Behringer GMX1200H Head

Mesa/Boogie, Marshall and Fender distortion by analog simulation
High, Moderate and Low tube gain simulation by analog circuitry
Mesa/Boogie, Marshall or Fender speaker simulation by analog circuitry

2 channels each with the analog modeling, 3 band EQ, volume, drive controls and assignable effects program.
Analog circuitry to simulate tube responce and tone characteristics

Presence control and master volume control coupled with digital effects processor with more tube amp simulation.

The back is loaded with ins and outs for direct recording and any other sort of connection set up you could desire.

The sound is very tubey. The response is fairly organic and gives or takes in response to your playing.

You WILL need a pedal on this head to play lead and get TRUE metal ronch tones. The thing is, you can get it to sound just like a rectifier. I mean it really does sound like a duel or even triple rectifier depending how loud you crank it.

You can use the digital processors tube amp simulation to get the gain you need for lead or to simply get a killer Fender blackface tone, but it sounds best when teamed with a pedal. I run a Danelectro Fabtone on it and it thunders and screams like a rectifier on steroids.
I imagine a tube pedal would really get it to give a perfected rectifier tone, but as it is it should satisfy anyone.

The effects sound great and the channel intelligent effects function is a nice touch.
Over all, this is the amp you want to take to gigs and the studio. Leave your expensive tube big boys at home without worry of it affecting your performance.

It weighs like 55 lbs! I mean it's as heavy as a tube amp but seems really damn solid.

Time will tell....

They are good people but not always on the mark with tech questions.
I have never dealt with them in regards to warranty service.

One of the best investments I have made though I find myself saying this about ever Behringer purchase I have made.

It's basically the Tech 21 design improved upon. You really do get the feel and response of a good tube amp. My speakers give that groany midrange like honking sound even when I scoop out all the mids and boost bass and treble. That's very impressive for a solid state amp to do.

I run this head on my Behringer BG412H angled cabinet. It is loadead with the Behringer Shark speakers and sounds incredible. When I team this with one of my custom guitars run through a pedal for a moddest amount of gain, I get the tube amp honk and response of a rectifier.

The only thing I wish this amp had was a custom tube gain stomp box for pushing it over the edge. I mean it already sounds and responds like a tube amp so why not take it the final step. I play some pretty intricate lead work and found it to sound so much more organic and natural through this rig in comparison to my others....it was almost upsetting because until this week, this rig was my dust collecting secondary due to space availability (two half stacks in a bedroom is overkill!)

For the money you are a fool, a damn fool not to buy one.

BEHRINGER?s V-TONE GMX1200H analog modeling amp head is a great choice for those who need their own arsenal of amps for optimal results no matter what the band brings along. With three amp models, three gain modes and three speaker simulations, all based on pure analog circuitry with no digital components, the GMX1200H gives you two fully independent modeling channels, each featuring 27 modeled sounds and supported by our revolutionary DYNAMIZER circuitry to deliver emulated tube warmth and responsiveness to your playing. BEHRINGER makes the GMX1200H complete with 2 x 60-Watt power amps and a high-quality FX processor, auto-chromatic tuner and MIDI control.

I use a Mexican Strat with single coil pickups. This amp absoloutly shreds in my pop/rock band, it even keeps up with our lead guitarists Marshall. No noise or feed back problems even when pushing it on 8 or 9. Great clean and distortion settings with great effects. NO distortion on clean channels even with the master on 8. Distortion kicks for general rock purposes.

Very reliable with no problems so far. I dont need a back up with this puppy.

I spoke with Behringer to get information on this amp and there staff were extremely helpful.

For its price its the best amp i have ever played

Basic two channel amp.

Limited Midi control.

Sounds ok but clean channel is not worth the space of the switch.


Not a versatile amp for gigging, they would proberly be better of making a small 10 watt home practice amp in this format.

Sounds are OK..........IF

You use Humbuckers. Once you connect a single coil ( aka Strat, P90 ) based guitar up to this amp then be prepared to stand at least 4 metres ( 12 feet ) away from the amp otherwise the hum noise will make you thrown the thing out of the window

( Behringer take not, shield the mains transformer )

If you gig and have to stand nearer the 4 metres to this amp and use a single coil pickup config then DO NOT buy this amp, you will regret it every minute of the day.

I have heard of some problems relating to channel one going dead.

Try emailing Behringer a few questions and you will find out the customer support is seriously lacking.

Very poor.

If they shielded the mains transformer, responded to questions and gave the amp some more basic Midi control functions then it would be a contender.

Perhaps this is the reason it is one of the cheapish ones, but there are far better modelling amps out there that are much more usuable for only a few Pounds /Dollars more.

2004, Very versatile 2 channel amp. It's got the effects loop you don't need with so many built in effects, headphone jack and CD or MIDI in, line out. 2-8 Ohm spkr outs, non-adjustable. 3 amp sounds, Tweed, British, and US(Mesa Boogie type), clean, hi-gain, and hot(for each channel). 2x60 watt @ 8 ohms stereo. I play blues/rock/metal. Each channel has multiple setups and effects, slight switching delay. Very quiet, no buzzing, and sqweel only on certain effects settings.

It sounds great with single coils and humbuckers without the BS resetting everything like on my Carvin SX300. I can't play my custom Carvin Bolt-T on the Carvin Amp, but it sounds great on the V-Tone. On hi-gain the SX is very noisey and the V-Tone out gains it without any noise!!! The L-280s on the Bolt-T don't sound good on my Laney ProTube either. The tweed setting is very clean but noticeably lower volume. I just found the octave distortion setting and it sounds 10x better than my Danelectro French Toast. You can get loud brutal metal tones, but if you go too far it gets mushy.

It is solid state and built well but sounds like a very good tube amp, without the overheat and bring spare tubes problems. I don't anticipate any problems, and would use it without backup.

Never needs repair. I did talk to them about the cab I got with it. They were friendly and informative.

It was an unbelieveable deal $430 for the stereo half stack, but I have it driving a Crate and a Carvin 4x12 for full stack. I have the noisey Carvin SX300 on two Behringer 4x12s (16 Ohms each). Laney ProTube head. Carvin Bolt-T, 3 Strats (one Emg-ZW), Jay Turser hollowbody, LP, Agile Hornet Flying V. I love the quietness and authentic sounds from this amp. I didn't really need it, but I'm glad I got it. Its tube emulation is better than the SX which is saying a lot, and it is more versatile and even better sounding sometimes than the Laney hot rod tube head. I wish it had Ohm adjustment so I could drive two Behringer cabs (it will, but at 1/2 power). I think it is the very best bang for the buck there is, and I've been playing 30 years.

First a little background: I bought this head mainly for home practice but hoping I could use for practice sessions with my band (I wasn't so optimistic to think I could use it on stage). It's so cheap, and I don't always want to carry my 50lb tube head and another 3-sp rack with FX, I tought, why not try it? I'd been using a Rocktron VooduValve for practice with a Carvin power amp. Thing is, I am constantly fiddling with the presets (while that unit is capable of very good metal sounds, it takes a lot of work to get them and I'm never satisfied). This amp is a 2-channel no-brainer.

Well, after playing with it for the last week through all kinds of cabs, I can say that there are great tones in this head, with a more amp-like response than the all-digital modelers. This uses "analog" modeling, they say. Don't know...but the amp breathes and you can feel the speaker pump. Not that bee-in-a-jar crap you often get with many of them. However: the tone controls are VERY sensitive AND interactive with each other. It takes lots of fiddling to get the good tones. There are also lots of BAD tones! Once I arrived at great tone, I wish I could then save it as a preset (!) because if you readjust your high-gain rhythm tone for a more prominent lead tone, when you want to go back to that rhythm tone having the mids or treble off by a slight bit can make it sound like dung.
Alas, it is analog, so there are no presets.
I find having just 2 sounds too limiting, even for practice. At a minimum I always want 4: A clean no-break-up sound, a bluesy overdrive, a high-gain metal rhythm, and a creamy mids-heavy lead sound. Well, that ain't gonna happen without the above-described fiddling. Looks like I'll be selling and going back to...? My fave modeling amp (having tried most) is the Yamaha DG series. Easy amp-like tonal tweaking, storable presets, amp-like response. Only problem is it doesn't get a real aggressive metal tone.

The other major problem with the GMX1200H is the clean channel does not get NEARLY loud enough for use with a band. I can set the drive no higher than 6 using parallel single coils before breakup, (the mode switches on tweed, clean, UK) and that works best, but even with the master volume is on 10 it's not loud. For our band that makes it absolutely useless. I've found with ANY of my cabs using one of the 2 cab emulations helps give it life. For clean tone, UK works well, CA does not.

By the way, the combination of the your cab and cab emulator it critical. The best I found was using a high-power speaker that does not add any coloration itself (an Eminence Delta Pro) and using either the UK or CA models. If using the cab models you'll have to back of the bass considerably, and tweak the mid and treble again.

Well in the end you have to admit it IS a great value. A few short years ago modelers didn't sound this good. This is as good as the Tech 21 stuff which always claimed to be "analog", but it cost 1/3 the price and has some passable digital effects.

You may wonder why I bought a 2-chan head if I thought I wanted 4+ sounds at quick disposal... good question! I've sold every digital modeler I've ever owned looking for a more amp-like response...This has it, but now I miss the presets. What can I say?

Amp: California, British, Tweed
Gain: Hot, Hi-Gain, Clean
Speaker: US, UK, Flat

Two Channel, Stereo only, Solid State, Analog Modeling, 24bit DSP
60W RMS X 2

I have been playing for over 25 years and the tone search as with most guitarists is never ending. I Play BC Rich USA exclusivly all with DiMarzio Megadrive humbuckers. This is the best modeling amp I have used yet for a variety of reasons I'll get to later on. Distortion is great, the combinations are sufficient, the DSP has a few good quality effects worth mentioning but it's to long to go into all that here. This is an amp review not an effects review. Typical DSP.

1 week old and I have no opinions yet.

Same as above

Ok here it comes, the head is super flexible and you can hook it up to just about anything you'd want. The stereo effected gain through head phones is awesome. I have played or owned them all at one time or another: Marshall (old and new), Mesa Rectifier, Peavey(trans and tube), Crate (trans and tube) Line6, NYC Tech, it goes on. I found one constant with all these amps none of them sound really good when pushed at volume live. This head can keep up with all the rest if used properly. First off it has a tendancy to buzz, I have found it is hyper-sensitive to the power source and cords being used, problem solved. There is a split second delay in channel and effect switching, well, hey! it electronic!, and to be expected. It is however very versitile and can sound great in all modes. If you don't have an EQ (and this goes for EVERY AMP ON THE PLANET) it won't sound as good as it should. The outputs let you set this up every concievable way, just about. The sounds it phenominal through the phones, line out to recording, through a home stereo (i.e. Home Theater amp, etc)or direct to the PA board.

BUT!!!!!!

Through a standard cab it's marginal at best. The typical irritations of Mid "C" twang, tinny, sometimes muddy, and not quite full. This has been my plague for years with all the equipment I have had. I suspect that it due to the limited vocal range of the typical guitar speaker. I am almost tempted to try it through a Bass Cab. I currently own a Peavey XXX Head and love it, but it has some of the same problems so I feel vindicated. I suspect that the tone of the as recorded (heard on the album) sound is near impossible to get with standard equipment short of being a millionaire with a sound crew. All in all definately worth the buy for the money, even as a back up. Yes I would get it again. Refer to the GMX212 Combo for other opiniions as it is nearly identical to the head.