Quote:
I have a real nice guitar tube amp $1000+, It is a mesa boogie nomad, would I be wasting my time attempting to use it as a headphone amp? I figure there is that small chance that it would be great so why not ask. |
Not applicable without extensive modification.It
can be done but in the end not a good way to go unless just as a cool project.Reasons ?
1-way too much gain for one.Guitar preamp stages use two cascaded high gain stages one into the other so you can set the "overdrive" state of the amp second stage.That is the reason you have multiuple adjustment for volume.One is Gain/Drive into the next stage and sets harmonics the other at the very last stage in the amp,just before the power amp output stage and sets overall volume.
The reason it is set up this way is so you can have extreme drive levels even at low actual listening levels.
2-likely there will be two and possibly three or four more stages between this and the actual output (Tone/reverb/etc) and each with its own active device (tube or ss stage) each of which will add noise to the signal.This noise is part of the guitar amp sound and a non issue when used as intended but strap on a set of headphones and plug into a multiple high gain stage headphone output and you will not like the results usually.
Low gain is the domain of the headphone amp,high gain the guitar amp.
3-where will you be taking the signal from ? The first stage after the guitar intput ? Second stage drive ? After the tone controls or other FX ? After the power amp stage ?
Great guitar amps do not neccessarily make for great headphone amps because the overall requirements for each are different so are designed with "end use" in mind but you CAN force it to be what you need if your needs are not high fidelity music but guitasr palyback over headphones.In that case take the "line out" feed used for recording straight out to your cans and listen.Be aware this will be a "mono" output in most cases so you will need a "mono-to-stereo phone jack" adapter or if a stereo output a "Dual TS to TRS Adapter" (two mono phone jacks to a single stereo phone jack).If drive is too low hand a buffer off the output and try that.If volume is not enough (though no way i see that event !) add a gain stage.
hope this helps
rickmongo