Orange vs Marsall ??

siraxeman

Whats the consensus ? I notice both of these british made amps differ greatly in price...Orange seem to be a lot more dearerer...so what is the reason for that are they betterer or summit ?

timmysoft

Not better, but very different

ICBM

Oranges are mostly built a bit betterer, which is where the cost comes in really - it's not too difficult to make a cheap amp that sounds good, but it's harder to make one well, and cheaply, if you see what I mean. Although Marshall seem to be having some difficulty making amps that sound good as well, in my opinion...

samzadgan

I think orange stuff is built a lot better from the solid state stuff all the way up...and they just seem to make better cabinets, whether its for speakers or amps...they are really solid.

But also since orange has had resurgence i think they are charging more as another way of differentiating from the pack

digitalscream

Marshall: Bright, brittle sound, reasonably likely to fall apart as you carry it to the car.

Orange: Dark, muddy sound, not particularly versatile, less likely to fall apart.

There ya go.

samzadgan

digitalscream said:

Marshall: Bright, brittle sound, reasonably likely to fall apart as you carry it to the car.

Orange: Dark, muddy sound, not particularly versatile, less likely to fall apart.

There ya go.

You say bright and brittle...I say check out a Superbass

You say Dark and Muddy...I say Thick and Doomy

jpfamps

samzadgan said:

digitalscream said:

Marshall: Bright, brittle sound, reasonably likely to fall apart as you carry it to the car.

Orange: Dark, muddy sound, not particularly versatile, less likely to fall apart.

There ya go.

You say bright and brittle...I say check out a Superbass

You say Dark and Muddy...I say Thick and Doomy

Agreed, but I find modern Marshall quite brittle.

Regarding build quality (and speaking as someone who repairs amps for a living), Orange are way better than Marshalls.

For example, I've got a customer who runs a dual amp set up with a Marshall 2061HX (£1049) and an Orange Tiny Terror (£299). 

Even though he uses the 2061HX for his crunchy sound and is thrashing the TT for his lead sound the 2061HX has experienced two output transformer failures.

I've had to change one OT on a Tiny Terror, and this was from the first production run. Since then the construction of the OT has been improved (with more insulation).

Of all the valve terror series other than valve issues, I've seen one other failure which was the cathode resistor to the power valves coming unsoldered.

In constrast I've seen several transformer failures (both mains and OT) in the British-made handwired Marshall 18W and 20W series.

Drew_TNBD

Lets see Orange make something even anywhere near the capabilities of the JVM, and then we'll talk.

digitalscream

Drew_fx said:

Lets see Orange make something even anywhere near the capabilities of the JVM, and then we'll talk.

Surely that just means making it go quiet for about half a second between channel changes?

ICBM

Drew_fx said:

Lets see Marshall make something even anywhere near the build quality or tone of the Rocker 30, and then we'll talk.

Corrected.

samzadgan

ICBM said:

Drew_fx said:

Lets see see either of them make something even anywhere near the build quality or tone of their amps from the 70's, and then we'll talk.

Corrected again...

strtdv

I'm not fussed on most of the modern Marshalls other than the Satriani version of the JVM which seems to be a step up from the standard JVM both in terms of sound and build quality. 

The standard JVM has all the modes etc but frankly I don't care for the basic tone. The Satriani model on the other hand has less fizzy gain, noise gates which work very well rather than pointless digital reverb, cleans based on a 6100LM and channel 2 covers pretty much everything from early 70's JMP to hot-rodded JCM800 (although sadly not without EQ adjustment between modes)

Oranges have their own sound going on, it's a love it or hate it sort of thing. I love it.

I'd happily buy a used Orange and save a lot on the new price. I'd be more worried about a second hand current production Marshall, I'd worry about transformer failure.

Honestly, if I wanted a Marshall sound badly I'd be buying a well built clone or an original 70's or early 80's version.