Crate GT-80

I don't know when it was made. I think its 80watts but it sounds waay quiter than my 100watt amp(s) when cranked, but I havent tried it with an extension cab so maybe thats the limiting factor in the 1x12" config. Technically I got it free but i did pay 18$ to get into the dump so i guess thats how much it cost.

i run emg's through my ltd and standard factory crap through my neck through bc rich. Sounds pretty good, obviously not that great but maybe if I retubed it it would work wonders like it does on all other amps that are 15+ years old.

I want to say this:

I found this amp in the metal bin at the dump. It had been thrown down into a garbage bin at least 12 feet straight down with no cushion to land on except for steel. Case was barely blemished. I crawled down there and handed it up to my protesting girlfriend and she threw it in my van and we took off, despite the dump worker's protests. I plugged it in at my house, cranked it to 10 on all channels and played for at least 2 hours. It works. Enuff said.

If it was stolen or lost, I would probably buy one with at least 20 more watts if i could get it cheap. Im not complaining mind you, just pointing out that 80watts isn't quite enough for a metal band.

I got mine new in 1993 or so. I don't remember what I payed for it, but it was probably somewhere around $400. 80 Watts. Two channels, each channel can use either a tube or solid state preamp. Separate reverb level for each channel. Effect loop. Footswitch for channel, tube/solid, and reverb. Single 12" Celestion speaker. Thick wood frame make this thing pretty damn heavy.

The amp gets plenty loud. With the gain high enough to push the tubes, and power amp volume at 2, it's already too loud for apartment use. Volume lower than 2 is barely audible. I've had luck putting a mixer in the effect loop in order to get a better control over the volume. I imagine a volume pedal would work just as well.

No headphone jack, but I plug one end of a 1/4" into Effect In, and let the other end dangle to shut off the speaker. Effect Out goes to my mixer/pod, and I use the headphone jack from there.

If you can turn it up, the amp sounds pretty sweet. The tube preamp on the clean channel is the best of the 4 options. Solid state + Clean is just plain clean. Lead channel is ok but not stellar. Solid state lead sounds like what you'd expect a solid state Crate lead channel to sound like. Tubes warm it up and make it a bit more respectable.

Tubes start to crackle on the clean channel when the gain is way up, but that seems to go away if I back off the treble on the guitar or turn up the power amp volume.

I play through a Gibson Spirit II with the stock medium-output pickups. At the lower volumes, I typically use both sets of humbuckers at full volume and tone all the way up, because everything else sounds muted and muddy. At higher volumes, the guitar controls seem to be much more nuanced and useful.

I had the same troubles mentioned by other GT-80 owners. The volume would randomly cut out and stay out. Sometimes it'd come back if I jiggled the amp, or if I turned the gain and volume way up, but it'd come back at full blast and then die again. I put the amp away for a few years because of this, but recently pulled it out of storage and did a little troubleshooting.

Turns out there were two problems. First, three of the four wires in the reverb tank had broken off and were shorting against the inside of the tank. I've just unplugged the tank for now, as it wasn't all that great anyway. The second problem was the mechanical switch in the Effect In jack. I've noticed that I can trigger the volume dropout by poking around in Effect In. Even better, I can "fix" the problem by shorting Effect Out into Effect In with a short cable. I'm usually using the effect loop anyway, so this isn't such a big deal now that I know what the problem really is.

So far with these fixes the amp is solid again, but with its history of mechanical failures I'd be afraid of depending on it for something important.

I emailed their repair folks to see if there were any service bulletins for the amp. I got a response the next day that there weren't, but the tech sent a PDF of the schematics which included some key test points.

If I lost mine, it wouldn't be at the top of my list for replacements. I've got a little more budget now that in '93. But, if I came across one for $50~$100 I'd have a hard time passing it up. (As long as the problems were limited to the reverb tank and effect in.) At that price, sweet tube crunch at tinnitus inducing levels sounds like a good deal to me.

My model was made in the USA in 1992. It's a pretty good, hybrid amplifier, good to play rock, grunge, classic metal, punk etc. I've paid only 'bout 250$ and it's very cheap for the amp which sounds as good as this Crate. It has 2 preamps, 2 channells, four independent gain knobs, basic EQ for each channell and good, deep spring reverb. I give it 9, 'cause it's good to play in a band, but I wish it has 'shape' or 'presence' control on the second channell, it would useful at higher levels of gain

I play an 8-year Flame Bell I, which is pretty good Fender Strat copy made in Poland and I wouldn't change it for any Fender Mex. I use it with stock H-S-S pickups (they aren't so good at all, the mid single is RUBBISH). This guitar has a nice humbucker tone and offerd great sustain (it's mad of good, solid wood and it has strings-through-body bridge). Crate GT-80 fits it perfect for hard rock/grunge music which I play in my band. It's very loud (I turn volume to '4' when I play with my band), but not noisy at all. It has very fine distortion on tube preamp, it really kicks *** and sound like all-tube amp. Mosfet disto tone can be good to play old, thrash metal, but I don't really like it. On clean channell you've got gain control, too, so when you you use tube preamp and give it more and more gain you'll get a good, classic rock sound, between AC/DC and The Cult. I give it an 8, because mosfet tones aren't very useful, but TUBES are fantastic!

I'd definitely gig it without any backup. When you turn it on, it can sound very flat, but after 8-10 minutes of playing, when tubes got warmed up, it's all about great tone.

If I lost this, I'll propably buy some classic, all-tube amp like Fender or Marshall, but I think this Crate is really worth the money. It sounds great, it's loud - that's all you need when you're starting with a band. I'm playing guitar for about 2 years and I don't play so good, but this amplifier suits me perfectly. I use it only with band, it's too loud for me to play at home, I use Roland Cube-15x to practice.

The features have been mentioned before. Here's a quick highlight

- Clean and Drive channel (Rhythm and Lead)
- Tube (1 12AX7 and 2 12AT7) and Solid State
- Independent reverb for lead and rhythm channel

I think it's nice having a reverb option for both the rhythm and lead channels. The reverb is not my favorite and leaves me wanting more, but for a slight reverb, it works well enough.

This amp gets plenty loud, but still sounds good at bedroom/apartment volumes. The Lead channel is hard to keep quiet, but the volume works fine in a gig/practice environment.

This was a pawnshop special that I picked up for $50. I was expecting it to be crap, as a lot of solid state Crates tend to be, but when I saw it had tubes, I had to check it out.

This is where I was surprised. Selecting the tube preamp makes a noticeable difference. Don't get me wrong, the solid state still sounds pretty good, especially for a cheap Crate amp, but the tubes is where it's at for this amp. It's not as responsive as the Vox AC30, Fender Deluxe Reverb Reissue, Fender Hot Rod Deville, or even the Line 6 Spider Valve I've owned, but it does a great job at getting close. The solid state power amp is what holds it back. If it had a tube power amp, I'd give this a higher mark.

The gain sounds better at the lower gain levels for me. I'm not a high gain kind of guy, and definitely not a solid state gain kind of guy. There IS something to be said for tubes. It does take pedals really well, even making my old Boss pedals sound better than other amps do.

I played this through a Fender Japanese Strat with Samarium Cobalt Noiseless pickups, my 60th anniversary strat with 57/62 pickups, two different Gibson Les Paul Double Cutaways (a 98 and an 07 model), a stock tele, and a tele with Rio Grande pickups. I've used a wide range of guitars and, with the right tweaking, they all sound good. Hell, even with everything set at 5, it's a solid sounding amp.

This is where I've had the bad experience. I've owned this for two years. I've been able to use it for very little of that. I mentioned I picked this up at a pawnshop, so I can't talk about how it was taken care of prior to my ownership of the amp. It's been a bedroom amp for the last two years, and hasn't been knocked around.

When the amp works, it sounds pretty good. But, it fades in and out at times. The amp's volume will die out and then pop back on. Or, it sounds really crackly. If I crank the volume, it will pop back on and work for a while. I need to get some new tubes and try that out first before I go with a more expensive diagnosis.

From what I've read online, that does seem to be an issue with this amp.

I'm not going to give a rating on this one because it was already in bad shape when I got it.

I have no experience with Crate. Though, I didn't find a manual on their site...I found it with a google search elsewhere.

This is a very interesting amp. I've played other hybrids (and own a Vox Valvetronix AD30VT that has a 12AX7 in the preamp for that matter), and the tubes play a much more noticeable role in shaping the sound in this amp. I really like the sound it gets when it works.

I recently owned a Vox AC30CC and a Line 6 Spider Valve. Having a tube preamp and power amp makes a big difference. I recently took the Spider Valve back to pick up a guitar and so I was reduced to playing the Vox Valvetronix, and it just lacks something that the other two amps had. I decided to pull the Crate out of the closet and I have some of the response I had before. It was refreshing. The option of a tube preamp makes a difference.

I'm not a cork sniffing gear snob who's into boutique tube amps. I'm a regular musician, who plays stuff you can pick up at Guitar Center, The GT-80 isn't going to satiate my desire for a tube amp, but it definitely works in a pinch, especially if it was more reliable.

I've seen these at Music Go Rounds for 100 bucks (do a quick google search). I'd say for anywhere between 50 to 100 bucks is a good deal, if it works reliably. If you can get it at a place that has a good return policy, I'd definitely pick this up...especially as a gateway to a tube amp.

I picked this up for 50 bucks. There's a sticker on the speaker with the original price of 349.99 back in the 90s when this came out.

Mosfet/Tube 80 watt 1x12 combo with what they refer to as Quadradrive simply put Lead and rythem channel on the solid state OR tube selection. different set of controls for mosfet/tube selection. This can be confusing until you get used to it. 2- 12au7's and 1-12ax7 in the tube side preamp making this actually a hybrid, NO power tubes. Speaker, according to internet research is a private label (Crate) Celestion designed speaker with specs almost exact to a G12-80. Versatile enough for most styles and with the appropriate pedals any style. Holds it's own and likes to be played loud. See problem below.

The tube sounds are fantastic. Nice and Creamy. Nails Blues from Buddy Guy to SRV to Hendrix to Robin Trower extremely well as it does Classic and southern rock. Use Strats Tele's Ibanez RG and S series, Epi Firebird V and VII, G-400 Custom & LP's. Dependant upon amp settings and Pedal selection you can throw any guitar at it and it will beg for more WHEN IT WORKS(see below)! High Gain and Hi Volume does porduce some background noise esp Gain. Reverb is decent but somewhat cheesey definately not Fender. On it's own it does get that Marshall crunch but that's what pedals are for. Speaker does fart a little at Hi-volume/gain. Solid Stat Clean has little to no noise at hi-volume and little to no gain, does distort a little though.

Very undependable. Crapped out with a week of my purchase (used). Here's the thing. When you turn it on it may be fine or it may be muted at any volume setting. You might be playing 10 minutes great then it may mute itself out. It might be muted then suddenly full on. It will do this off and on until finally it is continually muted. I changed out the tubes with no effect, tried JJ's, Tungsol, and Sovtek with no improvement. No amp techs within 60+ miles of me. If anyone knows help would be appreciated.

Never got thru on telephone and no e-mail reply

I don't lack for amps and guitars so I'm not life stranded without it, wish it worked though. I liked the sound do much that if it were lost or stolen I'd think about getting another, I wouldn't do it, but I would think about it.

This amp is from about 1990-1992 i think , itwas a fixer-up!
Good for all styles of music. Itis a cross of tubes pre and solid
state.Four diffrent channels of gain.Its 80 watts with lots of
punch and nice tone for a mid priced old amp. The tubes really
pump-up the tone using one 12ax7 and two 12au7 in the preamp.

Im using a fender strat and a OLP AXIS guitars. Its great for blues
and hard rock. With the lead channel and the tube channel together
it had a crushing tone on a neck pickup setting.

When i got it the power plug in the back pannel was broke, a easy fix!
It still has the factory slm tubes in it!

Crate been short and to the point to give you a dealer but will
answer e-mails quick.

Been playing for 14 years off and on. Its a nice old amp, i have 3 other crate amp too,and the old ones sound the best. The old crate
amps are know for getting dirty in-out 1/4 plug-ins and cheap knobs.
Its a great old amp too have!

This little beast is about 12 yrs old now, bought it used from a music shop , paid the princely sum of 119 euros for it. WAHEY! Total bargain. It does everything well enough. 2 channel 4 mode operation, decent reverb, plenty of volume. Has 2 12au7 valves and a 12ax7, mine were shot when i got it, but they are about 10 euro each for decent Electro-Harmonix (Russian made, "American style branded") ones. (get decent valves, they're worth the money) I use it at home, but will use it live in the near future. Also has a mosfet power stage. Loads of features, lots of variation in the sound. The 2 channels and 2 modes are footyswichable, which is cool. The manual is short, concise and informative.

I use it with a modded Yamaha Pacifica 112 strat, its now got DiMarzio and Jackson pickups, and a Squier tele with a generic dual blade humbucker at the bridge. It sounds well good, the valve stages are obviously the better ones, i never use the solid state, buts its nice to have it anyway. This amp will do most types of music well. Its not boutique, but good enough. It is a tad noisy, but acceptable (though in a studio it might be a problem) The Crate 12" speaker sounds ok to me, but I'm gonna upgrade it with an Electrovoice soon, coz I can get one cheap. Marvelous.

Its built to a good standard, very well put together, solid. I'd certainly trust it. As always : carry spare fuses, spare valves if you can afford it. Valve failure indicator LED's would be fantastic, but heyyyyyy...you can't have it all.

Warranty is well out on this one, but i hear that Crate is quite good at customer support things. Not a very good website they have though.

been playing rocky things for about 15 years, i use the amp with a Korg ax100 g , run that trough a vintage Ibanez PQ9 parametric EQ pedal to take the digital edge off the Korg. There is nothing to dislike about this amp really, wish it was all valve, thats all. But for a hybrid design, its well cool. Easily as good as Marshall valvestate hybrids, but with more features and better built quality. I bought it coz it was a total bargain and it suited my needs. If it got nicked I would be on the lookout for another one, but you rarely see them around these days

The features have allready been mentioned before so I won't repeat them entirely. With having 4 Channel (clean mosfet, clean/grunge tube, distortion mosfet and tube) two sperated equalizers and two master knobs for clean and lead it's a very flexible amp wich serves to all kinds off music. There isn't really something to miss at this amp for it's price.As mentioned before the other features can be read in the reviews below. I give it an 9 because nothing is perfect

I play it with a crate wxplorer copy with an EMG 81 and with a Epiphone Les Paul special (the thin one) with stock Pickups. I dont use much FX so I dont care about the FX port. I put the guitar straight into the amp for EMO, Punkrock and other stuff and it sounds very harmonic but it lacks a bit in low end and bass response. for Metal I hang my Boss Me-5 in front of the amp and use it for pre distortion (like you do with an Boss Ds 1) I also add some Bass, Compression and Noise reduction with the EQ of the Me-5 zheni play it above the rythm(clean)tube channel and put the distortion level on 8-9 and Ihave everything: the sound is still clear (in Metal Dimensions) and pinch Harmonics scream out of the amp very easily. For Solo Stuff I change from the Rythm to the lead channel and this its weak point the lead channel gets muddy very easily at high distortion levels so it's not the best metal amp but for EMO and Punk rock it sounds very good. The best channel is the clean tube one, it has an overdrive stile sound and stays clear at every setting by having enough distortion and loudness even for small konzerts. Irs other weak point is the 12 inch Speaker, for homepractice it's nice but for band practice I use it together with a 4x12 cab and sounds like a big one. At the end it must be said that this amp also behaves like a big one what means that it doesn't sound rich before you pull the volume up to a quarter of the volume so your neighbours will probably hate you after a few weeks. all in all I gave it an 8 (7 for its sound with its own speaker and 9 for its sound with a 4x12 cab)

Maybe I had very bad luck with it but its Trafo broke down for two times and the input jack rattles a bit. It can be possible that I am not very carefull with my equipment but it allways hurts if something doesn't work.

I bought it used so i never cared about it

Im playing E guitar for 6 years now but i never had very good equipment so I have to compare it with equipment of friends and what I tested in music stores and I have to say there are better ones but for its price and you may find it cheaper. If it would be stolen I think I would look for an Engl Savage 60 but this is another price cathegory. I rated this Product for its price because I know there are much better ones but in another dimension of price

Basically this amp is an 80 watt dual tube/mosfet practice amp with 1 12 inch speaker. It's gives out an astonishing amount of volume for it's small size. It's can easly keep up with a drummer and bass guitar and keyboards. The tone is also well rounded and professional sounding. It could be described as having 4 channels by some. You have the choice of switching between solid state mosfet power amplifier and the tube power amplifier. then each of those can go from Rythm channel to lead channel. Both power amps are very nice. The distortion that you get with the lead channel is very professional and rich. It's heavy duty power chord time. You can also back off on the gain and get a gutsy fat warm blues David Gilmour or Eric Clapton tone out of this. I easly hit upon a Roger Waters, "Pro's and Con's of Hitch Hiking" Eric Clapton blues tone with my fender strat. Strait in, no effects, just some reverb. Sweet! The tone of this amp is so rich and sweet and pro sounding that I just played it directly without changing a single setting for an hour. Didn't bother plugging in any effects. This amp would be good for a 60 year old blues player or a 19 year old punk rocker. If you want solid rock and roll tones, you can easly play this amp live with no additional pedals or effects. I was able to dial in vintage Sex Pistols (anarchy in the u.k. tones) I love this amp.

It's interesting to compare solid state with tube at the flick of the switch. I generally always have the tube power amp on.. it's just the fattest smoothest tone I've heard from an amp in a long time. The mosfet power amp sounds a lot like the Carvin SX Mosfet amps.. (kinda tube like but yet not if you know what I mean). I never use it. I'm not sure why anyone would when you've got real tubes parked in the garage next to those transistors. You know you have a really good tube amp, when even the noise of randomly struck strings sound musical and fat. Thats something that even the best digital modelers can't do. Sure they can sound tube-like, but they can't give out that fat gutsy tube tone.. and even some tube amps can't do it because they incorporate too many transistor electronics along the path.. the Mosftet amp on this amp however works pretty well with an amp emulator like the Line 6 Pod or the Behringer v-amp Pro.

It's also like traveling with an instant backup amp. If the tubes go out, just switch right over to mosfet and it sounds good enough to the ear that you won't mind finishing the set in mosfet mode.

There are some weird things about this amp. First. when you first power on, and your tubes are warming up, you have to unplug your guitar input cable and then plug it back in and keep doing this until you activate the tube amp. Otherwise it won't be present. Someone told me this is a protective circuit because a lot of people will actually bang on their strings and keep doing this until they hear their tube amp come alive. As if banging on the strings will make it hurry up.. What actually happens is that while your fragile tubes are warming up and you hit the strings, it slowly destroys the power tube elements and decreases their life span and sound quality.. People often talk about how they never had to replace the tubes in their Create gt80.. This protective circuit might be the reason.. I thought the amp had a bad circuit at first.. but once the tube amp is on, it's on.

Also, the spring reverb is rather weak. It sounds good but it's not very powerful reverb. Just enough to give you some juice and nothing more. Also the reverb tank picks up radio signals. I'd recommend just unplugging it and using a multi-effects pedal.

Another weird thing is the layout of the controls. Switching between tube and solid state and lead and rythm, they have the groupings sort of over hear and over there. "I need to turn up the gain for the tube amp/lead channel, where is the knob for it? it's not this one.. thats for the mosfet gain.. oh yes it's over here.. and where is the master volume? .. oh it's on the very far right.." and it kind hits you like this every time you try to tweak the sound.. confusing at first.. luckly they have some LED's light up to show you where you're at.. but they don't help that much.

You can attach a foot switch to this amp to switch between lead and rythm. you might find one on e-bay. however, the volume levels between the two channels might be really tricky to navigate especially when using a multi-effects pedal and especially if you're using distortion pedals.. Here is the tricky part. when playing live, I suggest you stick to just one channel, otherwise you might suddenly switch to rythm thinking it has enough volume only to have no volume or you might switch to lead and blow your speaker out or your bass players ear drums.. the rythm channel has less distortion overdrive but it has gobs of tone.. I use rythm channel with mild overdrive to give it an extra tubey quality and then if I need heavy distortion I use my pedals and or multi-effects. It never lets me down. In the studio, you can set it up how ever you want.

One more thing. This amp begs to be played loud. It's not a good bedroom amp. The master volume controls aren't happy when you're just trying to sqeeze out a 1.5. The amp isn't going to sound like anything until you free up those tubes to do what their supposed to.

n/a

I should mention that the tone controls are the kind that if you turn all three of them down to zero, you would have no volume. Old fender and vox amps are like this. So this is some indication that the people at Crate were using some sort of old vintage tube amp design. It's probably why it sounds so killer. Modern tube amp designs have always been a bit on the flat side.. I recommend this amp to anyone with a pulse. It has a vintage Marshall and Fender tone that can't be beat! It's a bargain too! Sounds great with either a single coil or a humbucker. It really shines when you input a good multi-effecs pedal with high quality reverbs and good chorus. it loves good distortion boxes. I love it.. get one if you can find one. they are rare! I don't see em' on e-bay.

Plain and simple, this amp offers more features than I care to use. It's not much to look at, but with the effects loop and the footswitch, it is highly versatile. I usually play lead using the rhythym channel, solid state (i need to replace my tubes). My only upgrade was adding a 6 1/2" 300 watt sub (over the power limit, oh well) that pulls alot off the no-bottom-end two Celestion Vintage 10's (60W). With the tubes or solid state both sound nice. This amp, using my Zoom GFX-8 pedal and a LTD M-107 7-string guitar, can easily overpower the whole band, of which I am frequently told. My friend has a Peavey 100W Transtube Bandit 112, and it doesn't push out the power that this has. I plan to switch out the Celestions for some Peavey 12-inch, and build a new cabinet. A 9 because it is flat out great!

Again, I use an LTD M-107 7-string and a Zoom GFX-8 pedal. Using the lead, it puts out a great sound which I have yet to hear from any other (besides the expensive Marshalls, which I personally think it comes VERY close to matching). With the heavy multi-effects processor pedals, using the effects loop cuts ALL feedback. The gain without pedals is still awesome to use, and can be utilized in case of a pedal shortage. The clean channel is CLEAN, no matter the volume, and the distortion is exactly how you set it, whether or not its loud. A 10 because it sounds professional!

I have had a little trouble with the input coming loose at high volumes, but the sub takes the shakes off the Celestions, eliminating that. The only other thing is the tubes have never been replaced I believe, and they are just about shot. That's my fault though. I have found with my pedal, putting my guitar into the pedal, then the pedal into the "Line In" on the effects loop takes care of needing the input. I give it an 8 because nothing's perfect.

I have only been playing for 4 years, and still feel like a total n00b to the guitar world. With the help of friends, my setup has made me the man of the hour before. I would not buy another amp, and if this one was out of service for good, I would probably try to get something like it or something from Crate again. I only wish the speakers were better, but hey, what the heck, they're worth every penny of it!