Peavey 5150 II

the peavy 5150 II is one of the best made and sounding tube amps with a great clean tone, crush distortion, and heavy lead channels that are great if you know what your doing. oh yea to hell with the canandian whinner. it's a good thing that you have a effects loop that works and i don't care if itdoesn't have reverb

it's great with low and high volumes. just dont' crank it above 3 or the cops with show up. i'm a death metal musician and i feel the amp is right for the job.at least i don't have to use any sustainer systems with this amp

i am using the damn thing right now in my band to do my job and it kicks ass!!!!

I will get anyone if it gets stolen or breaks on me. i handd 2 guitars a washburn with emg's it and 3 B.C. custom 7-strings with emg's in them as well.

not too many, not too little... check the peavey web site for features...

I played it through a Godin LG, Les Paul, Ibanez RG and some epiphones.... and I played everything on it from soft rock to hard rock to hardcore to death metal...

this amp sounds fine when I'm sitting in my room practicing at low levels. nice thick and heavy distortion, sooo powerfull. the cleans not too bad... when I crank it up at band practice or shows its really a pile of crap. horrible muddy sound. I turn the distortion way down when i have it up loud but it still sounds very muddy. if anyone buys it, look into getting some sort of EQ's or something to hook up to it because the sound is really a big piece of garbage when you turn it up...

the footswitch started going crazy after a year of use, and its like $100 or something for a new one.

for quite some time the amp volume would just die when I played it at high volumes, but it magically fixed it self.

nver dealt with the company.... so I don't know

if it was stolen or lost it would suck because thats losing something thats worth a fair amount of money. I'd definately would replace it with ANOTHER amp. If I only planned to play in my room at like volume 1 or 2 I'd love this amp... but I like playing shows.

look around, try other amps out...
if you're trying this one out before buying ask if you can turn it up to even like 4. you'll probably turn it off and look at other amps unless you love the sound for some strange reason??

this amp does everything i want it to do - just a straight up rock amp - 3 channels in essence, rhythm(clean), crunch and lead. Resonance is a great feature on it, as well as presence, but no where near as effective as resonance. read below for what i really have to say!

ok, heres the story - so i started off by buying a marshall tsl 100w head and marshall cab, after a few weeks, i realised that this wasnt for me, it had a big lack in bottom end and sounded like a 70's radio running out of batteries most of the time - very tinny, even with bass on full! so i decided i need a new amp, and put that on sale, my budget was #2000, i tried the 5150 (1st one) and hated it, thought it was very fuzzy. and after many amps, i got down to either a mesa boogie single rectofier with marshall 1960 a cab, or a peavey 5150 mark II head with peavey 5150 cab!
after hours of trying them in the shop, i realised that the mesa had a much better clean channel, and also a very nice overdrive - but the marshall cab didnt do it justice and that was where my budget stopped! the peavey 5150 mark II doesnt have a great clean channel, there always seems to be a slight crunch there, but i dont use much clean, so its all good, but you can keep the crunch to a minimum by turning down the gain and putting up the volume, sounds ok to me! then i tried the overdrive!!!!! bloody hell, i nearly creamed myself! as if the mesa wasnt good enough already! this took it to another limit! when the mesa was on 10 gain, this matched it at about 5 or 6! it has massive head room! the 5150 cab matches perfectly! i dont think u could buy a nicer sounding cab to go with it! the resonance control on the amp is amazing - you can tell your bass how to respond, i have mine on around 9, so when i palm mute, the room shakes! plaster basically comes off the walls!
All in all, this amp has the perfect overdrive for rock or anything harder, from punk to metal to hardcore
not recommended for a ska band as the clean isnt great, but its still there and has great bite to it if you want it to!
i was searching for my ultimate overdrive - and i have found it in my 5150 mark II head equipped with 5150 cab

no problems so far, but always have back up, you never know, i carry around a spare marshall avt 100w just in case. i doubt anything will happen though unless i blow a tube coz its built like a brick!

not had to deal with them yet

all in all - this amp is my perfect amp, as i was searching for my perfect overdrive and have found it hear! it might no tbe other peoples cup of tea, but remember - always try it for hours if needed first! you dont wanna part with #1658 (for head and cab) if its something you wont like in a few days (like my tsl)

Made in 2001
I use play though my 5150 II in my heavy rock band (threadline) and on Sunday mornings at my church for light worship. I also lend my 5150 out to local hardcore bands beacause there is no amp better for hardcore then a 5150. This is a very versitile amp, although the clean tone could be better. The sound is very customizable with the separate eq for each channel (presence and resonance). Having the bias switch is nice however it has a very narrow bias spectrum.

I play 2 EVH Wolfgang Speacials and a Fender Telecaster.
The 5150 sounds amazing with its parter (the wolfgang). Even though the clean channel isn't great the wolfgang seems to make it sound cleaner and brighter. Good enough to play a Sunday morning service and sound good. Also this guitar/amp combo is incredible for hardcore and heavey rock seeing as the wolfgang pickups as such high output and the 5150 has a ton of gain.

I was in a highspeed car accident where I hit a concrete divider with my car going 150 kph (95mph). My 5150 II head was in the trunk by it self and on impact the head busted right through the truck and ended up over 200 feet from the point of impact. I though it was done for. When I took it home, I plugged it in and to my suprise there was no change in sound. I didn't even break a power tube. Also in that accident I had a peavey 4X12 cabinet in the back seat which kept the roof from squishing me in the accident. I thanks God for saving my life in that accident and also to Peavey for their high quality constructed equipment. Now after having the amp for 2 years (a year from the accident) did 2 power tubes blow. (and I've been touring accros Canada with my amp play at loud volumes)

The warranty on this amp is 5 years. You can't complain about that. My footswitch had a loose connection and I took it in. They said it would be 2 weeks to fix, so I fixed it myself (a simple saulder connection).

I love this amp! I am so happy with my purchase. I play in a band with another guitar player running a mesa boogie triple rectifier and a EVH Wolfgang and my 5150 II rivals his tone for 1/3 the price.
If I lost this amp I would buy another immediately

The amp has plenty of features for what I use it for. I play mostly hard rock/metal. Reverb would have been nice, but an Electro Harmonix Holy Grail reverb pedal does a beautiful job. Overall the amp seems fairly versatile. It covers a wide range of overdriven sounds; from a searingly brutal metal distortion to a nice Marshall-type crunch. The crunch feature on the clean channel adds to the versatility, although it takes some tweaking to set it so that it works well for both clean and crunch. This amp is F*&%ing loud! I was overpowering my band with the volume at 3, and they are very loud. At 4, I couldn't stand in the same room for fear of my hearing.

This is with out a doubt the best sounding amp I have ever owned. Before deciding on this amp I tried several others, including a Mesa Boogie triple rectifier, a Line 6 Flextone and several Marshalls. The 5150II sounded the best, and was actually the least expensive. The distortion is amazing. Very warm, with every note well-defined. I am a gain freak, and I don't turn the gain much beyond 6. The clean channel is fine. I find it to be clean even at high volumes.

Seems to be built like an Abrahms. The thing weighs a ton.

Never dealt with them.

If this amp were to be stolen or lost, I would replace it.

im sure you already no them.

im using assorted ibanez rgs from the late 80's and early nineties as well as a universe into a jcm 800 cab.thats it. the type of music i play is a mix of noisecore/jazz/indie/deathgrind/prog/etc .......... king of like watchtower meets lightning bolt meets human remains. i have been tweaking with this amp for about a year and i couldnt be happier. there are alot of tones in this amp. ive gotten some great cleans and distortions. however, i find myself using the clean mode with the crunch engaged. it is biggest, thickest, crunchiest, warmest sound this side of a jcm 800 and still has plenty of gain for your grindcore explosions. i had the chance of picking up a mesa triaxes with a strategy four hundred but i sat down and really thought about it and guess what, im still using the peavey. so basically, check it out.

when i bought this amp i took to a friend who does amp repair and had him go over it. he said that some of the soldering was kind of shotty and proceeded to clean it up. aside that, no problems. it has survived one death metal tour and is actually kicking harder i think. who would have thought peavey could have done so right.

great amp. very versatile. i was trying to learn the first 3 zz top albums and i wanted to recreate their tone and i was pretty much able to nail it. it amazes me that it can do that as well be good enough for the several death metal bands using them now. versatility .... yes!

120 watts RMS - all tube

The clean sound is a raunchier sound than most amplifiers.
However it is harmonicaly rich and still quite usuable for most rock/hard rock applications.
A drawback however is that the crunch channel is just the clean channel when boosted. The EQ , Resonance, and Presence, controls are the same for both. There is also a bright option for the clean/crunch channel.
The Lead channel has plenty of gain and yet again seperate EQ, Presence and Resonance controls.
Standard FX loop, Bias Test and 16, 8, and 4 ohms of resistance available.

I give the clean/crunch features - 4 (due to limitations)
Lead Channel features - 8

I am using a Gibson les Paul Studio with stock pickups through this amplifier.
I play heavy rock but I DEMAND the most balanced tone because both guitars play complex chords and alternate voicings. Without a balanced tone, you will only hear the 1st and the 5th of the chord (Ie power chord) That is why power chords sound best with distortion, because the root and the 5th always come out the clearest. I was using an early 80's marshall JCM 800 and it was the limitations of low gain, no FX loop, and one channel that turned me on to the 5150 II. The marshalls clarity on complex chords was asounding, however I did use the Boss SD-1 pedal through the low-gain input to achieve this fantastic clarity. But that HUGE bottom end distortion could not be achieved no matter what pedal I used. However Im not reviewing the JCM 800 I just think it best to compare the two before I rate the Peavey. I also found the 5150 cab to have a really harsh buzzing sound to it. The cab is built of a high quality, but none the less there is a buzzing sound in the tone that I found unacceptable. I used my JCM 1960B Cabinet loaded with 75 watt Celestians instead and I found the tone far more pleasing to the ear and smooth.

The Clean Channel - Like I said before it is not a true clean. It is rather crunchy and dirty sounding. However it is harmonicaly rich and is quite usable for most applications. Ironicaly I found IMO that it sounded cleanest and fullest when the pre-gain was set around 4 and set the post afterword. It is quite a bright sounding clean too so to remedy that I turned the resonance and bass up until I was satisfied. This setting may be what Peavey intended because at this pre and post setting, the crunch and clean sound best when toggled back and forth. Not very versitile, but none the less is a ballsy, usable tone.
Live situations it is fine, however I would use a different amp to record clean sounds in the studio. I give it a - 6

The crunch is tied to the clean and I can get some very warm, rich sounds out of the channel and I would find it useful for a lot of classic rock and roll. Though I find if I want that classic 1960's-70s rock tone I use a BOSS DS-1 through the clean channel to accomplish this, and the slight break-up from the clean compliments this quite nicely. Its attachment to the clean channel will give you some limitations if you wish to use both in a live setting, but on its own it can be VERY satisfying as a crunch sound. I give it a 8.

The Lead Channel. This is where I beleive Peavey spent its most time with the amp. The lead channel is HUGE!!! with more gain than anyone could ever use. I find the sound comparable to the mesa boogie Dual Recitifier. The mids give this high gain channel a growl and sustain that is absolutely fantastic. For all you high gain lovers out there, this amp is a must try before you shell out 3000 grand for a mesa head. or anything else comparable. The range of sound you can get is not very large, BUT it is a fantastic sound so that is usualy not a huge issue. My only beef with this channel is that the presence control does not do the slightest thing until you go past 8. This may just be my amp, but that is the problem I find with this although its not a huge deal. I like to use the pre-gain anywhere from 4-6. Anything more than that and it will comprise the clarity of the chords I will play. However Ive never tried another amplifier where I can get that much gain and still have clarity like that. To get a great tone the post should be past 3. So in the store make sure they let you try it past this level to get the true character of the amp.

Great job Peavey!! I give this channel a 9.5!! But I really want to give it a 10 but I know there are better amps out there. I am just EXTREMELY happy with the way this channel sounds.

Ive owned/worked on a lot of Peavey stuff before. It is VERY tough stuff. I would not be worried about reliability in the slightest. I think 90+ per-cent of people could agree Peavey is durable.

I work at Colosimo's Music in Thunder Bay, Ontario and we are the Peavey dealer. I know for a FACT that Peavey has one of the best customer support systems of any company. They are extremely friendly and helpful.
5 year warranty if you fill out the extended warranty/survey.

Great support

Ive been playing 8 years, 4 professionaly. I have owned various other amps but my preference being a JCM 800. I just use my Les Paul and my main axe and I find it sounds really great for what I do.

If it were stolen or lost I would be F'in pissed! but would probably get another JCM 800 (cause its cheaper) or get a used one to use until I can buy another one. Or tinker with other amplifiers to find the ultimate amp.

I wish it had a tighter clean sound with less break-up , and a REAL separate crunch channel with seperate EQ. I would gladly pay more if Peavey could just do this. I also wish it came with a 50 watt option cause this amp is REALLY REALLY powerful. Its hard to rehearse with that great tone which requires it to be running near half volume.

Other than that it is a satisfying amp. The distortion and FX loop is what I bought it for.

I got this monster factory fresh last Wednesday, so I guess 2002-03 model. Contains 6 12AX7 preamp tubes and 4 6L6 power tubes, EQ for both channels, blah blah... not that many features, but....

This amp is EXTREMELY versatile. Can go from crushing, thick, brutal distortion to shimmery clean and everything in between. The articulation is unbelievable. You can FEEL your chunky palm mutes quake through your very SOUL!!!! Lead tone is also awesome, but I'm a rhythm player and don't solo much. I use a Samick Les Paul copy with EMGs (81 and 85), AWESOME guitar for $500.

I write riffs that are infuenced by Carcass, Slayer, Crowbar, Down, and C.O.C., and this amp fits in perfectly with my style, but I didn't always feel like this. When I first brought the amp home and fired it up, I was greeted with a weak, thin, buzzy distortion. I thought, "Well, I just got this amp... gotta tweak the knobs for a while."

Well I tweaked all damn day, and I still didn't like the sound. I was really disappointed in it.

Slowly but surely, I started finding the sound to be getting better and better. Yes, it still has a little "Fuzz", but I've grown to love this amp. And it's LOUD! The clean can't get really loud ( I mean CLEAN clean), and you gotta put in a little pre gain to get it to a good volume. And its not near as bad as people on this board will tell you. Its a very good clean tone, much better than I'll ever need, thats for sure. Its fairly noisy, as any high gain amp will be. If its too noisy for you, get a noise gate.

I've only had it for about a week, but it feels very sturdy. Its heavy, so as long as you don't drop it, it'll be fine...

Well, my bass player was in a band back in 98, and his guitar player played through a 5150, and they dropped it, spilled shit on it, and it STILL kept going strong, no busted tubes or nothing. Peavey is known for being TOUGH, and tough these things are. But, you never know what will happen...

The amp arrived within one day of ordering it. They seem like friendly people, and their website is helpful.

Been playing for 4 or 5 years, self taught. I'm not the son of rich parents, I don't drive a nice car, and I didn't beg for a Triple Rectifier and a PRS only after playing for a few months of holding a guitar. I played with what I could find for cheap. This is my first REAL amp, and I think it will be with me for the rest of my life. This is a great amp if you love metal. If you work with it, you WILL find your sound. I have my sound now, and I'm ready to swamp ALL of you with my crushing riffs!!! Mwa hah hah...

I just got this monster, but not sure on when it was made. I went out looking for a new half stack because my (very) old head ceased to function and sounded shit anyway. I didn't try anything else because it was the only head/cab unit in the store but upon trying it out I didn't need to! This monster blew me away! I play in an extreme metal band, mostly a mix of speed, death and black metal. This amp does everything I need and nothing more. You know the features from the other reviews. I havn't needed the crunch feature yet. Basically in my band I'm either playing melodic clean parts (albeit fucking rarely) or distorted as fuck black thrash. The clean channel is fine so long as you don't turn the pre-gain up too high (but that's a no-brainer). I don't use reverb, chorus or anything else on my tone live so I don't miss not having that shit (and not having to pay for it), and that stuff can be added later in the studio. Basically this amp is LOUD. That's what it's made for, and it's brilliant at it. You know you're playing the spawn of Satan when your in the store and your previously non-existant conscience starts bugging you when you only have it cranked to four. I managed to dial exactly the sound I wanted on the EQ, and the Resonance and Presence controls make a shitload of difference to tone... it gets a 7 because obviously other amps have more features. But this one does everything I want it to do.

I've got two axes but one of them is currently only a backup (pending replacement of the shitty stock Jackson 'buckers) so only one has gone through this amp so far. The guitar in question is a Godin LG with Duncan humbuckers. I'm not sure what model pickups they actually are - but they sound pretty sweet. Like I said I play some pretty heavy fast metal in my band and this Amp suits it perfectly. Previously I was using a Digitech RP7 through an ancient Australian Strauss head and cabinet that I picked up for next to nothing... I was never happy with this sound. Now with only the 5150 II my balls spurt the second I start to play. It gives me exactly the sound your parents have nightmares about. Brutal! Also, like I said it's loud as all fuck... I only have it set between 3 and 4 at rehearsal and it totally drowns out the drums... but fuck him - he should be playing harder! I'm gigging with it for the first time this week and have total faith in it. I only use two sounds like I said, a melodic clean sound and a super high-gain distortion. This head has quite a good clean sound so long as you back off the pre-gain, even when playing full chords. Ofcourse this makes it's crunch feature next to useless - but I don't use it. On higher settings the crunch sound is quite ballsy, but then the clean channel dirties up aswell. The lead channel is where I'm playing 99.9% of the time, and it's my new God. I've got the pre-gain set to 10 for guaranteed skull-crushing heavyness... but it thickens up way before that. I also have my resonance set to 7 and presence to 6. I hate to use nu-metal terminology (cos nu-metal is gay) but this tone is FAT and the evil just grows the more you crank the volume (you can tell by the rivers of blood that'll start running from your ears). BRUTAL! BRUTAL! BRUTAL! is all I really needed to say here. An excellent amp for any kind of rock but especially metal. 10 here for the length my cock grows every time I switch this monster on.

Amp seems rock solid, and I've never gigged with a backup because I've never had one... I might take my old amp on tour with me just in case but for local shows when it's just me and my trusty wagon I don't have the space. I've never owned a tube amp before, but having replacement tubes would be as common-sense as having replacement strings. Then again when you only play 40 minute sets replacing strings is impossible (but then I -DO- always take a backup axe). I think so long as I take care of it it's gonna take care of me. It's the start of a beautiful friendship *sob*. hehehe... 10 here guys.

I think the warranty on this beast is 2 years but I'm not sure... I've never dealt with Peavey because this is my first piece of Peavey gear (probably not my last) but the guys I got the amp from are Peavey authorised and they've been taking care of me for years. So here they get a 10 based on the other reviews and my dealings with my local dealer.

I've been playing for 8 years now I think... most of that time I was playing through a Laney GC50 and then when I joined my band 4 years ago I got the Strauss amp for the extra volume. Distortion wise I went between the Digitech RP-7 grunge distortion and a metal zone/EQ combination... Now the only reason I'm keeping that shit is to play at low volume or if I need to get the 5150 II serviced. I love everything about this amp, and hate not a thing... probably I'll get some rack gear to add some diversity and effects etc... but then I guarantee I won't even use em! hehehe... Metal is about beer, speed and fuckloads of distortion, and this amp is all about metal. I'll love it to the grave (and quite possibly after). 10

rhythm channel(with crunch option), lead channel. i give it a 6 for the lack of reverb on clean channel

I use an ESP ltd mh-300 with stock hz p.u's(i'm thinking about changing to an emg 81 in the bridge), i play in B, E, A, D, F#, B. I play melodic metal/hardcore influenced by bands like at the gates, in flames, killswitch engage, the haunted, soilwork etc. etc. I used to have a marshall jcm2000 tsl head, but i wasn't happy with how it handled the low tuning/high gain, it came out sounding rather farty and coarse. I exchanged it for a 5150ii and kept the 1960A cab. having played the marshall and a mesa dual rectifier i can say with confidence that this is the ideal amp for any technical/aggressive music especially with low tunings, there is no way that this amp is not "bassy" enough unless you want to go korn style and have so much bass in the frequency it sounds like your quad is vomitting, the sound is very tight, full and defined, similar tones to the artists i mentioned above are attainable. Considering i'm just going guitar straight into the amp the tone is pretty damn impressive, but i plan on adding a few things such as a BBE sonic maximiser to enhance the tone. The worst aspect of the amp is the clean channel, it's not terrible, but it's pretty flat and hard, but you can work with it, just select your front pick up and drop the volume on your guitar a bit to soften it up a bit, but it'll never sound like a fender but i decided the distortion is so good i wont let that take the score down

very reliable, had it about a year, and it had been sitting in the store as a display model for like half a year+ haven't even changed the tubes yet

never had to deal with them

overall i think it is as good a back bone to build a professional sounding rig out of as any you will find for heavy music, get an A.B for a nice combo and you don't have to worry about the average cleans.