Bad Cat Mini Cat Combo

As several reviewers have posted negative comments about the speaker that the Mini comes with, I just had to put my two cents worth! Do any of you realize that it is the same speaker that made the venerable 1959 Fender Bassman reissue so desireable?? Obviously, the Fender Bassman is one of the most used amplifers of all time, by professionals, of course. Just ask David Gilmour from Pink Floyd! He used a pair of Bassmans in conjunction with a pair of Hiwatt SA-212s to record the Division Bell album. So my point is that it is not the speaker which is the problem... perhaps the dimunitive size of the cabinet is to blame for your lack of satisfaction.

I think the reviews for this amp on HC are slightly misleading. On its own I really don't consider the Mini Cat anything more than a really great practice amp. But it's greatness lies in it's class A, five watts, small stature, and its studio and tube preamp pedal-like uses.

On its own, as a practice amp, the Mini Cat sounds excellent. Definitely the best practice amp I've ever played and for the money, it should be. The speakers aren't the best, but are easily replaceable even though I haven't gotten around to doing so yet. The Mini Cat's greatness, IMHO, lies in a hidden (well, not really hidden, but something I haven't seen anyone on here mention) feature called the line out. I take this and hook it up to my Vox AC30 and BAM! I have amazing, all class A, Vox-meets-Bad Cat heavy overdrive tones in seconds. With an A/B box i can easily switch between the Brilliant channel on my AC30 and Normal Channel that i have the Mini Cat hooked up to. I do wish there was a bypass switch for the Mini Cat so If I ever needed this combo for live use i could have 3 different channels (AC30 Normal without Mini Cat overdrive, with Mini Cat overdrive, and brilliant channel). But the Mini Cat/AC30 overdrive sound is magical. It's like the heaviest AC30 breakup you could imagine and then some. The Mini Cat combined with the magic of those Vox blues just works wonders.

Now I understand few people would be able to afford this combo. But if anyone ever gets a chance to try it, definitely take the chance to do so. The line out is also extremely useful for recording. Though I haven't gotten heavy into that yet, I have dabbled in it and it makes it a breeze.

I've rarely heard a bad word about Bad Cat's reliability. Plus they come with great warrantys.

Never dealt with them.

I've been playing for 7 years, right now I own the Mini Cat, the AC30, and a stand by DSL40. For guitars I have my trusty USA Deluxe Strat and Les Paul Custom and I think that's all I'll ever need. I love it's line out function. Quite frankly I think that's it's best feature. I bought it looking for a great practice amp and found a partner for my AC30. The only thing I wish it had was a better speaker. But for this size I'm not complaining.

This is a review of my new, July 2004 Mini Cat. It is a vrey versatile 5 watt pure class A tube amp enabling all genres or styles of play from clean to dirty. Clean ballads to SRV to Guns and Roses are capable with this little guy. It is a single channel, non effects loop amp but does have a line out for recording if you like, capability to power other cabinets and use amp as a preamp, or it has a headphone jack. I mostly use this amp as an expensive but worthy practice amp. Sure you could gig with it but it would definitely need to be miked. It has a volume, bass, treble, and master volume control utilitzing industry standard chicken head knobs. With only one 12AX7 preamp tube and one EL84 power amp tube, bias never needs to be done, and all you need are spare tubes and you are ready to go. An effects loop would have been nice, but not sure there would have been room for it since it is tiny. 14" X 14" x 7".

I use 3 different Strats from 77' to 04' all set up different from heavy blues only to a Highway One with a Seymour JB jr. and Lil 59'. I also play 2 Les Pauls, one a 92' customized Standard with Patent Sticker in neck and Seymour Antiquity at 8.64K in bridge as well as a 03' Gary Rossington Signature model 59' with Burstbucker #2 and #3. Amp sounds great with any of these guitars. It is quiet as can be, much more so than I imagined. The speaker that Bad Cat uses is WEAK at best. A Jensen P10R is an ok speaker, but if you dime the master and run the preamp volume higher than 5 or 6, this speaker sounds bad. I replaced it with a Jensen NEO 10"/100 watt speaker which is a great choice for this amp. You can dime this amp now and the speaker growls. For a small cabinet, I think you get all the sound you can get with this little amp. Tube breakup tones are wonderful now. I give it a 7 in this category because of the cheesy issue speaker it comes with.

It is very well built as I've had it apart changing speakers. As I said before, carry spare tubes and you are fine.

As with any boutique manufacturer other than Soldano (who has great customer service btw), Bad Cat did get back with me but answered my email question poorly.

I've played since 16, but smart enough to fly jets for a living, so on and off for 28 years. I also own a Soldano SLO-100 and Lucky 13, both 100 watt AB heads, a THD cabinet, and a multitude of boutique effects by Fulltone, SIB, Ibanez, Ernie Ball, and Peterson. I love the portability of this amp, the tone it has, and the options available. Tone costs money, nothing is free, and these manufacturer's deserve what they ask for with their pricing in most cases. It is an expensive little amp, but if you want a great tube practice/recording amp, this one is by itself. Is it that much better than a transistor amp the same size at $600.00 cheaper? Absolutely. Once you play a Bad Cat, you'll have to have one, and this is coming from a die hard Soldano guy. Nothing touches the SLO 100 period, but can't practice perse' at low volumes or with a headset with that one.. lol

Hope this helps in your decision.

This is a comment on my earlier review. The amp is still great
sounding. BUT, if I have the master volume over 2 o'clock and
gain over 10 o'clock then I can play for about 30 minutes before
the amp wants to have a break for about the amount of time. It just
stops creating any decent sound, it just pops and blops and hiss.
It I turn down the master volume then it works ok, but the sound is
good only with the master volume up.

If it just could work for at least one hour...

First off, understand that my high rating in the feature category means that this amp does what I expect it to. I wasn't looking for channel switching, reverb, etc. I was looking for a basic amp with great tone. Others have gone over the features.

I use a Paul Reed Smith Standard 24 with stock pickups. I play all sorts of styles, but mainly rock and pop. I grew up on The Beatles, and oddly, this amp does great British tones. It's a dry sound, not the bubbly Fender sound. More British in character which suits me fine. The small cabinet means you don't get a huge sound, but I'm using this amp for recording with a mic stuck right in it's face and it does well for that. The overdriven pre with the master down is great, and pushing it to power amp distortion is greater still. This is one loud little amp, forget cranking it at 1 AM unless you are on a farm. I find I don't need the amp loud to get good tone. It does a very nice clean tone, and I mean clean, not partially distorted. Playing with your fingers instead of a pick really shows off the clean tone of this little guy. The distortion is not metal, more like a Hi Watt breaking up, although I will say I have not had the amp long enough to explore all of it's possibilities in that area. With an extension speaker cab, I have a feeling this amp would be amazing, as it is, the only weakness is the fact that we are talking about a very small cabinet here. Think Champ.

Someone else mentioned how quiet this amp is, and boy, they are right. It is a dream to record with. DEAD quiet. You don't know it's on.

I don't gig, this is strictly studio. It is made like a brick you know what. I get the feeling it's as dependable as any hand made tube amp ever made, and probably more so. I do intend to order a couple of tubes for backup, of course.

I called them once, and the head man (Jim? forgot his name!) answered. He talked for a long time, was very patient, and I felt like he gave a darn. He even took another call, and came back and talked some more. This was before I bought it.

Been playing since 1962. A long time. Been through lots of amps. I think Bad Cat amps sound better than anything out there for what I do (rock and pop). If I was doing death metal I'd get a Marshall and a MESA and go deaf. But I love the Bad Cat sound. If it were lost or stolen I'd buy it again.

This is one pricey little box. I like well made things that do what you want them to do. I like class acts. This is definitely one of them.

Brand new. Volume, Master, Tone, Bass. Single channel, Headphone, Speaker out (very cool). Very loud. Same speaker as Fender Bassman's quartette. Peeked inside, looks good and solid. Big price. Looks like a stocky chihuahua next to other amps

I use PRS and ceramics from different companies. High, clear output. The amp is really quiet, even in situations where it didn't actually have to be. It just sort of sits there waiting for a signal. I used the extreme tone in front of it, but that was asking a bit too much of the speaker. I ran it through an 8ohm Marshall cabinet and that was the trigger. It screams and will even dare to replace a living room monster you're using at volumes level one. This little dude and a marshall box is the ticket. Or you can mic it. I put a Celestion G10 in mine. Ceramic speakers seem to work better with it if you play rock . The marshall solves everything except transport issues, of course. That's the ticket.

Replacing the Jensen with a favorite ceramic takes just a moment.

The distortion is useful, but there's no reverb and so the order gets messed up. I use pedals. It'll do what you want, but smaller.

It's nicely built and you can give it to your kids later. It's the quality that comes along with that price. They'll hopefully expand the line to include more features, though. I haven't notice any weaknesses in this area. It's quite over-built.

Nice guys. Answer questions on the phone. Frindly. Not rushed or hectic. Sorted everything out.

Been playing for a few years. I've had my ears all my life, so I know what sounds good. I'd replace it if it were ripped off. If you're nor shopping for this price, you can always get something else. I was happy to find this class, versatility and build quality for this price. Too expensive? For you guys, there's always Peavey.

This review concerns the new Bad Cat Mini Cat, color creme, with creme knobs graciously thrown into the package by the wonderful folks I bought the amp from. It's a very simple amp in terms of knobs, but what's really amazed me is how versatile it is...just a few minutes of playing around with the settings makes you realize what a great array of tones this amp can create! So I guess I like the simplicity. I also love the fact that it has a headphone jack on the back, and that the speaker can be unplugged so you can record directly, or even hook up a larger cabinet! I haven't used either of these features yet, but I like having the options. I also love the fact that this amp is basically a hand-wired point-to-point piece of art. I looked at lots of cheaper, mass-produced models like the Peavey Classic 30, Fender Pro Jr., Blues Jr., and even an Ampeg, but I found the build quality of each of these companies to be very variable, and the features lacking. And most of these mass-produced models use circuit boards and other such difficult-to-repair components, making it much less likely that they'll pass the test of time. That's why I shelled out the extra coin for the Bad Cat. It's like an investment in a way.

I'm mainly using my new Agile 3000 prestige Les Paul copy, which sports Wilkinson Alniko V pickups. These pickups are unbelievably noiseless, and so is the Mini Cat! What really amazes me about this amp though is the unbelievable diversity of tones it can create. With the 12AX7 pre-amp stage turned down to 2 or so, and the master cranked up towards the max, this kitty puts out crystal clear, sweet clean tones. But if you want to dirty it up, just crank the pre-amp stage towards the max and you get amazing tube distortion! I actually prefer it at lower volumes, so I'll turn the master way down to 2 or 3, and I still get a very dynamic, musical distortion that responds very well to pick attack and playing technique. The more I use this amp the more I'm impressed by what it can do!

This thing is built like a rock. The cabinet build itself is pretty impressive, with a cool leather handle and silver buckles, along with heavy duty reinforced corners. I expect it to last a lifetime.

I haven't had any dealings directly with Bad Cat. My only complaint is that it took a good month to get my amp sent from the factory to the dealer I bought it from, but admittedly this was during the holiday season, and the Mini Cat is relatively new. In any case, it was worth the wait!

Like I said above, I shopped around for months looking for the perfect small home-friendly amp that I could use for recording as well. I tried Peavey, Fender, Ampeg, Marshall, etc. etc., but nothing came close to the Mini Cat in terms of features, quality, and ultimately tone! Unfortunately the Bad Cat also cost literally TWICE as much as most of the mass-produced models I tried. In the end though I think it's definitely worth it, because the tone is superior in my opinion, and also because this amp is much more likely to last due to it's P2P construction. The other comlaint I have concerns Bad Cat's color choices. If you look on their website you see that they have LOTS of cool color options, even including sparkle vinyl and some suede choices! But it turns out that you can only get a few of the "basic" colors for your $650-700, like black, creme, or that army green they have. If you want anything more flashy like the sparkle vinyl, there's a pretty hefty upcharge of at least $50 if I remember correctly. So I had to draw the line and just get the creme colored amp, which actually looks pretty hot with the creme knobs. I just think the plain colors, especially black, look kinda cheap and don't do the Bad Cat name justice. I also wish the Bad Cat logo lit up like all their other amps do. Still, this amp is unbelievable, and I'd buy one again in a heartbeat! (if I could afford it)

'03 Bad Cat Mini Cat. Features have been well covered by the other reviewers.

Sold the amp after a few months of disapointment. Sounds like an overpriced "farty" sounding amp with very few, overly sensitive interactive "sweet spots" between volume and tone. IMO Bad Cat is trying to do too much with too small a cabinet and charging too much for the product. Frankly, decide for yourself. Play the amp before buying it...at varying volumes. It doesn't sound good unless cranked,and even then is just good. $900 should go farther. I sold this for a Savage Macht 6 (yes...slightly larger cabinet but similar price-point and night and day sound quality.)It's all subjective so don't buy this amp based soley on my (or anyone's review).

Played it w/ LP's strats, PRS's w/ P-90s.

Seems very solidly constructed.

Better options are out there. I switched to a Savage Macht 6 for mid-volume practice, small gigs and recording, and own an old Tweed Champ for portability, practice & recording and a Matchless Phoenix 35 for larger gigs.

Not a bad amp -hence the "7" but better choices do exist IMO, I think some of the reviewers are kidding themselves or intoxicated by their boutique spending habits:). Again, don't buy it without playing it first.

2003 Minicat combo in sexy green tolex. One channel, 4 knobs (volume, master, treble and bass), 5 watts, 2 tubes (El84 power and 12AX7) and three ways to get the sound out (headphone jack, recording out and Jensen alnico 10" speaker that can be unplugged without frying the amp). No reverb (totally unnecessary in my view given the 3-D quality and harmonic content of the tone -- with a Strat on the bridge pickup it does a lovely surf tone even without the reverb). No FX loop (might have been nice in theory but I wouldn't want it if it sucked any of the beauty of the tone out which is probably why it was left off). Plenty loud for 5 watts -- as discussed below, the best sounds involve turning it up at which point it's a little bit louder than an un-amplified loud singer -- too loud for 2am at home but not ear-destroyingly loud. For its principal intended purpose, which I presume to be recording, it's got the things I care most about (mostly tone . . .).

The basic tone ranges from a crystal clean with lots of high-end definition (some might find it too trebly but I definitely don't and that high end makes the tone really stand-out in a mix) to a mild overdrive that sounds like the power tube breakup you get when you crank a clean amp. It doesn't come close to a metal tone but when you run it hot you can easily control the level of overdrive with pick attack (also with the volume knob but when you can do it with the pick alone -- even better). Well, actually, if you *max* the volume and master you get a pretty overdriven sound but I think it farts out a little when you drive it that hard -- I prefer to set the volume and tone between 1:00 and 3:00 for a really dynamic tone that cleans up easily and can break up beautifully when you hit hard. I'll note that, even when maxed out, it's incredibly quiet.

As you might expect from 5 watts and a single 10" speaker, the bass response is lacking relative to an amp with a more substantial power section (hence the "farting out" when everything is on 10 described above). The bass knob is a bass cut (i.e., when you turn it clockwise the bass goes away rather than up) and I tend to run it at 9:00 all the time. The trade-off is that you can run it pretty wide open without having outrageous volume -- which for recording is great.

I have played this with 3 guitars: a PRS Custom 24, a Fender Roadhouse Strat (an American Standard with the SRV "Texas Special" pickups) with a maple fingerboard and a Gibson "faded" double-cut Les Paul with P-90s (a surprisingly sweet little guitar given that it's extremely no frills). All sound great. In particular, the PRS is terrific with this amp -- the single coil settings sparkle and the bridge humbucker setting is fat but still has great high-end cut and definition.

The headphone out is a nice feature -- obviously without a speaker in the signal chain, the sound is much more trebly and has more high end overdrive so it's a different sound (that raw sound always reminds me of Steve Albini's tone). Good for late night practice as, although it's not a purely conventional tone, it's still really dynamic. I've also used the recording out to drive the clean channel of a Hot Cat and that sounded great -- basically the same tone as the Minicat but at lower or higher volumes (I didn't run that settup with the Hot Cat up really loud as it does just fine on its own when you crank it but I was curious and tried it out at living room levels).

I give the tone a 10 -- it doesn't do everything but what it does is really inspiring -- an unbelievably pure and dynamic tone that delivers the sound of your guitar and all of your playing nuances in a really expressive and musical way. Really inspiring tone.

Had it for about 3 months without issue. Supposedly, Bad Cats are built to be very rugged but I can't speak from personal experience on this.

Called once to discuss the merits of NOS tubes in this amp and they were very friendly and helpful -- I don't know who I spoke to but from prior posts I'll bet it was the "Head Cat".

I've been playing about 8 years and this amp really rocked me. I played a gig shortly after I bought it and used it with a Soldano -- miked the Minicat with an SM57 and ran it through the PA and A/Bed with the Soldano using the Minicat as a clean channel (well, clean relative to the Soldano . . . ) and that worked just great. In fact, a couple of months after I bought it, I decided to take the big $$$ plunge into the Hot Cat and I sold my Soldano and a Hughes & Kettner Puretone (also a sweet and sadly underappreciated amp -- clean tone nearly as good as Bad Cat but the Hot Cat gain channel blows everything away) to pay for it. I'm 100% bought in to Bad Cat products now -- I feel like I really found my tone with these two amps (the big one for performing and the little one for recording).

I had considered buying a vintage Fender Champ for recording and around the house practice for a long time but my experiences with old amps I've owned and used in the past worry me -- in my experience with some of those the tone will be awesome one day and flat the next and things start to break down and I just haven't found an amp repair person that I'd trust with great equipment. The Minicat is a kind of a different tone than a Champ -- more Vox bright and more dynamic I think -- but it delivers the same kind of thing -- pure, pure tone and the ability to crank it without killing your ears -- personally I find I like the Minicat tone better but that's a personal view -- I won't deny that a sweet old Champ is awesome.

I'll give a 9 overall -- the biggest drawback of this gear is the price -- it ain't cheap -- for $400 it'd be an unequivocal 10 but unless you have serious bank you've gotta think two or three times at least before laying out $800 for a 5 watt amp. I'm totally glad I did and would replace it if it were stolen but that is, admittedly, a lot of coin.

As far as features are concerned, there are not very many knobs, but there are many ways of connecting it. As the manual (a sheet of paper) states: Independant LINE OUT and HEADPHONE OUT function with or without Jensen speaker in operation. The Jensen can be unplugged on the back panel. Can use the LINE OUT for direct recording to desk with or without speaker as monitor, or use as tube preamp pedal to fatten-up or seriously overdrive a second amp. Those of you who like the sound of integrated spring reverbs, remember, this one only comes without reverb. This amp measures 16" high, 14" wide, 7" deep and weighs in at only 19 LBS. Do I wish this amp had chanel switching, effects loops or any other features? Not really, this is a great recording amplifier, not a gigging amp (not with this kind of wattage anyway).

I'm only using guitars with single coils - 2 SRV strats, and 2 G&L Legacy strats. Seeing as I already own a 1959 Fender Bassman reissue, I thought it would be great to own an amp that I can exploit to its full potential (volume-wise) considering that I live in a condo. The volume levels are very reasonable, however there is not very much gain in the preamp section. To get any sort of heavy crunch, you must crank up the master volume which can make this small amplifier seem somewhat loud for my purpose. The amp is not noisy at all either. A great benefit to me was using this amp as a pedal in front of my Bassman reissue - still too loud for my neighbors, but what a fantastic distorted tone!!! The Mini cat on its own has a great vibe to it too, especially when getting the output tube to distort. By the way, no matter what anyone says, two speakers are better than one, and 4 are better than 2. However, I believe the purpose of this amp is for recording - in which case, one speaker ought to do the job. I'm giving this a 9 in the sound category. It would have got a 10 if it would have had reverb...

As with any tube amp, it is only as reliable as its tubes. Carrying spares would be smart. By the way, since it is only a single output tube and in class A, no re-biasing is necessary when changing the tube. Nor do you have to buy a matched set seeing as there is only one tube to begin with. There are still many point-to-point amps from the 1950's in service today, so one can only assume that this one will stand the test of time. In any case, it is a very new model and no one can really tell for certain.

I did call a couple of times to get info on the Mini cat and they were extremely helpful. I did not feel like they were trying to answer as fast as they can to get rid of me or anything. Just plain good old fashioned personalized service.

I have been playing and recording guitars for about 15 years. As equipment goes, I own 2 SRV strats, 2 G&L Legacy strats, 1959 Fender Bassman reissue, Peavey Classic 30, Matchless Dirtbox preamp pedal, POD version 2.0 and PODxt, and about 2 dozen pedals. I love the way the Mini cat breaks up and manages to keep definition in playing chords and single notes. The only bad thing I can say is that I would have enjoyed having reverb built in. As everyone knows, if you use a reverb pedal in front of this amp, you cannot use the overdrive or distortion from the amp. The sound of reverb before distortion or overdrive is simply horrible, therefore you must use a distortion or overdrive pedal AND the reverb pedal in front of the amp. Now, I know that I can add reverb while recording at the desk, but I would have loved to use the amp for practice with reverb too...