Behringer AC108 Vintager Combo

Has very usable tone controls, gain, CD input, headphone jack, control button for mids, lightweight 15W 8" with a tube preamp.

For the price paid and the fact that it is a practice amp ... I should give it a 10.

1970's made in Japan Telecaster - all stock. I play blues and blues based rock from 1960's through 70's. This is a practice amp so all comparisons/opinions start from that point. You look at other small practice combos below $75 and this thing sounds the best - period.

The preamp tube definitely colors the sound. Play with the gain, volume and tone controls to find the sweet spot. This thing blows away anything with an 8" speaker that I have ever tried.

My favorite thing to do is jam with people with thousands of dollars worth of gear. I walk in with $165 worth of gear and watch the looks on their faces when they hear me open up.

Hasn't broken down in the month or two I've owned it. Time will tell....

I'll submit another post if it breaks down.

Don't know. Warranty is something like one year, 90 days for speaker, 30 days for tube if memory serves.

For $60, I'd probably just buy another one if I damaged it.

I've owned several practice amps (and tried many others)in the last 30 years of playing. I don't expect much in terms of quality sound and I'm still often disappointed. Crate might as well stop making practice amps because these things will sell like crazy. $60!!!!

This amp is different. The quality of sound, the features and the price are really unbelievable. But it is really great for jams with buddies or living room rockin'. I would still like a half watt boutique amp but now I'm in no hurry to get one. I may use that $500 I saved to get lessons, go to concerts or buy other guitar gear. As far as practice amps go, I'm very satisfied!

'05
China
Great Champ style howler, only louder.
Good Blues tone, plus it has some clean headroom on the clean channel if you turn the bass down.
I use it for Jazz with an archtop in intimate settings.
No reverb or footswitch jack, but it does have a headphone jack.
The speaker sounds good and can take quite a bit of volume. It says 20 watts on the speaker. The amp is 15 watts.

It hums a little.
Has a channel switch kinda like a Fender, and a fat switch too, like a Fender.
It switches between the tube (12AX7) and the clean channel, which doesn't seem to use the tube. Has a Gain knob and a Master Vol, as well as a bass and a treble tone pot.
The jacks are steel.
It gets pretty distorted, but the speaker is probably the weak link. It don't take too much bass, so it can get kinda buzzy if you're really trying to get mondo distortion, but the louder you turn it up the better, you have to turn down the bass at some point though, or the speaker starts hitting the stops and sounds rude and flabby.

One month so far. No problems.

No experience

20 years.
I have other amps, but this one is handy small, like a lunchbox.
Sometimes I use a processor to get reverb.

I love it: it's small, sounds great, and is loud enough for jams. If it were mic'd it wouldn't have any limits. Use a processor and get every sound there is.

'05 Made in China, designed in Germany, 15 watt "practise" guitar amp.
1 preamp 12AX7 tube.
4-ohm 8" Behringer speaker.
A real metal 1/4" inputs and phone jack and lock nuts on steel chassis (yay)!
No reverb.
Minimalistic approach with good tone and volume for the type.

Using a stock (single coil pickups) Fender AV '52 RI Telecaster I love the sound it gets from quiet turned down (but not thin sounding), to loud enough and good sounding enough for live performance.
The character of the Telecaster cuts through very well and there's a good tone range available by switching modes and adjusting the knobs.
Gets a big hollow sound on the neck pickup, and the crisp bridge pickup can be controlled without losing its liveliness.
Great for Blues at small club levels with just enough "grit" for nice feel and emotional expression.
The speaker can be a bit farty if you get loud with the bass rolled up too far, but that doesn't mean you have to roll off all the "guts." I just turn the bass down until the speaker can deal with it, and it sounds pretty full range still.

I cut the speaker wires and hooked it up to one of my sons friend's Marshall 4 X 12 cabinets in 4 ohm setting and it was quite a bit louder and fuller.
It would not be a waste to run a 4 X 12 cab with this amp. It's quite viable as a guitar amp you could gig a medium size club with when used this way, but that won't make it sound like a Marshall or Metal rig. But it was eye opening.
15 watts pushing a lot of speakers can be very loud and usable far above "practise amp" class.
Overall I really like the sound and output level of this lil' ol' amp.
It makes me wonder why boutique amps are all the rage when you could buy one of these once a year (the warranty length) for twenty years and be money ahead.
Sounds like premium components to me

1 year warranty.

I've been thrashing it for 5 or 6 weeks with no troubles.

The speaker seems to take it pretty well without any trouble signs.

No experience

Started playing guitar in 1960.
I've had about everything through many eras, but prefer Telecasters through small "tweed" sounding type amps.
Fender Champs don't have enough volume for me, and these sound good to me (I have bought a second, and sold my 60 watt combo amp, as it just sat in the car as a spare since I like this/these so much).

This is actually a viable amp for performance, given that a Tele can "cut through" while the guy with a HR Deville needs more power for his "thick" sound.
In a band, this does OK as long as the volume wars don't blow the room out.
I bought the second just in case I need more power someday, as I've been at the limit with this (but got through).

Bought this amp new in Feb. 2004. Single channel, 15W practice amp with 12AX7 preamp tube, 8" speaker, open back cabinet. Very simple controls: master vol, gain control, bass and treble knobs. There is a shift button (on/off) which effects the mid-range freq. and a gain button (on/off) which enables the gain control. Headphone out and CD input are also included. Great vintage look with chicken head pointer knobs and white piping around the speaker cloth.

I use it in the classroom with a 5th grade jazz/rock combo. Plenty loud in this venue.

The "hand selected 12AX7 vacuum tube" used in all the marketing for this amp is over-rated IMHO. It's only in the pre-amp section and most of what you hear in the output section, or power-amp section is solid state. It still has some good features for the price.

When I plugged in this amp out of the box, it was noisy. Lots of hiss. Annoying not vintage, at any volume. I solved this problem by swapping out a new tube which I'll explain below...

I use this amp with a Mexican made Strat and a Squier Custom Tele with a single coil neck p/u and a humbucker at the bridge. I am impressed with the variety of sounds you can dial in with this amp. When the gain button is off, the gain control is disabled and you have a nice clean sound that is plenty loud with the master volume turned up all the way. The shift button seems to boost/cut the mids in this configuration. Bass and treble do a decent job.

With the gain button on and the gain control enabled, you have your typical solid state distortion that can get pretty ugly past 5'oclock. With a lower gain tube, I think the distortion is manageable and works well for blues or classic rock. The shift button and bass/treble knobs give you several eq options again in this configuration. I have not used the headphone jack or CD input.

Too soon to tell. It's built well and I would not be worried if it were dropped, which is a concern for me since I work with kids who tend to be clumsy with equipment.

I had been doing some mods on another tube amp I own, and decided to contact Behringer about swapping in another tube. They politly informed me that this was to only be done by a qualified service tech blah, blah, blah voided warranty etc. With screwdriver in hand, I swapped the "hand selected" 12AX7 with a "hand selected" (meaning, I used my hand to take it off the shelf at my local music store...) 12AU7 tube. This lower gain tube solved the annoying noise problem and made the gain control much more manageable.

*Email me if you want more details on how to do this. Warning: it will void your warranty with Behringer.

If you know something about electronics, you might be able to reduce the initial hum by twisting wires and all the other simple tricks I've only heard about and never tried.

I have been playing guitar for about 3 years. Teaching music for over 20 years. I own several other practice amps and modelers: roland microcube; behringer vamp 2 and korg ampworks. My Crate VC508, a 5 watt, single 12AX7 preamp tube and a single EL84 power tube amp combo with an 8' speaker, when played side by side with the AC108, the Crate sounds louder and fuller- but for the price, I think the behringer is a good deal, if you can reduce the noise factor.

I like the simplicity of the controls. As a first amp for a new guitarist, it's a winner. I plan to use it as a teaching tool so my student guitar players who use it have to learn how to actually dial in a sound rather than choose a preset.

It's a new amp from Behringer (january 2005). It's a 15 W combo amp, in a 8" speaker. Very simple, but designed with a 12AX7 tube as preamp. The tube can't be seen from the outside, but is really present inside (I checked ;-)
Very nice vintage look. Doesn't look as cheap as it is...

Gain, gain switch, Bass and treble knobs, Eq with a "shift" switch to choose between a guitar amp sound, or a flat sound, from what I understood. Anyway this switch is useful to change sound...

There is also a CD input and a headphones output. Missing an output to record, after the tube preamp.

Wow ! I don't know if it's intended as only a practice amp, it is not very loud, but has really an honest sound, can be clean or the "gain" can adjust tube distorsion. Very effective. I like it very much near my rack of old Harmony guitars.
I never tried other so small amps, so it's difficult to rate it.

I read dreadful stories about behringer gear. I have many of their stuff and never had a problem with it (sound processors, v-amp, and another very nice amp, the gm110, Trademark 21 clone).
This amp is new and I still have no experience with it, but my other Behringer amp works every day and never failed.

I am sure you can't find a nicer amp for the price. Excellent companion for the bedroom, travelling or practice. I suppose it could be a nice harp amp too.