Peavey Valveking 112 Combo

Ok, features have been covered extensive already. Read the other reviews if you're not sure what this amp has. This amp has all the modern features that have become standard. Only things that are missing are a master volume, a presence control, a half-power switch and a headphone jack but no amp has to have everything. It's definitely loud enough.

primarily, I use guitars with humbuckers and I play rock music. I do need a really good clean channel though and this is where the amp does a good job. The clean channel has enough headroom and doesn't get gritty unless you push it. The EQ here also works very well so you can tweak many sounds.

The distortion channel is just awful. I think it has a horrible quality. It is very raspy and doesn't have any warmth to it, especially at higher gain settings. Reminded me of a tiny solid-state amp. The EQ still works fine and the gain and volume boost switches do provide extra tonal options, but the basic tone of this channel is horrible. Overall, the amp sounds very boxey as well, probably due to the speaker. As other reviewers have mentioned, there is also the volume dropout when switching channels. I did enjoy having the resonance switch on the back.

given the unusable nature of the distortion channel, I tried using distortion pedals with the clean channel, but that didn't work well. I wouldn't say the clean channel takes pedals well.

I bought it online and when it first arrived, the spring reverb wasn't working right; the tank was really loose and one of the springs broke off. Also, out of the 4 screws to hold down the reverb tank, I only had 2. I exchanged the amp and got one with working reverb, but still only 2 screws. Is this some cost-cutting measure for Peavey? makes no sense to me.

Construction seems sturdy enough though. Weakest link would be the reverb tank I feel.

I emailed Peavey about the reverb tank and they responded quickly and politely, detailing how I could get it fixed. Good enough for me.

I'm quite disappointed with this amp. The clean channel is ok, but the distortion channel is hopeless. I'm not the type that's overly picky about tone cos I believe you can always tweak things to work, but the basic tone of the distortion channel is just awful.

I returned the amp after a few weeks of trying to get it to sound right to me. Perhaps changing the tubes or the speaker would improve the tone, but I didn't want to buy an amp and have to modify it. I had high hopes for this amp and think that Peavey makes decent products, but I don't think this amp is right for anyone unless they intend to modify it.

3 12AX7A Preamp
2 Channels
4 6L6's
Texture Modeler
and standard eq reverb
50 watts All tube




pretty good tubes for chinese made amp (using russian tubes)

I play all styles of modern rock. I'm dissapointed
I've owened many peaveys, and am no novice to lower mid price range tube amps and tube hybrids.

I tried this amp for about 2 hours at Guitar center for about one week straight, with almost every commonly used guitar (Lespauls, Strats, Schecters Blackjacks, Ibanez prestige, Ibanez RG570, ESP, Peavey Wolfgangs ect. jackson DXMG) Have not been able to get a good sound of it. The bass is lacking, and is very bad for open string palmutes. The clean lacks the warm glassy sound of tube amps, or the full body. The distortion is extremeley higain, and fuzzy sound however, lacks the warmth of tube amps. I wasn't expecting a peavey 5150, but i was expecting this amp to match higher end solidstate peaveys, crates and randalls. Personally I've had more luck getting a warm tube sound, with articulate distortion from peaveys Transtube line. Any one looking into this amps should save another 150$, and look into the 550$ range you'll have more options there and will be able to find a few decent sounding amps such as Crate V30's and Peav



I've regularily used at some point in th past Peavey Triumph 60, Peavey Ultra 40, Marshall 8240 Valve State, Crate Vintage CLub 5212, Rockotron Eganator TOL 100, Peavey Duece II, Peavey Revolution Head, Pignose.

I don't know, havent purchased it
looks pretty solid tolex is slightly weaker
than older peaveys from 1988 or so

I've been playing 4 years. Like i said i've had plenty of experience wiht midrange tube amps, i'm not a tube snob or anything. The amp seems like a good deal on paper, and certainly unusable. It does provide the volume and cut tube amps have, however the distortion channel lacks articulation for the gain and the amp lacks bass, the amp maybe okay
if one were to run pedals on the clean, but the clean isn't warm or fullbodied as most other amps. Users in the 400$ braket would be better
to consider high end solidstate amps, including peavey's own for better tone, or save another 150$. Those who really want tube but only have 400$ should seriously look on ebay for Crate Vintage clubs (blues, and 70s rock players), or Peavey Ultra these amps typically sell used around the same price as the peavey and have a world better tone.

Let me start with how I came upon the Peavey ValveKing.
I currently own a Peavey Classic 20, a Fender 1965 Twin Reissue and a Fender 112 SE (Transistors)... I play Blues, Classic Rock and Country Music so my guitars range from an America Fender Strat and Tele to ES335 and Les Paul Copies (Ibanez and Agile) amongst the mix is a Peavey T60 and Fender 72 Tele Thinline Reissue both with humbuckers. I am partial to that Fender Tube tone and the depth of a 12" speaker. My Fender Twin has the tone, that real clean, deep tone that the amp is famous for. It has only 2 drawbacks. It can not get a dirty tube sound at any volume and it is way to heavy to cart around. The Peavey Classic 20 can get the dirty tones for great lead lines but has very little headroom for clean sounds and the 10" speaker to my ear is a little thin. Installing JJ tubes in it recently made a world of difference. Now the Fender SE at 160 watts is very clean and the distortion channel is ok for hard rock but not for blues. And on 1 it is too damned loud. So I went out looking for an amp that could cover the best of all worlds so to speak. I tried them all. Tubes, Transistors, Crate, Fender, Marshal, Vox, Behringer, Line6. Nothing sounded right. The only one that caught my attention was a Mesa Boogie and they start at over 1k... I had no intention of spending a lot of money and will sell the 112SE to offset some cost so I very carefully considered a Fender Blues Jr. But the BJ although better in clean tone than the Classic 20 just still did not have the headroom I was looking for and not much range in dirty tone. Then I came upon the ValveKing and I'll be damned if it doesn't do it all. This is NOT an amp modeler but the real thing. The amp has two channels with a gain boost almost as if you had 3 channels. With one draw back which I'll cover under Sounds below.

I love the sound of this amp with all of my guitars from single coil to humbuckers but enjoy it best with my Les Paul Copy. It is great for any song I play from Blues to Classic Rock to Country.
The amp is fairly quiet until you get it cranked way up but not as noisy as my Fender Stage 112. At those volumes you'd be going deaf and really should be miking the cabinet at a lower volume anyways.
(Get your drummer to learn feel and touch)
The clean channel stays fairly clean at high volumes but breaks up as any good tube amp should. 65 Twin excepted. You can utilize the A rated A/B rated knob on the back and get clean tones while picking lightly with varying degrees of breakup hitting harder, depending on where you set the knob. This is a great feature and accounts for the many different styles of music you can cover. The distortion channel can go from Blues to Heavy Distortion. Most of the tone comparisons I covered above. Sorry about that. Here's the draw back with the gain boost. Yes as other reviewers have said there is a slight pause when switching from the distorted channel to the boost. I don't see that as much a problem (gives you time to set up for your lead from rhythm.) as the fact that the increase in gain is too much. Way over the top instead of just enough boost to come up from the mix. As the pause is not there going back down it is my belief that this was put here to save your speaker from the huge spike in volume. I tried using a fender single switch and it is no problem going from clean to the second channel or back. The gain boost is just an added feature I don't need and is not a reason for not buying this amp. I use a Bad Monkey distortion pedal for an increase in boost anyway. And the line in and out on the front is very convienent for my Digitech RP50. The Fender amp's are on the front also. I don't really understand why anyone would want them on the back.

Too new to know about reliability but I've owned several PV guitar, bass, keyboard and pa amplifiers and know for a fact PV to be a reliable product.
In fact I still own a PV keyboard amp that is 21 years old. The American made PV transistor amps have a tendancy to get a little dirty in the solder joints and need a tweak on the head now and then.
My bet is this Chinese made ValveKing will hold up better in the long run. Sure you have to replace tubes now and then but don't let that concern you. My Twin was purchased in 1991 and still has the original tubes in it and my Classic 20 purchased in 1994 just had a tube change only to try and get more headroom in the front end.
Here I am rating PV a 10 (not this particular amp) due to the longevity of the PV amps I have owned.

I've never had to use customer support for repairs of any PV product.
But have on occassion talked to techs over the phone for stupid questions. They have always been very kind and willing to help.
Never rude on any occassion.

I've been playing guitar for over 40 years with the use of many different guitars and amps. (Started out as a drummer so guitar took second place for awhile) I've utilized tons of effects and pedals lightening the load down to a Digitech Bad Monkey overdrive pedal and a Digitech RP50. Basically I prefer a raw amp with reverb and tone have much appreciation for that bathroom digital sound. Although the RP50 is in line for when it is appropriate and for the built in tuner. I do use a Line6 POD in my recording studio for guitar and the line out of my Roland Cube 100 Bass amp for Bass and Keyboards. It is just easier that way rather than trying to isolate sounds to mike amps. Basically and truthfully the Peavey ValveKing 112 is an excellent value and has the best tone you can find for the money. Sure tone is subjective but I'd recommend this amp to anyone.

I may have gotten a lemon, but I'm not impressed at all with the tone.
I also know that that is relative, but it was missing that organic, warm
responsive tone. I was very disapointed when I got it home. Let me also say, it was very inexpensive and as I just said I may have gotten a lemon, but I am already having to send it back to get fixed. Anyway, not for me, but everyone's got an opinion.

I had problems with it from day one. As many reveiws have said, there is a very bad delay when switching chanels. And for me the switch box for the amp did not fix the problem. The construction is very poor. By the second day of gigging, the top was making a horrible noise. The only way to stop it was to put lots of pressure on the top of the amp. And now all the 6l6's are shot, and I've only had it two weeks. Let me stress that I may have gotten a lemon, but I will be getting my money back (hopefully) and just spending the money to get something I feel confident in.

Personally, I don't think this is the amp for a working musician. I'm not saying that it wouldn't work for other applications, but not something I can depend on. For the money, you can still get a decent amp
that will last. Hopefully I've not been to negative, but this has been my experience with this amp.

2ch tube amp with indy eq, loop, reverb, 50 watts, all in all nice features. no foot pedal came with amp but any stereo jack 2 button wil do.

this amp sounds decent. loud enough for small sessions. OK here's whats wrong with this thing. the drop out on channel switching is real. it happens on the switch ups. comming back down its better but not perfect. i had called peavey and they said at an authorized dealer it would be fixed at no cost. by the way i did have the valve king footswitch and it didnt fix a thing, and it cost $51. thats to much. another problem occurred with the master cranked up to 5 or above with the gain at 5 and gain vol at 7(heading in to high gain/high volume mode)it sounded like something was shorting out when i played my low B on the E string. that did it! i sent it back to MF. also the reverb was no good.

i dont know how it would last over the long haul cause i returned it

they seemed informative and helpful

i been playin over three decades. i own a lone star so i know what this amp could sound like. that said. i think in cutting costs they opted not to put the chip in that gives smooth ch and gain switching. i was looking for a light weight amp that sounds good to tote around to various practices,jams,& gigs.leaving my larger amp parked at the studio. i would not recommend this amp for live play due to the problems i mentioned. the only thing its good for is bedroom practice. i will move up a couple $hundred and try out the traynor YCV40wr. ive read up on it and you guys here say its a good one. also you guys warned me about the valve king problems, but i didnt listen.

I am giving this a 6 because what amp is sold without a footswitch when there are multiple channels. Besides that It has a lot of buttons to play with

I honestly couldn't get a good sounding distortion through mine, and it has recieved a lot of good reviews here. Mine might have been a bad amp. That happens when they are made in China. To me the distortion was all fuzz. Also sounded muddy, unless you turned up the mids and highs, and rolled back on the lows, but then came the sizzle.

I tried onboard and outboard effects to try and clean it up. I got close to getting a good sound but not close enough for my liking. It wasn't horrible, but wasn't great either. It is loud as hell though. There wasn't much play room in the volume knob in it. at about 3-4 it jumped way up in volume. The AB knob in the back of mine didn't really do much. The website says it may reduce output by 60%, maybe on mine it was about 6%. Didn't sound great at bedroom levels, and only alright at loud volumes.

When hooked up to a cab, it sounded 10 times better. Most of the fuzz went away, and so did the high end sizzle. Actually sounded pretty good, through a good cab, but I wanted a good small combo.
I use a gibson Sg and Les paul through it and play mostly classic rock/80's metal.

took it back after three days, but it is Chinese built so who knows.

na

I have been playing for about 10 years. I have owned numerous amps in that time. None of them top dollar, cuz the only band I have been in broke up after a year, and now just a bedroom guitar player. This was the fourth tube amp I bought though, and wasn't thrilled with the sound. For 350 bones though it is a tube amp. I bet you could mod this out to get what you needed for a lot less than buying a good one, I just didn't want to do that.

Well, you probably know the features by now, but if you don't here they are from the Peavey website:

* 100 watts (rms) into 16, 8, or 4 ohms (switchable)
* Four 6L6GC and three 12AX7 tubes
* Two independent footswitchable channels
* Separate EQ for each channel
* Footswitchable gain/volume boost on lead channel
* Dual paralleled speaker jacks
* Two 12 inch ValveKing speakers
* Reverb with level control
* Buffered effects loop
* Resonance and presence controls
* New TEXTURE? variable Class A simulation control

This amp obviously has a lot of nifty features, but I'm gonna have to bump it down a couple points because it doesn't include a necessary footswitch. I e-mailed Peavey about it and I have to buy a special Valveking footswitch for $51.99. $51.99!!! for a freakin' footswitch that the amp shoulda came with in the first place!!!! Oh well, I'm gonna try to use a different (cheaper) footswitch but I'm not all that optimistic- I've heard of a lot of problems with the valveking switching with a cheap footswitch such as popping noises and delays. Everything is pretty much the same as on the Valveking 112 except instead of a tight/loose switch on the back you get a Resonance knob and a Presence knob. These help you fine tune your sound pretty well. Also, just like in reviews for the 112 the volume boost does nothing whatsoever, but that's alright becuase if you need to cut through, the gain boost works just fine.

I used this playing with an American Strat with a Seymour Duncan JB jr mini humbucker in the bridge. The first thing I'm gonna cover is the clean channel which is really good. There's not much I can say about it other than it is sorta dark, but still nice, without the bright switch and well... bright with it on. Otherwise, the clean channel seems well rounded and full, nice and glassy. It also sounds excellent when you add reverb. The reverb on this amp is really nice, not quite in the Fender 60's reverb range, but it seems a lot better than what reviews for the Valveking 112 would indicate. Noone's going to accidentally think your playing through a Fender Deluxe Reverb, but I can't see what you couldn't like about the sound, really. The only problem I could find with the clean channel is that it seems breaks up surprisingly soon considering there's 2 speakers. Now, I haven't really turned it up too loud, and I had just been playing with the distortion full on probably damaging my hearing (they were sorta ringing), but if my ears weren't decieving me it seemed as if it started breaking up with the volume around 5-6. It sounded like a really nice breakup, but I was sorta mad it couldn't get any louder, but it coulda just been my ears ringing. Either way, it still was loud enough at around 4 to play with the band.

Next I'm going to cover the distortion channel which is nice, but is kind of strange because it sounds different with the band than when you are by yourself. At first when I got the amp I thought the distortion sounded way to fuzzy and noisy. When I got with the band it sounded really nice. It didn't seem as noisy and fuzzy and really roared. It has a lot of Marshall like qualities and is great for rhythem. The only problem was that it can get muddy, but you have to be patient and EQ it properly, and I recommend you use an EQ pedal too. I had some problems cutting through at certain times, but I didn't have an EQ pedal or a footswitch to turn on the gain boost, which I'm certain would have fixed the problem. You can get a whole range of distortion sounds out of this thing, if you use the Texture knob you can go from Clean to blues to southern rock to Metallica. It probably can't do really intense stuff like Dimmu Borgir and the like, but then again, you never really need as much distortion as you think you do so this could probably meet all your needs. The Texture knob really helps you get a lot of sounds. It takes power away from 3 of the 4 power tubes until only one is powering the amp. When you have it at full power (A/B) it has the most distortion and volume possible, when you have it at this setting and the distortion on full you basically have an old school metallica sound. When you have it to the lowest power setting with only one tube working (A) there's no as much gain or volume, but it seems like the amp is working harder and you get a grittier sound, better for more low gain stuff like blues or southern rock. So you have a lot of tonal possibilities, more so than probably most amps, especially in this price range. The only problem is that when the amp is idling, there is A LOT of hum, it sounds like when you accidentally hit the AM/FM switch on the radio and it turns to an AM frequency without a station and you get all that static. It is really annoying if you don't turn on the Standby. It even shows up when you are plaing if you turn the volume knob on your guitar down too low. This could probably be fixed if you get a noise reducer and put it in the effects loops so it will clean it up the signal before it gets to the speakers, but you would have to be careful that it doesn't cut out stuff like sustaining notes. Another thing I'd like to add is that this amp has Sovetek 6l6GC power tubes and Electro Harmonix 12AX7 preamp tubes. This would probably make the amp more noiser sterile or w/e than it should/could be and if you invested money in JJ tubes at eurotubes.com and possibly better speakers then this thing could probably rival any combo out there, much less comprably priced ones. I can't be certain of this, but this amp is really nice already so there isn't any need to rush out and start putting money into it right of the bat.

Well, this amp seems really solid, but it had a problem right out of the gate. The first time I tried it and turned on the reverb, I would hit one note, then turn off the volume on the guitar, and the amp would start feeding back more and more unless the reverb was shut off. I didn't want to send the amp back over this and loose it for weeks/months if i could fix it myself, so i checked out the reverb tank. First off, it was barely screwed down and was moving all around. I took the tank out of the amp and had a look. The reverb unit consisted of a plate with two long springs extending to either end, long ways with some electric stuff at the end. The whole plate was being suspended in the tank by four small springs so it didn't touch the side. One of the springs had a broken loop at the end that hooked it to the side of the tank. I had to twist it around to make another loop in it so it could hook on to the side of the tank again. This solved the problem, and I'm glad I solved it becuase the reverb is nice, but I have my worries about other things going wrong due to this. The amp seems solid, so I probably would gig without a backup, mostly because its the only amp I have

Never dealt with Peavey, other than when I emailed them about the footswitch. They responded quickly, but I don't think its enough to rate them on.

Well, this amp is really nice, its really loud, I had the distortion channel on halfway and it easily kept up/dominate the rest of the band. It could handle a small/medium sized venue without being miked. Possibly in the outdoors venue. Anything bigger and you will be able to mic it anyways, so thats not a problem. It sounds great and gives you the opertunity to get you any sound you want aside from something extravagent like really hardcore death metal, or a Dick Dale surf sound. Don't get me wrong, this thing will let you cover Miserlou or Wipeout with no problem, but if you're only gonna play surf music and nothing else, you should probably look for a Fender amp. So far I am happy with this amp, I haven't had it too long and only played with the band once, but it seems like a winner. For this price, an all tube amp of this caliber for $560 cannot be beat. Really, all your other options in this price range are solid state amps that sound like crap, modeling amps that have cheesey or plain bad effects or are hard to use, or a faux-old school tweed tube amp that really can only handle old school blues or rockabilly. I highly recommend this amp, even over the Valveking 112 since it can't really handle the band setting too well. I'm rating this an 8 because, even though this amp is excellent it isn't the best amp out there bar none which is the only time I'd give it a 10. Also, it has a couple little problems, such as the useless volume boost, extranious noise, footswitch not included, and that reverb issue. If the footswitch was included and this amp got better tubes and speakers, (although you don't NEED to upgrade those since it is awesome already), you would be hard pressed to find a better amp at any price. But, as it stands, this amp already had one part broken, although an easy fix, and it was made in china. This leaves some questions that only time will answer, but I would have to say this amp is worth the money for sure. This amp probably has everything you're looking for so just buy it already.

Update to previous review, see features there

In a previous review I mentioned that there is a big delay when using the button on the front panel to switch between clean and distortion channel, this does NOT occur when using the footswitch, everythings okay. When using the button on the front of the amp I have experience the amp switching from distorion back to clean even though the button stays depressed for distortion mode, cheap front panel buttons, may become an issue as the amp gets older.

Okay except the front panel buttons.

Have noy used them yet

Still like it despite the button problem

Update to previous review

Tested amp with strat style guitar with humbuckers and all was pretty well. Then I got around to trying Les Paul scaled guitars (3/4 scale neck) and could not get a good sound. The amp lost all the nice distortion and characteristics I liked. No matter what I did the amp responded as if I plugged the guitart into the second input the LOW input. Well I changed out the tubes and put in some JJ high gain 12AX7's and now the amp performs well again. With the Les Paul the stock speaker sounds boxy and cardboard like and depressing the speaker dampening switch makes this worse (this was not that appearant with the strat using humbuckers). I used the external speaker jack (which cuts off the internal speaker when used) and plugged in my Emminence Red Fang speaker and things got much better. The amp is still weak on the bottom end lows so palm mutting is not as tight as it could be but fair (another speaker choice may help in this area). The mids and highs are great and the amp gets a nice singing sustain, chords arpeggios stand out well. Now satisfied with this amp and for $400 It's a bargain.

Not sure

Have not used them

For $400 dollars it's hard to give it a low rating but a Classic Peavey 30 could probably blow it away, Classic 30's can crank but their overdrive is not as refined as the distortion on this ValveKing.
The valveKing has that problem of pausing when kicking in the Distortion boost and that should not occure this day and age with amp technology as advanced as it is. What other tube amp is out there with all the features this one has and if a tube and speaker swap is all thats needed as an upgrade (something more expensive amps often need) I find it hard to give it a low rating, I give it an 8 do to the Distortion boost hestitation and what seems to be looseness in the bass at times (an inability to have a real tight speaker response in the bass (closed back cabinet may handel this)).

Made in 2005, two channels, clean has bright switch, dirty channel has volume boost and distortion boost. Effects loop, extra speaker output jack (8ohm), footswitch and speaker dampening switch. A knob to dial in class A or class A/B power output (great feature and sets the amp appart from others).

I use strat style guitars with humbucker pickups, clean channel is very nice (Fender like) and the tone controls work great to shape tone, bright swith works very well. I have compared the clean channel to my Peavey Ultra 12 and to my Pignose G60V and it sounds as good or better. It has that tubish three dimesionall tone and chime, the channel is NOT flat or sterile sounding. What makes this amp sound so good is the A to A/B knob. I have a Crate V30H all Class A tube amp, this means that there is no cross over distortion in the power tubes and it makes for a real smooth tone, even with tons of high gain pre-amp signal being driven into it. The Peavey ValveKing gets that class A smoothness with it's A to A/B knob and it definitly helps the amp sound better than other amps that are only class A/B. Using this knob can be comparable to having your amps Bias set right, warmer smoother sound from your amp. The dirty channel has plenty of gain thats not fizzy, very usable distortion and great sustain, you can dial in dark tones or bright ones as the tone controls are very responsive. It's not a Fender amp or Peavey Classic 30 overdrive but tends to be more like Peavey XXX or Marshall style distortion. No heavey bottom end, and this is where it seems have Marshall charateristics in that it is strong in the midrange, not much bottom. With the class A dialed in highs are smooth (not harsh like some peavey class A/B amps that are Biased cold). With the distortion boost on one can get some great feed back. It will do Metal but not New Metal as this amp does not do the Mesa Triple rectofier sound. Distortion and overdrive pedals work well on this amp and this is where the speaker dampening switch becomes noticable, it helped to firm up the speaker and tighten up the sound, glad to have it. The speakers not bad and this is the first time I did not feel I had to immediatly upgrade the tubes, the amp actually sounded nice right out of the box. I did notice that when you swith between clean and dirty channel using the button on the amp that there is a BIG delay. This does happen with the footswitch. However when you use the footswitch to engage the distortion boost there is a moments hestitaion, if you can't have this then you may not want this amp, it's okay by me but it is a disapointment. Reverb is digital chip driven rather than tube and can sound like it at times. It's not a bad reverb but if one is use to the real thing they may not be fully satisfied by it. As one other person mentioned switching to a Les Paul or similar type guitar the sound was muddy and had to be re-dialed in (strange). I have had no problem with dialing matching volumes between channels but I have only been using it in the studio and have not had the amp maxed out. For the money it delivers a lot.

It's new, made in China, will have to wait and see

have not used them

I have bought plenty of amps and I am always looking for a good bargan and for $400 dollars this amp delivers a lot and sounds as good as much higher priced amps.