Laney HCM30B Combo

I use it for practice at home. Made in 2002 but stores keep selling them. Looks that many amps is stil avaliable. It has everything. 30W is a little to less for getting rich bass, but one time I plug in 15" inch 300W box and that was way better.

I use it with squier jazz bass and playing rock, country, blues... I like the Dire Straits kind of bass sound. Clean, low...
At high volume with full bass of course it's getting distorted. Generaly maybe to much middle freq for my taste.

Never broke anything.

One year warranty.

Playin this thing almost a year. I also own Laney RBG500 300W. I started to like Laneys a lot. I was comparing everything in class of 30W and I think this is the best for money.

Lots of features on this little thing. More than others like it for budget price!

Sound quality is ok. I just use it as a practise amp so im not looking for amazing sound out of it. But it does have a fair amount of EQ options on it. You can get an ok sound.

Haha, now this is why i wanted to write this review!

This thing is amazing! I've had it for about 4-5 years now and havent had a single problem. And in those 4-5 years i think ive only not had it cranked to 10 (practising with a loud drummer) about 4 times. Still works fine.

Its fallen of the back of a car at about 20 mph. Still works fine.

Its been thrown/droped/kicked/had beer spilt into the wiring. Still works fine.

This thing really is a Hardcore Max!!!!

Good little amp. Good for beginners, or practising. And as ive said, it is Hardcore!

This amp does the job for me - spent a lot of time trying to find a bass amp that a) had a simple compressor b) had a line out. In 30W amps in the "small practice amp range" this appears to be rare.

The line out is a neccesity to me, I can run a cable to my mixer and I can't understand why amp manufacturers don't just put them on as standard, its not rocket science!!

CONTROLS L-R
Active Passive input jacks
Compressor switch / gain control
3band EQ pots with swept mid
Volume control pot
"Line in" phonos
Line out Jack jack
Ext. speaker jack
Headphoens Jack
Power switch and led.

Laney seem to have done very well for a budget amp, fully featured like a bigger amp.

I'm playing an 1980s Ibanez Roadster through this, the sound flexibiltiy is good EQ is more than flexible enough. The compressor adds good punch if used carefully, but sometimes takes a little too long to recover from "clicky" type playing e.g. with pick. With fingers and slap/tap it sounds good.

Its pretty loud, and clean and neutral until it gets really pushed at the top end of the volume control. Mine appears to be free of rattles and buzzes.

Never broken on me yet. Seems solid.

Never dealt with them and brought secondhand

I like this little combo, fits my needs well - I have a small space so its compactness is ideal for me. Its fine for small accoustic practices, and for bigger gigs will hook into a mixer/PA and double as a monitor.

I wish it had a better compressor, or attack control, but for the money, its good it has anything at all.

The Laney HCM30B is a useful and versatile little amp haing a 10" speaker and about 30 strong watts of power. It has active or passive input, a compressor, CD input, headphones, direct out, and an external speaker out which would cut out your dual ported 10" speaker. Controls are sweepable equalization with bass-mid-treble, compressor gain, and volume. As of this writing, my little solid state Laney bass amp is 2 years old.

I only use a Yamaha RB170 with this unit for practice; but that is what it is--a practice combo. (I play all instruments and all styles) It sounds good for what it is, but few, if any practice bass amps with 10" speakers will give you earth shaking bottom. The swept eq. controls will give you most any type of sound you want. Where this unit really shines is when you use the compressor (this should always be engaged) and take the line out using a Y cord to a power amp. Now you have a preamp with a great compressor and the power of the Laney amp pushing the 10" speaker for your high notes. Run that line out through your Y cable into a stereo power amp and push your 18, or 2x15's, or whatever and you will have an excellent bass rig! You will most likely have to push the gain (first control knob) a little high to get enough level for the direct out, but don't overdo it on the sweepable eq. section. You can put the actual volume control on about 4 or 5 depending on the strength of your bass guitar output.(I have not used this setup with the ACTIVE input whatsoever; if you use the active pickup input with this setup, I would like to hear how it does) Anyway, using the setup mentioned above, you can get a practice amp that can serve as a preamp to a larger rig, and the compressor, using the direct out, will protect your big speakers if you use common sense settings. Caution should be used when adjusting the gain control in the sweepable eq. section. Since I have a Yamaha bass, I actually had to keep the gain in the sweepable section in the negative area while boosting the bass; the Yamaha has little bass. I'm sure a P-Bass would need quite different settings, but you would get all of the benefits I have mentioned above. I would recommend never using any volume control on a combo amp over the level of 5 unless you have a very weak set of pickups. With any combo amp, you can bring up the volume until you start to hear distortion or breakup, then you should back off by a 1 number increment and never go past that level with that instrument. Your volume control should only be set to where there is still good sound. It goes numerically higher to compensate for weak pickups or weak input. You will serve no legitimate purpose by running any ampilfier too hard! If you want to crank out 500 watts all night long forever, get a good 1000 WATT amp. There are other reasons why this little amp is so versatile and useful. Using the compressor and the line out, you will be able to protect your big stereo amp and large speakers from harmful instantaneous transient peaks. (I take the line out to an AB 900 amp pushing two Eminence Omega 15's in a large cabinet) Large peaks can destroy your voice coils before you can snap your fingers! As a bass player, this should be one of your biggest worries. Using this little Laney correctly, you can avoid this from ever happening. No, I do not work for Laney. But this amp also doubles as a good acoustic or decent electric guitar amp. If I had another one, I could put my old Peavey Envoy guitar amp in the trash where it belongs! I have been in the music business for 40 years, and I think Laney has great sound, value, and innovative features.

This is a well made, solid little amp. I trust it completely, but I have never had to deal with Laney. I would use it for gigs in the configuration mentioned above. (You should always have a backup because you never know when someone might pour a beer on your amp)Yes, you would have to stomp them for this act of stupidity.

I do not even know how long the warranty was in force. Unless you got a lemon, you would probably never need warranty service anyway. Most amp problems show up quickly. Some amps have thin boards and lots of bad solder joints. (like Crate, but if you can fix them,they will crank!) As previously mentioned, I have never had to deal with Laney service.

I have done it all, from playing large concerts to small clubs, midi recording, composition through music theory, hard disk recording, sound and light company, electronic repair, network engineer, college honor grad, spiritual advisor...the list goes on and on.(Damn, I 'm burned out) I have owned enough gear to fill up a railroad boxcar, but if I lost this LANEY HC30B, I would surely buy another, or find someone who had one I could buy. I took a chance when I bought it on EBay two years ago, but life is all about taking chances. I rate this amp as a 9 overall, because nothing is perfect. It is a good little amp! Compare, and make your own judgements.