Peavey Classic 30

2 Channels tube amp (clean, crunch). A "boost" (I don't use it). Reverb, etc... just the basic stuff but still just what is needed, nothing more or less... maybe a standby switch would have been useful, maybe not after all. Clean may lack a little headroom for big venues in my opinion but for normal use, volume is pretty much just right.

I have to add that it is super easy and fast to dial a great sound out of this amp, which may be the reason why I stick with it.

Clean channel is pretty good. I play clean mostly and use this amp as a practice amp. As I said, I think it may lack headroom for super loud gigs, but I don't do that often so for practice, this is just right.

Crunch channel is very good for rock and funk. It is a bit midrangey which is awesome, it just cuts through the band so well.

The amp is a bit "boxy" and directional, so it may be better to mike it or at least, tilt it during a gig. I ran it through an extension 2x12 once but it was too bassy for my taste.

My amp is super quiet (which is good since I am used to a Jazz Chorus).

Allright so far (about 8 years), changed the tubes a couple of times.

I have never been super-anal about tone compared to most people here but I am a pro musician and after all these years, I tend to stick with what sounds good. Other amps I have right now are are a Mesa Boogie Mark IV (main amp) and a Roland Jazz Chorus (JC120). I usually play with a strat or some sort of archtop.

I use this amp for personal practice and small band rehearsal (I'd rather gig with the Mark IV if I can though). Considering its size and versatility, I think this amp is amazing for what I do with it.

Everybody is talking about the mods on this amp but I don't see the point of that so much as I think it is fine as it is (instead of spending $300 on a replacement speaker/tubes/etc, I'd rather just sell the amp and buy something else). If I need something specific soundwise, I'll just get my Mark IV, but for practice or band rehearsal, this is just perfect: sound great, easy to dial and doesn't look like the dash board of a space shuttle (like my Mark IV).

Enough for me. I use both channels. The reverb is adequate as a starting point for a good "base" sound.
I have one with the tube guard fitted as standard HOWEVER if you buy one of those tube tamers off of ebay, youll have to resite the tube guard slightly lower as the tamer bums out against the tube guard.
Im pimping this amp as i go along.

Using with a Telecaster Plus and a Ricky 360 mainly. The Ricky likes this more than the Tele. Not that the Tele is bad but the Ricky REALY likes this amp.
I play garagey 60's country rock and this amp does what i need.
Ive discovered i have some nice valves in this amp, all power tubes are sovteks apart form one mullard, and i have 2 Brimars and a mullard in the pre-amp section.
I paln on getting an Eminence Cannabis Rex to finish off. I also use this with a 115e extension cab. NICE!
I have noticed however that the amp really sounds ace when im playin an intro on my own but when the band comes in, i seem to lose my edge. Im only able to test this obviously in a rehearsal volume scenario so its a little tricky to nail. Im hoping the Eminence speaker will help here. Ive had plantty of Fender and Marshall valve amps and this trumps them all. I also had a Peavey Bandit once which was THE WORST amp i have ever owned. It took a real leap of faith to buy Peavet again but im glad i did. These are a real bargain 2nd hand.

Mine has the tube guard fitted, ive got 3 spare 12AX7s in my case. Think im OK. I would gig without backup.

Never dealt. Got to be better than Marshall.

playing since 1982. Would replace if nicked. Like the retro vibe. All logos removed.
Had a blues junior which i sold for more than i paid for this. Bargain.
Shame it isnt true 2 channel with seperate EQ. But no biggie.

You all know the amp and what it does.
This amp has no master volume, so you have to balance your 2 gain pots to suit where your playing. I had an amp tech mod the amp and fit a master volume. What a difference.

A 9 after the mod and probably a 7 before it

The gain is pretty weak but i run a tubescreamer constantly.
The master volume allows to you crank the gains up then play withe the volume. Take time and you'll find some nices sounds.

I play mainly rock and indie and what i love about this amp is that it doesnt sound pure, its messy and it squeals, perfect for me.

The clean sounds great for blues.

Had to replace 2 tubes early on and i just changed the power transformer after it shorted out. Not the best for an amp that is only 9 months old

Great, really helpful with ordering parts

I play a Duesenberg starplayer through a noise gate then on a loop on the noise gate i have a Boss Phaser, Boss Distortion, Ibanez TS9- back to the noise gate then a digitech digidelay.

I love this amp, not great for metal and such like.

You know the features by now.
BUT the footswitch kinda sucks. You kan switch between clean and distortion and switch the reverb on/off. There??s a boost button on the amp but that can??t be controlled by the footswitch.

I??m using a eagle with dimarzio pups and a Fender lite ash special with stock seymoure duncan vintage pups.
For classic rock this amp is pretty good but the mid is killing me, it has a screaming touch to it... so i usually dial it down to 3-4.
I belive the problem is the stock speaker, now it??s being replaced with a eminence lil?? texas speaker and the mid problem is gone!
The distortion is kinda weak for playing metall, but works pretty well for classic rock.
The spring reverb starts jumping around at high volume distortion... not so good, but I??m playing with a digital reverb now so thats not a issue for me.
I??ve had some issues with the hum... probably because of somekind of ground problem.
It would get a 9 with the eminence speaker!

It??s kinda sturdy built... but a week ago the tubes started to rattle. I belive this is a common problem with this model!

If stolen or lost I would consider another amp. But it has served me quite well!

This amp is made in the USA. It's a versatile amp, but it's more voiced for classic rock and blues playing. Comes with 2 channels which are clean and the OD channel. The clean is awesome on this amp. It sounds way better when It's at 5-6 on the volume dial. As for the OD channel, It is fantastic. I usually keep the pre amp gain to about 5-6 for that santana soft gain (Think samba pa ti). This amp can do Ac/dc, led zeppelin, rolling stones, Hendrix. Mostly classic rock. It has enough gain for me. If you want metal, well you'll need to get an OD to get to Metal territory.
Wish this amp had a standby switch, but doesn't matter for me. I just turn it on and have the guitar volume to zero and just let those tubes get nice and warm for about 45 secs. Also wish that it would come with a footswitch. I use this amp in a townhouse. Does well in a bedroom too. I keep it 2-3 when I'm using it in my bedroom and 4-6 when I'm downstairs in the living room. Definetly has enough power for me, and can also get over the drummer and STILL have nice clean sound.

I'm using an ESP F-50 with stock pickups. Sounds allright I guess to me. My guitar does not suit for what I play, but it still sounds decent for what I do play now(classic rock). It has white noise coming out when you start turning it up, but you can't hear it once you start playing. So don't worry about that. It's just a humming noise. All tube amps that use EL84's will make that humminh sizzz sound. The clean channel has a lot of headroom, and starts to break up when it reaches around 7-8. Distortion is not Br00tal, so don't be expecting to get metallica out of this amp without an OD pedal.

Definetly can depend on this amp. Hasn't broken down on me. I would never gig without a backup. Always need a backup no matter what.

Peavey is very helpful. They answer my questions quiete fast. I've never sent it to them to get it repaired. Warranty is 2 years, but if you fill their 3+ year form that they have inside every amp manual. You will get an additional 3 years.

I've been playing for a year and a half. I plan on buying some new tubes since this one came with Sovteks. Put in some JJ's in there and it'll be like having a new amp! I would probably buy it again. I did compare it to other amps like the valveking 112, Palomino, and Fender blues Jr.

My particular amp was made in the late 90s.
The good: 2 usable channels (sharing eq), 1 channel with nice preamp gain, reverb, effects loop, reverb & channel switching foot pedal option, light weight, 30 watts
The bad: weak stock tubes, boost is not foot switchable and therefore useless- how stupid is that!, small boxy cabinet that beats up tubes and makes the speaker sound somewhat boxy
The ugly: Tubes rattle and the sound carries through the speaker, horrible nauseating sounding Blue Marvel speaker

It seems like these mass production companies would just go the extra mile to make products they and their fellow Americans can actually feel proud of and simply add $50 to the retail price to cover the expense of including decent tube sockets, tubes, speakers etc. But alas they do not.
I have owned this amp along with others for many years but only recently discovered that this is a great little amp! The sound was improved somewhat when I switched to JJ tubes, but the huge improvement came when I disconnected the Blue Marvel speaker entirely and played through a Celestion G12H30. What a difference! I do test recordings and A/B comparisons on my computer of my amps at healthy volumes using different tubes and speakers etc. Actually every speaker I owned sounded significantly better than the Blue Marvel which sounds just downright ugly to me. Go figure. This speaker ruins the amp in my opinion.
The amp has EL84 tubes which produce a thin sound when compared to all other types . The tubes seem to compress the signal and yield the feeling of much more sustain at clean settings than do other amps I own which have different tube types. I like this a lot! The amp sings well without so much distortion.
This amp produces a kind of dark sound which I think makes it quite different from a Vox (which I've never played through but which I know uses the same tube type and is famous for its bright jangly sound).
On the clean channel (with good tubes and speaker), the Peavey Classic 30 is tailer made for blues, 50s rockabilly, and old funk. It sounds great and perfectly right for those styles.
At first I didn't like the dirty channel. But it sounds great when played through humbuckers and turned up about halfway on preamp and master through a single Celestion G1230 in a closed back cabinet. This speaker which is about as good as it gets for 70s style rock is a big part of the reason. Overall the amps distortion is really good and there is plenty of it. It is like a marshall but smoother and much less aggressive.
I should also mention that the reverb on the amp is quite usable.

Face it folks no one amp does everything. This amp excels in the areas previously mentioned and is therefore relatively versatile I suppose.
It does not have anywhere near the sheer beauty and richness of tone as my Fender Deluxe Reverb Reissue. It does not sound aggressive like my Marshall Anniversary or do modern aggressive gain on its own. It does not do surf or Stevie Ray Vaughn which require fat sounding 6L6 tubes. It probably does not do a really authentic Vox impersonation (though I could be wrong). However as I said it does blues, rockabilly, old funk, and its own brand of 70s rock really well.
I only give it a 7 because you have to spend more on tubes and a better speaker and maybe a cab in order to get the goodness out of this amp. Buy one used if you can and spend the extra bucks on these improvements.
I would even suggest removing the speaker all together and using a roomier external cab exclusively for better speaker sound, and to also eliminate tube rattle and abuse.
About the speaker. I searched the internet and the consensus seems to be that you can use an 8 ohm speaker with this amp but only if you do the following: 1)Disconnect the internal speaker and tape the leads apart from each other for circuit protection. 2)Plug 8 ohm speaker into the extension jack.
Why does this work? The external jack supposedly switches the transformer tap from 16 ohms to 8 ohms when a jack is plugged into it.
Alternatively you could use an 8 ohm speaker internally by plugging a dummy (open) jack into the extension jack thus switching on the 8 ohm tap but not adding any load.
I'm using the first method. Try at your own risk. I am not an authority.

My Classic is from the latest batch that arrived at Musician's Friend at the end of May. Mine came with JJ's already installed with the exception of one of the 12AX7's that was an EH. I don't know which stage of the amp that tube is assigned to. They also now have locks on the tubes. I assume to eliminate the rattling tube problem. One odd thing is that the amp was sold without the footswitch. That is considered an extra. It would be better if Peavey made that a part of the retail package.

It stock amp sounds pretty good. When I plugged it in for the first time and took it for a spin, I was more impressed with the clean channel. It was very warm and round sounding w/ the reverb turned up about half way. Close to the sound of a Fender but missing a little of the glass. The lead channel has a classic vibe to it but on the jagged end of the classic vibe. I wanted to smooth that out a bit, so i replaced all the 12AX7's with JJs. When I did that, The lead channel was improved significantly, but some of the warmth and roundness was taken out of the clean channel.
The amp is pretty mid-heavy, especially the lead channel. I'm not sure how well it would cut through in a loud band setting. There are various things you can do, of course, to change that. It is pretty loud and does have some noise to it. The first thing that struck me about it was that it definitely has a country vibe. I can understand why country players use it a lot. It's a good amp for classic and southern rock as well. But isn't a metal amp. Not on its own. I'm sure over time the sound will get better as the speaker breaks in. I'm going to replace it with a Celestion G12H. Nothing wrong with the stock speaker, mind you, but I like modding mid priced gear and I want to see what it will sound like with a Celestion. I'll check back in when I get the results on that.

Don't know yet.

I've got a few e-mails in but haven't heard back yet.

I've been playing for over thirty years off and on professionally and as a hobby. I play everything but straight ahead jazz. This is my first foray back into the amp market as I have been playing through PODs for about ten years and just got sick of the loss of physicality. It was SUCH a great feeling to dig into a real tube amp again. I started out on a Peavey Classic 30 years ago and there was actually some Deja Vu in the vibe. Peavey amps really do have a sound of their own that alters your approach a little. They make you play a little bluesier! This is a good solid little amp. I'm not sure I'd buy it again if it were stolen. It hasn't completely won me over yet. If I played strictly country, I think I'd be happy. But I'm not through tinkering with it yet. Like everybody else, I do wish it had a stand-by switch.

you know the features; sweet and simple, though I also wish it had a stand by switch.

I got this amp from a guy who won it and wanted to make some quick cash, so i was pretty much the first person to play it. for the first few weeks the sound was pretty darn stiff, i like to play blues with just a hint of overdrive (pre amp at about 2-3 and volume with post)i found that the sound lost a great deal of its glitter in its highs and it didn't sustain too well. this all got quite a bit better after the speaker was broken in, but it still bothered me that i couldn't get the sound bright enough with out it sounding harsh and dry. i eventually switched out the stock speaker (blue marvel) for an eminence wizard from the red coat series. i got it because it sounded the most like a cele vintage 30, it costed about half as much, and i think it has a tighter bottom! the speaker swap improved the tone and sustain in the biggest way you can imagine, switching to all JJ tubes helped a bit, but not as much as the speaker swap. without the upgrades i would give it a 6 with the new stuff i would totally go10 for 10!

never had a big problem, one night i had a little rattle problem, but i locked it down

i think the warranty is a few years. i've never had a real problem with it, so i'll give peavey the benefit of the doubt.

i've been playing for about 8 years, active gigging for about 3. I had a fender hot rod before i had this amp. the problem with the hot rod was that it didn't break up where i needed it to, i always had not enough gain, or way to much. After the modifications this peavey amp was totally a better amp! the dynamics come out more with a little gain, and it has PLENTY of fender shimmer plus Marshall edge when needed! i really love this amp after the mods. without id give it a 6, with id give it a 10!

2006 Classic 30 combo. Typical volume, tone, reverb controls with Pre and Post for the overdrive, effects loop, and a volume boost button that just muddies up the tone. The overdrive is pretty good, but I love my pedals. Very good spring reverb. All the controls I need.

READ THIS, important! As is from the factory, pretty poor tone. Brittle highs, muddy bass, and REALLY midrangey. I turn the mid control all the way down. I bought this when the main transformer blew in my '64 Vibrolux and needed an amp quick. I thought this was the best choice my local shop had in a tube amp. When I got the Vibrolux back I put the Peavey away. I decided one day to pull it out and see if I could do anything to improve the tone. I replaced the Blue Marvel with an Eminence Legend I had and the preamp tubes with 2 JJs and an old Amperex. Incredible difference! It sounds like a comletely different amp. It's still midrangey but the tone is SO much better now. With the changes I give it an 8. Without a 4.

Peaveys are known for being dependable. I've had 2 and never had a problem.

Never dealt with them

Been playing 45 years. At one time or another I've owned every blackface Fender amp made except a Vibroverb. Supers were my favorite until I got sick of carrying them and got the Vibrolux, and I'd have to kill if it was ever stolen. I've had too many tube amps to remember but here are some others: Peavey Bravo 112, Mesa Boogie, Marshall JMCs, MusicMan 2X12, Ampeg V4, Dr Z Maz 38 2X12(great amp but really heavy), Carr Rambler (nice deluxe reverb type but way too expensive for what you get), etc. The Classic 30 is a good amp, especially for the bucks, but ONLY if you replace the horrible stock speaker. For an EL84 amp I'd save up the money and get a DrZ Maz18 2X10 or a British made Vox AC30.

made in early 2002 you all pretty much know the features, its a basic amp, a sort of no frills amp, I really wish it had a standby, but ive read that alot and of course its a tube amp so its loud enough for most applications as long as your not trying to play thrash or death metal.

I like the clean channel, very much like a fender, lots of reverb, I like the fact that you can get more reverb than you need instead of needing more and not being able to get it. I like classic rock and blues, im a product of the sixties seventies eighties, I like all styles of music, this amp is fairly versatile, it can do a good job with the blues, and sound like an old marshall to some degree, I dont like too much saturation, so this works for me, forget it if your look for tons of overdrive.

Ive had this amp for a while with no problems, ive seen them at open mic jams where they have been literaly kicked around and still fired up! one was knocked off stage and still worked!

Peavey was lightning quick with there respones, bought it used so there is no warranty, everyone fixes them!

Ive been playing over twenty years, ive had many brand name amps, Ive A/B this amp against much more expensive amps, saldano, rivera, I still liked this better, I use Prs, gibson G&l guitars, I would get another if I lost it, hey there affordable! I Just love the tone it gets, I have a Mesa,like that too, its a different animal though. I do wish it had a standby, for the money you cant beat this thing, and I can afford to spend more, but what for? I put in a Vintage celestion to warm it up, and im going for the JJ tubes as well. So save your money and give this a try before you buy anything else.