smells like… another large repair bill incoming!

To be fair, not *all* of them catch fire. No more than AC30s do, anyway .

Definitely a good idea to take both.

gearaddict

I loved the sound of my DSL-50. Until it broke. I actually bought another one but it never sounded as good for some reason. Probably rose tinted ear plugs.

Every so often I think about buying another one. But my Orange TH-30 has been sitting in a cupboard for about a year so I think any other big heavy valve head would probably suffer the same fate.

xSkarloey

I'm an owner of one of the newer DSL's, the 5 watt combo. 

Since getting it I've barely touched a drive pedal. 

Drew_TNBD

gearaddict said:

I loved the sound of my DSL-50. Until it broke. I actually bought another one but it never sounded as good for some reason. Probably rose tinted ear plugs.

Nah, trust your ears. When my JVMJS broke and I took it into Marshall, they had to replace the mainboard. Never sounded as good since then. Same tubes. Same bias values. Just sounded thinner and fuzzier.

guitarfishbay

Drew_fx said:

gearaddict said:

I loved the sound of my DSL-50. Until it broke. I actually bought another one but it never sounded as good for some reason. Probably rose tinted ear plugs.

Nah, trust your ears. When my JVMJS broke and I took it into Marshall, they had to replace the mainboard. Never sounded as good since then. Same tubes. Same bias values. Just sounded thinner and fuzzier.

On this note I think it was Andy Timmons who has a story about trying an amp and liking it, so he got one (but a different unit to the one he played).  He was convinced the one he received didn't sound like the one he tried, so he now tends to buy the actual one he tries now.

This begs the question - what if you don't like the next Sig X you find? 

Cabicular

am I alone in hating the sound of them?

The crunch channel is nice but the main has far too much top end for my taste

I had one for a month or two and sold it to some lucky punter on here

Horses for courses I guess I bet you'd probably hate my amps

Cabicular

Maybe I had a thin fizzy one as Drew FX said

Drew_TNBD

guitarfishbay said:

This begs the question - what if you don't like the next Sig X you find? 

I will kill myself.

gearaddict

Cabicular said:

am I alone in hating the sound of them?

Yes

ICBM

Cabicular said:

am I alone in hating the sound of them?

No

Drew_TNBD

Cabicular said:

am I alone in hating the sound of them?

Maybe.

monquixote

Cabicular said:

am I alone in hating the sound of them?

Nope. 

I can't get anything out of any modern Marshall that I've tried (DSL, TSL or JVM) that doesn't sound like mud, or fizz, or both.

I am aware that other people make nice sounds with them so it's probably just me.

Cabicular

I had 100W I was probably not driving it hard enough.

I use 15-20W amps these days to get the powertubes working and then shove a pedal or two in front of them.

I probably was completely underwhelming the power section

ICBM

Cabicular said:

I had 100W I was probably not driving it hard enough.

I use 15-20W amps these days to get the powertubes working and then shove a pedal or two in front of them.

I probably was completely underwhelming the power section

Probably a good thing, since the DSL100 has a tendency to PCB arcing when it's driven hard, hence the fire potential.

A good high-powered amp does not need to be driven hard to sound good either...

jpfamps

ICBM said:

Cabicular said:

am I alone in hating the sound of them?

No

No!!

gearaddict

Oh they're fine. I always thought mine sounded nice and warm and was very versatile. It wasn't much use in the house...needed to be up loud. Marshall must be doing something right. Didn't i read in another thread Nuno was using a'secret' DSL behind his wall of Randalls? He knows a thing or two.

siraxeman

Gary Moore and Sambora both liked their DSL amps for their main live dirty sounds. Gary used Fenders for his cleans live tho. Always liked their toanz.....So no surprises there then eh.

Drew_TNBD

DSL's get a bad rap, but they're really not bad amps at all tbh. They're just not versatile; 2 channels anyway....

But I don't know if anyone remembers, I did a shoot out of a DSL, modded JCM900, and Fryette Sig X, back in the day... they all compared very favourably.