Peavey Classic 30

? I had this amp ordered--it is a brand new Peavey Classic 30. 2006 Model. Tweed covering.
? i was a bit curious to see if this amp would create a decent Jazz tone--sort of like a Polytone sound. I play more in the jazz style and was mainly reading reviews for Rock so I was a bit scared. I am VERY impressed!!! It sounds great for what I try to do and is more than capable of creating a nice, thick punchy jazz tone. But it is also great for rock and roots/blues.
? As others have said, this thing is pretty darn loud! i live in a NYC apartment and definitly can't use it to it's full potential for practice--but regardless of how low i keep the volume, it still sounds great.
? The features are good enough for me--it has a great tone, great reverb--sounds like a Fender in my opinion. I have tried some of the Traynor amps and the Kustoms--in my opinion this comes closest to that rich Fender reverb sound.

I have a Heritage H535 with dual humbuckers (schaller standard pickups)--it sounds GREAT. Rich, warm tone and great reverb.
The amp hums a bit, but it is almost unoticable. I haven't really turned it up, so I don't know if that will change in another enviornment. Sounds go from deep dark jazz tones to bright and twanggy country and roots rock. Good diestortion too--sounds like typical classic rock crunch.

Can't tell yet--but seems very sturdy and solid.

Haven't dealth with them yet.

I have been playing for about 15 years. I am not professional, but take it seriosuly enough to really work hard at my sound and impovisation. I only have my Heritage guitar. I have had several guitars in the past: a BC Rich, a Gibson SG Standard, an American Strat Deluxe Plus and an Ovation. I have only ever owned 1 other amp--a Peavey Bandit 112. I didn't particularly care for that amp and never thought I would ever get another Peavey. When I finally had the oportunity to get a new amp, I did lots of research. I wanted something good for jazz since that is what I have been working at for the past 7 years. I also didn't know if I should go solid state or tube. I really love the sound of old Fenders--and they are used a lot for jazz. But then there was the whole Polytone direction--or the newer Clarus amps. Finally, for the money, it came down to this amp--and it is GREAT--I am thrilled!

Pretty basic as far as features go. One channel, clean and dirty channel, shared eq. Effects loop, ext speaker jack. There should be a standby switch in my opinion, but thats ok, its still a good little amp. I would like a ground lift on it somewhere too as I plugged into the effects loop and there was a very audible ground loop hum going on. So until I get that figured out I can't use my effects loop, oh well, still a great amp.
Tubes are EL84's and 12AX7's.
Use this amp in church so there is more than enough power for anything, hardly get it past 2 ever.

I am playing through this amp on a Godin LG Centennial loaded with Seymour Duncan P90's. I play at home and at church, so I play rock mostly, and some lighter stuff as well. I run the guitar through a Dunlop cry baby, Boss compression, Visual sound Jekyl and Hyde, Boss OD3, Boss Giga Delay, and Boss TU2. First of all I wanted to say that I was a little dissapointed with the sounds of this amp when I started to get used to it. It was muffled if the treble was down but piercing if the treble was turned up, the mids were muddy if up and harsh usually. And the Bass was boomy, not tight at all. This was before. I made some adjustments to the amp and I'm loving it more every time I change something. I used to not like the clean channel at all, gross, and the distortion channel was even grosser. It was better than solid state but not like other tube amps I'd played through. So I first decided to replace the Tubes with JJ tubes from Eurotubes. Great company, great service, awesome tubes. I put the new tubes in and the tone improved 100 percent. Then just today I went and rewired my pedal board with George L's solderless cables. Man, the difference is amazing. The tone of that amp is so much improved...... clarity, warmth all in one package. Go with JJ tubes. I still don't care for the distortion completely, its ok for some stuff, but its still pretty fuzzy. I can't wait to put a new speaker in, maybe a vintage 30 or greenback. Overall this is a great amp and I was glad to buy it.

I have been able to depend on it so far without any problems. The tubes rattle a little bit but that is the nature of a classic 30 I've read and heard. I'm sure I can remedy that somehow. The stock tubes were crap, but its not an expensive amp so I can't expect great tubes or a great speaker now can I. Overall I haven't had any really problem.

Never tried....Not a big fan of the Peavey name though, but thats just cause. I've never tried to actually talk to them tho.

I've been playing now for about 7 years. I have only owned a solid state amp besides this, peavey banditt. I have played on a friends Fender Deluxe reverb with 4 10s. I have played on marshalls, THDs, Traynors. This amp fairs well compared to them. I'd have to say that for the price I paid (there was no way I could afford anything else. I would love a THD amp, those things are amazing. I would also love a vintage fender reverb. But hey, for the price, I think I got a fairly good deal all in all, and its a good sounding tube amp. Next time I will spend more money, definately.

See the other tons of reviews for the Peavey Classic 30 features. In my opinion, the Peavey Classic 30 is a good amp for the price. I was happy with the stock amp with the original tubes and Blue Marvel speaker. I was very happy, when I installed a Celestion Vintage 12 inch 16 ohm speaker and replaced the tubes with JJ/Teslas. I recently purchased an extension speaker cabinet for the Peavey C30 that has a 12 inch ceramic Brown Soun Inc Tubby-Tones hemp 16 ohm speaker placed in an EarCandy (www.earcandycabs.com) Sovereign 1x12 horizontal cabinet. I am now estatic. Both channels and all tonality settings on the Peavey C30 and my guitar sound excellent at any volume. I can get wonderful clarity and/or distortion at all volumes. I would suggest that a new buyer purchase the Peavey Classic head-only, replace the tubes with JJ/Teslas, and then buy the EarCandy Sovereign 1x12 cabinet with Tubby-Tone speaker. Perhaps the EarCandy 2x12 cabinet may be your best choice. I'm not quite sure which brings the most magic to what is already a good amp, the specially designed portally tuned EarCandy cabinet or the Tubby Tone speaker. All I know is that I am in guitar heaven with the Peavey C30 amp with the EarCandy Cabinet with Tubby Tone speaker.

I have a Music Man Steve Morse guitar and an OLP MM1-FR guitar. Both sound great with this amp and extension speaker cabinet. The extension cabinet smoothed out the sounds of the second channel. With the extension cabinet I can now get a wide spectrum of top quality sounds out of this amp at any volume.

I have had the amp for a year with no problems. I did purchase a Tubeguard off ebay to mount on the back of the cabinet to protect the tubes.

I have never needed to contact the Peavey customer support.

The rating of 10 across the board does require the purchase of the EarCandy extension cabinet and Tone Tubby speaker. The Peavey C30 stock is an 8. Add the tesla/jj tubes and Celestion Vintage spreaker and you get a 9.

You know the deal. It has all of the features that I wanted. Two channels, reverb, effects loop, light and not too loud.

I use Strats, Les Pauls and ES style guitars they all sound great. Changed the power tubes to JJ's and put a Brimar CV4004 in V1 in the preamp. This amp is so good that it pisses me off. I also own a THD Uni Valve, THD Flexi, Marshall TSL 100, 1970 Fender Super Reverb and various modeling and Hybrid amps. Between the 2 channels I can get just about every sound needed for most styles except for NU Metal which I just throw a pedal in front and away I go. I play mostly Rock and Guitar rock ( Vai, Satriani) and can nail those tones fine. I play some Country and clean Jazz and it covers those fine. Very little noise and the stock speaker sounds great. I've tried a G12H30, Vintage 30, G12M70 and Eminence Swamp Thang and none of those sounded " better". I ended up staying with the stock speaker because it fit the amp better due to being less efficient allowing me to turn up louder without Ice Pick highs and Flubby bass. The bottom line is that it holds it's own against all of the other amps I own.

No real problems. Reverb doesn't work but I bought it used this way. I use effects in the loop so it's no big deal.

I've used Peavey for other repairs and I must say that they are on par with the Best boutique Companies that I've dealt with.

I hate to say it but this amp is THE BEST bang for the buck that you can get. I wish that I had purchased this before the other amps that I own. I'd have a few Grand in my pocket.

All tube amp (pre and post channels)
Nice equalizer
Great Reverb
Superb over drive!

This amp is most indicated for vintage guitars. If you own one and really like vintage tones, that's your amp!

Great for classic rock and blues. I usually play Led Zeppelin, Deep Purple, SRV, Eric Clapton, etc. All of this sounds can be reproduced with precision. All you need is spend some time studying the controls.

It has a great clean channel, like Fender's amps.

The dirty channel is hot! That's the sound of the fire!

As all tube amps, the tubes has a limited lifetime. Despite of it, I've never had any problems with my amp. All you have to do is change the tubes when they get old.

PLEASE: take care of the ventilation for this amp! You must keep a clearence between the back of the amp and the wall, because it heats up a lot! It is normal, though.

I have bought this amp in Brazil. Here, the product is imported by dealers and there is no official support or customer service from Peavey.

Great vintage sound. Very versatile. You can play rock, blues, pop or even jazz in this amp.

Very nice clean channel (like Fender's), superb dirty channel (like Marshall's), great reverb!

I like the way it looks.

I would like to recommend it to you or anyone who likes vintage tones.

For what is, outstanding. I don't really understand the relevance of some of these catagories. If it doesn't have the features you want why buy it?

First I really don't think these rating really mean much. I'll give it a 9 just to reflect I do like this amp. Mine has had most of the "Blue Guitar Mods" which did improve the tone a little bit but was not a radical improvement in my opinion. I changed tubes numerous times but that is on par for most EL-84 amps. I hear a lot of complaints about tube rattle and this amp, that can usually be attributed to the tubes themselves wearing out, very common with EL-84's. I've used JJ's on all my re-tube's and it is probably a step up from the stock Sovteks or Chinese.

I might have to agree we the person who said the speaker swap is a waste. I put a V30 in mine and have played it that way for about a year. I can remember when I put in thinking "That's it?" Was it an improvement....? yes, huge improvement.....? I don't think so. What it did was push the mids so forward that they are hard to manage. I think one of the other downsides is the V30 is so efficient. I didn't have to crank the amp as much so I lost some power tube distortion and started having to crank the front more. I just put the Blue Marvel in and thought "This sounds really good" .... kinda of weird. Keep in mind that my amp is somewhat modded and that might accout for this. Maybe I just have a decent well broke in Blue Marvel. I think possible a Eminence Private Jack might be a nice speaker for the amp or a Eminence Tonespotter might work well too.

I have had Marshall's, Boogies, Carvins and a fleet of other amps. Currently I have vintage Twin Reverb and Trace Elliot Speed Twin. This amp has been a mainstay for me and is one that I always can find a use for. Some of the best recording tracks I've ever done. They are great little amps no matter how much they cost.

Never a problem

I've always had good luck with Peavey.

These are great little amps and will probably outlast allmy gigging amps. Actually I've used this amp alot over the past few years for gigging. I've been playing for over 25 years doing a lot indie typ rock. If it were stolen I would get another one or possibly look for a Trace C30 Speed Twin. As far as wanting more, I would just buy a different amp if it didn't have what I wanted.

30 watt 1 x 12 valve combo, two channels (clean and drive), reverb, mid boost push-button switch, channel select push-button switch, EQ for bass, treble & mids, FX loop, footswitch, extn speaker. No standby - boohoo.

EQ is versatile, although bass shy. This is a sharp, chimey amp. Generally I dime the bass and mid controls to 10 and roll off treble to about 6. I never use the mid-boost (mud!), and almost never use the drive channel (muddy fizz).

Reverb is ok around around 3, just enough to add a shimmer, but not good if you want full on surf. In theory you could use outboard reverb and the FX loop instead, but I've never tried it.

Points subtracted for no standby. All amps should have a standby switch so your valves last longer.

Overall, it has a lot of features, so high ratings for that. However, some feaures are middling quality (like the drive channel and mid boost), or else good enough but unexceptional (reverb). Which is ok, as it's meant to be an affordable, no bull, working amp.

I got it when i was moving from acoustic music to electric blues and a country, swing, blues blend. It was a valve amp, and it had a beaten up Fender vibe, and i could carry it - and that's all i knew back then.

NZ$500 second hand from Mel's Music. Later I got to play lots of Fenders and other good amps, and realised it was a harsh, clangy, ear-scrunching, mother-deafening, tone-challenged turd.

I decided to sell it, but before I could do that the valves started dying. I couldn't sell it without them, so I started researching valves a bit on the Net and got a few second hand Mullards, Telefunkens, etc (but 12AT7s, not 12AX7s). This improved the tone a lot. I decided half the problem was that the valves were old and dying, so I'd give it a second chance (stock valves were old Sovteks. This amp is one of the first Classic 30s, so the valve were 15 years old or more?)

Still clangy though, and nowhere near enough warmth. I put it through a mate's 100W Celestion and it's a huge difference, so I ditch the stock no-name speaker. I buy a second-hand Marshall cabinet with a Celestion G12M-70, and put the speaker in the Peavey. Voila! More bass, more mids, less clang.

Then I got hold of a matched quad of Teerad EL-84s (rebranded Toshibas, made in good ol' Japan). Hoowee, did these boys put out some gas! The chassis gets pretty hot now, but so does the sound.

Also some NOS GE12AT7s - wow nice and chimey and clear. Then NOS GE5751s to push it a bit more - oh yes, that's good.

It was a dog when I got it, now I like it better than a lot of Fenders. 30W is all I need. I'm a fan of low powered amps and low on-stage volume. I'm also the singer, so I keep it down. But you need to crank a valve amp to get good tone, so I like to mike a small amp and have it sitting just above the drums in the on-stage mix, but not drowning out the vocal monitors.

With stock speaker and valves I can safely say it was a horrible amp. It's now one of my favourite amps. Using the Lollar P-90 on my Tele, the tone I get now is fat and juicy and chimey without harshness. It won't suit everyone, but it goes well with that guitar and my style of old rootsy blues and country. Another mate does funky ska and reggae, and he just loves it for chimey skanking.

Rating is based on what it sounds like now - and only on the clean channel. Drive channel usually isn't much cop. I tried a Mazda 12AX7 in V2 that made the drive stunning, but it also made the clean side harsh. So take yer pick. If i want drive, i dime the clean channel - with decent valves and speaker it's great!

Valves always die eventually, and the stock ones, although nothing flash to start with, were just old and on their way out. Once I put new valves in, it has never died on me or caused serious trouble. I suppose the PC board will give out one day, but if you want boutique PTP wiring, you pay a lot more than $500.

I've had no dealings with Peavey or their New Zealand agents, so I can't rate them.

I've been playing for nearly 30 years, mostly acoustic until the last 5 or 6 years, almost entirely electric for the last 3 years.

The main guitar is a home assembled vintage style Tele with three saddle Callaham bridge, one-piece maple neck and light-weight ash body, but with a Lollar P-90 in the neck. I use the P-90 most of the time for blues, the Vintage Lollar bridge pickup for country. I use a stage tuner, and a MXR micro-amp clean booster pedal to push the amp for leads, and that's all really. Sometimes i scrounge a Hotcake and stomp on that. Often I don't even use the MXR.

I have had an C30 since the first run. It has the Tolex cover that has stood up to a near decade of road / club. use. I really think the world of this amp. It's size, weight, output, and sound. Compared to my Fender, Music Man, Marshall, Riviera, and Mesas this is the amp for me. I,ve tried using 2 amps for different tones but got tired of the backache of using too much equipment. The C30 has enough clean and crunch to cover. a very wide variety of genres.

I have searched for my ultimite guitar rig for almost 40 years. I started early at agd 8 w/ my cousin. I love going into music stores and trying out all the new eqipment, and many times I bought them to just try and ended up returning, so it was easy to A-B between them. This is the only way to really find what will work for me. The stores hate it though.I basically want a versatile guitar,(Modified Fender Strat)and great sounding amp.I was an equipment nut! Had one all everything and two of most if it was good. No, screwing around, When I found and used the C30, it was the amp the others were compared with. For the sound,size,weight,and price,nothing compared.

This is a very reliable amp if used correctly. It did not come w/ a tube cover and still doesn't have one. I wish it did. I also found out the hard way that if the back is not left clear to properly ventilate the resistors and caps will fry! In approx. 10 years of constant use in clubs and on road gigs, this is the only problem i've had. I would set it on a barstool or chair w/ a back on it. Even in the cold winter gigs it still needed to vent the heat. The problem is w/ lower cost amps is the electronics that are used in manufactoring are the cheapest they can find. Lesson learned. Replace w/ quality resistors and caps and ventilate. I did all this out of love for this C30. A good Green Back 30 is even nicer

Never delt w/ them.

After 40 yrs of playing I think a C30 nis the best bag for the buck. Even if price is not a factor.

Peavey Clssic 30 w/JJ tubes & an Eminence Governor speaker.

It's the best sounding AC30 I've ever heard!

I've found that going with JJ tubes & changing the speaker really makes this amp come alive. They do sound good stock, but the stock Sovtek tubes can't even come close to JJ tubes.
Eurotubes has some different preamp tube combinations that really help.

This is my favorite combo amp. It's loud enough for most live situations & rules at rehearsal.

Fixed bias, so you can change tubes yourself.

Peavey is great to deal with!

If you buy one of these change the tubes & speaker ASAP!
JJ tubes sound the best & either an Eminence Governor or
Celestion Vintage 30 will do the trick. If you make the changes
you will have an amp you'll never want to part with.
These Classic 30's don't really have clean tone like a Twin Reverb.
With EL84's in the power section you will get a warm/smokin tone
to die for (Really). Also these amps sound much better than the Classic
50's. I've burned through, Mesa, Fender, Hiwatt, Marshall & everything else under the sun. For what I do this amp exceeds all of my needs for pure tone. Don't let the Peavey name scare you away. These amps are 100% incredible sounding.

This is a 2005 model in vintage 'tweed.' Features are well documented in the other reviews. This amp is used at home for practice, recording, and is also used with my band. The 30 watts are plently, especially if you use an extension cab. I wish it came with some sort of tube tamer and cage or grill to protect the tubes. Two marks off for Peavey continuing to overlooking such simple but annoying things.

My main guitars are a GMW custom Strat with a Blues Trembucker in the rear and a Duncan SSL-1 in the neck and an EBMM Albert Lee with 3 single-coils. I have other guitars, but those are the ones used most. The C30 works wonderfully for what I need it to do. Nice cleans, which start to break up around 4.5-5. I'd like to mention here though that the stock speaker was not cutting it for me. It was replaced with an Eminence The Governor. The Governor sounds awesome in this amp. Really tightens the amp up with balanced mids. Crisp and clear. I've also loaded the amp with some NOS tubes and that's made a big difference in tone as well. I don't really use the lead channel, but run some overdrives through the Clean channel. A Fulltone OCD for heavier stuff, a Timmy for a boost, and an RC Boost to tweak things up a bit.
All these ingredients supply me with the tones I currently need. I'm giving the C30 an 8 in this category because I think the stock speaker blows. Upgrading it makes for a big improvement in the sound/tone of this amp. Also it has a low grade hum, but nothing noticable to anyone other than myself.

Owned it for 6 months with no problems. Note that I do play the hell out of it. I wouldn't play a gig without some sort of backup just because it's an amp in a live situation and anything can happen.

I've never had any problems with any of my Peavey gear, but when I've had any questions they've always been on it in a quick and friendly manner. I believe it comes with a 5 year warranty.

I've been playing over 20 years. I currently own a Peavey Wiggy/cab, 5150 Combo, Vox AD30VT, and Gibson GA 15RV. However, the C30 is my main amp of choice. If lost or stolen, I'd probably buy the newer Classic 30 head rather than the Combo. Combos are prone to the occasional tube rattle, which is one of the few things I don't like about this amp. Aside from that, this amp (with an upgraded speaker) is very hard to beat for the money. I'm very pleased with it.