Marshall Valvestate 8020

I bought this amp 8020 as a practice amp, in 1992, has two chanells, clean and boost, simple controls, easy to use, it's a practice amp , sooo, don't expect it to sound like a 100 watt JTM 45!

I have played through many amps, mostly tube driven amps.
As for this 8020, I am more than happy with it's performance.
The sound quallity is as one would expect for a tube emulated amp, some sounds it produces are good and some not so good, over all, for my style of playing, it is quite adequate.
Made in England, not China!

Here we go, very reliable little amp, can take a bit of rough treatment that tube driven amps will not tolerate.
However I treat all my amps with respect, so I don't really have any problems with them being unreliable.
You can't expect any amp, be it solid state or tube to be reliable, if you treat it like s--t, simple.

Wrote to Marshall and asked for a ciruit diagram, should i need to repair or modify this amp.
Recieved the diagram as requested, very good service.
Never needed to do any repairs to this amp.

I am 46 years old.
I first started playing guitar when i was in high school.
Blues and mostly stuff from the "vintage tube sound era", led zep, deep purple, and so forth.
My very fist full tube amp, was a JTM 45 100 watts with two quad boxes.
Lost a lot of hearing due to the loud volume levels we used to play at, no in house pa's were avaliable here in Australia, back then, well!, none that sounded any good any way.
I have over the years owned many amps both tube and solid state, as per normal, most guitarists prefer all tube amps, however as the solid state technology has improved, i have found many tube emulated solid state amps, are well worth a look into.
I would not part with my 8020, i have long since sold my big wattage tube amps, as i prefer to play at home with a few freinds, hence volume and **** loads of pedals are not required any more.
If you can't get most of the sounds you require from a amp with out pedals, you are not a very good guitarist, as far as i am concerned.
I play either my Ibanez ES175, or my Epiphone ES335 through the affore mentioned amp.

I bought this amp new in 1995, in Hong Kong at Tom Lee Music. If your practicing or jamming for fun this amp will get you where ever you want to go.I play Rock, Blues, Jazz and Country Licks. The Overdrive channel with adjustable contour and presence will get you just about any rock or modern electric blues sound you want. The clean channel is designed such that you get "natural" tube distortion when it is set at "10". For that 60's blues tone. So it is really only clean up to about "7" which is not quite loud enough to be heard over a drum set. Nevertheless, if you mic this thing into a decent PA it will do what you need.

I use a '74 Gibson LP Standard with the original humbuckers, '72 Gibson SG Std w/orig. humbuckers, '59 LP Std Reissue with Burtsbuckers and a frankenstrat with an ESP Alaskan Ash body, Philip Kubicki flame maple neck (very fat),Seymour Duncan V57 pu's on the bridge and a DiMarzio FS-1 at the bridge, and a 5 position switch. With the strat on the right switch position you can sound like SRV or Mark Knopfler. With humbuckers you will sound like Angus or Slash. You can't quite get that Joe Perry (train kept a rollin')or Dicky Betts(one way out)Marshall sound. This amp doesn't make any strange noises or buzzes. The distortion is very controllable.

Has worked fine for ten years. I've had this thing half way around the world and all over the states. Hundreds of gigs and jam sessions with no problems. The tube was replaced after about 5 years and is still working fine.

I've been playing for 42 years. The only other amps I've owned were a silvertone 40W stack (60's vintage) and a 1973 Twin Reverb. This amp is much more versatile than those amps. The first few years that I had this amp,other muscicians would give me those "are you serious?" looks when I walked in the door. Once they heard this thing cranked up they would give each other those "he is SERIOUS!" looks. People know better now. I've had several "Marshall half stack" guys tell me they were thinking of getting one of these. This amp will not impress the Soldano, JCM800,Mesa Boogie snobs if they are judging pure sound and power quality. However, if you want a fairly simple, very portable, great sounding amp that you can use every day and everywhere you can't beat this amp.

I bought the amp new in 1995 (I think). I play hard rock, metal and this was my first amp. It is 2 channel with footswitching, separate EQ and master reverb. The dirty channel has presence and preamp controls. There is a headphone and line out for recording or DI PA's. It is without an external speaker jack, the internal speaker is hard wired so you can't use an external cab without some modification. It is 20 watts, loud enough to damage your hearing and hear over a loud drummer but you will need something more if you require clean head-room. The contour control is like a parametric mid freq. It goes from all mid honking blues to scooped thrash. I would prefer traditional 3 knob EQ though. The speaker is a 10-inch Celestion. Some claim this has a tube in the preamp. IT DOES NOT. This is the first generation Valvestate and you had to get atleast the 40-watter to get the tube. No effect loop. Amps these days can come with a dizzying array of features. This has everything I need except for better EQ and speaker jacks.

I use mostly les pauls, I also have a Mockingbird and schecter, all humbucker equiped. This is a rock-n-roll amp. I wanted a Boogie to play Metallica but couldn't afford on at the time. This sounded good for metal. I also play GNR, Sabbath, Zep, AC/DC, etc. This amp is well suited to those sounds. After over 10 years I would say its best sound is gain:10, contour4.5, presence5, volume to suit. This gives me a good approximation of Slash's live sound. It sounds better louder. The power section will clip and compress above halfway to make the sound fuller. I use a lot of reverb to fill it out further. It can sound thin and brittle otherwise. The metallica sound is with everything dimed and any volume setting. It is more Kill em All, does not sound like a Boogie. I have a tri-axis for that. The clean channel is overly bright and breaks up early. I use a low gain setting and my guitar volume on the gain channel for a better sound. The speaker gives up and starts farting if you add too much bass from outboard effects so nu-metal is gonna be tough. The gain level is short of a Mark IV or 5150 but still adequate for 80's metal. This definately sounds solid state but sounds better than the pre-valvestate ss amps like the lead12 which were overly buzzy. This amp has the Marshall tone and can give you the woman tone on the rhythm pick up. The other guitarist in my old band liked the sound so much he went and bought the 40 watter. In my opinion the preamp tube made the gain dark and mushy and 40 watts was too loud to max the volume. My amp sounded better. As a low cost practice amp its great. You need a tube amp for serious tone. Vavlestate won't fool anyone. Among solid state, Valvestate is the best (10), modeling amps are something different and its unfair to compare this to tube. Against tubes it's a 6. overall I'll give it a 7.

It has never failed. One advantage to solid state is reliability. The pots can get scratchy from humidity and disuse. The loud speaker will not take a volume boost from effects. This amp ran flat out for hours at a time for three years of band practice and still works as new.

Never had to get a repair.

I have been playing guitar for 15 years. I still use this amp for home practice. I have a Mesa/Boogie tri-axis and 2:90 simul-class for other uses. I just bought a DSL201 and I have a Carvin 3-channel acoustic/bass/PA amp. I would get something else if this amp was stolen. My attatchment to it is emotional since I had it so long but I can afford better equipment these days. Still I'll likely not part with it. Its a good amp to back up my DSL on gigs (sounds even better miked)and to practice at home. I have played the new AVT line and it sounds more like tube but it also sounds dark (a concern with les pauls) and less organic/responsive on the high gain channel. The new modelling amps also sound more like tube but also lifeless ie: always the same identical tone no matter what. Solid State can be musical with this amp. People think they want tube but metal usually needs a diode distortion boost until you get expensive. There is a diode in Slash's sound (the Jubilee circuit) Kirk Hammett uses diode pedals in front of a tube power section as did Hetfield on Ride the Lightening. It gives a tight sound and lots of gain for tapping and harmonics. Malmsteen even uses a Stomp-box and who can argue with him?

2 channels clean and distortion. 20 watts, headphone footswitch and line out jacks (as someone mentioned the line out is great for connecting a tuner). Only one input, but I can only play one guitar at a time. Weighs next to nothing. Uses a standard "PC" type power cord, which is detatchable. Open back, 10" speaker - a practice amp for sure, but probably good enough for 90% of us - basement slashers abd wanna-be's. This amp does have one tube for the pre-amp (not fully solid state as incorrectly described by some reviewers).

I bought this because I can carry it and my guitar at the same time. Was looking for something not too loud for practice. My main amp is a Yamaha DG80-112 which sounds great, but has a million bells and whistles. I use the Marshall with an Epiphone Les Paul and a Godin SDXT and both guitars produce acceptable results. I like the simplicity of this amp, and I find if you back off on the gain for the distortion channel you can get a nice responsive bluesey sound (leave it at about 1/4 and back off on the contour). Turn it up and its loud enough to fill any room in your house. I have used the line out to an input on a Roland KC-350 (120 watt keyboard amp) and it totally rocked. My Zoom 505-II, Danelectro Daddy-o and Pastrami pedals sound good through the clean channel. Distortion is not deadly, but suits me fine. I had no problem dialing in a pretty good AC/DC sound. I think any of the Valvestates or AVT series are fine for most folks.

I don't gig, but I will drag this around with me without worry. Mine had a missing locking nut on the input, which produced a howling sound when an instrument plugged in. Replaced the nut and all is well (2 minute job, got the replacement part for free from local music shop). It has to be 10 years old and is still going strong, although it could use a cleaning of the pots - normal maintenance.

Never dealt with Marshall, although their web site got me a manual.

I have either been playing 25 years or 6 months depending on how you count. I love all kinds of music, and look for flexibility in my instruments. I could have purchased pretty much whatever I wanted in a practice amp, but I liked this one. If it were stolen or lost, I don't know if I could find a replacement so would probably look for a newer Marshall AVT line. I did a side by side with a newer Marshall MG15DFX at the same price, and I liked this better. The Roland Cube 15 was my other option, which I passed on although it was a nice little amp. Given what this was made for, I think it has everything one could expect, although an input for a CD/MP3 player would be handy.

Built in '93-'94. I use it for practice, but is loud enough to go head to head with 80w solid state amps. I play rock, blues, metal. It works. Clean channel sounds great with trebles at 5, bass knob turned all the way up. Also breaks at high volume, great early punk sound. Gain Channel is great for all kinda shit. I used to have a Marshall Shred Master pedal for more distortion, but I don't use it anymore, cause this amp's distortion is quite enough for metal. It's all in the hands, not gain. IMO this amp is one of the best practice amps around and with the PA line-out it can be the stack of marhsalls you've never had :) I only miss a line out for extention cabinet.

Fender Deluxe Series Double Fat Strat HH with a license Fender Floyd Rose, Epi SG. 8020 gives you killer sound. It only has a tiny little tube, but it makes all the difference. The sound is truly a Marshall. Clean Channel breaks up at high volumes. The distortion can be oversaturated if you turn Gain, Presence and Contour all the way up. If you have a good guitar, you're a winner, but with a guitar like Ibanez, ESP or Jackson it's too buzzy. Take out some presence and contour and it will be growling. Best sound I got out of it was with EMG81 pick ups.

Not the most reliable thing in the world. Broken down 3 times in 10 years. The reverb button does not work most of the time. It can all be fixed easily, but I'm a lazy MF.

Never dealt with them.

When I heard this little amp for the first time, my friend was blastin' some metal through it on an Ibanez w/ EMG81. Man, so much power and good tones. I had to have it. So I bought it of him and he has been sorry to this day that he sold me this little jem. I use it at home, but also giged with a band a couple of times with it. No problem there. You can run it through PA for more power. I think later versions of Marshall Valvestate practice amps are a piece of crap, the have too many knobs. This is the most rational amp of all time IMO.

Marshall 8020 made in early 90's. This was the first generation of the Vavlvestate line. Pretty versatile with twin channels and reverb.
This amp is a Rock Machine...is not good for country or jazz.

I wish the reverb was footswitchable. The presence knob seems to add ice-pick brightness, so I leave it off.

Would be nice if it had a master volume(you always have to be adjusting the volumes of the clean, and boost channels depending on where you play.

This amp is lightweight, and gives you the Marshall sound without tubes!

Using Gibson Les Pauls playing straight ahead rock n roll...I couldn't pick a better amp for that!

I was amazed that this thing could cop a JCM800 distortion with the gain set at half, and the contour pot panned hard left. And mesa style crunch is also available by dimeing the gain and contour pots hard right. It uses two diodes for clipping, similar to the high dollar jubilee, and artist amps.

The amp is plenty loud for 20 solid state watts! Great for rehearsal, studio, and the Bedroom Rocker. But if you need more volume, you can run this through a PA via a mic or the built in line out. Through a PA this amp sounds like a wall of Marshalls!!!

I've played this sucker for over 14years. The gain channel went dead once, but I sprayed all the pots, jacks, switches with contact cleaner and it came alive again!! This is one tuff lil booger!!! I've giged it without backup. RELIABLE this amp is.

I've been playing 14 years, The 8020 was my first Marshall. Since then I've bought dozens of Marshalls both tube and solidstate. The 8020 remains one of my favorites for great sound in a small package.

Bought used in 1995, so built in early 90s?
20 watts into 25 watt 10" celestion speaker, cabinet is openback
I believe the preamp has a single power tube to get closer to the tube sound.
Uses standard removable 3-prong power cord
2 Channels, clean and overdrive with a front panel button and foot pedal control switch
The clean channel has bass and treble knobs
THe overdrive channel has contour (compression) and presence (tone) knobs
The reverb is decent with one control knob
One input, Foot pedal control output, headphone output and lineout

The amp was not designed to be a full-blown setup, so it is unfair to compare it with larger more powerful units. For its weight, power and features it is very good and probably one of the best in its class.

When I first bought this amp it was for a practice amp. One day this past summer, I was late for a gig and decided to chance it. The amp is small and light so in a mad dash out the door, I threw it in my car. Later during the gig, I was surprised how loud it was! I was using the overdriven channel with a lot of high end to cut through. However, I still felt that it did not have the low-end needed for a live gig.

But the light weight and portability still intrigued me. This is when I came up with an idea. I am now using this amp in a small oldies trio (piano w/key bass and drums). I run the lineout to the PA and use the amp itself for a 'guitar monitor'. Sometimes I even point the amp back at me and not at the audience. This setup works great. The tube preamp through the PA makes this thing sound like a real Marshall stack! The only drawback is that the PA has to have some balls to emulate the 'multiple 12" speaker' sound. I have since used different PAs with different results.

Because the amp cannot get this sound on its own, I have to give it an 8, but it has become a good alternative to my Fender Deluxe, especially if there is a small stage.

I have been using this amp mostly for practice at home and recently for live gigs (i.e. lineout to PA). It has held up very well. I had to glue one of the gold knob caps back on but otherwise I have no complaints. This little thing can 'take a lickin' and keep on kickin''. Undoubtedly for a 10" speaker, the Celestion speaker is a brute.

Never contacted them.

I have been playing on and off since the mid-60s. I could kick myself for not keeping some of the amps I have had in the past - mainly a small Silvertone 1x12 with Tremolo and an early 60s brown tolex covered Fender 4x10 Concert. I have mainly used tube amps - SS just doesn't cut it. Currently for most gigs, I am using the Limited edition Tweed HotRod Fender Deluxe with the 12" Jensen that is really sweet. That said, this Marshall 8020 amp has been fun to use. Especially when you are in a small room. For a small amp it has a great sound. I am planning on using it until it 'dies'. All things considered, you have to give it high marks. You just can't push it past its limits.

20 watts of power through an 8ohm 10inch speaker - enough power for school hall size gigs, and more than enough for home use.
2 channel - clean with TREBLE, BASS and GAIN controls
distortion with GAIN, CONTOUR, PRESENCE, VOLUME and MASTER REVERB
1 input, a headphone socket (useful at school) and a line out socket.
The only other controls I'd like are a separate control for the line out level, and also a frequency splitter, so I could connect a bass amp to amplify only the lower frequencies. It could also do with another input, with a separate button for the channels.

The clean channel requires more bass and less ear piercing treble. It is a little distorted at high volumes, but only with heavy strumming and treble. The bass control is about as affective as the one on our estate car stereo. It is clear, good quality, and unmuffled however.
The distortion channel is better, and and makes for good rock music. A bit more tone required. It's not quite beefy enough for very heavy metal. Horrible sounding transistor distortion tends to break up the smooth overdriven sound when I use the second pick-up setting on my guitar.
It is very loud, especially when sat in the direct path of the speaker, and outdoors the sound travels for ages, even at low volumes.

This amp was bought for me second hand, and the only two minor things wrong are a short 1/4 second scream that occurs when you remove the guitar lead from the input socket, and loud background noise on the boost channel; when nothing is plugged in (could be normal). A knob has fallen off, but they can easily be put back on, and I used this as an advantage in lining all the other controls up. It's held up well, despite all the bashings and bangings it's had at school.

I heve been using this amp for a couple of years. The thing I love is the high volume that echoes around outside; and overdriven sound. The thing I hate, is the scream of the feedback, and that ache the treble can leave in my ears.
If it were lost or stolen, I think I would try something new, just as I never buy the same pair of shoes twice. If I had money to burn, I'd
buy the most powerful PA amp available (the EP 2500) complete with speaker stacks, and blast it off in an old abandoned aircraft hangar.
Things I wish it had were stated in the Features column.

20 w solid state combo, G10D-25 celestion speaker.
mine was built in 1991 or 1992.

2 channels
- clean : volume, bass and treble
- boost : gain, contour, presence, volume

and there's a spring reverb.

You can plug a footswitch, it wasn't included but it's easy to build one.
there's a line out and a headphone output
no FX loop, no speaker output.

with 20 watts, you may think it's a little practice amp but 20 w is actually already too loud.
with the volume up to 3 or 4, you can practice quietly but you don't get interesting tones, i.e. no crunch on clean channel.
with the volume above that, you could gig, but you can't plug an extension cabinet so you'll have to stick with the integrated speaker.

I mainly practice with it but I wish I could have some crunch without annoying my neighbours.

If you just want to practice, buy a 10 or less w amp, and then if you want to gig, buy some more serious stuff.

I'm using an Aria Pro 2 Thor Sound with Golden Age Ceramic single coil pickups from stewmac.
The clean channel is ok but nothing amazing, there should be a mid eq knob. you've got a good crunch when it's pushed all the way up, but then as I said, it's too loud for practicing.
The boost channel is very Marshall I think, that's the one I use the most. the contour and presence settings are self-explanatory. the gain knob is very sensitive up to 3 or 4, you get slight distortion, good for rock'n'roll, and above that it's hard rock and heavy metal. using your tone control on your guitar with the presence knob is the secret to get different lots of different tones. I think it sounds quite good and you won't need a distortion pedal in front of this amp. Nothing amazing however. It's good. sounds better when yu push volume.
The reverb is pretty cool, very sensitive and reasonably realistic. But I think that pushed all the way, there's so much of it it's almost ridiculous. I do that to impress my friends. Just use the clean channel, reverb up to ten, and just play some blue notes. It gives the effect that you're a very deep and sensitive guitar player.

the amp has broken down but then it was after I travelled with it in my car. It was moving freely and I'm a bit brutal as a driver. I don't know what happended. I left it collecting dust for months until one day I decided to fix it. I just changed a condenser, the fuse and the power switch and Hallelujah. Don't ask me what was going wrong. The amp is 10 years old and I was able to fix it myself so... not that bad. I wouldn't gig with it (if I ever wanted to gig with this) without a backup, or at least some fuses :)

I got it used and have never dealt with Marshall. I thought about sending it to them when it broke, but I think I voided the warranty, so I prefered fixing it myself.

I've been playing for 3 years and I just this thing and an Aria Pro 2 Thor Sound. It's a good amp but I wouldn't buy it again it was stolen or lost. I have just bought a laney LC15R which should fit my tastes much more.
for 80? (=~ $80), it was a very good deal. I've heard other amps with equivalent features and power, it's much better than them. But as I said, I think this amp is too loud to practice, and isn't complete enough to gig seriously.
I wish there was more eq controls and a speaker output, and off course I wish it was LESS LOUD. people have to stop considering a 20 w amp as small, it's already too loud to practice. I'm even considering buying a power attenuator to get all the possible tones at reasonable volumes.

Twin channels, (clean & Dist.) Reverb. Twenty watts into a 10" celestion speaker. It has channel switching( footswitch not included) Great for practise at home and gigs. Very Versatlile Rock n Roll amp.
I used it for gigs, I just stuck a sure mic in front of it, man, i could have sworn I was playig out of a stack!

Playing through it with a Les Paul . Great for the Punk/alternative I play. Awesome Marshall tone. I don't need anything more. It's got clean, Distortion, and reverb. What else could a guitarist want?

Dependable as any other Marshall, but not as high quality as the high end heads, but what do you expect for $250.00

Five year warranty

I've been playing 15yrs, I also own a JCM800 halfstack, and various Les Paul guitars. Its a great little amp for its price, and Hey! It's a Marshall. I egret selling it to a friend of mine a couple of years ago. I wish I still had it. Awesome lil' amp! It's got everthing you need to play Rock n Roll (except for a wah, I guess)