Peavey Classic 30

This is a nineties model as I have had it since 98. The features have been thoroughly stated elsehwere. I play classic rock and blues which this amp suits quite well. As others have stated, one improvement may be separate eq for "each" channel but that is not that big of an issue.

I use sveral guitars mainly an American strat with Van Zandt pickups. I also use a Washburn with p90's. The amp works quite well for classic rock and blues (although I prefer my Delta Blues specifically for blues). I finally made some changes due to advice seen here in the reviews and have replaced the stock speaker with a Weber Blue Dog and replaced the tubes with JJ's. I feel that this has greatly improved the sound "quality". I would like to experiment with a 1x12 cab just to expand the sound and move a little more air. I have found the amp fairly versatile as you can use the footswitch to utilive both the clean and overdrive channels. Plus, I use an Ibanez tube screamer inbetween on its own with the clean or combined with the overdrive to get more "drive". Personally, I like the overdrive channel as it has a nice tone. I used to have a Marshall JCM 800 combo and I actually got rid of it in part because the Classic 30 had a more desirable tone (for me). I guess beauty is in the ears of the beholder.

I have had this amp now for 11+ years and have had no problems whatsoever. Please realize that I treat my gear very well (I have a 30 year old ovation that looks new other than the frets are worn down). Take care of stuff and it will take care of you.

I can't answer this because I've never had to use them.

I've been playing 33 years. I also own a Mex strat, Custom Carvin, Taylor 514, Larivee D05. As I stated earlier, I also have a Peavey Delta Blues (another great amp). If this amp were stolen I would be sick but I would look for another and set it up the same way.

OK, I'm the guy, aka dweeb, in the previous review who said the Classic 30 has EL34s. I meant EL84s. What's worse, I typed it several times and didn't catch it. It was late - what can I say? By the way, I gigged out with the Peavey - sans backup - last Friday night. Honestly, I think the distorted sound was one of the best I've ever had. BTW, I leave the boost button down at all times. I have some nice pedals, but its hard to beat hot tubes for a classic blues or rock sound. For cleans, well . . . nothing beats an older Twin Reverb, but the Peavey sounded pretty good. It sounds better on the clean channel if the boost is not engaged, but its too much trouble, so I just leave the boost on. Also, I found that if I use my reverb pedal, the amp reverb needs to be off, especially if I'm using the distortion channel. Otherwise, I get this awful feedback. So, I won't be using the amp's reverb unit again on stage.

Like I said, the distortion channel is great, but the boost button must be engaged for my taste. Otherwise, it sounds thin and artificial, like a cheap pedal. I played my Les Paul for most of the gig last Friday and I was smiling a lot. Sounded goooooood.

So far so good. Even though I say I didn't have a backup, I kept my Twin in my van - just in case. You never know with tube amps. I still have memories of a gig we did in Jackson, TN about 25 years ago using my Twin. My butt was to the audience most of the night 'cause I was busy trying to get the noise out of my amp. It was a burned out 6L6. Live and learn. Tubes are worth the effort, but there will be problems from time to time. Be prepared.

I will say that I'm enjoying the amp more and more as I use it. I especially like the fact that I can lug both it and a guitar at the same time. Try that with a Twin! Actually, I can still do it with my Twin, but my chiropractor will hear about it. In fact, she did - today. I used it on a gig Saturday. Should have used the Peavey, or carried the guitar separately, or USED THE DANG WHEELS! Yep, wheels are a good thing. Should use them more often. You gotta love Twins.

I think mine was built in the late 90s - I got it used a year back, so I can't say. The amp is very versatile and so is my band. I wouldn't own it otherwise. It has an effects loop and a distortion channel. Here's where the other reviewers have lost me - they say the distortion channel is useless. Monkey see, monkey do. I thought the same thing when I got mine until I actually tweaked around with it and found out what it can really do. I've mainly used this in my practice room and sometimes on a gig (but that's about to change). 30 watts is plenty of power because we mic everything anyway. After working with it I now feel I can use it on any gig with minimal effects - an echo, tremelo, chorus and wah. Keep reading.

I use Teles, Strats, and Les Pauls depending on my mood. I played in a large arena on Friday night up near Nashville and brought my '72 Fender Twin Reverb, my effects board and my guitars. Last night, I played at a small local club and brought my Twin and my Peavey Classic. I had purchased a two button foot switch off eBay for the Reverb and to switch between my clean and dirty channels. In playing around with this amp at home, I found that by engaging the boost button (to the far right) and turning the post to about 3 and the drive to about 6, I get a sweet creamy distortion I had previously thought was only possible with pedals. In fact, I've gone through a lot of pedals and never quite found this sound. Well, last night I found it. I played the first two sets with my trusty old Twin, then I plugged this baby up (sans effects pedal - just a foot switch) and just let 'er rip. And boy did it ever rip. My bass player and drummer couldn't believe it; it actually sounded better than my Twin. The clean channel with the boost button pushed had just a little dirt so that when I rolled the volume off, it sounded clean. We cover 'Runnin Down a Dream' by Tom Petty, so I used the distortion channel and fell in love with it. Next, we started pulling out some old ZZ Top and Zeppelin. It sounded fantabulous. Like I said, if you can't get a good sound out of this, you're doing something wrong, or you can't play and no amp in the world will fix that. Don't believe everything people post here. One guy apparently got pissed off at his incompetent amp tech and rated this at a 1. Peavey likely would have fixed his problem, but from what he posted, the retailer, not Peavey, dropped the ball. They never sent it back, so Peavey never got a chance.

Case in point: My bass player bought a pro-series 450w Ampeg head and it farted out on him, so he took it Yarbrough's Music here in Memphis and they jacked it up worse - then tried to charge him $200 for repairs. They had it 2 weeks and it didn't work PERIOD when he got it back, so now its at a REAL amp tech's shop. It's not Ampeg's fault. My point? Don't blame a manufacturer for an incompent dim-wit at a repair shop.

I bought a tube damper for my amp right from the git. I replaced the tubes and it hasn't failed once and isn't microphonic IN THE LEAST. Absolutely zero tube rattle. It was a simple fix and Peavey really should buy the patent from the guy who invented that tube damper and use it on every amp that leaves their plant. Since I've only had mine for a year and have just started gigging with it, I'll use a second party's experience to rate reliability. Steve Jones (not his real name) is a professional player here in Memphis and has supported himself making music for the past 30+ years. He has owned his Classic 30 and played live with it on every single gig for 15 years without any problems (He says he's working his way through poverty; actually, he's doing pretty good now). He knows good tone and can likely play rings around most of the players reviewing on this forum. This guy is that good. Anyway, he's the reason I bought mine. He carries it around in his trunk, the tweed is all tattered and torn, but it still sounds great. It is his ONLY amp. He said if it gave out on him tonight, it would have still paid for itself 100s of times over. And you guys who think the newer Fenders are the way to go - have at it. Unless you get a hand wired one, be ready for some down time. They're not 'point to point' wired anymore than I'm an astronaut. Steve has worked as a luthier in several music stores and will tell you that the Classic 30 is far more dependable; Fenders were constantly being returned for repairs, no Classic 30s. Like I said, that's why I own one and I feel it was a great pick.

I've owned other Peavey equipment and they seem committed to honoring their warranty. They usually sublet their repairs to 'qualified' techs in your area, but they don't personally oversee who that is. They let the retailer find their own techs, like most everyone else does. If you have problems with the work the tech does, call their 800# and let Peavey know about it before coming to a review forum with your soap box and negative attitude so you can downgrade something other people are raving about. Their guarantee is they will either repair OR REPLACE faulty products. I've called them about a problem with a powered mixer we use on small gigs and they were friendly and very helpful. The tech talked me through the 'repair' which was simple.

Another 10? Yep. Been playing for 45 years, 32 years semi-pro. I own a couple of hand built boutique amps, a heavily modded Fender Twin Reverb, and this Classic 30, plus a few nice guitars (as if that matters on an amp review). If it were lost or stolen I'd look for a used one on eBay or Craigslist, but I would definitely get another Classic 30. In fact, I'm watching for another one to come up on Craigslist right now. Its small and packs a big punch, looks cool, and sounds as good or better than amps costing several times more. The components are not the greatest, but they're on par with other amps using printed circuits. I'm really surprised Steve's amp has held up as well as it has, so maybe mine will too. As far as I'm concerned, it has everything I wanted in an amp and it will now be my go-to for future gigs. I always bring a back up because tube amps are notorious for frying tubes at the worst possible time, but you gotta love 'em for the tone. If this one ever goes on the blink, I'll have to see what repairs would cost, but I'd likely just buy another used one as reasonably as they're priced. I'll cross that bridge IF I get to it.

30 watt tube amp with 2 channels but only 1 eq for both channels. Has an effects loop. Comes stock with blue marvel 12 inch speaker.

I will have to admitt the amp sounds good. I play mostly single coil teles and strats but occasionaly run a les paul or prs thru it. It is a good amp for country, southern & classic rock, and blues. If you play anything heavier you will need a stompbox distortion. I am not a big fan of the blue marvel speakers I recomend changing them to your speaker of choice.

THIS IS A PROBLEM!!! I have an older model classic 30 and the biggest flaw of its constuction is there is NO protection for the tubes. The tubes are the most delicate part of the amp! They are made of glass for crying out loud! I do not feel comfortable transporting this amp to a gig for that very reason.

I contacted peavey to see if they made an after market guard for the tubes and it turns out that they do. However I tried numerous times to contact their parts department to order one and can get no response. Its bad enough that you have to order an aftermarket tube guard for a $600 amp but when they won't even return an email about purchasing one that sucks!!!!!!!

I have been playing almost 20 years. I own marshalls, mesas, egnaters, fenders, and peavey amps. Including a peavey classic 30 2x12 halfstack wich is constructed much better than the combo I'm reviewing. I love the sound and portability of the amp. 30 watts is plenty for any gig. If you need to be louder you need to be miked. However not having a guard for the tubes and the ****** customer service make this amp a liability to own.

You can read all the features from previous reviews. As it's been stated this is not "true 2 channel" but the technical reasons don't interest me. I personally think the shared EQ is a good thing! This is the first amp I've owned where I've been happy with the settings switching between the lead and clean channels. This is also the first amp I've played where both channels sound good. Usually one channel is vastly superior to the other.

I play blues, classic rock, etc. and this amp can cover it all (except metal) without pedals. After experimenting around a bit, I've added an OD-3 pedal to boost volume during solos.

The "boost" button is interesting, most players seem to hate it. For single coils it sounds ok to my ears, the main reason I don't use it is it's not accessible via foot pedal.

I've used this amp recently playing with a small group, and this amp has plenty of power. The other guitar player has a solid state head with a big 4X12 cabinet and my amp with the single speaker not only holds its own but could blow him away if I would turn the volume past 5.

Not a lot of bells and whistles, but I like things simple.

I use humbuckers mostly, though single coils sound good too. I think it's a rather bright amp, sometimes a little too harsh for me. I usually use an amp stand, but with this amp I can hear it fine with it flat on the floor.

The reverb was humming on me at higher settings. That was cured by moving the reverb pan just at little.

Someone already described the amp as a "one trick pony". I think that's accurate, but it's a good trick.

I don't think it's a good idea to ever gig without a backup, no matter what amp you use, particularly if you're getting paid. I think with tube amps it's even more important to have a spare.

I would say this is probably not an amp that would take a lot of abuse, but if you're responsible for carrying your own stuff (I dream of having a roadie someday!) you will more than likely take care when loading in the vehicle and carrying it in to play...

Can't really rate it since I've had it less than 6 months.

Not dealt with Peavey. Bought it from a music store. It was $50 cheaper than musiciansfriend.com. Will take it back there if I ever need it worked on.

OK, there are other tube amps that sound better, but they are also a lot more expensive. I compared this to other models before I tried it out in a store.

Main thing that I think reviews like this are helpful with are people's experiences. I appreciate the negative reviews too, I hope my positive experience with this amp will continue.

Trying an amp in a store is important, but you don't learn much about it until you play with others. In that environment, it hasn't failed me yet.

I am writing this review after have a bunch of Peavey Classics over the years. My main amp is a Peavey "Blues Classic" which is like a Classic 50 with a 15" cab. Great amp. I've had and sold a bunch of Classic 30s but just purchased another one this week to use as a 'grab and go' amp to replace my Crate V3112. Anyway, after many years a of playing the Classic 30, there seems be a few problems that myself and many others have had:

1. The OD Channel doesn't have a seperate eq and gets 'lost' in the mix. Solution: Buy a $28 Danelectro Fish 'n Chips and put it in the effects loop. Boost the mids and output level and now you will 'pop out' of the mix rather than lose volume. Best $28 you could ever spend. Do this BEFORE you swap speakers, tubes etc.

2. Tubes/Speakers - save money and try to get some vintage or NOS tubes. Unlike most of the retarded bubbleheads on the internet, I'm not blindly advising the "JJ/Vintage 30" swap. JJ preamp tubes are horrible at best and their EL84s are just average. Plus quality has gone waaay down as of late. To demonstrate the quality of JJs, well, my cat buries them in the litter box b/c he mistakes them for something else. I would recommend any number of vintage or NOS tubes... I am currently using a Tungsram in V1 (fantastic) an RFT in V2 (great 'crunch' tube) and a Sovtek LPS or Tungsol RI in V3. With power tubes I would just go with regular stock Sovtek EL84s or better yet, get some older Russian EL84M 'military' power tubes also known as 6p14-EB. They are similar to regular EL84s but can take a beating and rattle much less. If you want to spend big bucks on a quad of El84s, go for some NOS Tungsrams (IF you can find them.... good luck).

And please don't put a "Vintage 30" speaker in this amp. I put Vintage 30 in quotes b/c the current made Chinese Celestions are nothing like a real older Vintage 30. But either way, they are a horrible match for this amp. Break in the stock speaker first. If you absolutely hate it, spend your money on an 112 extension cab. If you MUST change the speaker, about the best you can get for the Classic 30 is a Weber Blue Dog or an Eminence Cannabis Rex. But breaking in the stock speaker and then invested in an extra 112 cab will be money better spent.

3. Replace the Output Transformer. I replaced the output transformer on my Peavey Blues Classic with a Mercury Magnetics unit and the difference is amazing. Expensive, but money well spent. I can only imagine that replacing the OT on a Classic 30 woud bring about the same improvement in tone. This last option is only for hard-core tone freaks 'cause it's expensive and you can get most of the way there by just using the $28 Fish 'n Chips and putting some REAL tubes in there. (Not JJs). I challange anyone to prove me wrong.

I got mine used, so I can only guess from what the previous owner told me that its about 5 years old. I've had it for a year. The tone of this amp is its selling point - clear and articulate. I can generally tweak around with any amp and get a tone that I can use, but with this one its very easy and it sounds good on a lot of different settings. It could be used strictly for rock, or country, R&B, blues and even jazz. I play all those styles to some degree (still can't quite get the hang of jazz even though I took lessons a few years back.)It has plenty of power - I have amps with a lot more power, but even this one is too loud for most venues if I really crank it. I mic it anyway, so volume isn't an issue. The amp has everything I want in an amp - dual channels, reverb, remote reverb switch and channel switching with a footswitch, an effects loop, and 3 band eq. Great little package.

I use Gibsons primarily, but I've also played my Tele through this a lot and it has such a sweet tone through those EL34s. As much as I like Les Pauls and SGs, I think this amp is better matched to my Telecaster. The amp is surprisingly quiet. I turned it on tonight, went to the kitchen and came back and forgot I had it on until I picked up my guitar and unplugged it - AROOOMPH! Yep, it was on all right. I usually get at least a slight hum. Is that the norm for these things? I've only played through one other but I didn't pay attention to how it sounded when the guitar wasn't actually being played.

So far so good. I replaced the tubes right away when I got it because one of the EL34s was microphonic. I put Ruby EL34s in it and EH 12AX7s in the pre. I play it all the time around the house and have used it a few times on gigs. My friend Steve has one that he's used for about 15 years on every single gig (about 5 nights a week in Memphis plus Las Vegas tours on occasion) and its never been to the shop. If it quit on him tonight, he would feel he definitely got his money's worth. I'm sure he would get another Classic 30 instead of blowing his money on a boutique amp. I've read on this review that some people haven't had the same experience as Steve, but I think a lot of it has to do with how you treat it and being able to differentiate between an amp problem and a tube problem. Then again, not all Peavey 30s are created equally. Any amp can have a bad component or two that makes the whole thing sound bad. Anyway, in my case it has been dependable and hopefully it will stay that way.

I think with any company, customer support in the eye of the beholder is only going to be as good as the person you speak with. Some people don't like their job, they don't care if your amp doesn't work don't want to do anything about it. The only time I called Peavey was concerning a PA head and the guy was helpful. Otherwise, I've never had a problem with Peavey gear.

I've played for about 45 years and have owned a plethora of amps and guitars. Overall, I've personally been very satisfied with the Classic 30 and would recommend it to any musician looking for a great tone without shelling out a lot of dough. The amp looks cool, sounds great, and is easy to carry around. I wish it had a birch plywood cab instead of the particle board, but I can deal with it.

I've got two of these, I'm guessing they're around ten years old. They are the older style, with the silly-looking Peavey logo removed. Most people assume they're old Fender amps when they see them. You know the features by now, nothing fancy. The boost button is useless, don't push it. I have no problem with the shared three-way EQ between the two channels, sounds great to me on both. I use the FX loop, very nice. These things are easy to tote, plenty loud, and after upgrading tubes and speakers, have tone, tone, tone. The only thing missing is a standby switch, but it's no biggie. I point a small fan at the back to keep the amp cool. Depending on the gig, I'll use one or both of the amps, sometimes one with an extension cab, just depends. They work great for laid back jazz gigs, rock shows, everything in between. I use them a lot on worship gigs where it's a very critical environment. I probably spend too much time listening to the playbacks, but then again, they sound great.

I mainly use a very old Strat, sometimes an old Les Paul custom, sometimes lap steels. On the clean channel, the Les Paul sounds nice and round with great sustain on chords. Works great for jazz gigs. You can get a very nice R&B tone with the Strat, very well-balanced with a fat bottom and bell-like top end. I just like the way these things sound. Unless it's a really load gig, the Ampegs and the Boogie stay home. To me, where they got things right with this amp is the way both the clean channel and the lead channel sound. Warm and sparkly clean, that "Mississippi Marshall" tone on the lead channel. Both very natural. When you crank up the clean channel, the grit starts a-comin'. I've set both amps up the same way, JJ tubes all around and Celestion Vintage 30's. It's just the ideal match. I generally use SM57s for mics, a little off-axis from center, but I've also had good results with Sennheisers. Reality check time - this is a small amp, so it's not going to sound like a Marshall stack. It doesn't have the transformers of a Matchless DC-30. Does it record well? You bet. Is it loud enough for most club gigs? Absolutely. Can you play anywhere with this amp when you mic it? It's up to the sound engineer. Very easy to get my sound, pretty much plug and play, with an old MXR Dyna Comp and a Voodoo Labs Sparkle Drive before the input. This gives me plenty of tonal options. I'll use the Sparkle Drive set fairly clean to fatten up clean solos, and to drive the lead channel over the crest. In the FX loop, I generally run a Rocktron Xpression followed by a Rocktron Intelliflex, so I've got any effect I want covered, in stereo when I want it. Too cool for words. I use an expression pedal with the Rocktron Xpression, so I can add post-distortion eq for the lead channel. The basic tone of the lead channel is ripe for the picking -I just add some midrange in the FX loop after the distortion for solos to fatten up the sound. The Rocktron HUSH noise reduction is outstanding, so it's dead quiet for the worship gigs. It just works for what it is that I do.

One of the amps has never failed on me, the other one has had a couple of issues, both my fault. I found out the hard way that if one of the top handle screws comes loose, the nut can fall into the circuit below, cause a short, and you'll have to replace an internal fuse on the gig. No fun. The other time - you'll like this one. I'm pushing a hand truck with the amp on it for the long trip from the parking area to the gig at Opryland Hotel in a driving rainstorm. I hit a bump, the amp falls in a muddy puddle. I get inside, turn it on, and it sounds like an outboard motor. I turn it on its side, and dries out just in time for the show and has worked great ever since. That was three years ago. These things are American-made and tough as nails. Oh - one thing you must do. Buy and install one of the commercially available rear tube guards!

Never dealt with Peavey customer support, never had to.

I've been playing for 35+ years, so I'm pretty picky about sounds, and I like gear that's easy to move. I've had these amps for a while, not planning on parting with them. Is there better gear available? Sure. Is it more expensive? Very much so. For tone/price/performance/reliability/weight, you really can't go wrong with the Classic 30. For that, it gets a 10 in my book.

Tube Amp from 2004. A "not really"2-channel.Reverb.Nice Outfit.Tone controls work for both settings.12" speaker.Footswitch for channel and reverb.

I work with Fenders and Gibsons and all kinds of pickups with a
favour for P90s.The amp responds some kind of "couloring".Clean is NOT
Fenderclean.Okay its a Peavey.Crunch is good. Too much gain causes
problems.Played several gigs and the amp is powerfull enough for that.
For bedroom rehearsal strongly not recommended.All in all i'd like to
say, good for Rock and Blues, less good for Country as there ain't no
really clean, nothing for Metal.

I'm a lucky guy to have several warhorses from obvious brand,and so
must not rely totally on this one.Better is that.My experience is a
letdown.Crap tubesockets and a terrible serviceable U-form printed circuit are the main suspects.I know now why these go new from the
dealer at about 700 and within 2 years you find many of them used at about 300 and less.I can service a tube amp but I'm not in soldering
I'm in playing.Besides my amps go only where I would go sleeping,I'm
an "tubeamphugger".This beast eats tubes like I drink beer, cheap ones
and expensive ones alike.Noises,blackouts all things you don't need.

Never dealt with them. Amp was used when I bout em.

Been playing about 30 years now,my other gear is not matter of this.
Yeah he got lost,I sold him. I can only hope that guy don't hunts me
with his axe. I will never buy one again. Have you ever looked into the eyes of a servicetechnican when you brought that one in and saw
how he wants to leave the room "PRONTO"?
May all you others be lucky with em,I'm glad mines gone!

This is a modified classic 30 they have been available to the gp since 1996. It has a 2 channel thing going. I honestly don't care about the how it comes up with the channels. It has really nice cleans and nice distortion. The only flaw is if you get right on axis you get ice pick highs. I am going to try the fizzy lifter for that stay tuned on that. One of the biggest problems I had was it was too loud by the time you hit the sweet spot. Enter Jim at Amphead in Portland. He performed a cool little mod that cut out 2 of the tubes creating essentially a classic 18. Finally I can hit the sweet spot without complaints

Currently I play a Washburn MG122 with 2 humbuckers and a Schecter C1 EA with 3 GFS Memphis Ricky tones. The amp handles these guitars really well. The Piezo pickup sounds rich without too many mids. The GFS are bright pickups that yield any thing fro a nice strat tone to a pretty good classic rock tone beautiful cleans. The Washburn has a Seymour 59 and a pearly Gates standard. The amp loves these guitars but you have to dial it in. I find the treble set on 4 bass on 10 mids on 8. I play a little of everything from pop to old hard rock to country style. I push it with an ME 50 Boss and the normal amp switching. I like the distortion especially in the low watt mode.

I use the amp to gig and use a moddler as a backup. If I need more volume I can go to th 30 watt mode. Its reliable.

Peavey is a good company. They will actually send tech data and help. But with this amp I rally don't need their help.

I have been playing for 35 years I own the 2 electric guitars mentioned above as well as a Breedlove acoustic and a schecter Stilleto studio 5 bass.I also have 3 pianos and a drum set. Those are actually the wifes' Yeah how lucky am I? I have also used various pods and currently a boss gt 8 with a graphic eq in the effects loop. Makes the fizz go away and gives it a clarity that is almost tube. None of actually get all the way there. If the amp were stolen I would be unhappy but would probably go amp shopping and try a couple things.

Everyone is aware of it's features, so let's talk about what it doesn't have...

Controls on the front, like it should
A tube guard on the back
A metal vs plastic channel switcher
An Eq for the each channel
A light to indicate which channel your on

I play out, it's a one trick pony...

I will will admit at loud settings past about 6 on post, people like how it sounds, but at lower volumes, it sucks. It's also really dependent on which guitar you use...for me, humbucker guitars seem to work best...the boost switch just adds mud at lower volumes.

I bought it to get the tube tone. Not impressed.

Under the right conditions I have gotten close but as I state latter, with the controls the way they are, it's so hard to get.

Tubes are exposed, so if you store stuff in the back, then your just asking to have the tubes get bumped. It's happened to me. It's a bad design.

Had problems where the tubes got bumped and had to leave the stage to get the tubes back in. Not Peavey's fault that my tubes got bumped but it's kinda like walking around without pants, your ***** are unprotected, not smart, they will get bumped too.

Amp has always turned on.

Never used them.

If you gig, the first problem is find your tone on this amp.

First because there is only one EQ, the boost just adds mudd at low volumes, the amp is supper bassy, so cleaning it up is hard, the controls are on the back, tough to get to, no channel light. Tubes exposed, so they will get bumped. All of which has led to my gigs, where I spend the whole night trying to find the tone, the volume, the right channel, pushing tubes back in, taking out the mud, and less time playing..I have a wall of guitars, some of them sound like crap with this amp, some are better...if you buy this amp, buy a wall of guitars.

The only saving grace to this amp, is that at loud volumes, some people think this amp souds good, and with the right guitar, I have actualy had amp techs, looking into the back to see what I got inside there. Honestly, I got lucky, it never sounded right to me, right song, right night, right room, right volume..is there magic in this amp, maybe but it's hard for me to find. Spring reverb works fine, plenty of it, if you like that heavy stupid tremelo effect, but if you move the amp, then it sound like an earthquake. Spring reverb is silly, ...I am not a solid state guy, but if you move the amp a little the solid state reverb doesn't crash, bang like a spring reverb does, and they sound just fine, and don't break.

For me an amp with controls on the front, channel switching light, metal not plastic foot switch, with light, eq for both clean and dirty channel, distortion that is tight and clean not muddy is a required, not just something to have. This amp just gets in my way, because it's the kinda amp you have to figure out, rather then turn on, move some things around, done.

I would rather play on stage, then play with my amp all night. I give this amp a 7, if you figure it out, find the right guitar, play loud it will work, but it won't do much else. It's easy on the back to move, and it always turns on. Buy it cheap and you won't feel hosed if your gig goes south, but honestly there are better amps used, for the money.

If someone stole this amp, I would buy something else.

I picked up my Classic 30 from a friend in '99, a few years after he bought it new. I think the features the amp has have been pretty well covered by other reviewees. The amp is simple and effective, just how I like it.

First, I use an stock American strat with a humbucker in the bridge position, and single coils for the neck and mid.

I'm going to break this section up into two parts: premod and postmod.

premod: The factory setting of the amp had full mids and warm highs, pretty great for blues and jazz. The clean channel was beautiful. The overdrive was weak, and the amp really needed to be cranked to get any growl out of it. I only had two complaints: 1) the lack of low end presence & 2) the treble boost created an entirely different, awful sound which did not function as a 'guitar solo button'.

postmod: I made a few changes to my Classic 30. I switched the capacitors for the mid and low equalizer circuits (low: .022uF to orange-drop .047uF; mid: .022uF to orange-drop .022uF). And I wired in an L-Pad attenuator between the amp and the speaker. The result: my little Classic 30 now sounds like my cranked Marshall TSL tube amp! Seriously.

This amp went through a decade of heavy use on the original tubes! It has been knocked over several times and survived a ten foot drop without barely a scratch.

I had one which I'm sure is common with all amps: at some point, the volume would drop down randomly, or the high end would disappear and return, etc. I bought a $7 can of electronics cleaner from Radio Shack, then opened up the amp and sprayed the hell out of the insides of the pots. The issue was instantly resolved (I think this is called maintainence).

I've never attempted to contact Peavey.

This amp has the guts for almost any occasion. It can be ear-splitting loud, and if you're playing a gig that requires even more volume, the amp will probably be miked anyways. The Classic 30 does great on its own (especially after a few mods), and handles effects well. I don't know of a better value.

Serial number states 2009 so I would say made in 2009.
Suits my Classic Rock/Southern Rock tastes great.
2 channels normal and lead. Switchable by button onpanel or footswitsh not included, luckily I have an old Bandit 65 I use for my electric/acoutsic guitar and the pedal works perfectly on the Classic 30.
Effects loop to be played with later.
No headphone jack but seems to be adjustable form pretty damn loud to bedroom levels and still retain some credibility.
Standby would hav ebeeen nice to have and boost I find just seems to muddy things up.
Use this amp in my guitar room(spare bedroom) of my house and to take along to jam elsewhere. Has plenty of power and so much easier tolug around than a half stack.
Basic guitar amp with basic amenities.
Others here have made comments about lacking amenities but the current model seems to have heard a few cries such as the tube holders in place, metal screen covering the back of the tubes, JJ's allaround both pre and power stages. Heats up quie a bit but nothing a small fan won't cure.

Used with an Epiphone LP standard plus with SD Seth Lover pickups, an Epiphone G-400 SG with a SD Custom 78 in teh Bridge and Alnico Pro II in the neck, and a Peavey Patriot Duncan JB in Bridge and SD Jazz in neck, both coil tapped with the flick of a switch.
Suits me fine for AC/DC, Aerosmith, Skynyrd, Sabbath, Van Halen you get the nint.
Somewhat noisy at times but old wiring inj house is more to bame than the amp I am sure.
Two good tones from normal and lead then use the guitar pots to do their jobs and create a greater pallate of sound.
Starts to break up at higher volumes on normal but thats the nature of the beast. Can be brutal when boost added etc but to each his own.
Allready has JJ's all around from the store so may try a speaker swap with an Eminence Private Jack I have handy.

Only had it a day so still breakling in etc . Honeymoon is sweet so far though.
Seems solid , always bring back up gear for a gig. If you ar egetting paid shouldn't you do it automatically.

Haven't called for anything on this one but with my Valveking 100 Head and Bandit always got ptrompt info an danswers

Playing as a hobbyist fsince about 1981. Guitars Peavey Patriot, Epiphone LP Standard Plus, Epiphone G-400. Valveking 10 head, valveking cabinet with cros pattern Private Jacks and VK Speakers. bandit 65 amp, Norman acoustic and Ibanez electric acoustic.

This is a two channel tweed amp. It has an effects loop and boost switch which I use frequently. Only draw-back is it has no standby switch. It's been good to me (tone-wise) for indie and country/rock.

Good warm distortion. Not a tone of clarity but I'm sure that could be improved with a new speaker. I really dig the clean, it's full and rich for a little 1x12.

Man... this is why I wrote this review. I hesitate to do this but I have to be honest with my experience because I want others to know what happened to me. Let me first say this amp came HIGHLY recommended by serious pros who I trust, but unfortunately this amp has been an absolute nightmare for me. It's been in and out of the shop for the past 5 years solid. I've paid for the amp over twice for repairs. I should've have just immediately gotten rid of it, but the tone and the cost of getting a new amp kept me from upgrading. When I bought the amp I was in a band that played about 40 shows a year. It gave me problems. By now my band plays 150+ shows a year and this amp can absolutely NOT handle it. It has betrayed me at big shows and repeatedly crapped out when I needed it (like going to Nashville to record debut album). Every amp tech says the tube sockets are absolute crap and that's usually the problem. Even when the tubes are working fine there's a god-awful rattle. There was a nasty short in the reverb tank (is that what it's called?) that took techs forever to find out and as I'm typing this there a disgusting low-end buzz that cuts in and out every few minutes. I'm done with it. Thank God I spent 300$ for a back-up Fender Blues Jr. a few years ago. I haven't even changed the tubes on that thing and it's never given me the slightest problem. Ah well, I'm in the market for a Deluxe now. Sorry if this discourages, I just had to let people know. Cheers.

While it was under warranty they were pretty decent about the first few repairs. It was still a pain to have it gone for 1-2 weeks at a time.

Like I said, great tone, great look, and very light gig-able amp BUT... if it doesn't work it doesn't work. I've grown to hate the thing and I don't think I'll ever buy Peavey products again (unless I take up steel guitar and want the workhorse solid state amp). This was a bad decision. Go Fender (or anything else) if you want a 1x12 combo amp.

I have a 2004 Classic 30. It worked well for about two years and then started making a snap,crackle, pop sound. Under warranty, It has been back to Peavey four times. Every time, according to the paperwork, the tubes are bad. The longest time it worked correctly was two weeks after receiving. 1 rating for poor dependability.

I mainly use a 77 Gibson Les Paul and if the amp was working well it was killer. If not, a trainwreck.

I never used it without a backup. Has it broken down?, that is all it seems to do. As I said, it's a 2004. The first one I bought new was a 2003 and it made the same snap, crackle, pop sounds after a year. The sales person gave me the 2004 new in the box ( THEY SHOULD HAVE KEPT HIM) as a replacement. KK's music in Manchester, TN SUCKS !!!! and so does Peavey after sending it back four times. Gimme a break, I replaced all the tubes myself before contacting the authorized dealer!

Peavey obviously doesn't care. Allegedly repaired four times, the authorized dealer, KK's, Manchester, TN, gave me a lot ot smartass runaround just to get them to do anything about it!!! The last time it was allegedly sent to Peavey it wasn't, some local yokal who said again, tubes.

I have been playing 40 years. Mainly a 1977 LesPaul, 1965 Gibson ES-335, 1978 ES-175, 1973 Fender Stratocaster, 1989 Telecaster, Peavey Wolfgang, (which I like),and several other intruments. I have Fender, Marshall amps as well as an old Bandit 65 (which never gave a problem). I will never buy another Peavey product as they and their dealers will not service the products as the warranty demands.

I own 3 of these babies (1992 Tweed, 1999 Tweed and a 2004 Black Tweed) and have seen little change in their build quality or parts selection. All 3 were purchased "pre-loved" on eBay and all 3 had minor problems because they had been used and abused for years before I got them. I work on my own equipment so this was not a problem for me (I could also get them cheaper if they had known problems as well).

They lack separate tone controls for each switched-channel (Clean & Dirty) and have no Standby switch (my biggest beef with the design). The Boost function (selectable by push-button only) boosts level AND mid-range content and I have found this only to sound good with a Stratocaster using the Bridge pickup and then only in the "dirty" mode. It sounds honky and weird to me on any other pickup combination or with Les Pauls on ANY pickup combination!

I love the size, lightweight and basic design otherwise. It has a great basic tone (reminiscent of the Vox AC30 it was no doubt designed to emulate) but I enjoy them even more with a few changes (see below).

For my use in small clubs and outdoor events I have found them to be loud enough (with a speaker upgrade and used with the matching Classic 112E external cabinet... also with the matching speaker upgrade).

I primarily play Rock and Pop in small-to-midsized clubs and I standardized on a Peavey Classic 30 "stack" because of their small size, relative light weight and their tone (when set-up properly). There are 5 changes I have made to my "stacks" that have transformed these amps from good to great:

1. Matched set of JJ tubes from Bob at Eurotubes (using EL83S tubes instead of 12AX7 types to help prevent microphonic noises, a very real problem in small combos like these).

2. Factory tube cage with dense foam "shock absorber" for output tubes (to prevent tube damage, rattle and minimize vibrational stress).

3. Small fan to promote circulation and keep everything cool.

4. Weber 4" Beam Blockers on all combo speakers.

5. All factory speakers changed to Avatar Hellatone 60L units.

If you primarily play a Les Paul with Humbuckers you probably don't need the Beam Blockers but I play most of my gigs using a Fender Stratocaster as my primary guitar and the Beam Blockers help smooth out the high-end on those single coils.

In this configuration, the Hellatone 60L speakers are very smooth, efficient and dynamic. I love the way they sound in this amp! There is a dynamic "body" in both clean and dirty channels (heightened when used with the Classic 112E extension cab) but not at the expense of "sparkle" and definition. The amps sound well balanced and smooth. This makes the lack of separate tone controls somewhat moot and with the 5-way pickup selector on the Strat it covers a lot of sonic territory!

Notice that I do not modify the amplifier circuits in any way, I just embellish the amp with creature comforts and carefully chosen accessories that make it a little more reliable, louder and better matched to my primary guitars.

I have been regularly gigging with the Classic 30 for almost a year now and I have yet to have a show-stopper sort of problem. I respect the amps and am careful not to bang and shock the amp while loading, unloading and setting up. If I notice a problem (like a noisy tube or loose hardware), I fix it before the next gig and I don't let the degradation accumulate until a failure results (this is called "maintenance").

The biggest aftermarket accessories made for this amp are "Tube Tamers" and "Tube Guards" because this is the source of most failures and problems in my experience with multiple units. This is a small combo amp and this puts the tubes right at "Ground Zero"... they are simultaneously being directly bombarded by the speaker's rear pressure waves and subject to additional mechanical abuse when power cables, speaker cords and footswitches are shoved in the back. This can result in abused tubes and broken tube socket receptacles.

It took many years before Peavey designed a "Tube Cage" for this model (it looks a bit like the tube cage that has always been standard on its big brother the Classic 50). Unfortunately it is an optional part that you must install yourself. By adding some high-density foam to act as output-tube "shock absorbers" (similar to that used in the Classic 50) you protect the tubes and prevent tube degradation and audible "rattle" due to sonic pressure waves with better efficiency and lower cost than using those third-party screens and "tube bars".

I protect my Classic 30s and 112E cabinets with covers from BS Covers (BSCOVERS.COM) as I have found that these work to prevent abrasion wear, damage from minor bumps and protect against moisture (it drizzles a lot in the Pacific NW so this is an important accessory for all my amps). These covers are very affordable, lightweight and top quality as well.

These amps are not built heavy-duty but if you respect them and treat them like a passenger in your vehicle they will repay you with good reliability. Just maintain them and don't abuse them until they exhibit problems!

Check this link for a photo of the rear of one of my amps so you can see the Tube Cage, Foam, Speaker and fan additions. I put the cables and footswitch into a "ditty bag" and that fits in the back opposite the fan and does not damage the speaker or tubes:

http://www.pacair.com/Reference/Classic30_Tweed_1.gif

I have never had to call Peavey with a question. Their manuals and schematics are easily found on the Internet and my only contact with them has been to order parts when I first rebuild them to my liking. I found the Parts Department to generally have knowledgeable and pleasant folks who have yet to screw-up an order. They have gotten it right every time and have called me back when I asked a question that they couldn't answer directly themselves (once).

So far so good!

I've been playing guitar and bass for over 40 years (since I was 10 years old) and I have a lot of equipment (over 30 amps and cabinets) at my disposal. At this point in my life, I wanted to standardize on smaller, relatively lightweight equipment that was loud enough to gig with a 5 piece band in local venues and small outdoor events. I was not prepared to give up tone, however.

In the Peavey Classic 30 I have found an amp that meets all my size/weight/reliability criteria AND sounds great! They are a really good amp stock (especially considering what I paid for mine) but can be improved dramatically without doubling the price tag.

I didn't wait to have a problem or get one stolen... I have 3 of these Peavey Classic 30 stacks so I have all my needs covered (home/backup system and multiple gigs covered). I think that about says it all from my perspective!

I have a tweed 30 head with 2x12 marvel cab, plus a 30 combo with a Vintage 30 Celestion. Won't waste time preaching to the converted.
A few tips if I may, to get this beast howlin'. Effects loop: run a 2, 1/4" jack rig with a volume control in between for another master volume pot, any old volume pot should do. Then you can run everything on the amp at 11 if you wish, and you have a final volume knob, works on both channels! Great for playing at home! I run a sraight in Boss ME50 and use the amps in stereo, big sound.

I use a few guitars with this setup. Mostly Fender and Gibson stuff.
Sure amp is noisier with single coils, but when you turn on the playing who can complain about any tube amp, they are tube amps!
More advice, play with the tubes! JJ tubes will make the amp come alive. Have JJ's in the combo, with Celestion classic 30, and Groove tubes in the head. JJ's are dirty and Groove Tubes get singin' tight punch. Perhaps I shall put some emminence redcoat speakers in 2x12 cab. Allways playing with sound. Have a Marshall and a Hiwatt, but I kinda' like what is going on with the peaveys.

Never used.

Been playing 40 years. I have 8 amps, 2 of them Peavys. Why would I buy 2 if they were crap? I have no bias, just a love for good amps, even have an old Garnet, made in Canada. But if somebody stole my old Hiwatt, I would hunt them down and kill 'em. Be true to the roots! Tubes rule!

Made around 2004,mint condition,very versatile combo,blue marvel speaker and valve guard.You all know the deal by now.
I hade mine moded which improved the tonal midrange and did away with the mid honkey sound and also made the boost switch usable,but for me when I put in a Celestion Greenback was the icing on the cake.I also have the G12H which gives a cleaner slightly toppier sound to the combo and added 3DB to the sound level,but I prefer the Greenback probably because I have been using them professionaly for 40 odd years with various amps and gives it a smoother break up like the speaker is renown for.An 8 for features,it does what the controlls say.

Fender Tele and Gibson Les Paul Deluxe,for Rock and Blues and Shadows!!!Suits everything I throw at it,I love the creamy saturation.
Clean Channel is chimey and breaks up when pushed to 5 or 6.
OD Channel I use mostly especially since the mods and speaker change,from mild break up to quite a nice saturation.Check my link for some sound bites from some of my recordings with the amp www.george-nixs.co.uk
Amp is well loud enough for rehearsal and medium gigs and miking up at bigger venues.Amp cleans up well with volume control on guitar.I use this for recording as well.
Reverb is not the best but still good to add a taste of space.
Not a brutal distortion so metal heads steer clear.For me it has to be a 10.

Have had no problems with the amp,or valves which are JJ's

I had to contact Peavey about my PA mixer head way back in 1993 and they sorted the repair no problem or questions asked.No problem with anything since.Still have the PA Head mixer and Pa speakers in use still

I have been playing for over 40 years,and own marshall heads carlsbro pro head and an old late 60's carlsbro 100 plexi type head,no master volume very very loud.2x12 cabs with greenbacks.
If this little beauty was lost or stolen I would get another usa model and mod and change the speaker again.It suits me after all these years of finding a small tube combo amp.

Tweed, 2004 version.
Quite a few features for a small amp; reverb, dual clean/drive channel switching, boost switch, treb/mid/bass.
loses a couple points for no standby switch.

I'm using mine mainly with a Telecaster, into a BD-2, Rat & a DD-3.
lots of crunch and pretty good cleans. Mine is all stock.
Overall the Classic 30 is great little work horse for the working musician who's after a fair amount of clean headroom and good tone in a small combo.

I know guys who've used the Classic 30 for years with no problems.
They have a reputation for reliability.

I really like my classic 30, it's served me for a while with no problems and great tone in a portable, fairly lightweight package.
It's no wonder that it's been a big success for Peavey.
Excellent value!!

Made in 2004.
Versatile amp for many styles, but one major drawback - there is no separate EQ for the overdrive channel. Also does not have a standby switch, and does not come with the footswitch - you have to buy this separately. No presence button or knob. Easy access to tubes. Was able to tame tube rattle with teflon tube dampeners. Boost feature is pretty much useless as it only boosts mids, and there is no button on the footswitch for it.

Use various strats primarily, plus a custom made Carvin with humbuckers. Play rock/alt, and christian worship music. Good cleans, but not quite enough sparkle - could use more presence? Reverb is just ok. Have tried many tube types - find that certain tubes such as Sovtek, EH and JJ's make the overdrive sound a bit brittle. Settled on good old Groove tubes which smoothed out the brittle overdrive a bit and has given it a Vox AC30 type sound with natural compression. This was my go-to amp until I got a Crate V32 Palomino- better sounding cleans and smoother marshall sounding overdrive, less noise, plus a standby switch and presence button. With my Classic 30, I prefer using an Ibanez TS9 tubescreamer or Marshall Guv'nor 2 (Marshall for heavier distortion) as the first level of gain (can EQ them), and kick in the amp overdrive (with pedal engaged) for screaming leads since it gives you a treble boost also.

built like a little tank. Tubes are exposed, so always a challenge to transport without damaging them.

Never had to use support

Overall I would give this amp an 8 - Easy to set up and dial in a decent sound, lightweight, plenty of volume, ok features, good reliability. Probably would not replace it if stolen though since I don't feel they are worth the new asking price of $550 to $600. I bought mine for $400 which was ok. For $500, I would get another Crate V32 Palomino if available, or look with something else with better features .

My amp is about 4 years old - I'm the 2nd owner and bought it about a week ago. Very versatile; I even cranked out some Wes Mongomery on it using an arch top and it sounded good. I just bought the amp and used it for practice with the band recently and it did a fine job. The bass player looked at it after hearing how good it sounded size and mumbled "it just isn't fair". He has to tow a lot of speaker to cut through the mix like this thing (plus a 400 watt Ampeg amp!). I wish it had an 8 ohm load feature, but a friend of mine said he used a dummy jack in the external spkr. out to trick his into thinking it had a load and it worked. I'm going to try a Celestion vintage 30 in it and see what that does, but the factory speaker doesn't sound bad like some have said on this forum, just a little too mid-rangey for my taste. I'm used to older amps, Fender mainly (Deluxe Reverb, Pro Reverb, Twin Reverb, Princeton, etc) which sound great but are feature poor. Just having an effects loop is good enough for me, so I give it a 9. Kaa-ching!

I'm guitarded in the worst way. I'll buy one to re-sell and wind up liking it and keeping it. But I still only have one too many guitars: American Std. Strat, Baja Tele, Les Paul classic, Gibson CS356, 50s Tele, and an older Washburn J10 jazz box. That makes 6 electrics - oh wait! I still need one more to have one too many. What was I thinking? The amp is quiet with humbuckers and noisey with single-coils, like all other amps. I don't like or use the distortion channel although the boost button looks appealing. Haven't fiddled with that one enough yet, but I see possibilities. The clean channel sounds great at the volume that I use, but it gets a desirable tube distortion at about half way. Its really too loud for me to use at that point because I mic my amps. I ran the volume at about 3 for rehearsal and it did the job. I use pedals to get the overdrive. I have a SF Fender Twin Reverb to compare it to as well as a Dr. Z-28. They both sound great and this doesn't have the same tone as either one, but it sounds great in its own right. I had to run the mid down almost all the way and the treble up to 7 and the bass up to 8 to keep it from sounding too twangy with my strat, but to each their own. I like it so far and plan to gig out with this one next.

I can't speak for mine since I've only had it a little over a week, but a friend of mine (who turned me on to this little jewel) has had his for 15 years, played out 30 hours a week, and has never had a moment's trouble - just usual tube changes.

I've been playing for a good solid 44 years now and have owned my fair share of vintage gear in the past from Traynor, Marshall, and Fender to Silvertone and other old tube amps. I like this amp well enough to say it has a permanent home. Heck, I may even sell my Twin Reverb now that I have this. The twin sounds great but is a bear to haul around. Nah, then I would have one amp too few! Besides, I still use the Twin for recording and for calming my nerves at the end of a long day. Plus, its like my link to the past. This little Classic 30 can do the same, but its NOT the same, you know? I'll just keep 'em both . . . . along with my DrZ and my Dumble. Its a great little amp, very gig-worthy, and easy to haul. Plus, it looks cool and won't break the bank.

Classic 30 Vintage Tweed 1x12 combo (cool looking amp!!)
Styles of music: Rock, Classic Rock, Roots Rock, Blues and Rock-a-billy. This amp has the ability to cover them all.
This is a two channel amp with the clean producing some real nice bell tones when humbuckers are used. The overdrive channel is awesome and breaks up nice at lower volumes (this thing cranks too!)It's got a standard effects loop and an external speaker output too. I use this amp in my cover band and it has plenty of UMPH! to stay up front for the leads. On the outdoor events, I drag out my 2x12 open back extenstion cabinet. I have to give the features a 1 as it is limited, but it is all you need! Volume, tone, a little bit of verb...

I primarily use a Les Paul Special with P-90's, Les Paul Standard, PRS and a Tele for the pickin' stuff. Playing the straight up R&R it suits the music style great. This amp is fairly quiet, but has the typical tube hum. The clean channel with a distortion pedal tapping in and out give you a great jazz/country/rockabilly tone. the dirty channel with a compressor used for leads is awesome! I do not use my distortion pedal for the leads as the amps own break up is nice. The Blue Marvel speaker that came with it has been replaced a couple times. It was too brittle for me. I first tried a vintage 30 (kind of the same result, but muddier), but settled on a Scheffield 5150. This speaker really beefed the amp up and gave me a much better hitting bottom end that it needed. I didn't really care for the spring reverb that comes with it, so I run a sep. reverb and delay pedal through the effects loop. I also replaced the power tubes with J&J's. Stock amp I'd give it a 6 for sound, with Mods, I'd give it a 10+...

Peavey USA,....What can I say their stuff is bullet proof and lasts.

I've never had to deal with them

I've been playing for 27+ years and over the years I've become somewhat a guitar/amp/effects whore! I have many vintage amps that serve certain types of music beautifully. I've got a few modeling amps that sound great, but just don't give me the tube amp response to string attack. I wanted a small tube amp that I could easily drag out to gigs and not care to much about beating it up. This thing is awesome and cuts through the mix with authority. For the price, you can't beat it.

Don't wanna post the features again. (Read the manual on the Peavey homepage!).

Because 'less is better' I give it a 10. Who needs amp modeling anyway when the amp itself is sounding right?

The sound is crystal clear and could turn to crunchy. Typical american tube-amp sound known from THD or Fender in my oppinion. Lot's of dynamics!

Because of the fact that this amp is sounding sweet with my Hofner 4579 (LesPaul-Copy) and my Fender Rhodes Mark I Stage Piano, I give this amp a 10 again.

Well, althought the fact that this little amp feels sturdy, I hope that it never breaks. The amp is not wired point to point and the el. parts are on 3 connected PCB's. This is done for cost efficiency and not for serviceing. If a potentiometer has to be changed, the whole 3 boards must be squeezed to remove from the chassis. This is definitely not the best way...
For this i give it only a 5

never needed it but the schematics can be found online.

Although the amp may be hard to service it was a good deal for me and it sounds very good with my Fender Rhodes Stage Piano

Okay, first of all I own the Peavey Classic 30 Head. I figured id add to this review to you can get an idea what the head is like versus the combo. The head is about 2 yrs old now. I bought it new. Features are explained well in all other reviews. This amp is very versatile for what i play, which is mostly blues and rock. Ive tried the mid boost switch maybe twice, and i don't really see any use for it, IMO! Im sure it could fit great into someones style, but not mine. I honestly don't really use the "2nd channel" often at all. I find the best way to get a killer tone from this amp is to crank it! All the tone you will ever need is secretly hidden in the "volume" control. Play light and get cleared up chimey notes, but play hard and you'll get what you ask for, plenty of smooth output tube saturation. It's really nice! I rate this 5 only as i don't use anything else but the clean normal channel and the eq with a small amount of reverb.

I play this amp with a custom strat with fender texas special pickups, an epiphone les paul with humbuckers and a godin sd with 2 SC's and 1 split coil Dimarzio DP161 humbucker. As for my cab, i custom made a pine cabinet with 2 12" Celestions, actually "Hellatones" which are broken in celestions. 1 speaker is a vintage 30 and the other is a G12H30. You can get all the info on this particular setup from avatar or steamcomusic. One speaker is 30 watts and the other is 60 watts. I have this wired in series to get a 16ohm load, speakers are 8ohm's each. My cab is open back. This setup yields great results. These speakers are nicely matched for this amp. They have a higher dB level, about 100dB's each, which would mostly likely be about 5dB higher than the Marvel's you would get stock. Celestions are very efficient speakers and a must for this amp. I play with the pre-amp tubes here and there, swapping them around to see what i get for sound. It's a fun way to easily change the dynamics of the amp. Currently ive tried JJ's, Electro Harmonix and RCA. I've tried almost every combination i can get this what i have and the results are great. My next test is a balanced Tung-Sol for the Phase Inverter with 2 JJ's in V1 and V2. I'm currently still using the stock output tubes (SOVTEK) and they seem to work fine, but im going to swap them for JJ's and keep the stocks as a spare set. I've heard great things about the JJ's, and i mean for $40 bucks, you cant really go wrong. All of my guitars sound mint through this amp. I play SRV, Zeppelin, AC/DC, Dire straits etc. I've found that if you really want a different sound from the "2nd channel", run an overdrive pedal with that channel but only set the gain up to halfway at the most. I find that with the channel gives a kind of compressed signal which is cool for picking dynamics.

When i rehearse with my band i can get away with the volume around 4. It's easily loud enough with drums and bass etc. At home, i usually play around 6-7. It seems to really be the sweet spot for me personally. Playing a 12 i find you hear more of the EQ settings.

No issues here!

Don't have any stories for this as it's never been repaired. I find you can get all the information you need for this amp online by doing searchs for what your intent is. A lot of people play this amp and there's a lot of good information out there as far as settings, speakers used, tubes, wiring mods etc. Take a look, its fun to experiment.

Also, for most who complain about the Tubes rattling, i see that in other combos as well. With a head, you wont have to worry about this as long as your cab is tight and doesnt vibrate too much. But even if your cab vibrates some which can be good as well tonally, you can set the head beside the cab or buy a stand which puts the head on top of the cab without setting it directly on the cab.

14 yrs ive been playing, first peavey amp. Ive had a fender solid state (JUNK) and an epiphone valve junior head which was fun to play with. Ive used traynors, fenders, marshalls etc. My father in law uses a 71 fender bandmaster with 2 12" jenson alnicos, a 59 reissue bassman with 4 10" jenson alnicos and a marshall JCM800 head with a 2 12 avatar cab with Celestion G12H30's. When i come home from his place i can always count on my peavey to deliver what i need, even though ive just played through some remarkable amps and cabs. I wish this amp had more speaker inputs for 4ohm and 8ohm. You are limited to 16 ohm and i find most used speakers for sale are 8 ohm and it would be nice to try those individually without taking out 2 output tubes.

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.

I have played through quite a few of these over the past few months. Early '90's models to current production. What I like is the consistency. The design, speaker, and cabinet haven't changed. (Some things internally have changed like the tube guard, and how the boards are layed out in the chassis.) A classic design doesn't need to change to still be current.

Low, middle, high freq knobs. Class A/B. Boost button. Dirty and clean channel. Could use a standby switch. 3 12ax7's and 4 el84's. Using it at home I don't have to go much higher than 2 on the channel volume knobs to get a beefy enough sound.

Oh yeah, the best feature? All the knobs go to 12. Not 10, not 11 (not just 1 louder), but 12. Two louder!

The sound quality of this amp rocks. I have gotten very good tone out of it with a '79 Les Paul KM (limited edition specialty model), a US made 1981 BC Rich Eagle, a 2005 Eric Johnson Strat, and a 2007 PRS CE 22. All stock. All with the dirty channel. No pedals necessary.

Boost on this amp sucks. I overdrive the amp itself on the dirty channel, no fuddy duddy distortion boxes for me. 2/3 to 3/4 for the pre knob, and the post knob for overall volume (just 1 to 2 for home playing). 3 tone knobs all about 2/3 to 3/4.

The clean channel is very clean, mellow, and full sounding. But I really like the dirty channel. I don't believe you can get good tone with a both Les Paul and a Strat out of most amps (and I just tried a Marshall DSL401, great with a Les Paul, not so great with a Strat), and a Fender Super Sonic (not bad with either, but not great with either either).

Music style is classic rock to hard rock.

No issues yet.

I asked Peavey about the current models vs previous models, and some questions about the speaker (there didn't used to be a Blue Marvel sticker on the speaker), and they were very helpful in helping me identify what I was looking for.

Playing for almost 30 years. My main amp is a Lab Series L5 (BB King and Ronnie Montrose). That amps sounds great with my Les Paul, but not so great with a Strat, hence me picking up the Peavey. I can't get rid of the L5, have had it too long with too many memories, but the Peavey is now the main amp I play through.

Two more things I really like about the Peavey:

1) Made in the U.S. I know it won't fall apart next week like some Chinese made amps I've seen comments on. You pay for that quality, but I believe it's worth it.

2) Very easy to modify this amp. Tube changes, speaker changes, and check out http://www.blueguitar.org/articles.htm for some more cool tricks with this amp. Very versatile and flexible design and construction.

I actually got an early used one 1st. Sounded great with my Strat, but not so good with the BC Rich (too twangy for the mids; the PRS had some twang, and almost no twang with the LP). Eventually found out the tone caps had been "upgraded". But no twanginess with newer models I played at 2 different stores with that same guitar. GC had a special on a floor model, so I picked that one up too. I actually like how the older models look better. But I wanted the stock sound quality. Although I'll probably try out a Celestion G12T-75 in it eventually. Bottom line is that I liked the amp so much that I now have 2 of them!

Single channel, dual-mode (we'll call it two-channel for simplicity sake, but the lead channel just adds another tube to the clean signal path), all tube (except reverb and efx loop), 30W 4EL84 output. Gain boost switch, remote "channel" and reverb switch (more on this later). This is my second C30, I had another one 12 years ago. This unit is a few years old, not the current version.

I don't remember why I sold my first one, and I wish I hadn't. Whenever I test drive other amps at a store, I always plug into a C30 (if they have one) every other amp for a reality check. These amps are voiced perfectly for me. The mids, lows and highs are nicely balanced on the clean channel. I just enjoy playing this clean sound so much. Comparable sounding clean amps include the Fender Custom Vibrolux (at low volumes) and the Mesa Lonestar Special 112, which takes this same basic sound to another league entirely. Not really a fair comparison, but I have to say that I sound just as much like me on the C30 as I do on the Lonestar. The C30 stays clean to a surprisingly high volume.
The lead mode is very nice, much better than any Fender I've tried, and I say this even though my main gigging amp right now is the Fender Hot Rod DeVille 410. I won't even use the lead channel on the Fender, but this Peavey would work for me. You lose some low-end on lead, but this is done for a reason, so the distortion doesn't get flabby. Most amp makers do the same thing. Try setting the lead gain at about 6.5 (straight up) and then feeding the amp a Tube Screamer clone set to mild boost and med/low drive. This lead sound absolutely KILLS! Very harmonically rich, easy controlled feedback, and NO FUZZ. A light touch, and it cleans right up.
My one real gripe with these amps is the rattling of the tubes. I recently picked up a Tom's Tube Tamer on eBay, and this did the trick. I would say that this accessory is a must with this amp.

In addition to the Tom's Tube Tamer, these amps need some sort of protection in back for the tubes. There is an after-market grate accessory that does this well, and the new models have them already in place. The previous owner of my amp did something else that worked just as well.
I haven't gigged with this amp, but I may once I get a spare set of tubes. I trust the 6L6s in my Fender more than the EL84s in the C30.

I previously mentioned the footswitch. I made my own, both for this amp and for my previous C30. The stock footswitch has no LEDs so you can see which channel you are in, or if the reverb is on. The voltage coming out of the channel switching jack just happens to be the right current level to drive an LED. You could add LEDs to your stock footswitch just by putting one in series with each switch. I used a red one for the channel switch, and a green one for the reverb. The voltage is negative with respect to ground, so the LED has to be anode towards ground to work.

They have been good for parts and schematics for me, very helpful. I've owned several Peavey products over the years, and I do my own repairs. Peavey takes care of me for parts and advise.

The Classic 30 is a wonderful amp, and it makes a GREAT recording amp, so long as you do something about the rattling tubes. Honestly, Tom's Tube Tamer is a MUST for this amp.

I bought this amp in 2007 from a musicstore.It is my first tube amp!At first i didnt know if it would meet my requirements but after all it did totally!I havent changed the tubes yet but i bet it will sound even better than now.

The sound is amazing,in my opinion.
The clean channel is totally clean and bright.With my 70's strat i get the perfect strat tone.The overdrive channel works great.You can get every thing you need from Classic rock crunch to a dirty-clean.
The Boost button just gives it a boost of volume and warmth.
Its never noisy and if you set it righ you can even play quiet.

Sadly the EQ doesnt affect it too much, but it does its job well.

Never had any problems

Never used it

Its a great amp if you need a good bluesy to classic rock amp.
Its warm its soft and just looking great with the tweed.
Im a Knopfler fan and this amp is the right decision if you need his sounds from '77 to '07.

Same features as listed except each amps has it's own tonal qualities. More on this under Sound Quality. But things that knock it down are no seperate tone adjustments and no tremolo but I do like that you don't have to switch connections for gain/clean.

All this testing was done with both gain and clean channels. This is were having two of the same amp really shows their quality control differences. I just got a black then a tweed amp with intentions on giving the black one back when the tweed came in but noticed the difference between the two right away so I decided to do some testing. The black amp has Russian tubes in all but the clean and gain channels where it has JJs (even the small V3 is Russian). The Tweed amp has JJs in everything. The black has good ice pick attacks and very deep base. The Tweed is much softer and can really can't do the ice pick attack. I tried swapping the tubes and this did ABSOLUTELY NOTHING! I was hoping this would change their personalities but it did not. Where all these people say it completely changes the amp never had a side by side I guess and the time it took to change the tubes was tricking their mind into thinking it made a big difference. It DOES ABSOLUTELY NOTHING (at least with Burstbucker PROs which can get sharp but not as sharp as single coils I guess). Anyway, the black one was still very deep and sharp and the tweed was still much softer, quieter, and smoother (yes, the speaker was connected/phased corretly). Next, I jumpered the speakers over, NO CHANGE!!! The black amp using the tweed's speaker was still very deep and sharp while the tweed was softer even using the black's speaker. Crazy! Accourding to this board the tube swap should have done something but I swear, I changed them around 6 times and NO DIFFERENCE!!! Only thing is the JJ tubes kept bending their pins while the Russians stayed straight. Score one for the Russian tubes! At this point I'm at a delima (of course). The black one plays metal very well and can soften up when stroked smoothly but the tweed can never harshen up to be like the black. Man this sucks! I so wanted to have the tweed. But the moral of this story is if you don't like one classic 30 because it is too harsh or soft, try another and keep trying them till you find one you like. OH, and I even ran both amps with an MP3 connected to the input with volume at 6 for 6 hours so they were broken in (aimed them into the carpeted floor in a seperate room and played Tool and System of a down albums). I don't have any other speaker experience to guide me and I am new at playing (I know a little pink floyd, ac/dc, metallica, other). Hope all this helps someone.

They handled all this swapping without a problem.

Eeay to get on the phone or they call you back. But I haven't had to deal with a warranty issue.

I'd say it's a killer deal for the price. They are $399 at GC right now because they might be closing them out.

Not very many features as you all know. But what it does have I like. I like the gain but there isn't enough for metal but it certainly sounds good for just rock. Certainly is powerful enough as well. Has an Effects In but I'd rather just use the regular input (more on that later). There is no way to disconnect the internal speaker unless you unplug it. Doesn't have a standby switch which is rather odd. But, I love the tweed color!

I have a Gibson with Burstbucker Pros. Even with these the amp has very weak bass and anemic treble so I hooked a Digitech PR90 effects pedal straight into the input and cranked up the bass 6db (d8) and put the treble up 3db (t6) and now it sounds fantastic even with the stock speaker! I can't believe nobody has mentioned this before. Only downside to doing this is now the effects level has to be set to max (99) to keep the original volume the same. I don't know how this will affect things once I figure out how to use it all but hey, I'm happy right now. Connecting it this way also allows keeping the amps gain (which I like a lot) and reverb switches on the amp. Just having these adjustments on the amp and not on the pedal makes them so much easier to get to. Like I said, I don't know the real ramifications of doing it this way, I'm sure there is a gotcha problem in it but like I said, I'm happy for now. Doing all this certainly made the amp sound worlds better and the pedal has a huge amount of features as well. Raising the bass/treble could probably also be done with just an eq pedal or any pedal with those features (I don't work for digitech). Either way it beats buying some kind of speaker and hoping for the best. Now, I'd like to see anything beat this amps sound and features for even close to this price (amp $399, pedal $99 = $500). Before I'd rate the sound as only an 7/8 (that's an all tube rating. Most cheap SS/tube-hybrid deserve only 5 at best!). Now, I'd rate it a 9 because it just doesn't get any better, only louder!

I've had it only a few days but this is the Made In The USA version and from what I can tell they last as long as any in the business. I heard they are discontinuing production here and moving to China. Doubt those will last as long.

I think it has a 5 year warranty.

I'm a first time buyer but searched very carefully and didn't see anything within hundreds that I liked as much (tweed finish is nice). It could have a standby switch and a few other things but it doesn't so I'll have to live without. I'd say overall I couldn't find a better amp in this price range so I'll have to give it a 10. So what if it needed a pedal to bring out more bass and treble. I think most will always get some kind of pedal anyway and I don't see them discounting ratings because an amp doesn't have every pedal effect. Thanks Peavey for making such an excellent product at a great price!!!

2007 Model, the last of the "old style" front decals. As already stated time and again, it COULD USE A STANDBY SWITCH" - (Can you hear us, Peavey??)

Does have a mid boost that is very handy, especially with single coil PUs.

It can be a little noisy, but it definitely has a great "organic" sound to it. This is an amp I tried earlier in my playing career, but couldn't really appreciate unitl my playing progressed to the point that I quit using modeling effects and started playing the amp. It is old style all tube soudn with great tone. I/ve owned several tube amps (Fender evil twin, Deville, Marshall 401 DSL, Genz Benz El Diablo, etc.) and I can say that this amp sounds and plays great. Sound Quality is the reason I bought it.

This model has the tube guards and seems to be playing for the past 6 months since I have owned it without fault. That is one of the reasons I see alot of Peavey stuff in churches and with working (club) musicians. Peavey may be snubbed by most of the guitar magazines, but their stuff is bullet proof. I have owned 4 other Peavey amps and have never had trouble with any of their equipment.

Made a couple fo calls from a dealership with questions and have found them very helpful. What do you expect from a Memphis based company?

This amp is my secondary. I use the Marshall as my main amp at church, mainly because of the noise factor and the fact that there is no standby switch. However, I would use this as my primary with either my strat or tele. These guitars were made to be played on the Classic 30. I will keep this amp for life, just because of the sounds I can get with my Fender guitars (think Joe Walsh, SRV, etc.).

It's got what it's got. Don't we tend to buy the gear with the features we want, not necessarily the gear with the most features? Therefore I'm not offering a judgement on features.

Why did I buy this thing? I guess I read reviews that said it gives a pretty good sound...and it sounded okay in the music store (where it's often pretty hard to get a good handle on how a piece of gear really sounds). And because I'd read so many favorable reviews, I didn't bother to compare it side by side with another amp in the store. I have to say after having it a couple years as my play at home amp, the tone stinks rather badly. Clean or dirty. Also, mine, like many others, has a real problem with the tubes being very microphonic. That's really not excusable (all that growling and snorting when you hit certain notes...sounds haunted!). I just got a Vox ac15 today, brought it home, and sat it next to my Classic 30 for a fair comparison (happen to be using a stock American Stratocaster). The difference between the Classic 30 and the Vox at $600 is night and day. I'm not the guy with the golden ears...I'm amazed by the guys that can pick up on tiny differences in pickups, tubes, woods and so on. Lemme tell you, ANYONE can hear this difference. The Vox sound is so chimey, snappy and lively. The Classic 30 sounds like I took the Vox and laid it forward on its speaker. The sound from the Vox has sparkle and is articulate, while the Peavy sounds like it has blankets on it. The difference between the single pickup setting on a strat and the "in-between" setting on a strat is noticeable on the Peavey, but it's holy cow noticeable on the Vox. I had my wife listen from the other room, and she could easily pick out the Vox over the Peavey, and she's not amp savvy. Okay, so there's just about a 200 dollar diff between the amps, but after doing a living room side by side with these 2 amps, I'm kicking myself for listening to the Peavey for the last couple years. I though about upgrading the speaker, tube, and doing some mods on the circuit board of the Peavey, but I'd wrap a lot of money up in that, and the Vox already has the SOUND. Please don't get me wrong, it's not my intent to talk up the Vox, it's just what I happen to have here for a comparison. My advice: DON'T get the Peavey without putting next to the Vox or similar amp in a room where you can really hear what's going on.

I had no problem with mine other than the nasty microphonic tubes.

I did not have to deal with Peavey. If anyone knows about Peavey correcting the microphonic tube problem, I'd sure like to hear about that, though.

My overall rating on this amp's pretty low. It should either cost a lot less or be a lot better.

Features covered previously. it "works" but could use standby/presence control yadyadayada

Did a review awhile back on the C30....didn't do any of the mods I mused about but I DID put in a Toms Tube Tameer & made a tube guard for the amp Also bought a used Classic 112 E cab equpipped w/a celestion Heritage......WOW! whada difference!....still rely on pedals for distortion, tho I do play around w/the dirty channel @ home sometimes


The extra cab has made an amazing difference for my sound...full w/lottsa headroom.Have been playing a Gibson Blueshawk thru the setup.....hearing tone(s) I never dreamed of....when I wanna crunch & rock out w/an edge I pull out my Fender Tele equipped w/Dimarzio humbuckers.....boss chorus/Ibanez TS9/Ibanez sound tank trem

GREAT tone....figure only other mod I will make is maybe trade out the blue marvel in the amp for a vintage 30

HJad some issues w/tube noise/crackle when I first purchased & re-tubed the amp.....gotta bad bacth of JJ pre-amp tubes......they/my tube amp guy made it right w/fresh set, no probs since

Haven't used them, am really pissed off that Peavey doesn't manufacture the Classic 112E anymore....you gotta hustle to get one on e-bay & they ususally go for @ least $300 including shipping...have seen pristine units go for far more.


No waranty on my stuff, bought ALL used...why buy new when you have to change out the tubes & speaker right @ the get go

Have been playing longer than most people have been breathing (tho "intetmediate" would best descibe my performance abilities)...Switch off between a Gibson Blueshawk & a Dinario equipped Humbucker Tele

Features? what features? we don't need no stinkin features...
Not with tone like this. decided i had to chime in and pledge my alegiance after owning this for a year now. Like a nut I picked up a used 1996 classic 30 for $300 bucks at the local music store. add to the other five amps I have. but something about the tone hooked me. got it home set it up on a short dresser and it didnt have the same tone, till I put it on the ground. It came alive just like in the store. I think the JJ tubes (7 of those little bastards) made this amp. Great clean channel and good reverb is all I need. Pedal board does the rest. Very versatile. ac/dc to eagles, and johnny cash. Probable not for metal heads. you know the type they have the "cookie monster" style singers.

I took back my Lonestar, this amp is much easier to dial in a tone. Lighter and meaner. I use some good pedals. to get classic crunch. tonebone + tubescreamer, I can out "chunk" my dsl marshall, want the blues? go to clean channel throw the neck pickup on the tele and you can get real bluesy, or switch to bridge channel for country twang. instead of boost switch use an eq pedal for a lead boost. Probable the only knock on this amp. i would suggest a danoelectric fish and chips, only $25. Another MUST have.. I bought a tubetamer to stop the tube rattle. best $20 you will ever spend. find the extra money and replace tubes with jj tubes if you dont already have them. No need to replace speaker its fine. If you want extension speaker cab. email or call avatar speakers. One 16 ohm 12in.cabinet.and you'll blow out any drummer only with sweet ass tone. I must confess I am not ashamed of Peavey but I did remove the logo. I know, how shallow of me.

Super reliable. Proud to say I like my things "Made in USA" Oh yea. "F" the B-52Amps and all the other Chinese crap. although I must admit b52amps do sound real good. they just heat up and fall apart. I know.

No need to even call them..

25 years of playing. I had a serious case of gear syndrome before I found the Classic 30. I've stopped the crazyness. If stolen, I wouldn't wait a day till I got on Craigslist, eurotubes,and toms tubetame. I'd have the whole system before the weekend. Overall.
$300 amp,$120 tubes, $20 tubetamer. Small price to pay for happiness. and you'll have enough money left over to get a Boss loop station so you can plug in a rythym and play 30 min leads.I swear i want to spoogie in my pants when i hear this amp.

Mine is an old Classic 30, obviously fairly early in production. Bought it 2nd hand. Looks like it's been to hell and back. Scratches and rust all over but that's fine by me. FX loop, 2 channel, reverb, ext footswitch and ext cab jack. Great to see an amp with a bare minimum of features. Nothing I wish it had and the 30W is plenty of power. Not too heavy. This is a weird question: if it doesn't have many features BUT it's not meant to, does it get a high or a low mark??

Well, as has been covered below, the clean sound is solid gold. I never use the od channel- just pedals through the clean channel. I use it with Fender single coil guitars (strat, tele, Cyclone II and Lead 1 (modded with a single in the neck posn)) and the single coils really shine. We play indie pop but I'd say whatever style of music you play, it's got such a nice clean tone that you just put whatever pedals you want in front of it and it will sound great. I use a bunch of Boss, MXR and Electro-Harmonix pedals and my tone is great. No discernible noise, above what is expected.

I've had it for about 6 months now with no problems. As above, it looks like it's been around the world a couple of hundred times but is still going just fine. I love the beat up look of it. It was re-tubed before I bought it so I can't comment on tube life. No tube rattle. One thing: the other guitarist in my band has one as well and the chrome guard with the knobs on both is really rusty. This may be a design flaw. Also, they get incredibly hot. I've got other tube amps and they don't get anywhere near the temperature this does.

Can't say. Never needed it.

I've been playing for 15 years and have owned a bunch of gear. My other tube amps at the moment are a Fender Super 210 and an old Vase Trendsetter 60 head. As someone else has said, this is a 'go to' amp. it's light, cheap and reliable. You don't worry about it as much as the Vase and won't do your back in like the Fender has. We have band members without cars, so I have to transport them and their gear to rehearsals/gigs, so it just makes sense to take the smaller, lighter amp, especially when it sounds just as good anyway.

Bought brand new in 2007.

You know the features already mentioned. I run it at about volume 3-4 for clean channel. 4-5 pre amp and 4-5 power amp for drive channel. reverb at about 3, bass 6-8, mid 4-7, treble 6-9.

I wish it had a stand by switch. The Peavey 2 button pedal for channel switching and reverb is a joke. Must cost peavey about $2.50 to make it in China and they try to sell it for $100 AUD. There is no light to let you know which channel its on and it feels weak. Also there is an extra boost/lead channel with no foot switch so I never use it. I mean who has time to stroll back to there amp, stop playing and flick the switch by hand. Dumb Peavey Dumb.

This amp sounds great. The clean is almost up with the Fender clean and the distorted is really flexible. I tried Laney (not bad), Fender Hot Rods (clean beautiful and as one reviewer put it the distorted sounds like finger nails down a balckboard.) Marshall (great distortion but ok clean - Having said that I gigged with a Marshal AVT 100 the other day and the clean was quite nice), Vox Valve / Transistor things (clean ok distortions sucks) and few others.

I play some blues, classic rock, and some poppy stuff. I run it with a Roland/Boss ME50 so can dial up sounds from clean fat beautiful tones through to killer distorted metal.

Currently own an Applause Fender (clone) with a Dimarzio Super Distortion S in the bridge (with Single/humbucker switch), a cloney middle pickup and a SD STK-S2 in the neck. And man, on the dimarzio this amp rocks. With the SD its a different sound, fatter and muddier but sound great. I also have a Special Edition KOA strat with SD single coil pickups and the strat sound from the amp is beautiful.

Simply put the peavey sound is really quite good for both Clean and distorted. And this is without any mods.

Now dont get me started. Had it for about 3-4 months. Took me 3-4 months to find it and try it. It started to create cracking sonds when playing about 4 weeks ago. Put it into the shop and just got it back today. They replaced the power supply and some other stuff and the same problem is still there. BOO HOO HOO.. Not fair. I am now getting sick of this.

Seems that when you play it.. and I dont play really loud.. Im to old now. it just starts cracking up producing big pops and bangs like a valve is about to fall out. Not happy Jan.

Dont know but local music store Davis Music is great.

I have been playing off and on for 10 years.. spread over a 30 year period.

Overall it sounds great. Reliability to date. SUCKS !!!! Bang for buck I think this is one of the good amps out there (when it works) but if it comes back still cracking and popping it will end up as a boat anchor. And I will be trying another model or brand.

This is the older tweed model of the classic 30. Features have already ben covered mostly, it's got two channels, 3 band eq, spring reverb, and an effects loop. No standby, no lights on the pedal, it does have a mid boost button( whoop-de-frickin-doo). Not totally all tube, the rectifier is solid state, but sounds great. Plenty loud, why anybody would need more volume is beyond me, I never ever turn it past about 3, even with a post-heavy-metal-deaf-drummer. If you need more, throw a mic in front of it. All in all, a very straight ahead little amp, I'm giving it an 10 cause it covers the bases for me. Does it have all the bells and whistles of some line 6 pos, no. Does it have the features it needs to do exactly what it was intended to do....yes.

For what I do this amp is perfect. I play blues/country/rock/jazz and it sounds sweet. It just sings and I honestly couldn't ask for more. I've wanted to justify buying a Mesa Lonestar Special, but couldn't...(no, the peavey doesn't sound as good, but it only cost $350 used, and the difference is not worth $1000....). It's quiet (once you get the friggin tubes well connected...check on ebay, there's a tube holder that makes a night and day difference, without it there's a rattling crappy sound, with it you get the butta I'm otherwise describing). The distortion is not "brutal", but that's not a word I would ever hope anyone would use to describe my playing either....I'm using it with a custom built tele, a 1951 epiphone archtop, a custom built lap steel, and a custom electric mando. I put a tremolo through the effects loop (Voodoo labs) and run delay and wah/volume in front...it sounds great. Clean is very smooth with nice depth and warmth. The overdrive can be thick sustain leads (not it's high point, but do-able) but has a really nice warm break up that I love

It's a tube amp, so all it takes is one knucklehead to put it out of service. But, if you carry back up tubes I think this thing is amazing. Never a problem (again, once I solved the tubes staying in ). I play it 5-10 hours a week and no issues....it's built like the proverbial brick outhouse, but without bricks and without the hole to crap in....... I would use it without a backup, who has money, time, and space to haul extra amps around?

no idea. This amp is "self-biasing" (not that I couldn't find an amp shop that would have chraged me $50 to slot the tubes in) so as long as you buy matched sets of tubes you should be fine. The nice thing about tube amps is they are a classic design, so people know how to work on them.

I've been playing for 13 years or so, I'm primarily acoustic guy, but this amp got me going on electric. I have a Taylor 414ce, Collings OM3, Yamaha 512, Custom Tele, 1951 Epi arch top, breedlove mando, GD Armstrong custom Mando, etc etc, etc (yes I'm a degenerative addict and there are starving children who die because of my misuse of resources.....)If it were lost or stolen I would pry look for another one, I do really like it. I don't think there's anything close to the price range that gives this kind of tone and portability....if I had more money I would look at the Mesa Lonestar Classic (special? whatever, the lower wattage one). I love the vibe and the sound (the tweed just looks cool) and I pulled the Peavey logo off the front as soon as I got it home (unfortuately Peavey will always be synonymous with butt rock to me). I am a professional musician (by which I mean, I make my livelihood by playing music, not that I am rich and famous). A standby switch would be really nice, and lights on the footpedal (sucks to not know what channel you're on, but I spose that one could use their brain just that little bit to remember....) Friends, use your ears....so much of the industry is about posturing and brand name, but there's a lot of branded gear that sounds like crap, and a lot of gear people don't think twice about that sounds really good.

The features on this amp are acceptable and is easily adaptable to rock, country, even metal. It's got plenty of punch for any small club gig. I've used it at 200 square feet and have had no problems.

The reason I've rated sound quality so low is because this amp is so noisy. The actual sounds that this amp generate are great - good versatility. It plays great for almost any style. But the noise factor is just plain unforgiveable. I've played my custom-shop Strat, Gibson 61 reissue SG, Gibson VOS '59 Les Paul through this amp, with and without stomp boxes. It does not matter what guitar you use, the amp is so noisy (especially when you kick in the "boost channel") that the hum/hiss is so distracting to other members of my band and especially annoying to me that I will not gig with it any longer and I am in the process of trading it in for a Fender Hot Rod Deluxe.

Haven't owned it long enough to give an intelligent assessment. But what I can say is that the Classic 30 is solid and built like a brickhouse. I've been playing guitar for over 30 years and have owned an amp this noisy! What a shame, because it's a really nice amp, otherwise.

Never had to deal with customer support

Like i said, I've only played through this amp for a couple of months. I own a Dr. Z Route 66 (best amplifier in the world); a Fender Custom-Shop Vibroverb, and a Marshall combo JCM2000/TSL122. I would not replace the Peavey Classic 30 if it were lost or stolen. As a means of comparison I can only say that it's the smallest amp I own, yet it's the noisiest. It's a shame that Peavey has built an amp that produces such great sounds (great for howling leads, lots of crunch, and great clean sound for rhythm) but will drive you to distraction (it makes me crazy) because of it's noisiness. You have been warned.

This particular amp was purchased in March 2007. This model seems to have undergone many manufacturer changes in recent years. They appear to be listening to user comments. Many of the user mods you read about on the net have been incorporated. I make note of this since older/newer models may be different from the one I own.

This is a popular amp and the features are described elsewhere. The biggest cons are:

1) There is no standby switch which is generally unheard of on tube amps.
2) The foot pedal is cheap plastic and has no lights.
3) The foot pedal switches the drive channel and the reverb. Who ever switches reverb on/off? It should switch the MID Boost.
4) The cabinet is particle board instead of plywood. My only complaint here is that it adds to the weight, all just so the manufacturer can save $1 on each unit.

Since I paid $525 for this new, the CONS are minor. It's not like we're talking a $2000 amp here. It's also a very attractive box.

Sounds quality is where the amp rules. The clean channel is wonderful--especially after you break the speaker in. I play mine for several hours daily and after 3 months, the box took on a sweet sound. Very nice breakup when the volume is turned up to 5 or 6. The drive channel is not bad, but the dirty/distorted sound is quickly lost in the mix. I have had much better results using a good TS808-based overdrive pedal on the clean channel. I also like the tone better after I changed out the SOVTEK EL84 tubes with JJs. Some people suggest changing the speaker, but I think they are nuts. This is a great sounding $500 amp. Change the tubes and break-in the speaker. Plenty of volume. I play with 6 to 7 guys and this amp can cut thru easily. The amp also includes an effects loop which is great for chorus and echo. I occasionally plug it into my 72 Marshall 4x12 cabinet and this amp takes on a whole new and unbelievable tone!

I have recently started to experience annoying tube rattle at low freqs. This is confirmed by grabbing the tubes (with an oven mitt on) to see if the rattle stops. I have a Tom's Tube Tamer on order to solve the problem ($20 on ebay or build your own).

I called Peavey once and reached a real technician on pickup.

This is my daily go-to amp. Also great for hauling to jams since it is small. It is inexpensive, so if it is lost or stolen, it can be replaced easily. Always receive complements on the tone.

Features are basic but good. Too many amps have features, features, features but sound sh*t. This sounds great!!!!! I'm giving it a 9 for guitar sound without effects or 5 channels for nothing.....it is what it is!!!!!

I have 3 amps now...... a Marshall AVT100x (poo!) lots of features all sound crap, Ashdown FA-40 great amp for rock but not metal as the company advertises, and this wild Peavey animal!!! This thing beats them all, it's truly fantastic. Great clean that beats any Fender and i know..... i just sold my fender bassman! I use a BC Rich (USA) Warlock with seymour duncan humbuckers and an ESP Custom Mirage with Gibson Explorer humbucker. This may sound like a strange combination but it really sounds great, i play metal and classic rock and this amp is great with a metal pedal (i use Electro-Harmonix Metal Muff). The overdrive channel is great for things like AC/DC etc, smooth tone etc. but don't expect anything heavy without a pedal it's classic after all. Loud enough to gig? hell yeah unless you're plying in a stadium!!! great for small bars, parties etc. (Beats my marshall on volume and that's 100W)

No opinion

No opinion

I've been playing for 12 years and have owned lots of amps over the years (unfortunately!) Marshall TSL:- Marshalls do what marshalls do....great for classic brit rock but no good for anything else (by this i mean versatility for a good price), Fender Bassman :- Thought it was great until i bought this Peavey..now sold. Mesa Boogie (can't remember the model) maybe more depth in tone than this but look at the price and for the clean i would honestly say the classic 30 is better. This is the best amp i've ever heard ....basic features which sound great and in my opinion that's the most important thing......want features buy a multi-effects pedal and sound digital! want tone buy this!!!!!!!!!

Features have been mentioned plenty. No need to rehash. Could use a standby switch. Plus, it should have come stock with a tube guard. Slackers! I do like that it has an Extension Speaker out.

Great clean side. Stays clean fairly loud without the boost on. Actually, I don't use the boost at all. It does boost the volume, but it adds too much noise. Plus, it's loud enough without it. The dirty side is great! You can zero in on a small amount of grit or full out distortion. Excellent for blues and even rock, but not so much for metal. However, I'm a bluesman and this amp is perfect for the blues.
The guitars I play thru it- 1983 Squier Bullet. This is not the $99 Bullet you find today. In 83, they were made in Japan, with a beautiful maple neck, a truly sweet guitar. This amp and guitar are a perfect match for my ears. I also play a 1979 Fender Stratocaster (autographed by Buddy Guy) and a 68 re-issue pink paisly Fender Telecaster that I bought new in 1985. As of yet, I've really only played the Bullet thru this amp. It sounds that good!

I wouldn't gig with any tube amp without a backup, but this amp does seem reliable. I've had no troubles and have yet to re-tube it. I've read a lot of reviews where users upgrade the speaker and tubes, but honestly, I think it sounds just fine stock.
This past weekend I had an outdoor gig and I thought it would be the perfect opportunity to see exactly how well 30 watts and one 12 inch speaker would perform. For outdoors, would it have the power to cut thru the rest of the band? If not, I had my Fender Twin 2/12 100watt waiting in the wings. Wow! I knew this amp would be plenty for any indoor gig, but outdoors it held it's own just fine! I was pleasantly surprised. It had plenty of power, volume, and the tone was still there. Nice.

n/a

I've been playing for 30 years. I play Blues, Rock, Country and Jazz.
My main love is the blues. My other amps are- Fender Twin 2/12, Fender 85 (solid state), Fender Blues Jr. I run a variety of Boss effects pedals- compressor, overdrive, Octave, Delay, Chorus, tuner, Earnie Ball Volume Pedal.
Pair this amp with your favorite Fender guitar and revel in the blues!

My amp has a "New style" front but lacks stock tube guard, assume amp is early run new style...it's 'black tweed" (pressed tolex?) black grill cloth.

First thing I did "to" the amp after purchase was take off the oval Peavey logo & paint a nice black & white yin yang on the flat backside...flipped it over & screwed it back on;)

Features already covered numerous times, lack of standby particularly glaring ommision, presence control would be a good idea IMO

Sweet tone, did immediate re-tube after purchase. Was sorta bummed that the sovtecs were buzzing on an almost new amp but was prepared for the disappointment after reading many reviews on the Classic 30.

Play thru an old Boss chorus an Ibazez soundtank tremelo & occaisionally use a soundtank tube screamer w/drive turned low just for a little boost. The boost circuit in the amp just a tad over the top in the small venue situations that I find myself in....the amp sorta "squawks' unless you're ready w/some slight eq/volume adjustments

Plan to have some of the mods layed out @ www.blueguitar.org/ done when my "tube amp guy" has some time & I have some extra cash>

The basic mods (stand by, presence control, tuning the OD circuit in w/different filter caps etc seem sensible options to me.

Too soon to tell, have a Fender DeVille for backup. (much prefer the Classic 30)

dunno, Peavey site doesn't list 112 ext cab, only the 212 "Beetlejuice" fronted cab. Combo looks ridiculous sitting on a table level cab IMO.

Guess I'll e-mail Peavey & ask "them" why the hell they don't offer a matching 112 cab anymore & tell ya ltr, eh?

Have been playing 20 yrs, classic rock, blues. "variety" Itza tossup if I would buy again, dunno> Crate currently busting their ass to compete w/Peavey in the small affordable great sounding tube amp category.

Crate offers a Tone Tubby speaker in their black V30 & Celestion in the Palamino (blond) V32....both have a standby switch;)

Altho I love the tone of this amp, I stongly suspect Crates V-30/V-32 offer similar satisfaction....didn't getta chance to try the Crate, it's a LITTLR bit more expensive and was unavailable locally.

Ha!....gotta say my Classic 30 looks cooler w/the yin yang switch on the front logo...give it a shot, blaze a trail into "boutique" amp territory

2 Channels. 1 EQ section for both. Effect Loop. All tube!

I'm using an Iabnez with a Dimarzio pickup (one that Steve Vai used).

Great tone, tone, tone! This is a great amp for up to rock. Once again, the tone is so sweetfully crunch, yet you get enough gain to solo with fluidity. This is not for heavy metal.

Clean channel is great, too. Almost like fender clean. Quality.

I hear the sound will improve with better tubes, but it still sounds great with sovteks in it.

I just love the tube tone, and it's loud, too.

Can't comment, yet.

Don't let the price fool you. This is a great sounding all tube amp for rock.

Looks cool (tweed), sounds sweet, light enough to carry around, still loud. My search is over for now, for a perfect rock amp.

It's the model before the present with the little metal Classic 30 tag. 2 channels with a boost button. Wish it was footswitchable. 30 tube watts are damn near as loud as 100 solid state watts. At least that's how it cuts through with a band in a live situation.

Not real fancy. But I'm not a fan of tons of knobs. I like the fact it has an effects loop. I'd give it a 10 if the boost was footswitchable.

I don't want to say it's a one trick pony because it will do almost any style except super crystal clean or Mesa type brutality. No Godsmack here.
It will do classic/southern rock perfectly. Even 50's and 60's type rock/pop music.
The clean has a nice natural breakup at high volumes if you play aggresssively.
Man can this thing hang with the band.... It is plenty loud and cuts through fine.

I will say that I only use it for practice and small gigs. Otherwise I use a XXX head with e34l's and a Genz G-flex with Scorpion speakers in it. That's my main rig.
This amp cannot be beat for the price.

Anyone who's having problems with this thing need to realize NOTHING is bullet proof, and some babies are born dead. I've been playing and working on equipment for a LONG time. Half the problems people are bitching about are either tube or patch chord problems.
Respect the amp for what it is designed to do.

If want stage volume that will only get louder as your hearing gets worse, this isn't the amp for you. Go get a couple of 4x12's with your fav. head and have at it. Don't forget new batteries for your Miracle Ear.
Look at those concerts of your fav. artist. Do you really think they're playing through 15 Marshall full stacks? See how many are mic'd. Or look at Warren Haynes and some of the later Jimmy Page vids. They use combos most of the time. That's what the P.A. is for, monitors too. Imagine that.

Sorry for the rant.

This amp gets a little noisey with OD or distortion pedals. It takes effect in loop very well. Nice and quiet. I only use od pedals as a boost for solos. I use a DD3 CH5 and a BF5. That's about it.
The amps own distortion is more than adequete for AC/DC Zepp. even early Van Halen. It actually does the first 2 VH albums VERY well.

Peavey. Best for the $$$.

2006 classic 30 112 w/ factory tube guard (must!)
Features listed before. For the price point I feel the Features are fine

I waited 6 months after purchasing to write this review to avoid new gear shock. Stock this amp desrves an 8 after new jj tubes and celestion vintage 30 this amp deserves a 10 for the price. A 9.5 against anything in the market. When I purchased this amp I was strictly looking for something to cover SRV to Pink Floyd to lighter AC/DC. For heavier AC/DC to Slayer I have a JCM 800 2x12. It will play lighter metal well but if your looking for a solo amp to cover everything including heavier metal, as much as I like this amp I would keep looking. Originally it was between this amp and several fender tube amps. After spending quite a few hours at GC a/b'ing them I walked out knowing that for me I made the right choice with the 30 and for a very reasonable price. I now have added a second classic 30 112 to my rig and use them run through stereo and can do awesome pan effects through them on stage and with the JCM 800 running mono as a center for a little bite on classic rock songs I have found my sound. I placed a celestion greenback in the second classic 30 and like the mix between the 2 speakers however if your onlying running the 1 30 I recommend the vintage 30. Very full fat sound through it yet capable of plenty of bite. I feel this amp does Blues better than any amp under 1500, after mods, and will hold its own doing classic rock. This amp loves to have a wah in the mix, and handles OD with the best of them and takes distortion well but not perfect, can sound fuzzy. Yet loves fuzz pedals also if that make sense. The spring reverb on the amp is acceptable but if reverb plays a large part in your sound I would reccommend an add on, I purchased the EH Holier grail and it does a much better job IMO.

Have only had for 6 months and so far so good but not long enough to make a comment. Feels like it is built solid. Again do yourself a favor and buy a tube guard, it could save your gig. The LOUD popping sound when you turn it off is a bit worrying but apparently normal.

Never dealt with

I've been playing for 21 years and am lucky enough to have the $ to buy what I want "within reason". But just because you can afford a 2K amp doesn't mean you should overlook affordable ones. I bought this not because it was cheap but because to me it was the sound I was looking for. Fenders just don't do it for me personally. The older fenders to me were much better. This amp takes to single and humbucker PU's equally well. I'm not saying you must buy this amp but I feel if your looking for a blues to classic rock amp you will be doing yourself a disservice if you don't at least give it a try, and then buy what sounds best to YOU! To you younger guys please buy what you like not what your idol likes or what everyone else owns, other wise you just sound like everyone else. I gave it a 10 not because it's the greates amp in the world but because for the value nothing touches it.

I have a 2002 tweed model, still in pristine shape. Picked it up used recently, after looking for a really nice one for a couple of years. Compared this amp side by side to the Fender Blues Junior and Deville, a couple of Marshalls and Crates, and a Carr Rambler. The Carr won, and at $2k+ it should have. But for $300 used ($600 or so new) NOTHING CAN TOUCH THE CLASSIC 30! I'm 53, and have been playing and buying amps for 35 years. Been through an early 70s Fender Pro Reverb, same era Twin, a Randall, and a couple of other Peaveys. Again, nothing can touch this amp. I'm hard rock as it gets, but love the blues. This amp can do it all. I also have the matching tweed Classic 112E extension cabinet. Do you know how loud 30 good tube watts can get? With the 112E onboard you can peel paint at 100 yards. Fantastic tone with stock tubes, but JJs will get the juices really going.

Overall sound quality is "versatile"! I play strats and teles primarily (only Fender), and Ibanez SZ520QM guitars. With the strats you can wring out a pretty classic 60s tone without much work at all. Making a Tele "twang" the way it ought to took a little searchin', but it's there, and way sweet. As for my hard rock orientation, the Ibanez fits guts to blood with this amp! Let some gain loose in the clean mode and this amp sings forever. As for crunch, well it's not a vintage Hiwatt stack, but it does awfully well. Maybe a little weak on the bottom end, but play with it and you can get there. I lost my enthusiasm for most pedals and outboard gear awhile ago, but pair a Boss Blues Driver and TR-2 tremolo with the Classic 30 and you are in Bluesburg one minute, and Laramie the next. Much tonal variety to play with in this little brute.

I wanted this amp because of it's rep for reliability in addition to it's power level, straightforward approach, and word of mouth encouragement from other owners. It delivers. And, can you say "Peavey"? Probably says enough about dependability, huh? I've had zero issues with it or the 112E cabinet. Perfect for small to medium size gigs, and after as many years of playing out that I've had, I would NEVER go to any gig without a backup amp. At the very least, take extra tubes. Vehicles, people and electricity are very hard on tube amps.

Have only dealt with Peavey by phone, looking for an amp cover and replacement logo. Very, very pleasant folks. Extra fast service. Southern hospitality.

This amp and extension cabinet are with me for life now. Time to sell these other amps I've got. Maybe some day it will sit beside that Carr Rambler. If I and this amp parted I'd be on the phone and eBay immediately to replace it. And the best added benefit is, there is no amp and extension cabinet any cooler than the tweed Classic 30 paired with the tweed Classic 112E cabinet. Put one on stage and it alone generates a pile of buzz and questions. Great looker. Put a sunburst strat on a stand beside it, and a Fender Vintage Voltage tweed cable, and you've got the stuff mag ads are made of.

Pretty basic. Nothing out of the ordinary. You can read everyone elses review to see exactly what features this amp has.

Ok, the sound quality of this amp is not very good at all. It is very boxy sounding and it's hard to get the amp to sound decent at all. The gain channel on this amp is decent but it's hard to get a tone that sounds ok. I tried tons of distortion pedals on this amp and only a couple sounded ok. I do like the reverb on this amp.

This amp is very sturdy but incredibly annoying. This amp is VERY touchy. If you don't let it warm up enough before you start playing, it will work for about 30 seconds and then totally cut off. It also makes a lot of noise when it's warming up. It does not work well with certain effects. Some things sound very harsh through it. It is a tube amp, but decent tube amps shouldn't sound that bad.

Never had to deal with them.

I have been playing for about 7 years. I am a professional musician; I get paid to play and I have a good time doing it. I would never buy this amp again. I sold it when i bought my new amp. I recently picked up a Fender Blues Deluxe amp and it is by far better than this Peavey and i think it only costs a little more.

There is a possibility that switching out the Marvel speaker and upgrading the tubes might help with the crappy EQ of this Peavey Classic amp, but why waste your time? Just get a quality amp from the start.

My classic 30 was made in 2005...the older shape but with a tube guard. Im the second owner and just replaced the tubes for the first time. You all know the features so I wont rabble on. I use this at ALL gigs...pubs, clubs, party's where ever....mostly un-miked. Power wise? enough for almost any job unless your a rock star playing at 80,000 + stadiums...in which case your NOT reading this.

Awesome cleans, and a totally usable gain channel UNLIKE the crap Fender are putting out....with mud and more mud options. This amp can be dialed in low but as dirty as you like for home use, or take it out and gig and blow them away. The distortion or gain is superb for a small combo. I play mostly blues, classic rock and some top 40 stuff (when I must) and have no problems with this amp. The classic 50 is a shitbox....does not get the same tone or should that be QUALITY of tone. No noisier than any other tube amp.

This ones been at it for more or less 2 years....1 tube change and its STILL ROCKING!! The models made back 3 or 4 years ago were GARBAGE FIRST CLASS with tube harmonics, no tube guard and shoddy workmanship all round....they finally got it right in the last 2 or 3 years.

Um.....nuf said.

Ive been playing for 30 odd years, own a room full of classic collectibles from a 69 335, half a dozen les pauls form the 70's, an 82 fullerton 62 strat, an 88 62 reissue, 57 reissue, 52 tele reissue....the list goes on. Ive tried a pile of amps, the only thing close to this is the marshall DSL 401....a tasty lil tube amp. If it was stolen...not sure what Id do but Id get something depends on what pops up first but Id stay clear of ANY modern day fender....I recently tried out a custom shop pro sonic....what a box full of crap they make. If you see one of these at a good price....grab it....you will enjoy it.,

This is a brand new Classic 30 - the new design (I prefer the old look). Anyway no need to go over features - everyone before me has done that. They are the same in my amp as theirs. For what it is, I think the features are fine for this amp.

Here's where I differ with most of the previous reviewers. I think this amp sounds GOOD - but that's it. It certainly isn't a "10" or a "9" even. MAYBE the Classic 50 would warrant that - but that's not what this amp is. Let's be honest. It DOES get a nice warm sound that is punchy and somewhat mid-rangey - which is likely also due to the speaker type (Blue Marvel - it is mid-rangey). It gets a nice clean tone - good for Jazz, I think - and mellow blues. There is also a nice "light" overdrive on the "lead" channel with the pre set at about 2. I've always like a little subtle break up like that....but I'm not sold on the higher gain sounds. What I discovered, however, was that the amp lacks some bottom end and fullness to it. It is a boxy sound - which stands to reason given the size of the overall package. I think it would sound better with a closed back possibly. Perhaps an extension speaker would also improve that.

It is nice and lightweight...that is always a plus.

I brought it home and compared it to a Roland Cube 60 (sorry tube purists) that I have and the Cube had MUCH more bottom end - and the clean was just as good - IMHO. The Cube is a closed back design. The reverb is good - not GREAT. The Reverb on my Cube is actually better. I only play the Cube on the "Roland Jazz Chorus" setting - I don't like the other, fancy "modeling" type settings. Just a sidenote.

This amp - especially the overdrive - would likely improve somewhat if you upgraded the tubes. However, I did the same thing with a Peavey Delta Blues 210 recently and, while there was improvement in SOME areas (better bass response, more power) there were some negative effects as well. For example, a full complement of JJ's tubes in the Delta Blues added MUCH more mid-range to the sound. So much so that it was quite harsh and unpleasant on high notes. It hadn't been like that with the old Electro Harmonix Tubes. Then again, the breakup was smoother...so it's give and take. Point is, new tubes won't make this a DIFFERENT amp. It will still have the same personality. Same would go for the results with a speaker swap I would imagine.

The circuits between the Delta Blues and Classic 30 are virtually identical, so I'm confident I would have similar results on the Classic 30.

I will be returning this amp because it doesn't sound better than what I already have (Fender Deluxe Reverb RI and Roland Cube 60) - at least not $500.00 better. And that's really what it's all about in the end.

I'm sure its as reliable as any other tube amp in this price range...which is to say about average, I would think. I had one of these back in the mid-90's and it worked fairly well...but after a year or so I recall some sort of electrical problem with it. Can't remember what it was.

Never dealt with them.

Been playing for about 10 years...a little longer if you count the years I was a drummer and wasn't really trying to become a BETTER guitar player. Play mostly bluesy/jazzy type stuff - mostly fingerstyle. I like the "tasteful" players (Santana, Larry Carlton, Knopfler...). Not a bad amp for the price.

New chassis model bought new in Jan 2006. Features listed hundreds of times. Clean and gain channels share EQ and that is OK for me. Needs a tube guard.

Bought tube guard direct from Peavey for about $18. It looks better and costs less delivered than the one on the Bay.

Stock tubes are like the patch cables that come with your dvd player-EMERGENCY USE ONLY-UPGRADE ASAP!

Played for ten months with the original Sovteks and finally made the change to JJs. With stock tubes-7. With JJs-10. CHANGE THE TUBES.

You can turn the volume low for practice with good tone. Crank it to loosen the plaster or get divorced. You could gig small or medium rooms w/o a mic, but why?

Some people complain about the stock Blue Marvel speaker. Play it. Break it in. If you still want a $100 speaker trade out, do it. I think an extension cab is the better choice. Changing the tubes is the key to unlocking the tone for this amp.

Change power tubes to JJs. Change pre-amp tubes to JJs or Tung Sols. With the speaker broken in and the right tubes this amp sings. Like "piss off your friends" good.

Both clean and dirty channels sound great. Using your EQ you can find just about every rock, blues, and country sound that you want. Find that in another $600 amp.

I use a Bad Monkey OD, VooDoo Fuzz and a two button channel/reverb switch. There is a lot of variety mixing the organic distortion of the 12ax7 with the pedals.

I am a play with the friends jammer and haven't gigged in 15 years. This should last anyones lifetime. Peaveys are built tough. If I were gigging, an extra set of tubes in the kit for insurance.

Have called to order the tube guard. Very friendly. Spoke to a woman to order the guard and a man to talk tubes. The guy had been with them for 17 years and we talked all kinds of gear. A real American, in the good ol' USA! Tube guard came in three days.

How do I rate this? For what it is and not for what it is not: American made 30 watt LOUD tube amp with great Vox-like clean and a lead channel crunch that makes any Fender HRD owner regret buying that POS.

I am mid-forties and can afford to buy any gear I want. I look for value and no longer care to pay for a brand label that doesn't come through where it counts-the SOUND.

I am down to this amp and a few guitars. I want to try the Epi Valve Junior head with an Avatar 2x12 cab to compare. I will post after I pull the trigger and get over the honeymoon period.

I play an 80's Burny Japan lawsuit copy LP(VH-1 PUs, AWESOME, gettum' while you can), Fender MIM Tele replaced with "real" Bill Lawrence PUs (another bang for buck no-brainer), Fender MIM Deluxe Powerhouse Strat (American components assembled 90 miles south = poor mans Clapton Strat)and imho, a great 335 type in a Dearmond/Guild Starfire.

I am a bang for the buck guy and the Classic 30 delivers in spades.

This amp is very versatile for what it is. I use this amp on two gigs. Country and rock band and with a young soul singerl. Great sounds. Just need the right guitar. B-bender Tele for country and Carvin AE-185 for other stuff. It is plenty loud and I have figured out a way to help the volume. More later. It is what it is. A tube amp with two preamp channels.

I replaced the stock speak with an Eminence Cannabis Rex and what a differnce. Great lows and smooth highs with alot of clarity. Big Difference. After finding out about using a volume atten in the effects loop, I decided to try my TubeWork RealTube 2 in the loop so I could crank the master and lower the volume with the TubeWorks. WIth a Boss ME50 in front of the preamp, this thing is killing. I set the clean master around 6 or 7 and it was beautiful. My Tele was singing on New Years. The lows are gorgeous and the concerns I have about the highs can probably be solved with a good pick-up swap. Tele has tex mex 3 pickup strat set up in it.

It's a Peavey. I am a big fan. Hartley is a Hero.

Never use CS.

Playing 25 years. Own a teaching studio and play out frequently. I often get late calls to cover for people and wanted a good sounding portable rig. I can carry my entire set-up in one trip. Amp, Boss ME50, Guitar and TubeWorks and am ready for anything. This is a great little amp and I will buy a back-up soon.

Everone has already described the features adequately in other reviews

I love this amp. I can dial in lots of great tones with this little sucker. Clean is very nice, but the OD channel is where I find that this amp really shines. Now I have replaced the tubes with JJ Tesla tubes and this smoothed out the OD channel that was a little harsh with the stock tubes ( I replaced the tubes in my other amp with JJ's and was pleased with the results, so I figured I would try JJ's in this amp) The tube change also warmed up the clean channel as well. I traded a hot rod deluxe in on this amp, the hot rod had a better clean sound but the drive channel was very harsh and not as smooth as the classic 30.

Cannot say, only had this amp 2 months.

Cannot say, never had to deal with Peavey.

Played with my strat I can get Hendrix,Srv,Clapton sounds easily with tweaking the settings. Nails classic rock and blues sounds. I would definately replace this with another if It was stolen or lost. Solid build construction. Quite versatile. Do yourself a favor and go get one of these gems, You wont be disapointed.

It is very versitle and i lvoe the amp its so awesome i just got it the other day. I really dont like how there isnt individual knobs for each channel like my other amps.

Tubes are so pure and the reverb is awesome it sounds amazing. It is true what they say Once you go tube you never go back. Ill never look back at those solid states as computerized as they are getting they will never get the full warmth of a tube amp..

Never had any problems so i guess 10. I dont like the sound of the tubes when you turn it off and it the compacitors cool down..

Amazing amp, amazing price. Love it, so worth it and am so glad i went with el-84 instead of 6l6 hot rod deluxe. So glad!

Tweed model. Not mine, but it was the token amp in a rehearsal room that I used for a couple of months. Features well documented, I believe. I never used the mid-boost, as the stock Blue Marvel speaker was already very middy & I play with P-90s, so the boost was overkill. A standby switch would've been nice. Tubes precariously placed & it's well known that Peavies are a nightmare to take apart & work on. That alone would keep me from ever buying one....

.....having said that, this little beast could put out some great tones. Very loud and very touch sensitive. It seems to get louder the longer you leave it on for??!!? I don't think I ever had the "pre" volume past 2 or the "post" past 5 & the neighbours still sent the rozzers over. I was playing punky r'n'r which it did pretty well. Rips with P-90s. Didn't notice a huge difference between the two channels I gotta say. Occasionally augmented it with a vintage MXR Distortion+ which gave it a nice Pistols/Heartbreakers grind but it has more than enough gain on tap as is.
Ultimately a little too brittle & hard to control for my taste when playing saturated punky rifferama. I find it easier to work with less volume but more clean headroom & bottom end so I was glad to go back to larger setups.
Still a great sounding little amp that I imagine would excel for blues or early Cramps/Gun Club type garagey stuff. Soundwise very similar to a Fender Blues Deville, incidentally. And nearly as loud.

Never any trouble, but I only used it for maybe 7 or 8 rehearsals and never travelled anywhere with it. Would've been slightly wary of taking it on the road, as the exposed tubes in particular would give cause for concern.

Never dealt with Peavy, what kudos they gained with this amp they promptly blew with that 38-channel DSP FX-loop ridden MIDI compatible Joe Twatriani-signature space station that you can bet will not be working in 10 years.
Will mankind EVER learn?

Groovy little box. Plus the tweed makes it look cool. If you dislike strong upper mids & favour downtuned mid-scooped sludgy, gainy, buzzy, nu-metal mud, this isn't the amp for you, but frankly if I had my way, all those fitting the above criteria would be exported to Siberia (and it even rhymes!)

I bought this amp used in 1998, so it's one of the orginal tweeds. The speaker has a plain back, no Blue Marvel sticker or anything. Three 12ax7 tubes in the preamp section and 4 EL84s in the power section. I've noticed that most amps in this wattage (and higher) only have 2 power tubes, so the Classic 30 is overpowered by normal standards.

The amp is not very versatile - it's primarily a blues amp in my opinion. I've used it for rock, but in a band situation its 30 watts are not enough to keep up with the cumulative volumes produced in a rock band. However, in blues bands in small clubs, which is where I've mostly used this amp, it sounds great. If the Classic 30 is mic'd, it could probably work in any environment.

The classic 30 has 2 channels, one clean and the other with overdrive (overdriven 12ax7). It has an effect loop, an extension speaker out jack, and a jack for the footswitch which lets one change channels or turn the reverb on and off. Let me just reiterate what others have said: Switching the reverb on and off is pretty useless. What Peavey should've done is allow the player to engage/disengage the midrange boost. On my amp you have to press a tiny button near the eq knobs to turn the midrange boost on and off. That being said, the midrange boost is a great feature to have and it sounds excellent.

This amp does blues better than any amp I've owned. My blues heros are guys like Albert King, Buddy Guy, BB King, and Roy Buchanan. The clean channel of the Classic 30 is LOUD, and I wish I had the 112E extension cabinet for this reason. It's also a very NICE loud, rich in tone. I think this is because you're getting the harmonics from several tubes in the audio path.

I'm using several guitars with this amp. A 91 LP Custom, a USA Strat with DG20 EMG pickup system, and a 3 single coil tele with Van Zandt pickups. They all sound pretty sweet with this amp playing the blues.

The distortion (or overdrive) is good, not great, but it also depends on what brand of tubes you use. Swap different brands in and out to find what works best for you. I've also found that right around 7/7.5 on the gain is where you go from breakup to full on overdrive. The overdrive sounds better when mixed with a full band than on it's own, in my opinion. But again, this is basically a blues amp and it's been fantastic in that environment.

The midrange boost is great in the appropriate situations/songs, but it's not footswitchable and for that I've got to ask Peavey, "WTF?" I've never used the effects loop but plan to give it a try in the studio this month. The 3 band eq is decent and effective - sometimes for a warm BB King type of tone I'll turn all the eq knobs all the way down. Try it some time! Oh, and the reverb is perfect for this amp.

I'd like to hear how this sucker sounds with a broken in Celestion Vintage 30. I plan to get one when I can afford it :)

Also, I've had many compliments on the tones from this amp. I was in a Clapton phase for a while, trying to cop that "Cocaine" solo sound, thanks in part to a vintage Ibanez chorus, and a very critical blues artist in Seattle not prone to dish out praise really liked it. So there ya go.

Note to harmonica players: Play your harp through this amp with a green bullet microphone and you'll be in harp heaven! I played with a guy who used this setup and I was amazed. Makes me wish I could play the harmonica!

I just got mine repaired for a blown diode, but considering how much I've used it over the last 8 years, that's not too bad. The amp was sitting for a week or two and when I turned it on it just hummed. 125 bucks later I'm back in business. Such is the nature of tube amps, but it's worth mentioning that this is not an easy amp to work on unless you really know what you're doing. Until I played it again I cringed at the repair bill. Now I'm fine with it :)

I do have to deduct points for the tube set up. They're way too exposed and the heat from the power tubes floats right up into where all the electronics are. This doesn't seem very healthy, but in a combo amp I realize this configuration is just about the only option in order to save space. Get a head and a cabinet if you want the tubes on top :)

Never used Peavey customer support.

I've been playing guitar about 20 years. I own quite a bit of gear but nothing that gathers dust. If this amp were lost or stolen I probably couldn't afford to replace it now and would just use one of my other amps. However, it's a great blues amp, it fills it's niche very well. I bought it to play blues and will continue to use it for bluesy purposes, or in the studio for a nice clean tone. These old tweed ones are fetching good resale values, which is encouraging. The new ones are black and modern looking and are not my cup of tea. I'll stick with the tweed!

I have the blue covered version of the Classic 30. Not sure the year manufactured but I bought it in 2000 (or 2001). My other rig was in transit and I needed an amp for a gig, and picked this up after a short time in the store. It was small, simple, and had all I needed (two channels, loop and reverb, plus extension cab out).

It doesnt come with a pedal to switch channels/reverb, but I had an extra marshall switch (the functions are reversed tho, channel controls reverb, vise versa), but hey it works. the loop is very transparent and the reverb is nice, warm and fender-ish.

It definitely has enough power to keep up with a loud drummer in a noisy room, although the dirty channel is a little noisy when cranked, nothing a noise gate in front or in the loop doesnt fix. The clean is great. If u want warm and jazzy, its there...if you want bright glassy blues, there too. The dirty isnt as versatile as I'd like, but a good pedal in front can help, plus the dirty can be used as a extra channel or boost with a pedal or vise versa.

I play a variety of styles with many bands. I'm a session player as well, and perform everything from emo/punk, rock, pop, hip hop, R&B, to reggae, jazz and dave matthews hippy rock. This amp has stuck by me well in all those situations.

Would be nice if the tube retainers were a lil more sturdy tho. Get a rattle when u crank it, especially when u run the bass high. SOmetimes noisy for studio applications.

I have a large array of guitars... 61 Gibson Les Paul SG custom, Tobias Guitar (yes..guitar, not bass), Starfield American Cabriolet (duncan single coils), Heritage 150CM, Schecter Tempest Special (duncan p-90's), Tempest Classic (duncan 59's), Schecter C-1 Classic (duncan jb bridge, jazz neck), Epiphone Joe Pass Emperor, Fender Tele 72 reissue. Every guitar has a great tone thru this amp, and they all keep their individuality (try that on a line 6...a 2000 les paul sounds like a 100 dollar Cort)

You can definitely depend on this amp. I've had it for years..about 5, I gigged like a maniac with this amp, and have only had two instances of problems.

1. The tube retainers: really be careful with the tubes. Once rushing around to a gig, put cables in the back...cable got yanked and ripped 2 tubes out of the thing. Plus u can bend the things way too easy. IF someone can recommend a mod for this I would be eternally grateful.

2. My reverb went on this once, and cut the whole amp out for some reason. I managed to repair it myself, but I worry more now...but I definitely worked this lil amp hard for awhile.

I changed the sovteks and replaced with Svetlanas. Like the breakup and tone a lil better, but overall a really good solid amp, even stock.

No clue...

I've been a guitarist for 23 years, believe me I've tried alot of amps. This isnt my only rig, but its definitely a top contender in the land of great amps. I own Marshall, Mesa, Fender, Carvin...etc... This amps in league with the Fender blues Jr. But with the channel switching and loop, has more to offer.

When the amp went down for a bit, I was gonna buy a new one, but opted to fix it instead...I would definitely replace it if necessary.

Peavey needs to fix the tube rattle/retainer problems. The Fender design has way less flaws, maybe its just the quality of the parts, the blues jr. is the same price bracket and doesnt have the tube problem.

Tone is good, loop is awesome (I typically hate effects loops), reverb is good and the amp is solid. If you want a good, compact, great sounding amp with a simple design...or even a backup or alternative to your giant rig setup...pick this amp up.

This particular Classic 30, was made in 1998. I've owned 3 0f them over the past several years. I bought this one used at Guitar emporium of Louisville, Kentucky for $300.00 ( they have a website and stock a real good selection of new, used and vintage gear at reasonable prices, check'em out ). The Classic 30 is an awsome amp, completely versatile good playing and sounding amp for everything up until heavy metal ( which is my preference, but I'm sure with the right toneless metal distortion pedal it'd cover that too, if that's your thing ). Those of you not familiar with the Classic 30, it has 2 channels, global EQ ( mid, bass & treble ), reverb and boost, and an effects loop. It's a good solid built, reliable all-tube amp ( solid-state rectifier ), that really plays and sounds good. It does have channel switching and reverb on/off with optional footswitch. This amp is good from bedroom to recording to gigging, that about covers it does'nt it. Good warm tube tone, soft & sensitive playability from everyone else in the house is sleeping to you need to be in another room away from it volumes. Okay, this is mostly for those of you who already own one of these all-arond good amps. You know it sounds and feels really good right, but the overdrive channel is'nt quite good enough to your ear. Do away with those high priced overdrive pedals ( that do sound so good with this amp, classic radial tone bone for one ), this amp delivers in spades all by itself for a $30.00 upgrade. NOS Sylvania pre-amp tube in the input position ( the pre-amp tube furthest from the output tubes ). It's the cure all tube for this amp on both channels, it brings it to life and gives you all it's truly capable of ( Sylvania tubes available at Hi Test NOS Tubes, phone 201-750-2445, as well as many other tube retailer's for $30.00 each ). I'm sure an even higher priced NOS tube like an RCA or Mullard would give you an even more sweeter experience, but I'm just speaking from my own experience and just the one Sylvania pre-amp tube in the first position ( the other 2 pre-amp tubes and 4 output tubes stock ) will drastically improve this amp's tone and playability. As well as calm your need to think you need to keep forking out your hard earned money, or more of your tax return than your wife seems to be okay with for different gear etc. ( and even more importantly, it'll keep you from selling or trading this killer amp for some other less than desireable piece of equipment ). I have taste that this amp does'nt cover, as well as my gear addiction, but from clean to blues to hard rock this amp is really me. By the way for that really fat, mud thick, but focused all the while tone of Muddy Water's, try out an Epiphone valve Jr. combo. No mercury magnets or even a tube change ( which I tried and it smoothed the tone out too much ), with the stock Sovtek 12ax7wa this amp kicks ass with right player input, at least from my single coils and to my ear anyway. I think this is an amp to have as a player and for future price increases that are inevitable.

As I've said this amp can make any sounds you want it to up until metal. The clean channel with my guitar set-up will start to give you a good crunch at around 4 on the volume knob, but that's also with my EQ preference of heavy mids and bass, low treble on the amp. Lower the bass and you'll get more clean headroom you know. In general I keep the clean channel volume around 2 or 3 for good clean playing and it's loud enough that my wife has to keep the TV up so I can hear more of Oprah than I care to inbetween my playing from the living room. I'm primarily a single coil strat player, but I also play a humbucker guitar through this amp, both sound good for what they are through this amp. I mostly play blues and rock or a combination of the two and alot of pretty clean rythym stuff. This amp is not noisy on any setting with the exception of my 1,3 and 5 positions on my strat, which is minimal and expected. The sound quality is good and really good with the good pre-amp tube in the first position, really good.

I've had 3 of these amps and never had a problem one. I play several hours a day, everyday and other than tonal experimentation I've never had to so much as change a tube. It's definately a reliable amp.

I've never dealt with Peavey or had the need to.

I've been playing guitar for about 6 or 7 years. I've bought and sold or traded this amp a few times, but I keep coming back to it and I'm going to keep this one. It's just a good tube amp, it covers what I want, it gives me whatever I put into it, it's reasonably priced and besides it's cost I prefer it to everything else I've played through overall.

Features beat to death elsewhere in the reviews, but one thing I do wish it had is a HALF power mode to run it at 15 watts.

Very, VERY surprising little amp. Nice and clean at lower levels, and it breaks up perfectly at volumes over say 60%. I am an amp tech, and get to play just about everything... This one was in my shop, and I am going to buy one for myself. Believe me that says a LOT, but read my overall rating for the bottom line.

Standard Peavey build... too many poorly selected connectors, poor solder. If you can fix one, Peaveys are great, if not figure on some inconvenient down time cleaning up what needs looking after. This one was in my shop for intermittant reverb traced to a crappy IDC connector.

They are great at Peavey... never a complaint there.

If not for reliability issues this guy would rate a 10+++ IMO, if Peavey threw out the bean counters that "value engineered" their boxes, they'd be on top. As it is, this can't be.

I can't imagine taking this one or any other Peavey I own, or have worked on without some very careful reversing of the crap they do to build them.

The bottom line, IMO if you're an amp tech, or can fix them, this one is a GREAT amp to own, if not you take your chances.

30 Watts
3 x 12AX7 preamp tubes
4 x EL84 power tubes
12 inches 16 ohms speaker
2 channels: clean and lead
Boost switch: in fact it is a FAT switch
Spring reverb
Effect loop
Bass, Middle and Treble controls
Volume and Gain (for lead channel)

I dropped 4 points because it doens't have presence control and stand-by switch.

The clean channel sounds great. It has a warm tone and it is very loud.

The lead channel is superb. It Rocks! Warm creamy high gain overdrive that does it all.

However, there is an annoying rattle sound that I will explain better in the reliability field. I dropped 4 points because of this.

That is the reason why I wrote this review. I am not the first one to advise people about this problem. There is an annoying rattle sound coming out of the speaker. It is not the chassis. It is the EL84s tubes falling into peaces. The reason is that the EL84 tube construction is not sturdy enough and the speaker punch knocks them all. The tubes are too close to the speaker.

After 6 months, I couldn't stand the rattle sound. Than I changed the power tubes (for JJs), installed a tube shock absorver and the rattle sound disapeared... for 4 months! When I noticed the first sign of rattle sound I decided to sell the amp.

No matter what you do, you will not be abble to get rid of the rattle sound. This is my peace of advice.

However, if you use mainly the lead channel, You will not notice the rattle sound, because it will be mixed with the overdrive sound. In the middle of a gig, you will not hear that too because there is a lot of noises everywhere mixing to it. So you can live with it.

Because of the rattle problem that shortens the power tubes life, I dropped 6 points.

The warranty in Brazil covers only the first 3 months and it is provided by the dealer, not by Peavey.

As after sales is very important, I dropped 9 points.

It sounds great. However, the rattle noise is very annoying. If you can leave with it, go ahead! I dropped 6 points because of this.

I think it's an '05 with the newer logo. I Play every thing from Allman Bros. to ZZ Top and AC/DC to Zeppelin. I'd say the only thing and I do mean the ONLY thing it won't do too well is Godsmack,Metallica, Pantera kinda stuff, unless you try a MT-2 on the clean channel. I wish the Boost option was footswitchable.
I use it for practice at home and as a backup to my XXX 112 combo that I use live.

I love the distortion this thing has. Much more usable than the XXX. It works GREAT when rolling off the volume on the guitar to clean up the gain, VERY Marshall like. I use An SG, Explorer and a V and I use a H/S/S Charvel at times. With minor tweeks you can get any Hard/Classic or southern rock sound.

I was at the music store and never even considered trying it but I was in need of a backup and figured I would. I was blown away, I thought it would sound fuzzy or tinny. I was wrong.

It sounds like I wisthe XXX would. If this amp had a third "Over The Top" Cahnnel for Metal It would be perfect.
The clean Channel is kinda sterile without a chorus or delay but that's all good, I use the volume on the guitar to clean up 90% of the time.

I can get "THE" Skynyrd Sound Nailed! Blackfoot too. Flirtin' With Disaster? Yeah, It Nails it! Then for a goof we played Love Gun By Kiss and this thing sounded EXACTLY like the record, especially the solo.

I use a Seymour Duncan Custom 5 in the bridge and a Jazz in the neck on my 3 Gibsons and a Pearly Gates and 2 Texas Specials in the Charvel.

I have always used Peavey and none of them ever had dramatic issues.
But never gig without a backup!

I like the simplicity of this amp. It's a 30 watt tube amp with 2 channels - clean and overdrive. It has a bass,mid,treble EQ and a boost switch. There is also a boost switch and an effects loop for your stompboxes. The simple operation of the amp is refreshing to me. I find some of the modern designs are just too complicated when all you need is a great sounding amp with a simple but effective EQ like this amp. The boost switch is the only feature that i have not found any use for so far. It is suppose to scoop your mids to acheive a more rock tone but all it does is ruin the amps great natural tone. Having said that though, if you don't use it then it won't bother you. This is my single amp for all situations. I use it for gigs and garage band type jams. Although being only 30 watts, it packs plenty of punch and i have never had a problem with volume during a gig. In most situations I usually mic up the amp anyway. More often then not, I use the amp as my own foldback speaker and my amp through the PA is all the crowd will generally hear. The main thing with tube amps is driving them as much as you can to get the best out of your amp without being too loud. Being only 30 watts then driving the amp hard doesn't require massive volume levels. I have found that driving the amp at about 4 or 5 acheives the best results both on clean and overdrive channels.

The clean tone on the amp is similar to the clean tone on most fender amps. I recently played through a Fender Blues Junior and found the clean tone to be very close to the Peavey. I play a Fender US 57' Re-issue Strat with original pickups and my clean tone is very warm yet still bright and very punchy. It is close to a Hendrix,SRV,John Mayer type of tone but different guitars and different playing styles will have a different effect on the amps overall sound. The overdrive channel is excellent if you want a great mild overdrive. I think the overdrive channel is not quite as punchy as the clean channel but in most situations, I need the overdrive to be louder then the clean channel so slight loss of punch is hard to notice because your volume is increased. Overall the tone is still incredibly natural and will suit a Strat or Tele perfectly. The amp is not DEAD QUIET but it is quiet and i have never had a problem with the amp being annoying or anything. I mainly play blues/rock/rnb and with the Strat then this amp suits me perfectly. I doubt metal players would be looking for an amp like this but whether your playing rock,pop,country or blues then this amp would do it all with ease. I have to give it a 9 because this is not the perfect sounding amp for me. It's damn close though.

The amp is extremely solid. It could take quite a beating and still sing. Although i do my best to take good care of it. I don't think there's any need for having a backup amp with you for a gig. This amp has proved to be reliable for me. Only thing is would say is keep an eye on the tubes and check the wiring every so often for comforts sake.

I've been playing for 4 years and have owned lots of gear in that short time. I'm all about keeping it simple now and a having quality guitar and a quality amp is all i need now - and sometimes a volume or boost pedal. This is a quality amp and given the retail price of these then it blows away most other amps in this price range and alot above it. I was lucky to grab this amp on sale at just half the retal price but after using it for so long now i would have happily paid the standard price. It's still great value!

Twin channel 30 x watt class B valve amp, 1 x 12. The specs are well documented by previous posters.
Mine dates from 2002 and comes in a very rugged tweed covering.
Very loud 30 x watts, more than enough for a small gig.

Very glassy quality clean sounds and very Marshall like on the O/D.
Sounds great with humbuckers and single coil and covers all types of music apart from metal.One of the best value small amps out there.
My only mod was to swap the stock speaker for a Celestion G12 although the standard one is not bad.

Has been thrashed and gigged for 4 x years and never complained once.

Peavey always answer emails promptly.

The Classic 30 is a genuine bargain and a far better amp it's competetors ( Marshall DSL401 etc).Use with an extention cabinet and it's all you will ever need.

My amp was made in '95. Had it for nearly three years. Play lots of styles, R&R, Rockabilly, Country, Blues, Soul, R&B, Classic Rock, Indie, Jazz, Bluegrass

It only has one channel but it is switchable between clean and overdriven - so it is commonly mistakenly advertised as two channels, but that's not a big minus. I bought it mainly for hobby playing - After 2 years of trying it out in various jams, and gigs with my US series Strat, the tone started to sound a bit trebly- then all sorts of weird hissing noises started appearing and I eventually figured out from the Peavey Forum that the output tubes had started to go, so I got a new set of unmatched sovtek EL84s and swapped them around till I found the lineup that had the least hum, (hey - what's a teeny bit of hum on stage?) - the great thing about the amp is there's no finicky tube biasing required - its just a pure and simple swap. I changed all the pre-amp tubes to a GEJAN-5751 in V1 any old WA 12AX7 in V2 and a Sheldon re-issue 12AT7 in V3 (Phase splitter), and I've got a very fenderly sounding machine for my Fender so I don't think I'll be buying any more amps for a long time (I've tried a few other valve amps - Vox AC30 Fender Hot Rods, and boutiquey tube amps - Sheldon, Victoria and they all sound good but) this can't be beat for tone-price. Now to try a few speaker combos - I think some cheap Alnico (Red Fang, Jensen) might be interesting

Once I had re-tubed it with a few different combinations, I found my tone mojo without having to do any internal mods. Withe tube combo mentioned above I get great tone throughout the amp on both 'channels' and the pick-up selector on my Strat actually gives me different voices. So aging tone for $$ is good

Its never done me wrong so far - and I inadvertently ran the internal 8 Ohm (Carvin 100W BR12) speaker off the 16 Ohm tap from the OT for 2 & 1/2 years without doing any damage (that I am aware of) and used it for several loud gigs in that time. (I stuck a disconnected 1/4" Jack Plug into the extn speaker jack to activate the 8 Ohm OT coil tap when I found out that this switches the impedance - just to be on teh safe side). Any problems have turned out to be bad-tube related (so far). So reliability is pretty good

I never had to take it to Peavey for any reason - but the bloogers on teh Peavey website guitar amp forum (including some Peavey Staff and old experience techies) have been very helpful with troubleshooting. Soryy guys, I'd feel disingenuous giving out a perfect score for customer service - to anyone

been playing for 30 years - gave up trying to be 'pro' in 1986, took up amateur gigging again three years with other has-beens as mid-life crisis loomed, now just tryin to make the crisis pan-out for all its worth... so back to the amp - I'd give it 99/100 for value for money, reliability and versatility and (after tube tweaks) tone mojo

already well documented.

good clean sound. can't fault it. dirty channel has a nice broken up chimey sound to it. i also like the dirty channel on low gain at the point where it just about starts to break up. i play a jaguar and it seems to get on quite well with this amp. it even sounds ok on the "boost" setting, which virtually everyone has derided here. it's good for that really thin trebley single coil 60's vox sound. but if you turn the bass all the way up, and have the middle and treble on medium, it can do rock or metal or whatever. well, maybe not metal. but i don't really go there much.

bought it second hand. first off, the power tubes needed replacing. they had started to make this eerie breathing noise. this was fine, and to be expected.

this particular amp cuts out. it only cuts out for a few seconds though. then it comes back to normal. this happens usually when it has warmed up. maybe after 10 mins. maybe after 20. sometimes it doesn't do it at all. sometimes it will do it several times within the course of half an hour. it's very annoying. i've checked the effects loop. you can even plug a loop in, and it will cut out regardless of this. i suppose it could be the speaker connection? i don't know, i'm not an electrician. i've also replaced the preamp tubes, and it still happens.

it's also possible this cutting out has something to do with the reverb. the reverb doesn't work (properly) in my opinion. first of all, it has a hum. the hum could be normal to these amps, i don't know. and it doesn't increase with volume, and isn't really that loud. if you turn the reverb down, the hum goes. what i do know is that you can turn the reverb up full, and it's as if it is only on a very low setting. the other day, it kicked in full and there was lots of reverb. today, i've turned the amp on, and it's back to being really weak. i could live without reverb, but this is also quite annoying.

i'm really dreading taking this to a tech. because the problems aren't that apparent or obvious.

please contact me if you can shed any light on it. thanks

been playing a long time. if this suddenly dissapeared, yeah, i might buy another one. A NEW ONE, that is! not one that's developed faults and been passed onto me as 'perfect' by somebody who i now bear resentment towards.

the fact remains, you can get these for much less than orange, vox, fender etc etc

Made in the mid 90's this class a all tube amp has foot switchable clean & dirty channels, killer reverb and is perfect for the classic rock I play. The 30 watts is loud enough for small to medium venues and mic it if I neeed it louder.

My Classic 30 can go from fender glassy cleans to Marshall crunch to mesa over the top singing overdrive. I use Epiphone Elitist les Paul & Casino, Fender japan strat & tele, Agile gold top w/ P 90's and they all sound just killer with the Peavey.

so far so good

don;t know?

I've been thrashing away at the guitar for over 40 years and I've owned Buddas, Marshalls,Mesas,Dr Z's, Bogner, Fenders....and I've got to say...THIS IS THE BEST SOUNDING PH**KING AMP I"VE EVER OWNED and I only paid $300.00 FREAKING dollars for this tone machine and I'm BLOWN AWAY!!!!!!! FINE ONE! THROW IN JJ TUBES & A VINTAGE 30 and you'll be one happy camper! My search for "MY" perfect tone has ended with a measley 10 year old Peavey Classic 30 tweed in mint condition. Get one, you won't regret it!

This amp was made in 2006. 30 watt head version powered by four EL84's and 3 12AX7's. Effects loop, 2 channels, boost switch, two button footswitch compatable ( Channels & Reverb), and plenty of tube power. I have only had it for about three weeks now, but it seems very versatile. Guitars: Telecaster Standard, Gibson SG Standard, Epiphone DOT, and a modified Epiphone Strat with a Semour Duncan JB Jr. in the Bridge. I play it through 4x12 Sonic with Celestion 12M70's and a 2x12 Closed back Birch cab with Cerwin Vega ER123's ('77 vintage). I play most rock, but have really been into the clean channel on this amp, using the reverb, and boost....it really starts to chime. Channel 2 ( Lead ) runs pretty much the whole field, unless you are into extreme metal. Although in the lead channel with boost kicked in, the mids seems to get a little muddy, so I usually only use the boost on the Clean channel. The amps EQ controls are really interactive. The reverb is as good as any fender deluxe that I have played. I think the amp sounds really good for the price(I paid $400 Brand new), only wish the controls were on the front of the amp instead of the top like combo.

I think it sounds great. I mean it is not a handmade botique amp, so for the money I don't think you can beat it. It seems to have some hum on the lead channel when you crank it, especially with single coils, but the tone more than compensates. Suits my music style for rock and pop-rock just fine, but could do just about anything from funk to blues as well.

Seems to be really well built. Never owned peavey, btu have always heard good things. I would gig with out a back-up unless I was playing a really large venue, you may want something with a little more power then.

5 year warranty if you register it with peavey...you can't beat that.

I have been playing for ten years with and have owned marshall, Sovtek, and Line6. I liked all of them, but this peavey really is the most versatile tube head that I have owned. Not as versatile as Line6 but then again it is all tube. I love the power tube saturation you get from this amp since it is only 30 watts. You can crank it without blowing your ears. Plenty of headroom in the clean and lead channels...unless you are playing 5,000+ person venues. You can't go wrong here for great tube head that has all the versatility you need.

No exactly sure.I borrowed it and liked it then heard it played live in ahorn band and thought I'd give a tonal review.

For the money these amps rock.Have sort of a tweed Fender kinna sound to um.I borrowed a freinds and plugged it into a Marshall cab with G12M-25s and Wow sounded great almost Marshally but still this tweed thing goin on.Very easy to dial up I remember took me about 3 minutes to get a useable tone.
I highly doubt it would do a Heavy rock/mteal tone.And I can vouch for its Fender Twin clean tones.But for a Blues lead amp this sucker rocks and for its price bracket it really rocks.The amp in question was all stock tubes.Only "MOD" was my freind installed one of those tube brace things on the powertubes for rattleing tubes.I give it a 7 as I'm pretty sure(from what I've done with it)its only gonna do the Blues-70 rock thing.

Well I dunno again but I do know my freind has the 30 and 50 and both have a problem with power tubes rattleing at higher volumes.

Nice amp just thought I'd share my thoughts.Its a nice amp for Blues and Blues rock lead work.

You should know the features by now. Bought my with a standby switch fitted and a Celestion Vintage 30. Would give it a 10 if it had a second channel eq. More than enough power. Play bluesy classic rock to thrash metal. Metal needs the use my of metal monster...which is all good.

Play a Standard Tokai Les Paul. Sounds warm as all tube amps should. Parametric EQ for mids boosts or scoops depending on songs. Sounds nice for what i play. Low noise. Volume for clean is 2.5, Pre 7, post 3 for distortion. Clean channel breaks at 5 or 6. A low gain amp that needs a pedal to get brutal distortion.

My first tube amp/proper amp. I'm poor and can't afford much gear. If stolen I would try and get another or save for a mesa f30 or something different just for exploration purposes. Still playing around with pedals and knobs to get the perfect tone. I feel i need an overdrive pedal first tho. I never give 10 so 9 is vveryy veryyy high.

Lots of reviews here on features, very basic EL84 Voxish style with a nice cab. Boost does little but muds up the signal and no standby switch or presence.

If you look back far enough you may find my honeymoon review of this amp when I thought it was all that. After two years, three sets of tubes and five different speakers I will tell you what I know about this amp and why I sold it. This amp has a nice warm tube tone and decent but buzzy overdrive channel. Thats it. There is no sparkle or chime in the clean channel unless you don't know what chime means. The C30 has a nice flat warm tone with no tight bottom and is great for jazz. Any decent Fender or the new V30 from Crate sends the C30 packing its bags quickly. No tight bottom , no chime, just not there. Try the V30 from Crate as I did and hear what a clean channel should sound like. The Overdrive side of the C30 is dead until 5-6 then turns to mud at 9. That gives a pretty limited range to work with and no sustain at lower gain levels. Tried JJ's, EH's and the harsh Sovteks it comes with and all pretty close just slight changes. The Greenback made it a decent R&R amp but again nothing special and stay away from the Vintage 30 in this amp, all mids. I own the Crate V30 now and it just sings like a bird on both channels and side by side it was no contest on either channel. With a presence switch, standby switch, boost for both channels on footswitch and a real glass jewell power light not the plastic crap on the Peavey and the Crate comes with a Celestion stock and made in USA. I love the V30 so much I just bought the V50 also just read the reviews on these two amps before you get stuck with the Peavey.

Peaveys are very reliable, no issues here.

Good support and a great forum of sadly tone challenged people.

Good dependable mediocre sounding amp that got me with its cool tweed cab and listening to the many people lie to each other about how good it sounds.

30 watt, 1 X 12 two-channel tube amp (though not a true two-channel amp - the overdrive channel merely adds the gain stages of the second preamp tube). Four EL84 power tubes and three 12AX7 preamp tubes. Mine still has the stock Blue Marvel speaker; I've been satisfied enough with the sound that my feeling is any advantage in replacing the speaker would be minimal at best. I've got matched Groove Tube Gold Series EL-84s (rating of 7) power tubes, two Groove Tube 12AX7 preamp tubes and a Groove Tube 12AT7 in the driver slot (V3). Conspicious is the absence of a standby switch. Features also include an effects loop (which I've never used) and a "boost" switch, which I also never use because the extreme midrange boost isn't very practicle for my usage. I bought this used about five years ago, so I'm not sure when it was manufactured. The bottom line is that this amp does not have very many bells and whistles, which is fine for me. I'm of the belief that one doesn't need much more than good pickups and a good tube amp to achieve good tone. If you can't get a good sound with just guitar and amp, then you're just wasting your time and money adding effect pedals and the like. I've given the amp features a rating of "7" based on the fact that there aren't many features, but I don't consider this a drawback.

I use this amp with the following guitars:

1976 Gibson Les Paul Deluxe with a Seymour Duncan Phat Cat (bridge) and Seymour '59 (neck).
Epiphone Sheraton II semi-hollowbody with Jason Lollar Imperial humbuckers.
Fender Telecaster with Harmonic Design Super-90 (bridge) and Vintage Plus (neck).

I operate using the clean channel at a volume as loud as the club p.a. or situation will allow (usually 6 or 7), using a modified Ibanez Tube Screamer TS9-DX to help the power tubes along. I crank the level up all the way and keep the drive around 9 o'clock or lower, using the TS-9 mode. I also use a Boss EQ pedal for volume boost when I solo.

I use this amp for playing in rock groups. I don't use a whole lot of overdrive; I tend to be on the cleanish end. My style is influenced largely by the likes of Keith Richards, Ron Wood (Faces Ron, that is), Robbie Robertson, George Harrison and Pete Townshend. I prefer the sound of power tube overdrive to that of skronky preamp tube distortion. The Classic 30 accomodates my style of music quite well. I've even played around with more hard rock influenced tones when no one is looking, and it seems to handle that sound quite well, too, when utilizing the overdrive channel. The sound of this amp, due largely to the El-84 power tubes, tends to be somewhere between a classic Marshall sound and an AC-30. I ocassionally use a clean tone (without the overdrive pedal), and the Classic 30 handles that tone with ease, tending to be a bit "chimey." I usually crank up the amp about an hour before a gig and let the tubes get nice and toasty, and when it's cranking it will sometimes surprise you with interesting harmonic overtones. The amp's tone has inspired my playing on a number of occasions.

I would note, however, that be it my tube choices or other unknown variables, the clean channel doesn't have much headroom. It's nearly impossible to get a compeletly "clean" sound when you're relying solely on your amp (i.e. not miked), but that's fine with me. I like the grit, so I'd view this as a plus. I like the ability to overdrive the power tubes without peeling the paint off the walls. The amp is plenty loud, though. I mostly play in clubs where my amp is miked, but on those occasions where it isn't (such a rehearsal and clubs with inadequate p.a. systems), it has proven to be sufficiently loud. I've played several dates this year where for whatever reason the guitars weren't miked, and it had no problem competing with the other two guitar players' amps (Fender Hot Rod Deluxe and Fender Vibrolux).

I've had the amp in the shop once because of a blown fuse, but that was inadvertantly the fault of the poorly-designed handle. The bolt that held one side of the handle on came loose, and the washer on the backside had fallen inside of the amplifier section and caused a short (during a gig, I might add. I had to sit out the rest of the first set while I searched for a backup). I had the handle completely removed at this point, since it was a matter of time before the other side came loose and caused this problem again.

Another complaint is the fact that the tubes sometimes rattle, which can cause difficulties in the studio. The design is faulty in this model, as the tubes are exposed and held in place by small wire holders (the culprits that rattle). The exposed tubes make me nervous, as it would be easy to snag one with the power cord. I've taken this on the road with me, and numerous times I've had remove the tubes and straighten the prongs because they came loose and got bent. The newer models, I've noticed, have rectified this problem by adding a protective panel, but the design on my model is just plain ill-conceived.

I bought it used, so I've never had to deal with customer support.

I've been playing guitar for almost 25 years now; over 20 of those years have been spent playing in rock groups. This is the only amp that I currently own and it suits my needs perfectly. Of course I'm biased, but I think between the Classic 30 and the killer pickups my guitars have, my tone is always the best in the house. I've played many gigs where the club provided the backline, and I never feel as comfortable on other amps as I do with mine. I played a gig a couple of months ago through an AC-30, and though it sounded fantastic, I'd of rather had my Classic 30. The only time I've used another amp that I preferred to this one was a gig last weekend where I used a Peavey Classic 50 (50 watt, 2X12 version of the C30). It was an outdoor gig (Bonnaroo, to be exact!) and the p.a. was loud and clean and I was able to play on 3/4 volume. I was so impressed that I'm longing to upgrade to the Classic 50, now.

Bottom line - you can't beat the sound of this amp for the price. In fact, you can't beat the sound for twice the price. I can't think of any other way to get a quality rock tone for this price. Just beware of the design flaws.

Features have been covered in their entirety already. This particular review is on an early 2000's model. Points taken for no standby switch and highly exposed tubes (which I've knocked out of place just by removing the power cord twice). Has all the features I need outside of those two areas, and performs brilliantly as an amp for all scenarios.

I purchased this amp used, and the Sovteks were nearly at the end of their life. Even so, I bought the amp based on the sound it made at that time. I have since upgraded to full JJ 12AX7s and EL84s from Eurotubes and I am now very, very pleased at the sound and ability of this amp. The JJ tubes break up a little later in the game than the previous tubes did, which gives me a tremendous amount of room to play with. The distortion is very smooth and not buzzsaw-crackle infected, which is exactly what I was looking for. It also savors things like pick noise and minute vibrato with a very classy air.

There's virtually no noise at all with this particular amp and it records incredibly well. I've used an SM-57 which captures a spectacular lead guitar, and have used two ADK matched condensors for an awesome stereo rhythm spread.

I currently play an Ibanez GRX20Z through it and am upgrading to either a nice Fender or a PRS Custom 22 soon. I have played a 70's Gibson Les Paul through it (not sure on the model/pickups) and would have found a 70's LP for myself if I could spend the cash. Even with a low-model humbucking Ibanez plugged in, this amp has the ability to make it sound like much more of a guitar. I've even run my Taylor 714CE through this amp and it has the coolest, warm distorted acoustic sound!

I would like a little more bass available, but the speaker does have it's limitations. I've given the recorded tracks a little EQ love and achieved an awesome tight bass feel with little effort, though.

I've driven it around town a few times and it seems ok. Judging by the tube conditions when I bought it, the previous owner put it to the test and it succeeded. Can't really rate this though.

I wouldn't gig without a backup, especially when the tubes are hanging precariously and exposed from the chassis.

N/A on the support - haven't talked to Peavey.

I bought this amp because a friend saw it come through his pawn shop and it looked pretty decent. After playing with it for a good ten minutes and having a stellar time getting it to feed back, crunch and sing I was sold. Especially when the price is less than $200.

This is the first decent electric amp I've purchased - my first was a Rogue practice amp that did little more than teach me how to play electric. I'm primarily an acoustic player and own quite a bit in that department, but I am a total addict when it comes to a great Gilmour or Clapton solo. This amp can deliver something very similar in the right hands.

I've played a LOT of what's in the standard guitar shop's offerings - the Vox Valvestate line, a couple of Marshall TSLs and their late 90's Valve combos, some Crate amps, etc. This is still my favorite in terms of tone, versatility and ease of use. I even feel like I could peice this amp, replace a speaker, upgrade the reverb and such while I would be hesitant to do so on one of the modern digitally-infused boxes they sell nowadays.

If it were lost/stolen, I'd find another unless I could afford a Rivera or an Anderson...and I would probably still buy one for a backup anyway!

I may upgrade the speaker in the near future with something from Celestion's lineup, as I would really like a little more bass to come out of the box. Overall, though...an unbeatable purchase. And man, is this thing LOUD when it wants to be!

? 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.

My Classic 30 was made in late 2004. It fits my style of music, Blues & Rock. It has two channels and an effects loop. I use the clean channel most of the time with a modded Boss DS-1 and a Rocktron Pulse Tremelo. I added a 2 button foot switch, which it doesn't come with. The footswitch controls channel selection and reverb. Speaking of reverb, I replaced the 2 spring reverb tank with a 3 spring tank from Accutronics and the reverb sounds 10x better, thicker more Fender like. This upgrade is worth it. I also use a volume box in the effects loop so I can drive the tubes without cranking the volume. This is one loud amp.

I have 4 Strats, a Classic 50's with Texas Specials, Classic 60's with Custom Shop Fat 50's, 57 Reissue with GFS Lipstick pups and a SRV 62 Tribute with GFS Hot Overwound pups.
I love the sound of this amp, it is fits my needs just fine. Warm tube sound with nice crunch when you need it.

I have had it almost a year now and it is very dependable. If you are gigging with this I would suggest you get a tube guard for it. The tubes are not really protected and can be easily broken from an errant mic stand!

Never had to deal with Customer Support

I wouldn't hesitate to get another Classic 30, I think it is a great amp for the money.

Basic features here. You know what they are... Everything you need, nothing you don't.

The sound is unbeatable. I play a Strat, Telecaster and an ES-335. These guitars could not be more different but the Classic 30 doesnt miss a beat. I barely have to change the EQ when I switch between them. I would say that this amp does a great job of accurately passing your instrument's tone without changing it or coloring it in any way. This means that the better the instrument, the better it will sound through this amp. Clean is clean. Even with the 335 and any Les Paul that I have plugged into it.

My other amp is a vintage Fender Twin and believe it or not, I like the Classic 30 better. By a LOT. Why? Well, I am from the school that says an amp sounds best when pushed a bit. The lower headroom allows me to push without blowing my bandmates or audience away.

I play around 40 to 50 gigs a year and this is my "number one". This is the only amp I use on stage. I mic it with an SM57 for the bigger rooms and straight up in the smaller rooms. I have never needed another amp since I started using this one. I keep my Fender Twin in the car as a backup but have never needed to use it.

I had to replace one of the wire clips that hold the tubes in. (This is an older model before they made the tube guard.) I called and had the part shipped within a week. Good company with a solid reputation.

I bought this amp for practice when it first came out. It quickly became my primary amp. The price was considerably lower before the retailers realized what they had here. I have seen this amp sell for over $400 used since it was discontinued.

30 Watts, 3 12ax7 and 4 el84 tubes, effects loop, long spring reverb, channel switching(really one channel with an extra gain stage), ext. speaker out, optional footswitch, 'tweed' cosmetics, blah blah blah.

What can I say about this amp? Well, in the past few years, I've had three amps in the Peavey Classic series and I'm about to buy my forth. I had to sell the other three, but I keep coming back to the Classic 30. Recently, I've also owned Vox Valvetronix amps, Crate tube amps, Roland amps. I jam regularly with a friend who has vintage Fenders and a host of boutique amps including Dr. Z, Bruno, Emory Sound and more. I can honestly say that I like the Classic 30's sound, vibe, punch and power better than any of the above amps, including amps costing well over $1500. I don't currently own a Classic 30, but I am saving every penny and starving for this amp. I has a great punchy, chimey, warm clean sound that I have not been able to find in any other amp, cheap or expensive. There's a reason that this amp is a standard of the music industry... it delivers time after time in the real world. Plus, it's made in the USA. Most amps in this price range are made in China or Indonesia. Trust me, at least try this amp out. The clean sound is somewhere in between a Fender and a Vox, but it's still it's own thing. The overdrive channel is great: smooth, ballsy, sort of between a Marshall and a Vox, but it also has it's own sound.... all Classic 30.

By the way, the speaker that comes stock with this amp is voiced for this amp... it sounds punchy and open. I can't understand why ANYONE would put a Celestion Vintage 30 in this amp... horrible match... way too brittle, stiff and midrangy for this amp. I tried it and it was a big mistake. I guess people believe that if they spend more money they will get a better sound. Not always true. Putting some quality tubes in this amp will sweeten the sound somewhat, but not make a huge difference. Ei tubes sound great in this amp.... JJ's are okay, but have much less gain and volume and are a little too 'tame' for my tates. Don't believe the hype!

I've never had a problem with the amps... Peavey is known for building quality and rugged amps.

Never had a problem with the amp, so......

See my comments in the sound section

Dual channel, reverb, EQ, and a boost. Thats it. One input, fx loop, one speaker. simple

The peavey classic series are really good amplifiers, and have potential to be wonderfully vintage and full sounding. They are great in tone, and amazing for the $. Having said this, stock I don't think they are that great. When I got my peavey classic 30 it was brand new. It came with the peavey stock blue speaker, and IMO it simply put, sucked. I struggled with the tone on it, but finally decided to buy a 'real' speaker for this amp. I got a celestion greenback. Man, what a great difference!! In addition, I put all new JJ tubes for this amp and it roared now! Now, granted, it is only a 1x12" combo, and it won't sound like a marshall stack, but it was much much fuller and usable.

In addition to this, the clean channel is one of the best I have ever heard! I own about 10 amps, one of which is a Marshall JCM800 combo. While the distortion on this amp is incredible, the clean channel is unusable. So, I use my peavey for this. It sounds awesome and loves pedals!

As you may have heard, the boost is useless. It makes everything sound like mud. There are mods to fix this, but since I always used boost/overdrive pedals anyway, I really had no interest in fixing this...

Solid. Sturdy. Pretty heavy for the size, honestly. Looks great, sounds good too. The only complaint would be that the tubes are totally exposed. You can buy or make tube guards, and I HIGHLY recommend it. Crash..crunch..zap..no gig tonight!

Overall, a solid amp that sounds ok quiet and great loud. It can work as a good practice amp and also serve in band practice and small gigs. Great tone!

The other reviews on this site have gone into great detail on the Classic 30's features: 30 watts powered by 3 12AX7 pre-amp tubes and 4 EL84 power tubes two channels, reverb, boost switch, effects loop, extension speaker jack, optional footswitch, one 12-inch Blue Marvel Speaker (16 ohm in my amp, though I believe the amp is also available with an 8 ohm speaker). Mine is a 2003 model with black tolex, not the updated tweed model. I bought mine on sale in Louisiana two years ago--I think the shop I bought it from was making room for the newer models.
The only feature I have yet to use on this amp is the boost switch. Since the amp already features the channel-switching option, I don't find I need the extra boost, which I think adds more noise than anything else. This doesn't mean the boost switch won't work for you--I just haven't found much need for it, especially given how sweet and musical this amp's natural tone is. I wish it featured a built-in tremolo circuit, but I solved that problem by adding a Boss TR-2 to the effects loop (see below).

I've played several tube amps over the last ten years, including a Peavey Classic 50 head, a Fender Deluxe Reverb reissue, an old tube Fender Princeton, and a Vox AC-15 (not to mention a bunch of solid state amps I forget!). Currently I also use a '68 Bassman head through a modified Dual-Showman cabinet for bigger venues or with a full rhythm section. Of all these amps, the Classic 30 is my favorite because of its warm, rich, swampy tone. After I bought this amp two years ago, I sold most of my effects pedals!
I have a couple of Strats which I run almost straight into the amp, though I sometimes include a Boss RV-3 for delay/reverb/slapback effects and an old MXR Distortion + for a little overdrive. Over the course of the last two years, I've broken in the stock speaker and it now has a warm, rich tone which reminds me a little of my Bassman, especially when running my Strat's neck pick-up. I get a little overdrive around 4 or 5 on the clean channel. The drive channel can produce a fairly thick distortion, but I tend to use it instead for a Vox-like shimmer and drive with my Strat's bridge pick-up. With the Boss TR-2 running through the effects loop, the amp is just about perfect!
I find I'm constantly discovering new sounds with this amp, which is the mark of a great instrument.

I've just started playing out with this amp, but I would depend on it, given my positive experience with the Classic 50, which made it through a lot of gigs from Boston to NYC and back (though I much prefer the sound of the 30 over the old 50 which I sold years ago). As other reviewers have mentioned, I'm a little concerned about the lack of a tube-guard in the back of the amp, but you can easily add one by looking on eBay or talking to your local amp tech. I'm afraid that adding the guard will change the tone of the amp, so I haven't modified it yet, but I don't want to shatter the tubes! I always make sure it goes to rehearsal with a blanket around it to protect the back of the amp (the blanket also helps during the bone chilling winters we get here in Chicago).

I've never had to deal with Peavey, though I know thay have a good reputation, and I've never been unhappy with any piece of Peavey gear I've owned. I even miss the effects pedals they made in the late 80s (their digital delay was one of the best-sounding and most verstaile I've ever played--if only I could find another one...)

I've been playing for 16 years and gigging for most of that time. I've learned to depend on affordable, high-quality, portable gear which can take a beating and still deliver. These days I play mostly folk-rock in alternate tunings inspired by Chris Whitley (RIP), Daniel Lanois, Bert Jansch, The Byrds, and bands like Fairport Convention and Jefferson Airplane. There's also a little Husker Du and My Bloody Valentine in my sound, and for all of these styles, the Peavey has more than delivered. I'm not sure if this amp is for everyone, but if you're into classic sounds and want a plug-in-and-play tube amp with a lot of features, this might be for you. It's worth checking out, and it's one I wouldn't hesitate to recommend. The only amp I've played which comes close to this in terms of its tone and its ability to inspire your playing is my old Deluxe Reverb. The best amps are musical instruments in their own right, and this one is as irreplaceable to me as my Strat.

Mid 90's version. All tube amp, clean and dirty footswitchable stages but really one channel. Comes with a boost function not footswitchable. All the usual - effects loop, - extension cab jack Would be great if it had a standby switch. Mostly play classic rock, country rock. Play medium sized venues, always mic and run through PA. Lots and lots of grunt for a 30 watt amp. Ran it into an old Traynor 2x12 16 ohm stadium cabinet and scaired the band including the drummer with the output and headroom this thing generated. Volume to burn, not what you'd expect from a little 30 watt combo!

This baby likes humbuckers! Great chunk with my 2004 Gibson LP but really fantastic clean tone with a 1982 Ibanez Artist AR75. (Think 335 here folks). Having said that it is real credible with lots of guitars, I also play a couple of different Mexi Strats, okay, doesn't like my Mexi Telecaster for some reason makes it sound a bit reedy.
Amp is very quiet. Breaks up on the clean side at about 6-7 but a nice tonal break. Starts to get "overdriven tube" sound approaching full volume. Real nice dirty tone, blues, classic rock dirty - not metal dirty. But hey they're not playing Peavey's are they.
Used to play through a Traynor Bassman all tube (circa 1969)head and cabs. Couldn't take the strain on my back carrying 50 pound heads and 70 pound cabs around all the time. Went through a whack of amps - solid state Fenders, a Fender Champ, Marshall Valvestate, all looking for a combo that could be carried with that tube sound, that thick beautiful tube sound, that undescribable tube sound that solid state amps, hybrid amps, modelling amps just never get right. Found it in this little gem of a Peavey Classic 30. Yes I will admit I didn't think it was going to end up this way either.

Picked up a tube tamer as there is some tube rattle. Other than that this thing is rock solid. Haven't encountered any issues.

Haven't dealth with Peavey on this but have had other Peavey gear over the years and they have always been very helpful. They have a good website as well.

Been playing for about 20 years. Have serious gear problem - 20+ guitars, basses, banjos, dobros, mandolins, etc. etc. amps all over the place, okay you get the picture.

Plugged this little unassuming tweed amp in, hit three notes and fell in love. It really just has a tone that you'd expect to pay Fender or Laney money for. (you know Fender money right? value of amp x 2....)

Love the tone, would like a standby switch, other than that perfect portable tube amp.

Standard Classic 30 with 2 channels and a boost. Effects loop. External Speaker output. Tweed. Amp looks nice and has everything I need for practicing and gigs. I haven't used the effects loop or played through and external speaker. I wish it had a Standby switch.

The biggest problem with this amp (and I consider it a major one) is that it has a nasty tube rattle when you play certain notes (E - F#) on the A string for me. I just bought this amp and did lots of research on the problem and found that it is common. I replaced the stock tubes with Eurotubes ($65 delivered) and that cut the rattle in half. I also purchased Tom's Tube Tamer off of ebay ($19) and that fixed the rattle all together. I probably could have gotten away with just the tube tamer. Now the amp sounds excellent and it is loud. After these modifications, I have no complaints about the sound.

I just bought it but it seems sturdy. I have transported it a couple of times to rehearsal with no problems.

I didn't bother dealing with the hassle of repairing it under warranty. I was able to fix it myself. I do intend on shooting an email to Peavey to express my dissatisfaction with the design of this amp. It seems that they could fix the rattle with a simple tube seating modification.

I sold my Fender Blues Jr. to a friend and replaced it with the Classic 30. If Fender made a comparable tube amp, I probably would buy it instead. I wanted something between the Blues Jr. and the Hot Rod. This configuration is exactly what I wanted. Not too loud for home and loud enough for rehearsal and gigs. That rattle bummed me out but now that it is fixed, I am happy with the amp.

30 Watts. 4 el84's and 3 12ax7's. 2 channels. Same as classic 30 combo. Mid-boost button etc..
Made in U.S.A. (so what? The parts are probably from all over the place)

Would like to see a standby switch though.

Awsome!!! Both channels are fantastic. The clean breaks up at about 45% volume depending on the output of your pickups. This is great if you have a fat strat and have the clean channel at atound volume 5 (out of 12). Put it on the single coils and you have a peaked, almost orgasmic clean; switch it to your humbucker and BOOM. She breaks up nicely. Crunch channel is also very dynamic. It responds amazingly to your picking and pickups. With pre-gain at about 75% your groovin. Play soft and it sounds soft; play hard (especially with a hot pickup) and you've got an awsome heavy rock tone. (definitely not for metal though. maybe Maiden style but that's it).
I'm running it through a Marshall 1960b 4x12 cab. 30 watts through this is perfect. Sounds great and doesnt hurt. Nice resonant boxey blues tones too.

So far so good. but it is a tube amp with somewhat cheap sovtek power tubes. I'm hearing great things about the JJ el84's so I might do the switch for reliability reasons, but the current ones sound absolutely awsome so i'll ride them for now.

Emailed them a couple of times. They responded within a day or two.

For the money (even if it costs more) it cannot be beat. It is a genuine tube amp. Sounds sooo sweet. I own tonnes of gear...dont get me started. I compared and found this amp different from all my others. It is definitely the most dynamic. It does not have the kind of clean headroom that my fender hor-rod does, but the hot-rod does not even tough this amp's crunch. It is it's own sound. If it were stolen I would hunt down and kill the thief...or buy another classic 30.

I think the features are well documented at this point!
It's not a modeling amp, so those looking for hundreds of different sounds go get a solid state effects amp.

The tubes do tend to occasionally make a bit of a rattling noise when you're idle and not playing. I understand that Peavey has since remedied this problem with a better quality stabilizer. My problem hasn't even been unbearable. I'm sure I could stablize it a bit better just by bending the tube holder, but I haven't even bothered... it's minor.

I just bought it a month ago, so the reliability factor has yet to be determined for me...

I was looking for a new amp to play some local clubs with in a rock cover band, playing rhythm guitar. I was hoping to find a tube amp, but didn't think I had the cash. I saw this used at a local music store, and my first instinct was.. Hmmm.. kinda small.. 30 watts?? (The casing gives it a decievingly small look) Didn't think it was really for me. The guy at the shop who's a friend of mine coaxed me to at least plug it in. He raved about the Classic 30 up & down.. saying he's had one for years and wouldn't do without it. Well, since I really respect this guys opinion, I gave it a whirl... I was instantly sold. This amp has the sweetest tone I've ever heard. Perfect for what I like and what I needed. Very warm crisp clean channel, and a damn crunchy distortion channel. Not to mention... it CRANKS!!! It's a powerhouse. In rehearsals I never even turn the volume up past about 2.. maybe 3. I recently put it to the test at a live show, and I was thrilled with it.
In the process of looking for an amp, I tried a Line 6, a couple Fenders, and even a couple other Peaveys. They didn't come close to what I heard the VERY FIRST SECOND I plugged my SG into this thing.
I'm in love with playing guitar again, and thats in no small part to my Classic 30!!!
And for the cash it cost me.... NO BRAINER!!!!

30 watt 1x12 el84 combo amp. specs. can be looked up at peavey.com i'm giving this a 6 for features and quality of them.

eric clapton noiseless vintage strat. keeley ts9, univibe. boss gt-8 for delays and other modulation effects. i generally run this amp simple. i use the clean channel and mid-boost on clapton strat for bluesy stuff or throw in ts9 on any given day. the amp needed an extension cab to have the clean headroom i needed. i wound up buying a bassman and a/bing the amps because the tone of this amp was not that great for clean. i finally wound up using the amp as a distortion amp. it does singing allman brothers, santana, led zep. type lead tone very well on channel 2. i kind of think of this amp as a small marshall knock off. that is a compliment. i did replace the speaker with a tone tubby ceramic. smoothed the tone out very nicely. i put the stock speaker in a 1x12 cab and it keeps up with the bassman since i am pushing it into distortion.

smoked a power tube or two before i got the extension cab. this amp is not super loud compared to past amps. twin, super reverb, etc. 30 watts will do you if you know how to use it. had this amp 8 years and have used on and off. not the most solid amp, but has been reliable.

n/a never dealt with them.

i have been playing for 19 years, owned a ton of gear, (i have a problem). i would not buy this amp again, then again...i bought this in college the first year or two it was made. held on to it, i recently dug it out of the closet when i sold my twin, now lets be real, that is a loud amp. after some tweeking and new speaker i have found this amp to be a real bang for the buck. it covers those lead sounds very well for the dollar and i will probably use this amp in a 2 amp set up for some time. it does have that marshall flavor and i do enjoy getting tube distortion over pedals sometimes. (different day different flavor). i feel that for jamming and local clubs this is a very practical amp for my style. the bassman handles the fat fender clean/bluesy tone and this is the marshall tone. 30 watts and 2x12 speakers gives it plenty of thump to keep up with the band and i can draw feed back out of it with control, very nice. the overall rating comes down to what works for you as an individual. this amp works very well for me (a tone freak willing to compromise) and not spend a truck load of cash on a boutique amp that i may not like anyway.