Mesa/Boogie 20/20

Most of us know the features of this amp by now - right? It's certainly not the "new kid on the block" anymore. but for blah blah sake , here's the skinny: stereo el84 power amp with individual volume and presence dials per channel. that's about it - would you call these features or basic potatoes? the thing that's most exciting is the one space capacity in your rack but delivering a fairly LOUD output.

this 20/20 is late '03 or early '04 production. i bought it new in 2004. now that it's out of warranty , i did the Deep Mod to it myself.
after doing such , everything's the same as the operation of it goes other than the peak in the low mids is now gone. it's quiet just as the day i first got it. this amp has never let me down. i must say i like the results of the Deep Mod - but i also liked the amp as before because i don't play no stinkin' metal boys. i can hear why the metalheads like the Deep Mod. for myself, the Deep Mod just allows me to get more of that Fender clean tone - bigger , fuller , etc. - you guys know that sound. the mod is also more "user friendly" if you will by allowing other than Mesa preamps to be used. so , i see the mod overall as a benefit to my course of playing which is a variety of styles. here's the signal path: guitar(McCarty,SG,Strat,Tele,Charvel So Cal)> Marshall JMP 1 (effects loop > Intellifex > TC M300 > Dbx 215)> (master out)> Mesa 20/20 > 2x12 Lopo closed back cab WGS ET-65 loaded. the power is all thru a Furman RP-8. all the midi switching is thru a Rolls Midi Buddy. there's a huge advantage to using something like the Dbx 215 with the 20/20 - mod or without. overall , the cleans have improved from the Deep Mod. i like Fusion type music - mostly jazzy blues stuff more than the rock jazz stuff. for either style i can dial up the tones i need without any fuss ... the credit for that going to the Dbx 215. my JMP 1 does have a slightly different feel to it now after the Deep Mod and i find it for the better. of course i had to re-Q my patches on the JMP 1 by taking down the bass and re-shaping the mids and yes , the treble and presence as well. overall , my modest little eight space gigging multi rack setup as somewhat improved after the Deep Mod to the 20/20. it's a great little package and not too heavy to tote. i find it fascinating how the removal of two teeny tiny capicitors changes the amp's voice. my guitars are the initial "tone source" for my sound and each of their voices are rendered well thru this setup with a bit-mo-beef from the Deep Mod. a word about doing this mod yourself - it's fairly simple but you must use patience and proceed cautiously removing the circuitboard from the retainers. i don't recommend using a soldering iron to remove the miniscule caps - snip them off. instructions to this mod is fairly easy to find by a general web search.

i've owned this amp now nearing six years and it works as it should.

i've been playing many years - yeah , i'm an old guy. this is the only rack setup i have and the 20/20 is great for my objectives which is : lower the weight but keep the volume and punch to the sound allowing a variety of flava as needed. i also own and use a Super Reverb and a Vox AC15 Heritage head. i do use the rack setup more for it's flexible offerings and use the other two amps for a more "narrow and focused" authentic tone for 60's & 70's type stuff. i also own the Mosvalve MV-962 mosfet power amp and will sometimes use it in the rack setup. i do so when playing all Fusion type material because the Mosvalve delivers a big 'ol buttery smooth sound yet it is very tightly focused. i dig the marriage of the JMP-1 to the Mosvalve for the Fusion stuff - it's just superb. the 20/20 gets the lion's share of duty though for it's more complimenting sound for doing cover material which yields a larger audience. the 20/20 is the way to go if you're wanting to keep a rack setup at best performance per pound while saving some weight. i recommend the Mosvalve MV-962 for any JMP-1 user doing Fusion material competing against horns and synths ... you're tone will cut thru every bit as theirs (make sure to use a graphic EQ to get all the best from it).

early chrome/silver face version. does it have tons of switches and gizmos? no. does it have everything you need? yes. Simple, straight forward controls (volume, presence, power, standby, input, speaker outs, slave out).
No 16 ohm ouput, but Mesa discusses this in the manual, and you CAN use 16 ohm cabs with the 20/20.

Using a Gibson Les Paul Classic, or Fender American Deluxe Strat (from the late 80's) this power amp sounds great. Extremely quiet, the fan can be louder than any noise on the amp. Very versatile, cleans can be chimey and bell like, distortion as beefy as you want it and it retains its clarity.
Really warms up any preamp, and kills with a decent tube one.
PS- this 20/20 has the deep mod. (a must as everyone knows by now)

MESA/Boogie makes some of the toughest gear I've ever used. I hear abuse stories all the time, and how their stuff just keeps on working.

Very nice, intelligent people at Mesa. If you need help, they'll take care of you.

I would definitely buy another 20/20 if mine were lost or stolen. It's in a league of it's own. My rack is so much lighter than it used to be, but still sounds fantastic.

Everything you need in a power amp, nothing you don't.
Some say they want a standby switch for each channel, but there's no need since all you have to do is put the volume to zero and the presence to ten. Simple.

First off: DO THE DEEP MOD.
I liked this power amp fine before it, but the deep mod makes this thing open up and sound amazing. You lose that crazy mids and up boost, and get your bass back. Extremely sensitive, and alive sounding. Not sterile. You can actually get power tube distortion with it!

It's a MESA/Boogie. I've owned lots of their amps, and never had a problem with any of them. Built like a tank, would gig without a backup any day.

I've dealt with Mesa on a few topics (usually just regarding mods, or ordering parts) and they've always been very helpful and informative. Leave them a message, and they actually call you back. One of their repair techs gets under mine skin, but everyone else is awesome.

1 space tube power amp. Light weight. Amazing tone. There's nothing else I could ask for, so this baby actually gets a 10.
NOTE: this is after the deep mod has been done.

It's a stereo amp with independant volume+presence control for each channel and a shared standby switch. It supports 4 and 8 ohm cabinets. Thats *almost* it. No voicing options, no mono-bridging, no nothing... At this point I would rate it's features at a 5, which doesn't mean that it's a mediocre amp but featurewise it's bread'n'butter. However I will :
* add 1 point for it's slave outputs. I regard this as a feature (allthough I personally have no use for it)
* remove 1 point for it's lacking support of 16-ohm cabinets; rather annoying. I'd like to use this amp with a MesaBoogie Recifier 2x12 cabinet (powerful and portable), but that's a no-go since that cabinet (which would require a very simple stereo-modification) has 16 ohm speakers. You CAN attach 16-ohm cabs to the 8 ohm output but this is really sub-optimal and who wants to run their Boogie in a sub-optimal configuration?

The amp is fixed bias meaning that you don't have to worry about biasing (ie. pay a tech if you can't do it yourself) when replacing tubes. Simply buy the tubes from MesaBoogie, plug'em in and go. Nice thought, especially in live situations if you blow a tube. But, if you're forced to buy tubes from *one* specific supplier, do you think those tubes will be cheap or expensive? And when you've payed big bucks for an amp, do you like other people dictating what tubes to put in and at what bias to run them? I think MesaBoogie have shortcircuited their own design-philosophy in the sence that "we build premium ultra flexible amps" that "can only use low-biased (cardbox sounding) Sovtek Tubes". It's like buying a Ferrari and being forced to use snow-tires at too low air-pressure.

Powerrating is 2x20 Watts, and I will certainly never need more power than this. It can more than keep up with the drummer, and if you want it louder you need a PA anyway to keep everything balanced. In fact, the idea that the much sought after output-stage distortion can be obtained at tolerable levels with such a "tiny" amp is rather misleading if you ask me. It's still too damn loud. Remember, 50W is only 3dB lower than 100W, and this is a 40W amp! Playing through Vintage 30's speakers (100dB sensitivity) it's exactly as loud as my 100W Marshall playing through Greenbacks (96dB sensitivity). Headroom for clean-sounds is fine for me too, but I'm not the ultra-picky type in this respect who insists on a 6L6 Fender...

Oh, and the big plus : it's *light*, 1 unit and approx 6 kg. No back-ackes, which is my main reason for getting into this amp...

I play a Gibson Les Paul studio, and the styles cover pop, blues, rock and almost-metal; the last meaning that the loudness, distortion and energy is there but I don't chunck out (detuned) palm-muted powerchords (which is often associated with the metal genre).

So, I received the amp, hooked it up, and : it was god-awful! No bass and even worse, a boost in what I guessed was in the low-low-mids which sounds absolutely horrible. No matter what combination of preamps and cabinets (Marshall 4x12's, Mesa 2x12's, ...) I used I was unable to simply dial out the problems.
Luckily, some other reviewer had prepared me for this by saying something like "you really-really need to deep-mod this amp", so I didn't panic but reached for the soldering iron and mod'ed it. Got bass, but still this ugly honk sound. My signal line was down to this : Gibson->Triaxis->2020->Rectifier2x12. Spend days/weeks. Could NOT make this setup sound even close-to-decent and I have allways been able to dial in satisfying tone withing 5-10 minutes.
I added a programmable equalizer in the form of a G-major, so my signal line was like this : Gibson->Triaxis->GMajor->2020->Rectifier2x12, and started doing 1-2 octave wide cuts of 3-6 dB in the 200-400 hz region. Things improved but I just could not nail the right frequency, cut-level and Q-value to really get rid of the honk.
After weeks (of growing dispair), I ended up putting this amp plus another (good sounding) amp through full blown automated frequency analysis. By comparing the gain vs frequency characteristics of these amps, it finally revealed it self :
1) provided that the Mesa 20/20 is deep-mod'ed (which mine was by this time)
2) provided that the presence knob is in the mid-position, that is, pointing directly upwards
=> The Mesa 20/20 has a 3.2 octave wide 1.8dB boost centered at 180Hz! (compared to my ok-sounding reference amp)
I would never ever have guessed that it was such a subtle but wide boost that totally ruined everything for me. I set the Gmajor to do the cut and aaahhh! no honk...

So now I had bass (deep mod), no honk (external equalizer) but just a plain dull sound. Why? The cardbox sounding (probably under-biased) tubes that you are required to use according to Mesa. I bought a JJ-based retube kit from EuroTubes, because these guys provide the service of handpicking the individual tubes based on their individual electrical properties, so that when installed in the amp you will get a decent bias; plus a lovely sounding set of JJ's. At this point, the amp (finally) sounds good.

How do I rate this amp? Stock, I'd rate it a 1-2. It's almost totally useless to me. Deep-mod'ing it and adding external equalization I'd give it a 4-5. It's useable but dull. Inserting handpicked JJ tubes (this is the amp's current state) I'd give it a 7-8. It's consistently good without blowing me away, but occasionally it "shines". In the future I might upgrade it to adjustable bias so that I can really control things. I hope this will give it the last push into the 8-9 territory.

Rating is based almost entirely on it's character when stock (since this is what you buy), but acknowledging that it *can* be improved once you cracked the riddle.

I haven't had this amp for very long, so it's too early for me to say. However, I must say, looking inside the amp everything looks very tight indeed and I really feel that I can depend on this amp. I especially like the way air-ventilation has been designed. It sucks in air symetrically from the front, flows evenly over all hot compontents, and is let out on the rear side where it cools the tubes - which are exterior mounted for easy access and ventilation. In that respect it seems much better designed than it's competitor the Marshall 20/20 (with internal tubes and almost blocked ventilation ducts at the side of the amp due to the rackcase-wall)
I'd be surprised if this amp doesn't deserve a 9-10 in this category, but currently I'm unable to rate it.

Never dealt with them.

I've been playing guitar for 20+ years. I *very* recently upgraded to a premium-brand guitar (Gibson), but before that I allways played cheap guitars, mid-to-higher end amps and was always able to dial in a tone that seemed good to me. At some gigs (with multiple bands) I would even play whatever amp was there, and make it work. Point being, I don't consider myself that picky and has made alot of friendly jokes to fellow musicians about their need for magic wood, virgin blood and angel hairs in their guitars.
But! regarding the (stock) MesaBoogie 20/20 I have never been so disappointed with an amp or any musical equipment before. Really! I don't love/hate any brands by default, I simply either like a product or I don't; regardless if it's a cheap Behringer or an expensive Mesa. But, if I pay alot I want quality right out of the box. If it's cheap I'm more forgiving.

The verdict : It's a rediculously expensive (certainly in europe), rock solid, god-awful sounding amp. It *IS* possible to turn the ugly duckling into a swan, but the steps required will not only void the warranty but are so involved and time-consuming that it's totally beyond what can reasonably be expected from a person who payed big bucks for a premium amp; regardless of this persons level of technical expertise. You should *definately* check this amp out before purchase (as always) which is an option I simply didn't have. (And, I'm way past point-of-no-return, and finally starting to enjoy this amp)

Again, I have to rate it based upon it's condition when stock.

I don??t know about year. Mine is black face. Very versatile and there are the possibility to obtain Marshall tones. 2 x 20 watts, 8 and 4 ohms outputs. Four EL-84 tubes and 3 12ax7 tubes (Sovtek EL-84 and JJ ECC-83). Very good for my music style, alternative brit rock, gothic rock a la Cult, Mission, Sisters, Siouxsie etc. This thing is very very very LOAD... Incredible for a 20+20 power!!! This amp sucks my Marshall JCM-900! The only bad news is about power and stand by switchs (commom for both channels), then i leave 9 for this topic

My guitars: MIJ 83 Greco Les Paul Custom and 95 Gibson Nighthawk special. My style: Brit pop, goth: The Mission, The Sisters of Mercy, Siouxsie and the Banchees, The Cult, The Cure, Joy Division, Gene Loves Jezebel. I use Triaxis + G-major + 2x12 Snake cabinet. Cooler is prety noise, but only in the pauses. Clean sounds presents high headroom, and are realy cleans! With Triaxis Lead Channels, i can to obtain good distortions, and harmonics. Brutal distortions, enough for metal style and hard rock. This amplifier is VERY LOAD!!! I can??t use volume 2 in my garage, or volume 3 in studio.

No problems. Like a tank. New tubes.

Mesa attention is very good. They return me all emails.

I??m playing since 1985. Other gear includes Triaxis, JMP-1, Marshall Cabinets and a lot of FX (TC 2290, Lexicon PCM)
I have Marshall 9200 dual monoblock. Mesa 20 20 is higher!!!! Beliave me!

It's a 2007 unit (Black). Two channels with independient volume and presence. Cab options are 1x8Ohms per channel or 2x4Ohms per channel. Slave outputs for re-amplifing.
Fan cooled, and let me say, the fan IS NOT noisy at all, in fact you can't even hear it unless you put your ear next to the unit.

It's a power amp, so too many features would be suspicious to me. It does what it have to and do it greatly.

It's rated 44 watts and believe me, it's loud enough for any aplication i can think of but the better part is that it still sounds amazing at lower volume levels (more on that later).

I gave it a 9 becouse of two things. First, I would like it to have individual power switches for each channel. Second, the Deep mod is a MUST and it could be easyly implemented putting a little switch next to the ground lift one.

I play prog-metal, fusion, hard rock, bluesy stuff, some alternative/modern stuff and the 20/20 seems to handle it great so far. My equipment includes a Strat with HS-3 pickups and an OLP with Steve's special/Air Norton. My cab is a Vintage Electric 2x12 with two 8 Ohm Celestion V30's wired separatedly, it's pretty much a Rectifier Cab copy made here in Argentina. I use two ADA MP1s, one stock and the other modded to sound close to a SLO-100. I also have a PODxt that I used before I had this setting and now is there just for FX until I can afford a Lexicon unit to go with my rack :D.

Out of the box, the 20/20 sounds too middy, the filters on the first gain stage really cut the bass out of the picture wich in my case wasn't a good thing. It may be cool for some aplications but not my cup of tee. First I tried to change my preamp patches to compensate but the more bass I added the muddier it got so I followed the advise of the other reviews and cutted the damn cap on the B channel. Then I did a side by side comparison between channels and boy was I shocked!. My cab came to life, the bass entered the picture and the preamp sound started to come through. I admit the stock sound is tighter but the lack of bass made it useless for me.
As far as unwanted noise...this baby has NONE so don't worry about it.

For recording or bethroom playing I found that turning down the output of the preamp and turning up the power amp volume brings more bass to the sound becouse of the power tube saturation making it sound extremely well at low volumes.
At high volumes it may need a little presence adjustment but I think is better to have low and high volume settings on your preamp.

Another thing I found is that the 20/20 goes extremely well with the PODxt. I tried using the PODs preamps without the cab simulation and the sound i got was really impressive, the tubes give that thing a lively sound that brings it closer to valve land, if you've got it, give it a shot and you'll see.

I rated it with a 9 becouse the deep mod brings the unit alive, if you have one and didn't perform the mod you just haven't heard it's full potential. As another guy said, the deep mod doesn't add things, it makes the response "normal" so you can hear your preamp and your poweramp interacting in a good/non destructive way.

Haven't had it for that long, but It looks like it's built to survive a nuclear war. I've opened it to do the mod and the insides look neat and solid. Metal knobs, smooth pots, heavy switches and thick chassis...that's the definition of reliable to me.

I don't think I'm gonna have to call them ever.

I've been playing for about 10 years, haven't tried a lot of high end equipment but I'm not a guy that looks at brands, if you like how it sounds then it is good.

If it where stolen I would just buy another one right away becouse there is no way of beating this baby in price/size/reliability. It won't get lost EVER!!
There was nothing to compare it to becouse all the other tube poweramps that sound good are two rack spaces so...
You couldn't get anything better than this for this price.

10 becouse:
- 1 Racks space
- VERY loud
- No heat issues
- TONE!!!

Get it, mod it and enjoy it.

ho comperato un mesa 20 20 del2007.
l ampli ha 2 canali da 22 w in classe A. e sono piu che sufficienti per suonare sia alle prove che in locali anche ampi.per gli esterni ci si appoggia solitamente al PA.

l amli ?? valvolare e si sente. io l ho abbinato a una effettiera gnx3000 come pre e a 2 casse 2x12 recto closed back.

i due canali non sono indipendenti...e qui ?? una pecca...cmq se si vuole attaccare solo una cassa basta mantenere il volume a zero sul canale e il potenziometro presence al massimo per evitare che il 20/20 si danneggi.

il suono ?? paurosamente bello! tutta un altra cosa rispetto ai marshall che ero solito usare.
l unico appunto che si puo fare ?? che qs mostro ha un sacco di basse ancora di piu enfatizzate dalla cassa closed back. ma basta aggiustare un po le patch del pre e qs mesa si rivela splendido sia sui puliti che sui distorti dando sonorita e chiarezza a ogni nota.

il volume 22 piu 22 ?? iper sufficiente e non ha problemi a far suonare sia le 2x12 che una 4x12

fino ad ora non ho mai avuto problemi.?? solido e cmq va tenuto con cura all interno di un bel rack

non ho mai avuto bisogno

?? da 10 anni che suono in giro per i locali d italia facendo cover band e pezzi inediti con vari gruppi. ho sempre usato marshall ma da qnd ho acquistato qs piccolo mostro con le sue relative casse il mio playing e suono ?? letteralmente incrementato in meglio

This is a new 2007 20/20 bought in 2008 primarily for use in my home studio. I wanted to simplify my setup and get rid of a lot of equipment including some boutique tube amps. It's a very simple power amp that has all the features I would want. Two volume and presence controls and plenty of speaker outs. One of the great things about this power amp, however, is that the volume controls allow you to gently raise the volume at lower levels, unlike other Boogie units. I had a Mark IV for 10 years, and it is was a beauty, but it was very difficult to play it at even moderate volumes. Once the master volume hit "1", it was LOUD. Not so with the 20/20. Don't get me wrong, it gets very loud, but you can get great sound at lower volumes too and that's what I was looking for.

I give it a 10 not because of its complex features, but because the simple features work so well.

I play primarily rock/blues, do a lot of looping and also like dreamy sound textures. Have a lot of guitars ... Les Pauls, Teles, Strats, Gretsch's, ES 335's. For the past 25 years, I've played through Boogies, Fenders and currently have a THD BiValve and a Groove Tubes Soul-O-Single ... both great amps and I've often used a Boogie StudioPre on the front end which sounds great through those low power amps.. I sometimes use a PODxt for recording direct but have always been disappointed by how a POD sounds/feels when played through an amp. I've tried every possible configuration, but have never gotten the POD or my Vox Tonelab to sound good except through headphones or direct into the board. That all changed with the 20/20. This poweramp does absolute magic with both the POD and the Tonelab. I'm very surprised that Boogie and POD don't market the 20/20 this way because WHAT A DIFFERENCE!!! The POD provides the sounds but the 20/20 brings them to life, smooths them out and moves a lot of air.

Having said that, I'm selling my POD and Tonelab because the Boss GT10 has finally achieved what digital modeling intended to do. The sound of the GT10 through the 20/20 is unlike anything I've ever heard. MUCH better than any amp/pedal/preamp configuration I've ever used and I've owned and experimented with a lot of gear (tube and non-tube) over the years. I'm running the GT10 through the 20/20 stereo out to a THD 2x12 and a Dr. Z 2x12 cabs and the sound is unreal. Almost no noise, extremely simple cable hookup and the SOUND absolutely Rocks on every level. The feel, picking dynamics, natural sound of each guitar ... they're all taken to a whole new level and happen at moderate volume levels as well. As disappointed as I've been with the live sound of digital modelers over the years, I have to say that I'm a convert now with the GT10 through the 20/20.

Haven't had it long enough, but if it's like the other Boogie gear I've owned (Mark IV, Studio Pre) then I've got nothing to worry about. The knobs are METAL and work very smooth. It looks and feels like a "Boogie-Quality" unit.

The times I've called Boogie, either at their store in Hollywood or the Petaluma location, they've been super helpful. They understand what voice to voice customer service is. No "web-support" nightmares, thank God.

Like I said, I've been playing a long time and have played a lot of gear, modern, vintage and digital. I have great guitars and still love the lower wattage boutique amps for what they do. But, the Mesa 20/20 driving the GT10 is the new gold standard in my studio because it sounds incredible through real guitar cabinets and at different volume levels. My previous setup was usually Voodoo Sparkle Drive >> Barber Direct Drive >> Mesa StudioPre >> TC Electronics G-Major >> THD BiValve >> Cabs. And it was a great sound, don't get me wrong.

But now, it's Boss GT10 >> Mesa 20/20 >> Stereo Cabs and the sound absolutely blows away my old rig on every level and the reason for it is the 20/20. I tried the GT10 through the front and back end of both the BiValve and the GT Soul-O-Single, and it sounded good, but not great ... nowhere near what the 20/20 produces using the same speaker cabs. Same thing with the POD and Tonelab ... However, don't waste your money on any tone generator until you've heard the GT10 and if you run it through the 20/20 with some good speaker cabs, you'll be in tone nirvana.

My 20/20 has the black faceplate. Not sure how old it is though. I got it used.
It has two independant channels with a volume and presence knob for each side.

I wish the amp came with a "deep" switch in stock form, a mono bridge more and a 16ohm output. The deep switch is crucial though.

The fan is pretty noisy and I wonder if I could find a replacement fan that is silent for when I just want to practice at bedroom levels. Other than that, the electronics themselves are quiet.

Plenty loud. Its a total of all tube 44 watts. I run this amp through a 4x12 and I have no issues with getting enough volume, even with a loud drummer.

I play classic rock, classic metal, hard rock, blues, some new modern rock and this amp seems to handle those styles pretty well. I can get nice clear highs and at the same time, a nice low end chug, even when tuned down a 1/2 step.

I like the fact that from the preamp, I can dime the volume to really drive the Mesa's input tubes, giving me another stage of gain. It makes a big difference in tone and doing this works really well for me. It will clean up nicely depending on pick attack or the guitar's volume. You could also just use your preamp's volume as a master for more headroom. Regardless, this amp allows you to play around with the volumes to get your sound.

One important note on this amp though. When I first got the amp, I was very dissapointed. It was very middy and lacked bottom end. At times, I'd turn around to re-check my bass/mid settings on the preamp. very frustrating. Nothing I did improved the tone. After 48 hours, I was ready to return the stupid thing. It just sounded like a low fi transistor radio.

I did a bit of research on the web and found out about this "deep" mod. The 20/20 has a high pass filter that cuts the lower bass frequencies. This is the same idea as the TS-9 pedal by Ibanez but on the 20/20, the bass cut is pretty big. The mod is pretty simple and being good in electronics, I performed the mod (simply removed C1/C3 capacitors for chA and chB respectively). One of the reviews below describes how to do the mod.

Doing the mod completely transformed the amp. The frequency response is now "normal" and not modified at the input with the filtering crap. What a difference. The amp is now alive and playing clean chords on my Strat on the neck pickup sounds like it should.

My recommendation - don't buy this amp unless its already modified or you can modify it yourself.

The MESA EL-84s sound decent but some people say the JJ's are better. I might just try 'em someday.

I can't give a great rating in the sound quality department because you HAVE to do the mod to get this thing to sound good.

Looks pretty reliable but the tube sockets are mounted direct on the PCB which is held by a couple of plastic connectors. Doesn't seem very sturdy. be very careful when inserting the tubes.
not sure how it will hold up long term.

Never dealt with MESA

I like it. Its nice and compact but needs to be modded to sound decent. Would I get another if it broke? Not sure. I might try the Marshall 20/20 instead.

Mine is the old version, not the black one. Simple to use it has all the essential you need. Volume and presence for every channel, outputs for every use. 1 rack unit.

I think that it is so loud for a 20 watt per channel PA, impressive loud!! A great attack, great dynamics. It respect your playing, your sound will come out. It has a warm voice, and enough volume for every situation, not only clubs. Using the 20 20 your guitar will be heard by everyone, it brings your sound out from the mix at low levels too. great quality sound in a 1 rack unit.It's louder than some others 100w power amps...
I use this pa with a brunetti mille and an intellifex or only with a rocktron utopia g100, in both situations the mesa works great, I think it improves the quality of my sound.

Never brocken, it's a tank.

10 for those reasons:
- 1 rack unit, all tube pa
- very very loud!!
- great tone, smooth, warm, great attack, great dynamics
- very pratice and simple to use

I tryed others power amps and for my use this was the best one.
With this you are ok to play where you whant, at low or high volumes.....