Epiphone Firefly 30 DSP Combo

Bought new in 2007 from American Musical Supply.
I think the others pretty much hit on the amp, save for one thing: this sucker weighs a ton. I wanted a smaller, lighter amp to replace my marshall mfx(?) 50w, 12" combo. This thing weighs more and is more awkward to carry. But I like the sound so much its a keeper. Im gonna trade the marshall for something lighter. Which will probably turn the Firefly into a closet queen. Sigh.
Rating is due to weight. Otherwise a 8.5

Very nice. Clear and clean. I dont like the gain, but have never heard gain I liked in an amp. DSP beats the Marshall, tho I dont know if that means much. Reverb doesnt get too deep, but has a richness I havent heard since the Fender Super Reverb I owned ages ago.

Too new to have an opinion.

Too new to have an opinion.

Great little amp if you dont plan to move it much.

There are a few onboard effects, a fairly nice reverb, 2 foot switchabe channels and an 8ohm jack for an extension cab (very nice option for such a cheap amp)

OK so the DSP effects are crap useless and horrable, so is channel 1 (the over drive channel) it is hands down the worst sounding crud I have ever heard. I have a Rogue 15 watt amp somewhere that sounds like an AC30 compared to this shit. I can't figure what is going on here it just sounds awfull.

Then there is the "clean" channel out of left field. I was speachless at first when I first heard a strat using only the britge pickup through this thing. It is so warm and chean picking up every note with amazing clairity. There is no faking trying to play throught this channel It's amamzing how easy it is to tell mid song when I start to go out of tune.
I don't really play humbuckers, I have a gibson 137 that I screw around on that has hotrod 57's in it and it sounds a little "muddy" throught this thing but truthfully it sounds "muddy" through any amp, but my fenders and 72 melody maker sound amazing.

It's a solid state it should last for ever!

I tend fix my own shit so I have no idea

I paid 69.99 for this thing off of EBAY with free shipping and shit for that price there is no way you can go wrong. I was screwing around at Guitar center one day with one of these and almost baught it there for $225, but I ended up finding it on ebay for $150 cheaper. If stolen I probably wouldn't buy another only because I have 10 other amps at the moment, but even at $200 the clean channel is hard to beat.

Features are cool but more of a novelty. The DSP is no better that any cheap pedal. Delay is pretty good though. I use quite a bit during my solos.

Wow... I'm not an equipment freak. I like to do more playing than shopping, but I've tried many high end tube amps including Fender Deluxe and Blues and this one is very, very close to the same sound. In fact when I gigged with this amp I had several people ask me if this is a tube amp. Great sound on clean. OK on dirty. Pro sound amp without the price. I use a Frankencaster with humbucker bridge and single coil neck PU and run an OD pedal like Bad Monkey. I play funk and a lot of blues. Been playing for ever (25 years or so) and still learning. I use this amp now instead of my Fender Princeton.

Just got it, but so far so good.

Save yourself the big bucks you would shell out for a tube amp and go with this one. Loud enough to gig with in small places. Sounds great through pa also. Have fun.

It is a quality amplifier for the cost. I paid $150.00 from Cintiolli's.. and it is worth every dollar. Undoubtedly, it has some drawbacks compaired to many other amplifiers, however, for the price it simply cannot be beat.

By adding a 15" extension speaker, the amp opens up with much more personality, greater, and better sound.

The amp is better in a clean channel setting. The gain channel is not very manageable.

The clean responsiveness is fast.. clean, and very precise. The incorporation of the DSP effects are nicely done and present a great sound.

The only enhancement would be to link multiple dsp effects into the sound - you are stuck with either/or one effect and reverb.

Incidentally, the reverb is very good for this series and class of amplifier

It is solid and reliable.

no problems... not even worried about the warranty.

I've had this amp for about 6 mos.

I'll probally get the combo head or a tube amp in the future (I'm a tube head).

THIS REVIEW IS TO EXPRESS MY INITIAL FINDINGS AFTER PLAYING THE AMP AT HOME FOR A WEEK. I WILL POST AN UPDATE AFTER USING AT BAND REHEARSAL, AND THEN AT A GIG.
clean channel and distortion channel with separate eq's. reverb. dsp fx (chorus/flange/delay). speaker out for cabinet.

clean channel - very muffled, treble needs to be on max regardless of guitar. first guitar i used with this was an epiphone SG with dead strings and a muddy neck pickup and it didnt sound good, but i had better results with other guitars... i advise running something relatively bright through this amp. the amp is noisy, and oddly the noise is accentuated as you play.. i thought it was some room reverberations or something but no its the amp. as for the tone, its fine - i fail to see anything tube-like about it, but i dont care about that i just want it to sound "Good". it is a dark channel. its still boomy with the bass on 0. in fact, the tone controls don't have much affect at all. even with the treble on maximum, i have to reconfigure my stompboxes for more high-end through this amp.

distortion channel - this is some of the worst and most un-useable fuzz i have ever heard. no sustain. same amount of gain from 9 o' clock to max. i have a hard time putting into words how bad the distortion channel sounds. toneless harsh tinny buzz. simply, do not buy this amp with the intention of using the distortion channel

dsp fx - all the flanger sounds are awful. there are 1 or 2 ok chorus sounds. delays are all useable, but come nowhere near the depth and quality of a boss delay i once had.

reverb - fake sounding. and has an odd gated effect at the end. but i actually quite like it like this.

my ratings for each element (out of ten) are:
clean channel - 5
distortion channel - 1
dsp fx - 3
reverb - 5

not good

as its solid state, it should last
construction seems solid
no rattles or anything

i must say, im kicking myself for not buying the Orange Crush 30R which is better and cheaper. i'm disappointed and quite annoyed at the amount of glowing reviews this amp has got - its not even worth what i paid for it. then again, its relatively cheap, so i might as well just get the orange crush too. i cant see how the sound of this amp is possibly going to cut through the mix of my band. i've heard that its discontinued so perhaps i'll be able to sell it to someone else who's been duped by the inexperienced rave reviews - what the hell is wrong with all you people!? and as for the people who actually LIKED the distortion.. there is no hope for you. there were no shops stocking this amp in my area so i had to buy online.. oops...
one thing - it looks very cool. but thats about it.

Sorry, nothing is a perfect 10. Always room for improvements!

2 channel, with Reverb and Master volume. Relatively basic setup. It does have a headphone jack too. Awesome styling for this price range amp. Gotta love it!

Very good sound with single coils. A bit darker with humbuckers.
clean channel is very nice, not noisy. Overdrive is just as good! Can go from bluesy Keith Richards to Angus Young by adjusting the gain.

Currently I have a 2006 Gibson Les Paul Studio worn cherry finish and a 2006 Squire telecaster-the butterscotch finish one. This amp is sweet with either guitar.

I also have a 1981 Dean Elite which totally blows either of the above guitars oot of the water.

I have the footswitch which is a must for the variety of sounds this amp offers.

Seems solid and is a tad heavy.

No need for repairs yet. Waranty is for 5 years!

Been playing for 30+ years. I have an original Fender 1964 Princeton Reverb, and a 2006 Fender Blues Jr.

Lost or stolen - probably would look for a decent 50Watt hybrid.

Do not like the weight, or the original speaker with humbuckers. Original speaker is fine with single coils.

Follow-up of my previous review: the digital effects still have some issues such as delay when the knob is set to chorus and the flange still has that weird hesitation once in a while. I find the tone stack to be better than I previously alluded to and has a wide range, though tone will vary depending on guitar. Distortion has good crunch up to about 7 then just scrambles the tone out. For me, I like it anywhere between 2 and 5. But that is me.

I bought this amp for the clean channel and to put it straight: the clean channel alone is worth the $150-$200 this my or may not cost. Since my previous review, I have had a handful of tone-freaks play on this amp and the opinion is that this amp sounds just plain great, especially the clean (for an amp that costs less than $200). This is not a amp for metal but your go-to pedal on the clean channel is where it's at. The always-on tube emulation does an outstanding job.

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I bought this amp defective and slightly damaged to fix and re-sell. After fixing it, I realized I had stumbled on an amp that I like and only cost me $100. Me thinks it a keeper.
For the price, this amp can't be outdone. If you know of one that can, please share that info with me. I have never been a big fan of solid state amps and my last ss amp was the Marshall MG100DFX (made by KORG) which I actually like at the time (sold it long ago) and this Epiphone sounds better to me. But that's just me.

Features are okay. It has what it needs to have to justify the price. DSP is not too charming, but most people have pedals for delay, chorus, and flanger anyway.

The drive channel is useless, except as a possible effect (I'm thinking Cardigans guitar solo). The clean channel is warm and dynamic, albeit not quite as bright as I would like it.

Seems like it will last a long time. It is built very solid.

The bottom line is, for $200 you will not find anything even remotely close to this amp. It's worth that price for the clean channel alone.

Why is it that delay/flange/chorus are on the same dial? I understand the financial logistics of keeping an amp affordable, but one day, I may want some chorus AND a bit of delay but the way things are in the world of one-dial digital effects, this will only be realised with an extra pedal. They also used a ribbed ceramic 10" speaker yet I am a big fan of Weber speakers so I can only wonder what vast improvement may lay ahead. Heck, I replace the speakers in all of my amps with Weber speakers and have breathed new life into some very BLAH amps. When playing with flange, there seems to be a slight hesitation, but this doesn't happen often, so I wonder if the responsible capacitors discharge too fast, so when one hits the next note, it has that millisecond delay until the capacitor is recharged again. I can only speculate. You'll never notice it playing in a band or even just chording out some tune. Headphone jack is an enormous plus, just don't expect the amp to sound good with the headphones on.
As sharp as this amp looks and as inexpensive it is, I think that this amp is loaded.

The tone controls are obviously designed to keep this amp from sounding like anything that could be construed as "tinny". But the clean channel has just enough brightness with the treble up and the guitar brightend to sound just great with none of the nerve-grating ear-bleeding. Well done. Personally, I really like the tone of this amp. I have a hot-rodded Fender Champ with a 10" replacement speaker (Weber, of course) and this Firefly can really keep up in the tonal range and does sound "tubey". Not brittle or tinny, mostly because of the tone stack and, my guess, the way the engineers have emulated how the power amp stage interacts with the speaker, which has a very thick membrane. I do not believe that this amp was designed with Metal in mind, yet it can deliver up to a certain point. Also, most amps sound better when played loud and sound even better once the speaker is broken in. I use a Carvin SC90T and the strings are 10s.

Seems well built. The cab is completely enclosed, so you'll never have any birds building a nest in your speaker.

Never needed them but the squeaky wheel gets the oil.

Been playing On/Off forever. I like this amp for the price/tone. It even looks good, so it blends in well even in Grandma's living room if need be. It is not a Carvin MTS812 fullstack but it only costs 10% of that. Keep that in mind and you will never put expectations on a $150 amp that it cannot deliver. Let's face it: this amp actually sounds good to some and sounds "blah" to others. Tone is very personal. Don't take MY word for it just because I think this amp to be a friggen steal!

Blaah...

- Tone-controls dont work at all, same both channels
- Very Noisy
- Lack of "middle vocals" in tone

Dont know

20 years with all tube amps, 30+ axes today
Firefly works only with low power bridge singles with strat