Music Man HD-130 Head

1978 MM HD 130. The amp is very versatile. Sounds good for all styles, Classic Rock, Blues, Country, Pop, and reggae. 2 channels Normal and Bass. My tech says the only way to get full power with this amp is to engage the deep button, other wise some of the bass is rolled off. One feature I really like is the series speaker outputs. This allows me to run 1,2, or 4 (4 or 8 ohm) cabinets at the same time. I have never needed any more power indoors or out.

I use all my basses 4 and 5 strings. The amp is dead quiet. I don't push the transistor front end, but when you lean on the power tubes they sound great.

When I purchased this amp the seller did not disclose its actual condition. I had to replace the power tubes and it took 5 techs to find the problem I was hearing. Bad transistor in the pre. So much for todays techs. Once it was repaired properly it hasn't given me any grief. I do carry a spare to every gig but haven't needed it.

The guys at the Ernie Ball Music Man forum are very helpful if you have questions

I've been playing for 42 years. I own a 68 EB3, Carvin LB 75, Cort headless, and a slab 51 P with a MM pickup in the P bass position. I run this amp with either one 2x12, two 2x12s, or two 2x10s and two 2x12s. If stolen I'd hunt down the thief and bury him in mine shaft. I love this amp. 38 lbs of pure tone.

1978 MM HD 130. The amp is very versatile. Sounds good for all styles, Classic Rock, Blues, Country, Pop, and reggae. 2 channels Normal and Bass. My tech says the only way to get full power with this amp is to engage the deep button, other wise some of the bass is rolled off. One feature I really like is the series speaker outputs. This allows me to run 1,2, or 4 (4 or 8 ohm) cabinets at the same time. I have never needed any more power indoors or out.

I use all my basses 4 and 5 strings. The amp is dead quiet. I don't push the transistor front end, but when you lean on the power tubes they sound great.

When I purchased this amp the seller did not disclose its actual condition. I had to replace the power tubes and it took 5 techs to find the problem I was hearing. Bad transistor in the pre. So much for todays techs. Once it was repaired properly it hasn't given me any grief. I do carry a spare to every gig but haven't needed it.

The guys at the Ernie Ball Music Man forum are very helpful if you have questions

I've been playing for 42 years. I own a 68 EB3, Carvin LB 75, Cort headless, and a slab 51 P with a MM pickup in the P bass position. I run this amp with either one 2x12, two 2x12s, or two 2x10s and two 2x12s. If stolen I'd hunt down the thief and bury him in mine shaft. I love this amp. 38 lbs of pure tone.

1974 amp, solid state pre-amp, 12AX7A driver/phase splitter, 4x6CA7/EL34 power tubes. Generates a very loud 130W.

This amp has two 'channels' a Normal (Guitar) and a Bass channel there is no channel switching, but an AB/Y switching box can be used to feed one, other or both channels at the same time, or alternately, just use a jumper cable between Input 2 on one channel and Input 1 on the other (the so called Marshall Plexi trick) and drive both channels all the time.

There is no headphone jack, no effects loop, no DI out, no tuner out, all of which was on the Traynor YBA200 that this is replacing. It does however have a 'Low Power' mode, which is not as on a Marshall something that drives the power tubes in Triode instead of Pentode mode, it actually changes the tap on the primary side of the mains transformer and lowers the voltage to the tube stages uniformly, to allow a 'browner' sound. Also a Deep Switch which affects both channels, and each channel has it's own Bright Switch. Switchable between 8ohm and 4ohm loads.

I play reggae, I play alt-rock, I also play doom/drone metal, this amp covers it all with a tweak of the Gain (Vol1 or Vol2) and a flick of the Deep Switch. I give it a 10, as I consider each of these sounds a very important feature, more important than a tuner out.

I use this amp for bass, I'm a bass player, I play guitar in my basement, I also use it for that. I used it with a 4x10, a pair of 2x15's an 18 on it's own or another 18 in a folded horn sub, with a 15 on top, a 6x12 or any of these in combination, it's a killer no matter what. I run a 5 string, non-active (I took that crap out) detuned to A and it sounds great.

As I said above it covers reggae, alt-rock and drone metal with ease.

The amp is loaded with Groove Tubes 6CA7's as it runs at a very high plate voltage (725V) and needs a hefty tube to be able to take that abuse. I believe that the tube is probably a good part of the reason this amp sounds so great.

The amp broke down once, just after I bought it, I had transported it several hundred miles in the back of my car at that point, it was a bad connection on a diode in the power supply, I had it up and running again in an afternoon. It's been fine since. Not bad for a 30+ year old amp.

I'm paranoid, I ALWAYS have a backup, even if I never need it, even if the backup is 'I'll play into the PA' never had to use it yet.

Never tried to get it repaired, Ernie Ball do not support MusicMan amplifiers beyond, supplying all the schematics. However thats more than enough, all the parts, with possible exception of the transformers are easily found and replaced. Any reputable amp repair tech should have no problems with this amp.

Never dealt with the company, all the information you need is in the Support section of their website at http://ernieball.com/

Been playing on and off 20 years. Owned Ampeg, Crate, Peavey, Sunn, Behringer, Hartke and Selmer gear.

If it was stolen, I'd do my best to track down another one, or something similar from that era.

I love the tone of it, there's not fancy controls, no presence, no switchable mid selector, no scoop or resonance, but you can get a massive range of tones from it, with just the controls provided. I hate the fact it's not being made anymore.

This was 'compared' in a sense to a modern Traynor YBA200 bass amp, which had all the bells and whistles, but sucked in tonal quality, it was a one trick pony amp, it could do clean up to a certain level and then distortion beyond that, like some kind of 15W beginners amp, it really had no balls atall. After I returned the second Traynor in disgust (first one arrived DOA) I had given up on tubes, and was looking to put together a rack system instead. I was talking to Greg in the Guitar Shop and he said, try the MusicMan, I did, it was love, I bought it before I even got the refund from Traynor (thankyou Visa), for 2/3 of the price, and it's 130W beats the Traynor's 200W by far.