Hiwatt Higain 50 Head

made in 2006 i guess... bought it april 2006.

its got 2 channel. clean/distortion. clean channel has a bright switch.(push pull pot)
overdrive channel has a push pull pot for high gain.

jacks for channel switching, mute, reverb on off, fx loop on off.
50 watts. totally enough no one needs more nowadays..
EL34 tubes.

(im a professional guitarist)
the sound quality is amazing. i play it with a fender custom shop strat and a 1964' gibson melody maker.

i was looking for an amp the whole time. tried marshalls (800 (great but no clean channel and not useable for strats), 900s clean sucks.2000 tsl drive sucks), mesa (clean sucks - drive - only this one sound), engl, peavey.... i also tried using a bunch of pedals with my fender showman head but the distortion sounds much better on the hiwatt.

it seemed that no amp had to offer what i wanted.
i wanted an amp thats got an good clean channel, (i own a fender dual showman reverb so i know what good clean is), and a drive that i can use for more modern sounds and for more bluesy sounds as i play in different bands with totally different styles.:

clean channel. i dont use the bright switch option as it cuts some bass frequencies and adds some highs. gets thin with this switch on.
but without the bright its really punchy, cristal clear if you want.sounds good with hb and single coil pickups. really great clean sounds. hiwatt was known for this btw... they have the same circuit as their custom models for the clean...

drive: the 1st drive mode you can use for a zeppelish style with a hb guitar or like blackmore with a strat. sounds like an old tube amp cranked with a lot of bass. :)
but dont use too much gain in this mode. gets muddy with too much gain.

for more gain use mode 2. (pull switch) it adds gain and some upper mids and some treble. and clears up the whole thing. (which is a good thing) with just a little amount of gain and a strat it sounds like an old tube amp with a TS9 in front of it but a lot better cause theres no low end cut of. add more gain and you get a good distortion sound for a single coil guitar.

switching guitars isnt a problem . they only thing i do is turn down the treble from 12o'clock (humbuckers) too 9o'clock for strats. and increase the gain of the clean channels so they get the same level as with humbuckers. AWESOME how good this works.

they way the amp reacts to your playing is incredible. it sounds modern if you play modern stuff. it sounds vintage or bluesy if you play like that..

BUT DONT FORGET THE TONE IS IN YOUR FINGERS. IF YOU CANT PRODUCE A GOOD TONE WITH YOUR FINGERS DONT BUY THIS AMP CAUSE IT WONT SOUND GOOD. YOU NEED TO BE ABLE TO PLAY!!


WHAT I DISLIKE: the switching via footswitch from clean to drive takes
long. the volume goes down for a moment and comes up again. thats a little too long for my ears.

the reverb you can switch with the footswitch which is cool but its too long. its longer than fender reverbs. you can only use it for clean ambient reverb effects. its not really useable for bluesy overdriven sounds.. that sucks.
but i wont give it a bad rating here cause what i do is i use the boss rv5 which is amazin btw and so simple to use. i use in the fx loop which works perfect as i can switch it by foot as well....

THIS AMP is THE MOST VERSATILE AMP IVE EVER TRIED AND IT IS BUILT IN THE UK. and not in china or some crap like that.

IT IS BUILT TO RESIST. very solid!

i guess so . looks sturdy.

dont know? never dealt with them.

i guess i would by another one.
it isnt cheap but its worth the money.

i compared it to alot of amps as mentioned aboth...