Hughes & Kettner Tubeman Plus Guitar Preamp

Easy to use, just a preamp, no programming involved. The only real chore is getting an eq setting that works for all 3 channels. It's doable.
I've had this about a week, and have practiced, rehearsed and recorded with it. I've gone through the return of a Fender Super 60 tube amp, the front end and return of a Tube Works combo, all with great results. I'll be trying it through the front of said Fender soon.

First off, this is a one tube preamp (the rackmount version). The tube glows a little and gets slightly warm, but this is essentially a starved plate design. If you're looking for vintage tube tone, forget it.
That being said, this sounds pretty damned good. The clean sound is pretty pristine, but in a good way. The Crunch channel can get you from Vox AC-ish breakup to a good grind. The lead channel offers very high gain for nice liquid shreddy stuff. The lead 2 button sort of spreads out the sound, takes the edge off.
The set mid boost sounds good on all 3 channels.

Only had it a short while, haven't gigged with it yet, have gigs coming up in a couple weeks, will post an update.

Been playing over 30 years.
I don't stick with gear for too long, always chasing the magic tone, never satisfied. I've had Marshalls, Boogies, Peaveys, Fenders, etc., though I have a soft spot in my heart for oddball gear like this.
Musically I'm truly all over the map, both with my cover band and with my own projects. This unit covers everything I've asked from it so far, from jazzy, bluesy stuff through classic rock to scooped mids pseudo goth and many points between.
The two things I would change would be higher voltage to the tube and individual tone stacks, at least for the clean and dirty channels if not for all three.

Takes a little tweaking of the eq to get a decent sound out of all three channels, but it's there.
Used it straight into the power amp of a Fender tube amp, and in the front end of a Tube Works Mosvalve SS amp. Worked great both ways.
Will try it soon in the front end of said Fender.

If you're expecting a classic tube sound, forget it. There is a tube in there, but just one. It does glow a little and get a bit warm, but no way is it getting high voltage. So basically this is a solid state unit with a starved plate tube for a little more warmth.
But the sound is pretty damn good. Clean is clean, even when maxed. The crunch can go from a little gritty to near metal. The lead channel is very metal high gainy, and the lead 2 button adds a nice low end boost.

I've had it for less than a week, so no guesses as to how reliable it is or isn't. This is a backup unit of sorts, bought it to replace some stomps.

I'm all over the map musically-gig with a classic rock/pop/light alternative band, and play some jazz and classic prog for musical satisfaction.
I've already practiced, rehearsed and recorded with this, and I've been able to cover those bases.
I don't know if I'd buy another, but the 3 channel flexibility offers great options.

If you can turn a knob and push a button, you just might be able to use this product. You don't need a PhD in computer science, let alone a Grade 6 equivalency diploma. The manual is pretty short, b/c there is nothing really to say. Plug in, select channel, turn knobs. That's it.

I use this for home recording. It's small and doesn't take up too much desk space.

This device very successfully models clean/dirty Fender Twin and crunchy Marshall tones. Great for blues, rock, country and even jazz with some tweaking. I can finese a reasonable Fender Tweed sound with tweaking eq on my multitrack.

Three channels. My favourite is the first channel. This is the clean channel, however ... if you crank up the volume and play with some attitude, it gives you a perfect aggressive blues/rock sound (Stones, SRV, The Jam/Old Who, etc). Just like cranking a small tube amp on stage ... except not nearly as much fun.

The recorded sound quality is very comparable or even better to close to when I mic my very bluesy-sounding 30-watt tube amp. The best part is I don't waste precious time on mic placement. Instead you can just plug in, decide what channel I want, add a little studio reverb and get at 'er.

So far so good. I've had the product for over two months and have used it for many, many hours ... but just for home recording, haven't tried it thru a PA yet.

The product is made in Germany. In other words, it's not made in Korean or Chinese labour camps (like many poor quality music products are these days).

I would love to see H&K build a higher-end version of this product. I would like an on/off switch or standby and it would be great if one could easily toss in different tubes to find new tones. I don't think all the channels need their own EQ, but if they could build that in without making this product three feet long, that'd be great.

I was looking for something to use for late evening recording to capture tube tone without waking up my wife and little boy. 95% of guitar multi-effect products make me sick. The H&K Tubeman absolutely devastates any POD or other digital amp modelling effects. I also tried out the Zoom twin-tube multi-effect product, which was very disappointing tone wise. Sure it would be nice to have some backwards guitar gimic and ping-pong delay ... but not at the price of sacrificing realistic tube tone. It makes me shudder with fear to think I was considering shelling out 3 times more to get a Studio Pod.

I needed a tube tone for direct recording and this simple little box solved that problem better than anyone else could.

this is the tubeman 2 floor pedal from the tube tools range.

its very easy to use... every 1's used a preamp before in 1 way or another, usually the controls on the front/top of ur amp!

clean, just a volume

crunch, volume and gain

lead, volume, gain and voicing

a shared parametric EQ for all 3 channels and a master volume.

round the back, 3 jacks - 1 guitar in... 2 outs.. 1's to go straight into a power amp or the power amp stage of ur guitar amp (fx return)
the other to go into a mixing desk, with the emulated line out using h&k's redbox speeker emulator.

also on the back is the power socket for the 12v input.

on the top of the unit, theres also the a footswitch for each channel.

each channel in turn, the clean, can get some good sounds from it in all its applications, be it thru a desk, or straight into a power amp.
the crunch channel goes right from crunch thru to quite heavily distorted, although not too heavily distorted, which can be quite restricting if you wanted all out gain for rythem and lead, and were saveing the lead channel for a solo boost...

also the lead channel is very good. again goes from slight gain, but goes a lot higher gain than the crunch channel, as youd expect...
the voiceing on this channel is quite special... goes from anything from "noel gallagher" right thru to a shredders dream!...

very versatile

i really trust the reliabilty of this pedal, how the pots are recessed so they wont get dammaged....

the unit its self... 10 out of 10 for the construction..

what i really can not under stand is the flimsy little power adapter for it....

i'd much prefer the transformer to be within the body of the unit, rather than on the plug! as a result, the wire is very thin, looks like it could snap at any moment!... and if the adapter goes.. its a nightmare to get a new 1!... why didnt they just put a kettle lead on it! and put all the stuff inside... if they;d done that, it'd be perfect!.... but they didnt... my power adapters broken (earth pin snapped).. so i cant use it where i practice, cos you need stuff pat tested! for the adapter, a 1

n/a

i play most styles of music... prety much anything... its not really about a style.. its about what sounds u need for a style... like i said, it covers most things...

its proberbly like a v twin...

i wouldnt buy another 1, cos ive just bought a wobo proglooper... awesome bit of kit... anyone into pedals should check it out!

i do think its an awesome bit of kit... for a back up rig at a gig... for a practice amp at home with headfones... to turn ur tranny amp into a valve state... to add extra flexability with 3 channels... for a different front end to any amp...

there amazing!... but the power supply makes it lose a points!.. and for the price of around 280 brand new?... get an orange tiny terror... a wobo proglooper.. a big muff.. ts808 (learn how to use it properly)... and go for some propper power amp distortion!... the best you'll ever hear..

so there amazing!?.. but i wouldnt get it again... damm that power supply has pissed me off!

Easy and cool in use

Yes It is noisy on 3rd channel when gain pushed to the max....
and bass freqenses are little thin.... but it is for guitar)
in all its very good pedal-preamp for metall shredding playas)))

no

i dnt need

i play metall, funky crunchy chording, it is also for warmy overdriven sounds grately, good for recording guitars in line.... very very beautiful preamp for 275 dollaros -)))

The best sounding tube preamp I used so far. I sold all my stompboxes and a rackmount guitar processor when I got this amp. I matched it with my JCM800 combo using an Ibanez RG450 guitar. I love the channel selactors where you can have a warm drive to a growling lead. But this amp is not for the shredders if they are looking for that growl, but ey it worked fine for me.

3 channel selector for clean, crunch, and lead. Upgradable to MIDI port. Rackmount with separate footswitch.

Very reliable, the footswitch was very well built.

I didn't really need customer support, I upgarded the MIDI patch at the back for my Zoom signal processor.

For today a lot of other pre-amps are out in the market probably even better. But for me this was the beast sounding tube pre-amp I used. I had thi preamp with me from 1997 to 2001.

I only have experience using the tubeman directly plugged into the poweramp of my fender combo (40W Blues Deluxe 1x12). It can sound a little harsh (maybe because the 6L6's in my amp, maybe it likes EL32 better).
The eq is very sensitive (active ?), a little change on treble can affect mids and bass too. It is difficult to find an EQ setting that sounds good on all channels, but once you have found the sweet spot it really rocks ! The clean channel can sound a little thin compared to the fender clean, but can be very usefull.

same as reviews below. 3 channels, shared EQ, amp output and mixer output.

Always worked.

I now realize how good it sounds. At some point of my life I got rid of the Twin Reverb because having it on good shape with good tubes was a pain in the ass, so it was when transporting it. I was gigging contantly and some crazy tube snob offered me 3500 bucks for it, so I sold the Twin. Then I got a nice Johnson Millenium amp for giggin'(really versatile) and a Johnson J station for recordin', and I shelved the tubeman. A month ago I was recording on a studio and I was using the J-Station and suddenly it began to sound really bad. I went home thinking that I would have to take the Millenium amp to the studio next day, then I remembered the old tubeman plus, I looked every were in my home and I found it behind the fridge (crazy, huh?) It was all rusty but I thought let's give it a chance (I was lazy enough just to think to take the Millenium amp to the studio) . The next day when I began recording with it it was like Yeeehaaa, it sounded amazing from take one. My sound wasn't that full and round in years, even the distortion was beatiful, singing like. This unit beat the crap out of the most of today amp simulators ( POD, J-Station, etc)

Made on early 90's, 19" single space rack unit. I bought it beacuse at the time I was using an old silverface Twin Reverb, and I wanted something more versatile but I loved the clean sound of the twin, so I bought it beacuse it had 3 channel and I hated what dist stompboxes did to the sound of the twin, all of them sounded awful at the time, comparing them to the tubman. This thing has 3 Channels, Clean, Crunch (both of them use the same gain control), and a lead channel (separate gain control) 3 band eq with a prescense control knob, and Clean, Crunch and Lead Volume controls. It has a power amp output, a mixer/amp output with a switch to turn on or off the cabintet simulator (surprisingly quite good, but not excellent)and a din connector for the footswitch. It uses a 12ax7 or ecc83 preamp tube wich gives it a nice tone.

As I told the thing was behind the fridge and I don't know for how long. This thing was rusty, beaten to death, but sounded amazing on studio, and I also tried on a Tech 21 Power engine 60 and it sounded great. I don't think that a POD Pro would take all that abuse and still work.

I never had to deal with H&K

I've been playin as a pro for 16 years, and I'm in love with the tubeman plus, if it gets stolen I would get another one without thinking twice.

N/A--update from previous posting; nothing has changed

This is an update of my previous 2001 review. Still the best after all these years... The new Tubeman footpedal units look like they're more flexible than the original Tubeman stomp boxes (which is why I preferred the Tubeman Plus over than the original Tubeman in the first place) but the new units don't have the presence control, switchable Lead 1 & 2 channels, midrange boost button, etc. so this one is still superior for my needs. I finally found a footswitch that works (see next section) so now I use it live as well as for recording--I play in a church where we cannot use amps (the room is too live for monitors and amps so everything is plugged in direct and we use in-ear monitors) so I plug in direct to the PA and this thing just makes my guitar explode with tone--I barely miss my amp! I also have a tube-based multieffects unit but the so-called tube tones I get from that unit pale so much to the Tubeman's that I use my multieffects board exclusively for clean effects (reverb, delay, chorus).

The noise problem I used to have when recording direct to computer has been allieviated by a Behringer noise reduction unit, so it is no longer an issue. As a result, I'll bring my original rating up a notch to a 9.

Finally put it in a portable rack, after years of it living in my gig bag. It was no more the worse for wear though and still works great.

I finally figured out that the H&K FS3 footswitch (the same one included with the Attax amps, etc.) works in this unit. I deduced this by looking at web pictures of the back of H&K's amps and noticing that the basic setup was the same as the Tubeman Plus, but I wasn't able to confirm my hunch with H&K since they never answered my question even after multiple email requests. I finally ordered one from an internet music retailer knowing that if it didn't work I was out about $60 US. However, the experiment worked and now I finally have a footpedal for this thing, so if you too are missing a footswitch, get a FS3 with confidence!

My church asked me to research our getting a Line 6 POD and/or a similar virtual amp unit so that all the guitarists can get consistent, quality sounds regardless of who is playing and whose gear is being used. Sorry, but the POD is too "digital" for my ears compared to this, even if the POD can do a whole lot more. Too bad H&K doesn't make these gems anymore or else I'd just recommend we get these too, since (1) I don't want to give mine up since it's become such an essential part of my sound and (2) there's still NOTHING out there that puts out the tone sans a real amp that the Tubeman Plus can, except maybe the VOX Tonelab which costs a whole lot more.

This is the newest tubeman preamp. For me it is as easy to use as it gets. The manual is very straight forward and simple. It actually has pictures on the different connections and set up. I can basically dial in any clean or overdrive/distortion tone I would ever need.

I use USA Hamer Daytona Strat guitars only. I simply love single coil pickup tone. These are my favorite, Duncan pro alnico II. The Tubeman is a bit noisy on channel 3 when driven hard but mostly due to the single coils. If the pickups are set for 2 pickups at once most of the noise is gone. Channel 1 is very sparkling clean and has great tube tone. Channel 2 can go from suttle tube blues overdrive to a nice a/c d/c tone. Channel 3 can go from a nice crunch overdrive to shread distortion, even with the single coils. I mostly use the tubeman straight to the pa board. It has an amazing speaker simulator. It makes my pa sound like 2 4x12 cabinets driven by an incredible tube amp. If I had a real high dollar mackie system with nice JBL speakers I think it would be the most incredible tone available. It still sounds great with my rig. If I use it through an amp there is a separate 1/4" out for a guitar amp. Being a tube preamp you have to run to the power amp in or the effects return of the amp. If you run it to the amp input which is to the preamp it sounds like crap.

Have had no problems at all in several months.

I have never needed them.

I play 60's, 70's, 80's and 90's rock. I also play old style blues and texas blues. If I get a wild hair I will play stuff like Creed or the likes. The Tubeman absolutley takes care of anything I play. It can get almost a dead on SRV tone especially after the tube is real hot. I have been playing for 22 years. I currently have a Yamaha DG 100 amp (incredible amp) and a Yamaha DG Stomp Preamp/ multi effects. I only use it for the awesome effects. If lost I would most likely get another for sure. I like everything about it. I really don't have any dislikes. I have had several preamps and distortion pedals. This one takes the cake. I have the DG Stomp as I said and it has a pretty good preamp onboard but does not have the tube tone and bite that the Tubeman has. I do wish the Tubeman had some good on board effects like the DG Stomp does. I use the Stomp as a multi effects behind the Tubeman. Give one a try, I believe you will like it as well as I do. I really don't have to have a guitar amp when gigging because this thing sounds so good through the PA system.