Carvin Vintage 16 112 Combo

I bought this amp shortly after it was introduced. Just your bare bones, meat and potatoes no-frills amp. I personally would'nt call it versatile but it does what I need. I use this amp for practice in my basement.

I'm using a Tele with Lindy Fralins Blues Specials, and a Les Paul with Dimarzio PAF's. I find the tone of this amp to be a bit on the stiff side, and the bottom end tends to flub out a bit too quick for my liking. Granted your only going to get so much low end out of an EL84 based amp that's only 16 watts but I'd like if it was a bit tighter. Speaking of the low end I don't understand the bass knob. From 0 to 2 there is no bass at all. Turn it a tad past 2 and the bass suddenley kicks in and the actual bass response stays the same up until 8. Then from 8 to 10 there is a slight increase that's hardly noticable. So basically the bass knob is an "on/off" switch. I e-mailed Carvin and they told me this was normal. Huh??
Anyway, because I find the sound a bit stiff and cardboard sounding I use a Bass GE-7 EQ to reshape things a bit and it helped out a lot. I keep the Soak knob at about 7 and the Volume knob on about 8 and with the EQ this keeps things clean and smooth with no breakup and it sounds pretty good with both the Tele and the Lester. For distorted sounds I'm using Tonebone pedals. The Tele goes into the Hot British and the Lester goes into the Classic and I'll tell you what, I'm learning to pull some pretty good sounds out of it all. I've got all the volumes at an equal level and it's all just right. Not to quiet, but loud enough to get the point across without rippin your ears off of your head. It might be loud enough for a basement band practice but in a live situation it would no doubt have to be mic'd thru a P.A.. But for my needs at home I find that the combination of my guitars, amp, EQ and the Tonebones gives me what I need. I wish the amp was a bit smoother on its own but again, I fixed that with the EQ.

Seems to be reliable and has'nt caused me any grief although it's due for a tune-up.

I've heard a lot of good and a lot of bad regarding Carvins customer service but if the amp just quit on me I'd take it to a local tech.

I really don't know if I'd buy it again. Offhand I probably would'nt. But then again now that I've tweaked it a bit with some pedals and for my needs at home I think it works okay as a basic base to work from.

Really all you need. Reverb* Switchable power. EQ, and a master volume.

Tried it through a couple P-90 equiped and a Hamer sunburst. Very organic sound. As a matter of fact, just what I was looking for...dirty...not buzzy. Good for grungy stuff, classic rock, blues, etc. Not for heavy distortion. (no boxes). Disappointed in how weak the clean sound was though.

Here's my problem: first one came with reverb not working. It wouldn't change for pentode to triode either. So, I returned it. Very helpful satff sent me a second one that didn't work at all. Now, I'm very impatient. But, a very friendly staffer promised a replacement in three days, so I said "bring it on". I called to get a tracking number for delivery...."on back order...three weeks!" So I've cancelled the order and am very unhappy with Carvin quality.

See above. The staff are very friendly and helpful. But, they couldn't help me in the end. Give me surly and competent and day. Plus, the promise of a three day delivery was just a plain lie!

I wish I could say good things. The price is so right. What I heard was cool. But, the complete failure of quality control has to giv e this the low rating.

Almost everything you need. 12" speaker. It's small. Very portable. 16 watts of tube tone.

But it is missing a couple things. First, it does not have a standby switch. That would have been very nice. I see that as a big oversight. It is not the end of the world but I like to be kind to tubes and a standby switch makes that a little easier. Second, it does not have a line out. That would be nice for playing at place you do not want to take the time to mike the amp (like most of the time). I got around this by using a Behringer Ultra-G. It is a DI box that sits between the amp and the speaker. It sounds good too.

This amp is amazing. Especially for the price. Great for that blues, classic rock, country or even jazz tone. It has good smooth distortion but not the "metal" sound. To give an idea, here is what I compared it. Fender Blues Junior ($400) - this is what I thought I would buy till I tried it. It sound colored with no life. What a disappointment. Fender Hot Rod Deluxe ($600) - A little colored. Just did not sound right. Riveria Clubster ($900)- This was the one with 10" speaker and maybe 18 watts. The clean sound was great. The distortion sound was not that good imho. It sounded cheap. Riveria Clubster ($1200) w/ 12" about 40 watts - This was a great amp. Perfect clean and such a smooth lead channel. If I had the money, I would have purchased this one. Groove Tubes ($1000+) I tried a few their amps. They all sound great but the Carvin just sounded better than those. Mesa F-30 ($900)- A very good sounding amp with the mesa sound. It could get alot of different sounds. Very comparable to Carvin but capable of more range of sounds. The Carvin won my decision on price.

What really got me on this amp is that it is fun to play. Adjust the settings and jam. That is the most important thing in an amp.

I have not had any problems. My rating is based on the time when I found my 2 year old using my amp as a jungle gym. He climbed on top of it, lost his balance, knocked the amp over, into the wall, and fell on top of it. There was not a scratch on the amp but there was a dent in the wall. Everything powered up fine.

No problems.

I wanted a small, low watt tube amp to use mostly at home and in a studio. I was looking for 12" speaker, under 30 watts, and under $500. To my surprise there are not many good tube amps under $500. This Carvin just amazes me because of the sound for the price. Most the amps I compared this to were over $1k.

It is surprisingly louder than I thought it would be. I used it at a gig in 300 seat auditorium. When I asked the soundman how the amp was sounding he told me that most of the sound was coming from my amp and not the PA. I was shocked.

The speaker takes a while to break in so it sounds better with more use. Some people have complained about the lack of a 2nd channel. That is not an issue for me because I use pedals to overdrive the amp. There are only a handful of amps that have 2 channels where I like the sound of both channels. I rather get an amp I like and then get some good pedals to go with it.

About me, I have played for 20 years. I play regularly and am good enough that I have been asked to sit in the studio for other folks. I play blues, jazz, rock, and sometimes country.

I am rating it a 10 because I cannot find anything that comes even close in this price range.

Its Eq Section is a carving section. Don't think since you get a huge variety, that makes an amp better. Usually it is the exact opposite. How many variables do you need? You want something that adds the frequencies but not to a point of over doing it.

Play '93 PRS Goldtop custom 24 Deep Dish, USA Strat w/single coils Alder, USA Strat single coil Bill Lawrence pickups Swamp ash old guitar. Very quite amp, with GREAT tone. I am a session player and believe me I have played it all. I mostly played "botique amps" but didn't own very many amps. Played Boogie (old stuff is ok but NOT the new) Fender (Good cleans at medium volumes, too colored.) Marshall(Good if you have min. $3000 to get old amps, the new amps I DO NOT LIKE at all!) Dr. Z (very good, but get ready to mortgage your home for one) Snider Amps (Awesome, but they start at $4000) If you like a DRY tone, I really have only ever heard a few as dry. Dry is good, your actual guitar tone will come out, if you have a crap guitar with no tone, don't attempt this amp. Dry will allow pedals and guitars to express better. If you have patients and use HIGH Quality pedals, this amp is an absolute TONE ANIMAL! I have played Rock, Jazz, Funk, Country, & Blues through it, without any tone issues. I don't use alot of effects, just a couple pedals, Jekyll & Hyde, Tonebone hot british, texas ranger, Crowther hot cake, not all at the same time, with a RMC 3 wah and a fulltone clyde wah. It may be small but FIERCE.

If Carvin ships it to you, check the tubes right away make sure they are all seated properly. Mine had one V2 position out of whack.

I have many people I know that do regular business with them and they are easy to work with.

I have been a session guitar player for almost 10 years, and have seen it all. Carvin has stepped up thier quality over the past 5 years in my opinion, most everything is actually very impressive. I tried the other amps, didn't have this tone. You have to break this amp in like all tube amps, be patient grasshopper, your tone will arrive with this thing. And for MSRP of $399, scary cheap. By the way a few of us A/B'd this amp with a bunch of 20 watt "botique amps" and we about crapped ourselves, this amp kicked the sh@# out of many of them, not kidding. We found 2 that sounded better out of 9, oh yea by the way one cost $2000 and the other one $2300. For the money this amps kicks ass no doubt, but it isn't for everyone, I recommend it for an accomplished player with high quality Guitars and Effects, don't throw modeling crap through this, use the real stuff like I listed. Some of the pedals are almost as much as the amp but the tone is versitile and much bigger than it looks. By the way if you are comparing this to a Blues Junior, no comparison, the blues jr. starts to loose its tone fast when pushed and is too colored. I will put this against the better Fenders of this age and still have confidence this will smoke them, even the 2x12 stuff. This amp has a large amount of punch and remains strong even on 10, and play it at a small gig, it has plenty of balls.

This is a new (2004) Vintage 16. I play in a band that does a variety of music -- mostly classic rock, but also current stuff and originals that have kind of a Santana vibe. I have a large amp collection, but find even 40 watters overpowering in many of the smaller venues we play. I had been searching for a versatile, reasonably priced, low-wattage tube amp, and previously owned (and sold) both the Fender Pro and Jr. I found that the small Fenders had a great "lead" tone, but in my opinion, not enough clean headroom to play chords with sufficient definition. The recent review in Guitar Player magazine convinced me to give the Vintage 16 a try. The Vintage 16 is a very basic 1 channel amp: put the gain on or about full, set the tone controls how you like, and use "soak" to dial in the desire volume and crunch. Despite the lack of "features," I find this to be a very "versatile" amp, capable of producing great clean and overdriven tones, and in that respect, I disagree with the GP reviewer who characterized it as a "one-tone" kind of amp. I think this amp can really cover all bases, with the exception of metal.

This is a wonderful amp. The first amp I have ever owned or played that actually allowed me to get great tube tone at lower volume levels, both clean and overdriven. Far superior, in my opinion, than the Fender Pro and Jr. In addition, I tend to disagree with the reviewers who say that you need to swap the tubes and speaker to make this amp really sing. I have experimented with different tubes (Sovtek, JJ, EH), and speakers (Celestion, Weber, Reverend, Jenson). I found the different tubes so close in sound to be barely indistinguishable. Speakers, of course, each have a voice of their own, and changing them will result in a differenct sounding amp, but this is totally subjective. After trying a whole bunch of different tubes and speakers, I ended up putting the "original equipment" back in, and have never looked back. It sounds great.

I have not opened-up the chassis, but from the outside, the amp appears very sturdy and well constructed. I have purchased quite a few Carvin products over the years and have never had a problem. However, I never gig without a backup.

The Carvin sales staff has always been a pleasure to deal with.

I've been playing about 30 years, and have owned all kinds of amps and guitars. I currently rely mainly on Reverend and Marshall amps, but based on my experience with the Vintage 16, may also purchase the Carvin Belair (50 watt 2x12). I play a G&L Legacy, American-Std Tele, LP Classic, Peavey Wolfgang, and Reverend Slingshot. If the Vintage 16 were stolen or lost, I would definitely buy another.

Bought new in 2003. Limited, but very useful within that range.
Wish it had: a standby switch, an ext. speaker jack, A NO-TOOLS-NEEDED 16/5W SWITCH. An effects loop might be overkill

I use an SG90 (usually in single-coil mode), and Telecaster, and occasionally a theremin and an electric kalimba. The amp is respectably quiet, only developing background growl at higher gain settings, although sometimes a hum creeps in that I remedy with a swat to the side of the amp.
Straight out of the box, I hated this amp. I'd gotten used to my '68 Vibro-Champ, and the Vintage 16's cardboard tone couldn't touch it for gritty bite or chime. I almost resigned myself to an immediate speaker & tube swap, but after a few days it sounded better; maybe the tubes were settling in, maybe my ears were recalibrating, maybe both. But I came to admire the amp's roundness and non-brittle clarity. A subtle liveliness. The tone controls seem to operate much differently from my Fenders. Bass and mid add, respectively, depth and "muscle", not mud. I can find very few EQ settings that flat out suck.
Things get mushy when the soak knob gets past 7. I've heard there are some diodes (or resistors, or whatever) that are in the circuit specifically to produce some warmth/distortion. I'd rather have a bit more headroom. In time I'm sure I'll swap out the tubes and speaker, and maybe yank out those mystical diodes, but for now I'm quite pleased with it.

Only a year old, so I'll make an estimate.

Too many salesmen, not enough repairmen. (A universal truth?) The amp shipped with the wrong fuses, and it took the company three days to properly field my question. They sent me replacements, but I'd rather have spent the $.55, gotten my questions answered promptly, and spared them the postage and excessive packing.

I didn't especially need another amp, but when I won a $250 Carvin gift certificate, it seemed like the best use of the funds. No regrets. Two thumbs up.

This is a great amp, I think it sounds above average with stock tubes and speaker, I put euro tubes JJs EL84 and AX7s that Bob from euro tube recomended that help alot, I already had a 30w weber alnico blue dog, But it was still missing something, So I called and talked to (Ted Weber) and He told me to get the 15w Alnico Blue Dog and WOW HOT I can't tell you how good this amp sounds,I have a 83 Fender Telecaster,A 68 Gibson Les paul Custom Cherry Sunburst, A Music Man Albert Lee Translucent Red Cherryburst , And a Carvin ae185-12 string electric semihollow body Guitar. The tube and speaker change cost around $240 dollars.This Amp dose everthing great I really like the 5w mode best but the 16w mode is great to.With my Les Paul its Led Zeplin meets Aerosmith,With Albert Lee its CCR,Albert Collins,Texas Blues ZZ Top,With the Telecaster its twang heaven,With the Carvin ae18512 its the Birds,Eagles, The tone is fantastic,This Amp does everything.I live close to the Carvin Covina store after I put the speaker and new tubes in the amp I had to show it off the staff was in awe of the sound they thought the stock Amp was good but with the changes WOW even the customers were asking where they could buy the speakers and tubes.This is not a one horse pony,this amp is hard rock,blues,soul,breath,buttery brown sound,I love this amp I own a fender twin with two JBL E120 speakers that is a great amp two and a Carvin vintage 33 with the same tubes and speaker as the vintage 16 but with 30w alnico weber blue dog but theres something about that class A 5w mode in the vintage 16 amp,like I said its awesome it sounds like a 30w amp

10

The Manager and staff at the Covina Carvin store is the best

The basic amp is a awesome product but with the speaker and tube change it out fenders a fender,and out voxes a vox,and out marshalls a marshall I have been playing for 35 years I have owned a lot of amps a 65 vox ac30,Boy was I dumb my ex wife needed tires for her car so I sold that amp,I taken this amp to the rude dog in covina and other places and played,every one who has heard this amp loves the buttery clean and brown distortion sound

Basic features: volume, bass, mid, treble, reverb and soak controls.
Single input. Bought it for use in small venues, ie. coffe shops, etc.
I play mostly country, classic rock, and blues. For what I wanted it has the features I need.

With this amp I use a PRS McCarty and a G&L ASAT Classic. When I purchased it, the tubes had alreday been changed to JJ's, so I can't say anything about the stock sound of the amp. Keep in mind that I am comparing this amp to a vintage '65 Fender Deluxe Reverb I've had since '65, so any negatives and positives about this amp should be taken accordingly.

When I first plugged in to it I was a little disappointed in how thin and tinnish it sounded. So I sat it next to the Fender and plugged the Fender's speaker (Celestion G12 vintage 30 watt) into the speaker jack in back of the Carvin. That immediately lit it up! So I bought the same speaker and put it in the Carvin. Before, it was hard to get much of a clean sound, even with the soak turned way down. Now it has a lot of clarity up until about 6 on the soak knob, then a nice warm blues tube breakup kicks in. The Celestion also gives it quite a bit more volume, which is nice. With the soak knob on 10 you get all the distortion any blues song would ever need. Nothing a metal head (is that the correct term?) would like. No need for any kind of distortion pedal for me. Others have not been too excited about the reverb, but to me it sounds fine at low settings, 2-4. Anything over that and it loses something.

Have not had it long enough to comment on the reliability but it seems to be built like a tank.

I've been playing for 40 years and have owned lots of different amps. Nothing compares to a tube amp. I'm totally satisfied with the "Sweet Little 16" after the speaker change. Doesn't compare with a big amp but if you're looking for something to use at home or smaller gigs I don't think you'd be disapointed with it after the tube and speaker change. I'd definitely buy another one if anything happened it.

The feature set is about right for a small amp - Lo, Mid, Hi, Vol, Soak (Drive) and Reverb. The 16W power output and triode (5W) modes are great for small venues and recording. What's missing is a Standby switch and effects loop send/return.

The sound is underwhelming - tone controls have a limited range, the amount of drive and reverb are limited too. In fact, adjusting any control from 0 to 100% is like adjusting the controls on a Fender or Marshall from 0 to 25%. It's not impressive at all, even after I re-tubed it. It can't compete with any of my other amps - Fender Hot Rod Deluxe, Supro 15W practice amp, Crate 25W solid state amp.

It seems to be built pretty well - Carvin makes god stuff.

I've dealt with Carvin before and found them to be responsive.

I wanted this for playing inside the house without breaking all the windows. This amp sounds cheap and you really can't get a very wide range of tones out of it. I'm dumping it and buying a Marshall.

Brand new I had to wait a few days extra for it!! Made in 2004!!!It does just what it is made to do and it does it well. For the price though it should have tremelo. Great all tube amp.

Fender American Strat and Gibson sg. Greta sound very quiet all the time!!

Too new don't know yet

Well I have not need support yet but.. They did not tell me it was on back order I had to find out myself. They did not tell me when it was shipped I had to find out for myself. The emails and phone conversations I had were not very pleasant.

Playing for 40 years. My first good amp was a Fender Bandmaster reverb. I just bought a Blues junior with a jensen c12n It sounds better/different that the V16 but I really like both of the sounds. The v16 looks very cool and I love the front mounted chicken head knobs. I also have a fender stage 100 dsp and a kustom quad 2x12. A hammond keyboard with a motion sound amp. Feel free to email me with question about the stuff i have.