Gallien-Krueger 400RB III 210 Combo

I got a 1 year old used one at Sam Ash for $549.00. I brought it home for testing.

Even though I had bad experience with GK in the past, I decided to give it a try because it sounds pretty good and I didn't mean to cranck it too much anyway. I was looking for a small cportable combo for my fretless bass and I have an SVT tube stack at home for the Rock and Roll gigs.

That thihg is 16" high, 16" deep, 21" wide and 60lbs so it's pretty portable.

I like GK classic feature and this one has a presence which works pretty well. It sounds pretty clean and loud fof a small 210. It would b a good amp to mike on studio. But this version is very noizy and don't have much bottom. The noize also gets into the XLR output so it doesn't cut very well in the main console.

But it sounds great but it's rateling if you try to hear the fondamental of a low E. It would be pretty good for an upright bass.

As usual with most GK combo, you have to do some modification on it to reduce rateling and buzz... BOOOOO

But if low end is not what you're looking for, it's worth a try.

I had it only for one day. The sales person let me take it home for 30 days and tried to sell me a one year waranty for $50. I said no way. He made me understand that he wouldn't support me if I had any problem and I didn't pay the waranty, and I know by experience that GK service sucks hard. Read my review on the Backline 115 and you will understand. Since it was rateling I thought maybe the drivers were blown. It would have cost me $150.00 to have new ones. No way!

Meanwhile my local small Ampeg dealer did it's best to match that price with a brand new 115-220W combo with tube preamp. So I got a brand new Ampeg BA115HPT with 5 years of transferable waranty instead and I gladely returned the GK to the store. And I know Ampeg service because I also use their service before. But Ampeg never let me down.

I know by experience that GK service sucks hard. Read my review on the Backline 115 and you will understand.

Even though it sounds really good, I didn't trust it enough to keep it.

I have been playing for 4 years now and I started with GK. Eventhough I was happy in the beginning, it died on me after a few months. No support from the dealer, claiming that GK was not supporting them very much. I dealth with them directly and they slapped me in the face twice. They sent me twice a broken driver.

I thought this unit might have blown drivers as well, so I sent it back the store for refound.

I like the size and light weight of this thing, but now I can sleep in peace with my Ampeg.

2003 model. I bought it new at Guitar Center over an Ampeg. It's very versatile as I've used it in small club venues and on a concert stage in front of 4,000 people. Of course it was DI'd to one of the biggest sound systems I've ever seen. I use it for rock, country and jazz. It works great sitting on an 8 ohm 15" SWR cab which delivers the bottom end I need and the 2 10"'s lack. I like the on board effects for tonal control and the loop for processor color. Some medium size clubs I work won't hook it to the house sound. Plenty of punch. I wish it had 2 channels though.

I use a MM-5 Stingray, HM-V Fender and a '73 Fender Jazz 4-string bass. The only active pickups is on the Music Man (giant Humbucker). I haven't found that I need the db input reduction switch with it though. I just turn down the pre-volumn a little to reduce distortion. The amp is amazing with the sounds it delivers. As stated before, I play a variety on genres and in the same night. So I need a multi-voiced amp to be there for me. I have had some distortion issues when it's cranked past 2 o'clock. I've found that by increasing the graphic controls and backing down the volumn, I can achieve the wattage I demand for certain situations. I haven't noticed any unecessary or unacceptable noise from the power plant.

Never had a failure yet. Seems solid and is a tank for it's size.

Never used them. Have logged in on the web site to look at the manual when I couldn't locate mine.

I've been playing for about 30 years professionaly. In that time I've owned a Fender Bassman (silver front), Gibson V-4 (There's a relic), a Sunn Coliseum (Chiropractor misses me when I sold it), Piece of SH#% Crate, , Peavy and an Ampeg. If stolen, I'd kill the thief and probably buy a 700RB combo for the extra features/power. I'm at the time in my life when I am in a quality group with quality equipment and can afford to not settle for less. It would nice to get a sponsorship from GK. I don't know what the others on here expected when they bought a used and sounds like abused amp. My opinion is that GK is a solid performer and a better value over the high dollar star name brands out there.

This is a follow up from my post below..

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CHAMPIONS!!

After seeing my last review, Dan from GK sent me an email and offered to help me out. he got on to the australian distributer, who was also incredibly helpful and understanding. the parts i needed were shipped in the next container to Oz, and then posted free of charge to my local tech (the other side of australia). all i had to do was pay for labour, which i was very happy to do!

i really can't tell you how helpful these guys were, even when my amp was out of warranty. more to the point, she now sounds better than ever, definately a keeper!!

thanks GK!

400rb-III 2X10 combo

not too bad. i had this amp for years and was very satisfied with it. has some cool features, the DI out is nice. i'm not a huge fan of the voicing filters, as they seem to change my sound only for the worse. it is built like a bit of a tank. ohh, and the cabinet is well designed. you can tip it back so the speakers point up towards your ears. that's a mighty cool feature.

i have never been truly happy with the sound of this amp. i struggled for ages to get a nice thumping tone, and ended up purchasing a Sansamp BDDI (which i thoroughly reccommend), and i finally got a tone i was relatively satisfied with. GK's do seem to have their own voice, and to be honest i have started to grow fonder of the kind of punchy funk style sound i get in conjunction with the BDDI. there's something about the onboard eq and voicing filters that just doesn't sit right with me though... not enought bottom end or something. i have used this amp with both 1x15" and 4x10" cabs, and the 4x10 has been the best option in my opinion.

ok. here's where we start to go downhill. I bought this amp new and had it for about 3 years with no problems whatsoever. then one day, one day, out of the blue, my sound just started cutting out intermittently. i took it to the local tech who re-solded the pcb board and the inputs. and it worked great. except a few months later the same thing happened again. i rang the guy and he told me to try putting a patch lead from the effects send to the effects return...and viola, it worked. then hardly used the amp for a few months and last night on a gig, it started to sound pretty terrible, and i think i smelled something burning. got through the gig and i'm pretty damn keen to sell the piece of crap now. mind you it was a work horse before these problems...

i called the music store where i bought it from and they were really helpful. i knew it was out of warranty, but the guy gave me the GK repair guy's number and said to do it through him direct, as it would cost more if i gave it to the music store, which i thought was pretty cool. i think the warranty was 12 months.

to be honest, if i could get this amp back to where it was before it started having problems, i would (will?) probably keep it. i'm gonna give repairs one more go, and if they don't fix things COMPLETELY then i'm gonna sell it and get and Eden. hmmm... i really want an eden. oh btw, i am playing a Spector NS2000/4 string, to SansAmp Bass Driver DI, to GK. i have been playing for about 6 years and am studying music at WAAPA (the West Australian Academy of Performing Arts).

5 or 4 string voicing(very sweet), contour and presence control, active eq controls (lo and high mids), direct outvery useful and transparent, preamp gain control though its marked as volume, tuning mute(!), db pad for active pickups and hot circuits(like effects), and output boost with master volume(though i think this where the gain is realy controlled. Overall I'd say this combo has good features and enough wattage for smaller volume gigs and rehersals. There is a failsafe circuit thats got a "clip" light on the front panel, this is a blessing and a curse(more on that later. All around its got goood features and is versatile for mutiple situations.

I get all the sounds i want from this bugger and they sound big when its tipped back. I play a Strad plywood stand up,an OLP MM4(passive,) a Musicman S.U.B.(active electronics,) A 5 sting Pbass copy (passive,) and Danelectro Baritone and Longhorn reissue bass through this amp. The mids and highs of this amp can real be rich and thick, and not to clicky or shrill(and Mind you i play a baritone guitar tictac style sometimes.) With the 5sting voicing engaged it's like cheating cause the low end is sooooo fat. I really like the sound of this amp ALOT, and i own three others that are good but not as good sounding overall and not half as versatile, i like having an amp that does it all, loud and overdriven to whisper acoustic.

This is my big qwiggle and i wish this amp was perfect. I bought it used so i was expecting to have maybe some issues, but not a major one right away. It failed half way through my first rehersal session. I.E. the "Clip" light came on and no sound came out! i am an experienced repair tech so i looked inside immediately and realised that the veriable speed fan went out or wasn't working in the first place. I replaced the fan which was a cheap fix($16.00), and it was easy to do unplugged and plugged in the new fan, vuallah fixed or so i thought. The fan has failed again since then and i went over it with a fine tooth comb and so has another tech, and we both found no other problems, soooo..... i hope it never goes out during a gig!

they didn't wanna talk shop on the phone but they told me where to take it to get my amp looked at for free, but the guy was 100 miles away and didn't do anything that i couldn't have. And he ended up not even installing the new fan when it went out the second time, I did it and he wanted to charge me for labor!

This amp is part of my family and an important one, so i am commited to it.

That being said it ain't perfect but sounds perfect!

Be sure to get warranty info on any gallien krueger gear you buy new. If you buy used then know a compitent tech(like me) to fix it if God Forbid it breaks. I wish I could give it a 10 but i can't, if sound alone were enough it'd be there.

GK-400RB
Used in recording and gigs through an 8x10 svt cabinet

very clean sound.
Amazingly quiet.
Great pre-amp section

Blew out after 6 months, but I was cranking it for hours almost daily, and it was underpowered for an svt 8x10
They should put protection circuitry on this amp

not worth fixing, bought 2000RB instead and am very satisfied.

playing bass 14 years. have a Sunn Coliseum, Peavey Century Custom, Randall 800, Gallien Krueger 2000RB.
8x10, 8x10E, 18-210, sealed 18 cabinets

I highly recommend GK equipment, but you need to buy more watts than you ever will use, because they do fry. The 2000RB sound is great. I think Flea uses them, I use them, they are awesome.

amp purchased 2002. The amp had a great sound until it was turned up past half for either boost, volume or master volume, and then it started to distort. The amp didnt have nearly as much power as i needed, but i had to make do for awhile with it.

As mentioned above, the sounds were good and the eq accurate until turned up past halfway. I have played it with funk, jazz, rock, reggae, and recently, metal.

This is where this amp has failed me miserably and whenever i say gallien krueger to any of the 3 repair men i know, they all shudder. When i first got the amp, i had problems with it picking up static and whatnot. It would often overpower the bass sound and make it distort. And three months ago, a few minutes after i turned it on and played it at a low volume level, it just gave out. it would not turn back on. the repair man tried putting in a new fuse, but it blew it. for three months now, he has tried many different combinations and it keeps blowing the transistors and parts he adds. And he is an authorized gallien krueger repair man. He reccommended that after he fixes it if he can fix it, i sell "the piece of junk" immediately and get another brand. He said he has always had problems with gallien kruegers because of how they are made.

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PLEASE PEOPLE, DO NOT EVER BUY ANY GALLIEN KRUEGER PRODUCTS UNLESS YOU WANT IT TO CRAP OUT ON YOU. THIS IS NOT JUST MY OPINION, THIS IS FACT FROM MY EXPERIENCE AND OTHERS FROM PEOPLE I HAVE MET, AND FROM WHAT I HAVE READ ON THE INTERNET. DO NOT FUEL THIS COMPANY WHO CHEATS SO MANY, QUIT BUYING ANYTHING THEY MAKE, THEN MAYBE THEY WILL GET THE POINT AND START MAKING BETTER AMPLIFIERS. For quality, your best bet is mesa boogie, ampeg, or swr. The most frustrating waste of money i have ever spent. I feel like i have been anally raped by this deceiving company. For the money (actually a bit cheaper) go with an swr working man's combo. Swr's combos are the nicest combos out there. or if you have the money, get yourself a mesa boogie or ampeg head and cab.