Randall RH50T Head

A follow up to an earlier post ...

While I liked the smooth distortion on channel one at lower volumes, it just sounded too flubby on palm mutes. I changed speakers three times in my cab to try out something else, and couldn't get the chest pounding sound out of it that I wanted. It was no Triple XXX. The Randall sounded muddy when playing out so I ended up selling it and getting another XXX. It didn't sound bad, it didn't sound great.

Once fixed, it worked while I had it, but took a while to get it fixed

I sold it, enough said...

I purchased my Randall RH50T from Ebay as new. It is a very basic 2-channel amp with reverb and some tonal controls.

I purchased my Randall RH50T from Ebay as new. I own about other 50 other brands solid state and tube amps. Each seems to have their own characteristic in tone. Like the earlier reviewer, I was first very disappointed about the lack of mid-tone from the clean channel. This is a problem when the amp is providing too much bass and treble. However, when I lower the bass and treble, the problem has mostly eliminated. While others may view that the lack of midtone is a negative, I see that the amp has the ability to provide a very saturated bass tone. Depending on the type of music one plays, that can be a positive. I am not a native American, so I am also exposed to some non-traditional music such as Chinese Opera, and so forth. Sometimes, I find that amp to be a plus. Of course I also have other amps too. Regarding the non-clean channel, it sounds okay. Then, I am not expecting it to perform like a Marshall, Mesa, or Fender.

Regarding reliability, I think the amp is okay. However, I do not drag the amp everywhere to gig. Becasue I only purchased the amp as new two years ago. I really can not comment on how well the amp can handle abuse.

No issue yet. So I have naver contacted customer support.

Overall, the amp is different from the other amps that I own. Nevertheless, all the other amps have their own unique characteristics. While the earlier reviewer indicates that the amp lacks mid tones, I see the amp having a very good bass and treble that sometimes may be desirable for some weird music.

This is a hi-gain tube amp, 50W, directed towards heavy metal. Has a clean channel with boost, and a gain channel with 2 selectable gain presets. Footswitchable reverb and channels, clear lay-out, nothing fancy.
Unfortunately, there is hardly a middle ground between the clean and the heavy heavy distorted sounds.

I've only had this amp for two weeks since it belongs to a friend and he wasn't happy with the sound so I modded it. See "sound".
If you're looking for something versatile you can use for classic rock, blues, funk or other things, don't get this amp - soundwise.

By the way, for those of you worried about the "non-tube electronics" inside the amp: this *is* basically a tube amp, all the other stuff is for channel switching, the reverb driver, and the fx loop. So in pure essence it's a tube amp.

I see other people here like the sound of this amp; me and my friend didn't. When you turn up the master volume it starts to sound more or less usable, but when it's not wide open we found the clean channel to sound much too compressed, even nasal, and when turned up or boosted it gives a very compressed distortion.
As for the hi-gain channel, I didn't like the distortion very much. Not the heavy thumping Metallica gain, not the rocking smooth Iron Maiden thing, not the "classic amp at full blast" Black Sabbath thing. Price-wise the comparison isn't fair but my friend's Mesa/boogie dual recto, *that's* distortion. And my old fender amps, that's clean and od sounds.
This thing sounds so compressed it almost made me think it was one of those ghastly digital things instead of a tube amp.

Not to get too technical, but I found out why it sounds like that. They put 5 amplification stages before the power amp. For example, a fender bassman has 2 stages, a jcm800 has 3. But in order to keep everything under control, they have to "tame" the signal after almost every gain stage. And, to my opinion, they haven't done a very musical job at that. Mesa/boogie does it too, but their amps don't sound so damn tame and compressed - unless you really want them to.

Well, I had a go at it, and by changing a couple of component values (well, about 20 small modifications) I made the clean channel brighter and more responsive, the "boost" has a fine crunchy quality to it instead of a compressed distortion, "gain1" sounds very "classic rock" now and "gain2" is the full open distortion. Those of you who want the technical details can mail me at stefaan - at - stefaanvanslycken.be

The electronics were assembled in China. Looks like they did a decent job over all. It is - of course - not handwired so it's all built on PCBs.
Looks road-worthy.

NA, found schematic on-line.

To summarize: off-the-shelf it sounds way too compressed, lifeless, has no attack and isn't very responsive. Not an inspirational amp. It starts to come to life a bit with the volume way up, but even then there are better sounding things around.
My friend was thinking of selling it only a couple of months after he bought it because he was so dissatisfied.
The modifications I did were good enough to make it "all right" - still, it's not a m/b - so if you are stuck with one, you can make it sound better. If you don't have one yet, look for something else.

Very good features for the price:
Amplifier head with 4 ECC83 preamp tubes, 2 EL34 power tubes, 2 channeles, each with two footswitchable soundmodes, footswitchable 2 separate lead gain controls, lead channel ha s a lvel control, each channel with separate 3-band-eq, effects loop, footswitchable spring reverb, master volume and master reverb controll.
Only 2 things may be missed: presence control, jack for 16 ohm speakers.

I think the great sound of this amp is not apreciated fairly in here.

Cleansound: good and really clean with stronger passive humbuckers if volume below 13 o'clock. It is dynamic, has bell-like trebles, never sounds too sharp and feels just like a good tube clean sound if you play it. reminds me a little of a blend between fender tweed and blackface. The response to your playing is very tube-like. 9 of 10.
Clean with boost: very good crunch tone, a little like a non-master Marshall that starts to break up. 10 of 10! Best crunch sound i ever played!

Lead-channel, gaincontrol 1: Rather good, with enough drive for biting rock rhythm tone with gain1 set to 9 o'clock. gain 1 has more trebles than gain2, gain1 sounds like a JCM to me, great overtones, really pleasing, 9.5 of 10.
Gain 2 has the same amount oof drive like gain 1 but sounds warmer, has less trebles but a tad more compression. Also sounds good, but needs a little more drive to sound good. with gain between 10 and 13 o'clock you have a warm, compressed but still dynamic lead sound with great overones and artificial harmonics. 8.5 of 10.
Gain 1 is more appropriate for rhythm, gain2 for leads, imho.

All in all very god to phantastic tones, a good variety of tones, no one-trick-pony.
Sound is good for clean stuff with a little bite and kick, for driving rock, harder blues rock and old school metal like old metallica, savatage or helloween.
For softer blues it might have a little too much bite, but i haven't testing wether the EQ can change that good enough.

If your box/speaker is not sounding too dull and treble-less, the eq is more than sufficent for almost all use cases, imho.
If your box is on the dark and dull side, a presence control might be missed or a bright sitch for each channel

All in all slightly above 9 of 10, but not a full 10.

no idea, but looks stable and reliable. Rock solid cabinet with metal enclosure at the back side.

The downside.
The manual is a bad joke, the web page of Randall does not help much, questions in the randall forum often remain unreplyed.
Obviously nor Randdall employees do write in the randall forum, and in case they do they seem to very stingy with help.

The the amp would cost the double of its actual price i'd rate this 9, because it offers good and some very good sounds and enough of features.

Regarding the actual price of about 500 euro or 600 US$ tthe apropriate rating can only be a ten! Phantastic value!

Two channels, each with two functions. The clean has a boost that brightens up the tone, and the gain channel has two voicings to it. Has reverb that is foot switchable. effects loop, 4 & 8 ohm speaker outs. Its fairly light weight.

Real good lead channels. It's not a fuzzy type of distortion. More smooth. It does have some high end bite that Randall's are known for but it can easily be eq'd out if that's not your thing. Clean channel is good two, although it doesn't seem quite as loud. I honestly don't know how this didn't catch on more like Peavey's Valveking series or other chinese built amps. I think it can hold it's own against them. It's only 50W compared to the VK 100w, but sometimes having less wattage is a good thing when turning it up for tone.

Chinese built, but so far no problems

don't know

Very good amp head. The el34's have a nice tone to it. The somewhat smaller size will fit on any cabinet. I still can't figure out why these are so hard to get. I don't know if they never made many of them or Randall just isn't as marketable as the others. Who knows.

Features are listed below.

I play this mostly with a Gibson Les Paul with Burstbucker pups, but sounds good with all guitars I have. Haven't tried it live yet, but will post a follow up after hearing it out with the boys. Thing sounds fantastic. I also have a Peavey Triple X and a Peavey valveking, and the distortion is smooth and clear on channel one of the overdrive channel. Channel two gets muddy but I really only use the other. the gain I keep at around 12 or 1 oclock. It really makes me think of selling my Triple X. The Triple X has a more boomy bottom end to it, but also has that high end sizzle that's hard but not impossible to eq out. The Randall doesn't have that sizzle style distortion. I don't know if the gainiacs would find enough gain for death metal, but for rock, 80's metal it's awesome. May very well be the best sounding amp I have played through.

Came DOA from an ebayer, and it took a amp tech about two weeks to find the problem, and it's from China, so who knows. I am keeping my dingers crossed.

Manual is a joke, Randall won't respond to emails, but if you can get someone on the phone, they do have a small chance of being smart enough to help you

Been playing 12 years, see above for other amps, I currently have. Played it next to a Peavey Windsor for a comparison of el34's and the randall was way more versatile, smaller and easier to lug around. This amp, as mentioned before, really makes me consider selling off my Peavey's and going all Randall. Maybe trying out their MTS line.

I have owned this amp for 3 years and play it through a 4x12 randall cabinet. I play anything from light rock, blues to hard rock and metal. This amp can cover the range.

The amp has 2 channels. see below for comments. Footswitch allows switching between the channels and also kicking in reverb.

This amp is loud. I use it with an attentuator at home but use it without it when playing live

I play various telecasters and PRS's through this. Sounds great with singlecoils and 'buckers. The clean channel is great - very quiet and great for lighter rock / blues. The drive channel is AWESOME!!! Superb gain and quite a range of sounds depending on your taste for overdrive into full on distrortion. The distrortion is musical and not harsh. Works well live.

I haven't had any issues

I have had no need to get any support

Awesome sound for the money.

50 Watt Valve head with 2 X EL34 power valves and 4 X 12AX7 preamp valves. Clean channel with boost switch, gain channeles 2 & 3 (shared EQ and gain control for each). High/low gain inputs, 2 speaker outs and FX Loop

I'm currently using this with a Randall 2X12 loaded with Celestions and the sound quality is excellent for what I play currently in a band which is a mixture somewhere between GNR, Muse and Blink 182!. Guitar wise, I'm playing it through a Jackson DK2 and a Japanese Tokai Love Rock guitar (check these out, far superior sound wise to the 3 Gibson LP's I've owned!!!!)

It's a bit of a Jekyl & Hyde as there's a few 'niggles' which aren't an issue for me but may annoy others.

First off, the clean channel is very warm and has lots of headroom but anything above volume 6 and it will start to break up slightly. I tend to have this on about volume 8 as the cleans sounds I require don't need to be crystal clean and very tiny breakup is great for me. To balance out the distortion volume, you will only need to run the overdrive channel volume at about 3. If you click on the boost, you will get more breakup and a bit more volume.

Overdrive on this amp is absolutely awesome and is the best I've owned (I've owned loads including a Marshall Slash Stack, various marshall valve rack gear, Hughes & Kettner, Line 6, Marshall JTM etc etc) and the crunch is HUGE!!!! The sound is quite compressed (just how I like my overdrive) but this may be a reflection on running through a 2X12 and not a 4X12.

I always run through the low gain input as this thing has more distortion then you would ever need!! I tend to run the gain on about 5, Bass about 4.5, mid about 9, treble about 6 and reverb about 4. Crank the master volume up and it's absolute crunch heaven somewhere between Angus Young and Slash. I never tend to run more gain then this as I just don't need anymore despite it being on tap.

The only bad bit about the overdrive channels is the 'channel 3'. It only has a seperate gain control and everything else is shared but you can't use it as a lead boost as no matter how high you set the gain, there is absolutely no difference in volume when you switch channel so I can only presume this is for someone to use if they prefer the shape of the sound on channel 3....

I'm currently using a Behringer preamp booster through the FX loop(which is excellent) and gives me a massive volume boost that I need for soling without tainting my sound.

I'll give it a 9 as sound wise it's perfect but the features ain't perfect Randall should have left this as a straight 2 channel amp.

I've had it for about 2 months and so far it has been reliable. It did smell of burning solder when I first got it and ran very hot but seems to have bedded in now as it doesn't run as hot and no smells noted.

I'll leave this as no opinion as I need to run it for a while longer but hope I'll never have to call on backup.

Longer term, I may get another stack as the gigs we play get bigger and I can switch between two or use as the same backup

I believe the warranty on this is 3 years but so far, I've not had to call upon it.

I love the sound of this amp as it is perfect for what I play but some of the features aren't required like the gain 2 channel or possibly even the high gain input as there is absolutely loads of gain!!

If you need a hard rock valve sound then this is perfect. Metalheads may want to look elsewhere as although it has the gain, the EQ voicing on this goes as extreme as early Metallica although with a good parametric, dare I say, you would easily obtain the dual rectifier sound as it has the gain but just not the scooped mids required in standard guise.

If this was stolen, I would be absolutely gutted and would go straight out and buy another one.

For the price paid, this is a very very good amp indeed and although I got it at a discount (now the standard price), I would have paid the original price based on the sound.

High and low gain channels with two varieties of high gain plus clean boost feature. Also has hi and low inputs. Fifty tube watts is plenty loud for most venues. The four button footswitch enhances versatility for live playing.

I'm using this head with a Randall 4 X 12 cabinet loaded with Vintage 30s. This of course gives the setup lots of low end punch. I play the amp with a variety of guitars (SG, Tele); the amp produces distinctly different sounds with each pickup type (as it should), but all guitars I've tried sound very good. This amp makes a very good but not spectacular clean sound, and excellent high gain sounds. Gain 1 is great for chunky rhythm work while Gain 2 is better suited to smooth lead work. To keep the clean channel really clean you need to keep the channel level control low ("4" or less) which of course limits the volume output for very clean sounds. If you want some breakup of your "clean" sounds, the clean boost feature works well. In comparison to the Randall solid-state heads that I tried, this one is much smoother and has far richer sounding harmonics.

No problems for the first year.

Never had to use customer support.

I've been playing 25 years. I also own Marshall and Fender tube amps. This amp has it's own vibe distinct from a Marshall and other brands. That's why I bought it - for the sonic variety. I got it on a half-price clear-out sale but even at regular price it's less than half the price of a similarly powered Marshall head. As such this head is a really great value.

50 Watts, all tube. Two channels, boost on clean channel and and two flavors of gain on the lead channel. Reverb, 8 and 4 ohm speaker outs, effects loop with switchable level for rack gear and stomp boxes. External probes to check bias and the bias level of each tube can be tweaked independantly, so if your tubes aren't matched very well you can adjust for it by running them at different temps.

You get a nice collection of features for the price tag.

Using Rhoads V's with EMG's (81,60). Surprise, I play heavy metal (old metallica, Slayer, Pantera, Sepultura, etc).

With the EQ's set to noon, the clean channel is bright enough to cause cancer. Once I did some major tweaking (cut mids to about 10:30 and the highs to about 8:30), the amp has a pretty nice clean sound, somewhere between a Fender and a JCM.

The Lead channel has enough gain for the stuff I play, which is usually my first criteria for an amp. There are two types of gain: one is very tight and crisp and excellent for rhythm work (think JCM on steroids), the other is smoother (softer) and is very nice for leads.

The fuse holder broke on me, but once they sent me a replacement I was up and running and haven't looked back since.

Here's the bad part. Remember the fuse holder that needed to be replaced? Well it took them about a month to send it, and when they finally did, it was only because I raised HOLY HELL with them. Being a nice guy for a month got me no where, but once I became a total prick (see post below) they got their butts in gear and sent me the part ASAP. Sad that they couldn't just do that in the first place during the month that I was patient about it.

For the money, it's a great amp. Doesn't compare to high end amps, but it's as good or better than anything you will find in it's price range.