Randall RG100 ES

I've got the head version. All solid state. What I am told its from the 80'. I can play blues, rock and metal on this thing. It won't hit Cyclone territory. It needs something in the front of it pushing it for distortion though. By itself it has a overdrive gain to it. Clean is clean nuth'n special but all of it is useable. Reverb is excellent! It has channel switching if you are fortunate enough to have the footswitch. I got one off ebay recently and it is working fine. It has a pull out pot on it that just cuts the sound level way down and gives it a little different distortion. Useless in my opinion. Has effects loop but I haven't used so I don't know if it works. I run my stuff up front.

Got an SG Gothic with 490' in it. I play blues, rock and metal. I use it in a band. With a half stack no problems at all being heard over the drummer. Very manageable amp noise wise. With dist. added it will squeal like any other. I use a noise gait anyways. Mine is not even close to brutal on its own. Again only an over drive gain. It will get metal though with a pedal or processer and I've used both. Since I have the footswitch I can use both channels at once. I like doing this for a boost to my leads. Oh yeah...they cut through now. I didn't have the footswitch when I first got the head. You can use both channels with out the pedal but the versatility is much better with it... especially how I use it. It can play louder than I've needed easily. It sounds better turned up. You can hear it smooth out as it gets louder and take on a new voicing. So get it up to performing level and then set the EQ.

According to an amp tech/electrition friend of mine these things are built to make it through a holocaust! He has had mine open too. He says the wiring is made of the hardy stuff. Me I don't know crap about that stuff. I know it stays cool after playing for hours. Oh yeah, its still going from the 80'.

Haven't dealt with them.

I've been playing 20 yrs. Just got rid of 2 tube amps a peavey rock master and a JCM 900 Marshall. The Randall out preformed the Marshall. The RockMaster ain't worth comparing to anything ok! I have a Avt 20 marshall I use for bedroom practice. Good little amp. This amp came my way. After trying it out I really wanted to keep it. Been playing it for a few months now. I will probably keep it for good. It has its own character(voice) which you just have to try for yourself. I find it to have useable sounds for the range of music we play. If you don't like it give it to me. I am saving up for the Cyclone right now to better handle the heavy stuff I will be playing. Its from the 80' and it is still kicking ass!

From what I can tell the amp was manufactured in the 80's (maybe its because of the very "hair-metal" rattle snake covering" and really doesnt compare, feature-wise at least with some of the new amps. Is platy powerful with its 150 watts and the reverb is one of the better "onboard" reverbs. And you people out there who think all tubes amp are louder than soilid states, this beasts can blow 98% of tubes amps out there.

My guitar is an Ibanez RG equiped with a tonezone and a humbucker from hell (dimarzio all the way bitch!). My music writing style has been dubbed "hairmetal with a trim and some massive balls" but my lead style is a barage of sweep arpeggios ala Jason Becker, and very fast stacatto licks ala Zakk Wylde, Paul gilbert. The amp isnt noisy at all, but i do use a seperate booster type of distortion to push the amp. I get the perfect distortion (for me at least), its well defined and has mids plus crunch. But is has to be cranked to get the full effect tubes or not. The clean is excellent its shimmery without being twangy. But if you want serious gain, get a pedal.

No problems, The beast is a tank

Randall are assholes period!

bottom line is, that if your looking for a great amp thats sturdy and toneful, this is it.

Great amp,150 watt 2 channels solid state head.I own the original footswitch.For more details see the reviews above and below.Sounds more like a tube amp then a SS-amp.Especially when you use both channels at the same time.

i use a Fender 1984 USA stratocaster.All though i've read alot off people telling this is a real metal amp ,I'm using it to play ACDC,METALLICA,DEEP PURPLE AND EVEN HENDRIX, this thing does it all.
The Distortion can be very versatily if you know how to turn the knops.

as reliable as can be.Never had any problems,not even a cracking knop.

never dealt with Washburn before, I hope to keep it that way!!

if it where stolen or lost,i'd try to find another one,but hey their hard to find and becoming vintage.I heard people say it sounds just like a Msrshall jcm800,but i don't know how that sounds maybe someone can conferm this fact!!!

This is an 80's amp. 2 channels, and footswitchable if you manage to either have one of those silly original custom-connector footswitches, or have one made by someone who knows how those connections work.
I traded in my mid 70's Marshall JMP 100 watt head for this - and I am sorry now. I heard many great things about these Randall amps - even the reviews here seem to rate them high, but really, unless you are into hair metal or music with similar tonal characteristics, this amp has little to offer. I basically traded because I wanted something more reliable than my tube-burning Marshall...

I play varying styles of music from heavy alternative to classic rock to jazzzy blues stuff sometimes - and I have to say that this amp sounds OK at best when distorted, but even then you have to settle for the "Randall" distortion sound, because when you decide to use your own overdrive (I use a tube driven distortion), you have to keep the gain of this amp practically at zero - otherwise it totally craps-out in a very non cool way. Of course, the other effect of doing this is then that you have to crank the master volume to like 11 so that you can be heard over the other instuments, if you have a fairly loud band. So this doesn't really work that well for me. Having said that, the amp IS quite loud if you decide to use the gain and distortion provided in the stock amp circuitry.
Bottom line - It delivers half decent hair metal-like tones if you plug straight in, but your range of tones is very limited, and I have found that using different guitars has a minimal effect. Using this amp clean (or as clean as you can get it) I found to be a waste of time. It sounds very sterile, and goes nowhere near being lush. This is a solid state amp, and I have heard very few amps of this type that can produce a nice clean organic and rich sound. This is no fault of Randall - there are very few exceptions to the fact that tube amps are more versatile, and easier to get a variety of brown tones from whether its clean or distorted. (The only exception I can think of is the Roland Jazz Chorus. They manage a nice lush clean sound - of course, the trade-off is that the JC sounds like crap if you run it with any kind of heavier distortion).
As a matter of fact, I feel like I am fighting my guitar when I try to play The Randall clean for some of our slower numbers. I find myself trying to deal with this my layering on chorus or phase to make it sound sweeter. Also This amp is not manually switchable without the foot-pedal, so you are always stuck using one channel.

Well, I have heard these are extremely reliable - thats why I traded my troublesome JMP. I have benn using it for about a year.. It hasn't broken down, although I have experienced rattling from somewhere in the chassis, and radical volume fluctuations when playing during rehearsals. Once it even turned itself off in the middle of a song. I later took it apart and found a short in one of the wires, and one of the reverb springs had disconnected from one end of the tank and was bouncing around on the circuitry. I fixed that, and I havent had any problems since - although I did experience a mild volume fluctuation at one rehearsal. Still though, despite this, I still find it less trouble than my old smokey tube burnin JMP.

Never tried to call - most of my stuff is too old for that.

This amp is OK for the amount they fetch used. I like it in a limited way, but it isnt as versatile as I would like an amp to be soundwise. I think if I were after something new I try a lot of different amps. Maybe I will go with a Mesa-B... ;)

Bought my RG-100 ES used in 1987, so I'm not sure what the manufacture date is. I haven't used the effects loop, as it sounds so damn good on its own. As for volume, this absolutely amp kicks ass, i've played some outdoor festival type shows, and never needed more than the RG100 & the 4x12 Carvin cabinet delivered. With the extra gain and ability to mix the channels, i'm rating it high on features.

My Charvel with a single active EMG makes for alot of crunch with the RG100 for metal, and the clean sounds very good, with a lot of sparkle, using a Martin acoustic-electric. Again, i rate this amp high, as it sounds great, and i've always gotten compliments on my tone using the Randall.

This amp has seen it all; bars, basements, several long distance moves - but time is finally taking its toll. Recently the footswitch connection (that 6-pin nightmare) began giving me problems, and the dashpots on the clean channel are making some noise as well. Anyone with suggestions on who to take it to in San Jose, CA, please email me!!

I haven't tried yet, but am not very hopeful they'll be able to help me after reading the other comments on the board. What is Washburn doing to the Randall name, anyway?

Also have a drum kit, which my neighbors must love (nothing quite like a guitarist who occasionly beats on the drums after a few beers!) and various parctice amps and guitars. Can't say it enough, I love my RG-100, and any help in getting it to the right service shop or person would be greatly appreciated. Suggestions?

Standard features for a guitar amp, with a couple cool extras. 150 watts(120 RMS). 2 channels, one for clean, one for distortion, with seperate master and gain. Both channels share a presence/treble/mid/ bass EQ. Built in reverb. Effects loop. The cool extra features are the 2 seperate inputs for low and high gain (0db and +06db), polairty selector built into the on/off switch, and a gain/distortion boost via the treble knob(more on this feature later).

This has to be one of the best solid state amps i've ever heard in my life. It's for sure the best ss amp i've gotten to play on personally.

I bought this amp about 3 years ago. At the time, I was using a classic 30(great amp), but I wanted to buy a head to use with this 8ohm cab I had. I ended up buying this amp off a guy locally, at the time, I thought it sounded great, but when I took it home, I ended up hating the sound that came out of it. The distortion was just the usual thin, metallic, SS crap that i'm used to hearing (mostly from crate, excluding the blue voodoo). Anyways, I ended up putting this amp away for 2 years, and in the mean time, I purchased a marshall JCM800 2205 and a Dual rectifier. Eventually I got ahold of a 3rd cab, so I figured i'd give the Randall another shot.

Took it out of the closet, hooked it up, and hated it has soon has it turned on. Started messing with the EQ, and by accident, I pulled the treble knob out. Supposedly, this is some type of gain boost, but it dosn't really give you more distortion. It lowers the volume so you have to crank the master more, and it smoothes EVERYTHING out. The distortion produced when you do this actually sounds incredibly close to a tube amp's distortion. To me, it sounded alot like adam jones tone from undertow. It's not really that heavy, crushing, nu metal type distortion thats produced today. It sort of has the tone of my jcm 800, but its much heavier, but not quite on the level has my dual rectifier. Very rich and detailed. Without this extra feature, the amp would be practically useless. Wish I had the manual so I knew this EARLIER : P

Has for the clean channel, its great. Not excellant or spectacular, but its more than good enough. The built in reverb is excellant, and when set correctly, the clean channel can be sparkly clean. With the seperate gain control, you can add just a bit of dirt too it, giving an excellant blues tone.

Giving a 8 in sound is a bit much, I know, but this amp does sound great, and I think the score is justified.

Never failed me, so I give this a 10. Certainly has less problems than my tubes amps that I own.

This is were your s*** out of luck. Like the poster said below, Randall dosn't even acknowledge this amp anymore. I've tried to contact them about it and get manuals with no luck. Trust me, if I could give this a negative score, I would.

After having this amp so long, its a shame I didn't get to use it the whole time I had it. I absolutly love it. Out of all my amps, I play out of the randall the most, and it is always the main amp in my setup. It's almost unbelievable that this amp can be had for only 200 dollars. I remember a time when I was looking at the RG100's on ebay because I was interested in selling mine, and people couldn't even sell them for 120 dollars. Ridiculous!

This amp has the best one of the most over-looked gems in the amp world.

This is an old Randall RG100 ES SS (solid state) head. I play it on top of a 4x12 Avatar cab with Celestion V-30s.

No speaker up front; covered in grey carpet material.

Not bad for features. 150 watts (120 RMS, so you're REALLY getting 120 TRUE watts), 2 inputs (hi/lo gain), 2 on positions with different polarities (so your singer doesn't get his lips zapped on the mike), an EXCELLENT reverb with an on/off jack for a foot switch, presence, bass/mid/treble, treble knob pulls out for extra distortion, separate master/gain controls for each channel, foot switch (VERY proprietary), effects loop, 2 speaker outputs (4 ohms each or 8 ohms if you're only using 1), an unswitched electrical socket, and a line out. Green/red LEDs to tell you what channels are on. No built in digital effects. Hard to wish for much more, especially in this price range.

Using 1984 Ibanez X-Series with blade pickups. Great match for this amp. I play hard rock/metal/numetal.

First, for the clean channel. It sounds pretty good, with plenty of power. No volume issues here.

This is a real overdrive beast. I'm amazed at the flexibility in the overdrive of this amp. Early metallica/megadeth/slashmetal sound, straight into Godsmack-type roaring, pissed off raging OD. As I mentioned before, the reverb is EXCELLENT in this amp. You can do any kind of rock with this OD, although it is especially competent at the really hard, heavy stuff. Both of the inputs bring up a completely different type of sound. I've had this amp for a couple weeks, and I'm far from finding everything it has to offer.

The treble knob pulls out, giving you another big gain boost (lowers the volume for some reason, but big deal, crank up that master some more). The amp has lots of headroom. No worries about "farty" sounds when you crank it up.

Another great thing about the amp is the ability to use both channels at the same time. You can play with an acoustic and electric sound together, or you can crank the gain on both channels and blow the roof off.

This is the perfect amp for rock, or when you need a lot of volume for something acoustic. You will not believe how great this is for a solid state.

Let me put it this way: the amp is almost 20 years old, got shipped to me in a thin cardboard box, has gotten a few carpet-ripping bangs in it over the years, and still performs flawlessly.

It's solid state! It's built like a tank.

Randall and Washburn don't give a flying rat's ass about a 20 year old amp that they don't produce any more. Mine does NOT have the footswtich, and they made it VERY proprietary, so I'm having one custom built by Steve (see him below). Randall does NOT make the foot pedals for these any more, and they have absolutely nothing about it on their site, not even a manual.

It don't matter anyways. Steve can build you the foot pedal (and for a very fair price), and this thing will NEVER break.

If you want to see it, here's a URL to the ebay auction I won it at:
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=894050721

I never was a fan of it's looks, but when it sounds this great, who the hell cares about how pretty it is?

I was looking for a hard rock amp that I could blow people 50 feet back with, and I've found it.

I wish the foot pedal was easy to get. Too bad it doesn't have any digital effects, but the overdrive is so great on this amp, I doubt I'd ever use them.

That guy who gave this amp a bad review either got a REALLY bad amp, hooked it up wrong, or was reviewing the wrong amp. Believe me (and the other 10 people reviewing this amp) when I say it is a rock monster.

Great amp. I'd hunt down another if anything happened to it. Powerful, excellent clean and OD channels, great features, 2 channels playable at the same time, dependable. What more do you want? 10 is the rating for "Fantastic Value," so a 10 this amp shall receive.

the entire amp is covered with black felt cloth. has 2 channels - one clean and one dirty, each with its own gain and master knobs, and they can both be on at the same time. has an excelent reverb tank and has the typical presence, bass, mid, and treb knobs. there's also a sustain boost switch that works farely decent but not great. i would've given it a 10 if there was a an on/off switch or something to turn the dirty channel off. i need a foot switch to accomplish this, oh dear god how i need a footswitch...

i play metal. not really numetal, but more like old thrash meets hardcore. i play a decent ibanez RG 320 with EMG-81 pickups, and an old kickass ESP Kerry King flying V with EMG-81 pickups. my primary distortion is through an MP-1 rack processor by ADA thats also punched up with a boss eq pedal (i need a rack eq sooon). my 4x12 cabinet is made by ampeg. i used to play into one of the early Marshall Valvestate 100 watt combo amps with a metalzone pedal... this amp with the MP-1 preamp KICKS ITS ASS!!!

this amp just screams METAL!! forget playing those old country-western tunes or even your cheesy hair metal... this amp is for everyone wanting to play Sepultura and Slayer! actually the clean channel isn't that bad and punching the reverb can give you really bitching surf sounds. the gain knobs do give the amp a lot of versatility in sound, but its limmited in that the distortion is a very DIRTY distortion and it is NOT AT ALL WARM. i've even gotten this amp to do some really nice early led zeppelin tones.

i have fired about 23 rounds at this amp while a dog urinated on it... the dog died but the amp lives on!!!

i've played with this amp nonstop for the past several weeks and it is amazing. deffenitely try to find an ADA MP-1 preamp too. the distortion from that rack processor goes so well with the randall amp. if this amp broke or got stollen, then i would deffenitely hunt for another one. also, i need a damn foot switch to better mold my sound!! arg!!

For Metal Applications I would suggest a Sonic Maximizer, and EQ through the Loop. Distortion channel will be ruthless, and clean is crystal clear. I heard that this would work, so i tried it. I'm not disappointed. Read other posts for the Features.

Use High Output pickups, e.g. Duncan Distortion. The use of both channels at the same time...is awesome. Very suitable amp for band situations. Will kill Marshalls Guaranteed!

No backup necessary

10

It has a clean channel and a crunch chanel, and best of all, you can have them both on at the same time! (now that i have a footswitch, thanks to Steve!!!)

Really like the tones I'm getting, just wish their was a way to get my solos louder like on my friend Peavey combo, you hit anotehr button to ghet a solo boost.

This amp is very consistent every time I use it, even when i play out I know exactly how its gonna sound. my freind has a tube amp, and he always complains the AC power in alot the bars he plays at is fucking up his sound.

I needed a footswitch , but couldn't find one anywhere, and they were NO HELP AT ALL!

Then I saw Steve's ad below and conatcted him. (read my comments in the next box)

Like i said aboce I needed a footswith and saw Steve's ad, which is on this same page here below (it's close to the bottom).

He repiled immediately, answered all my questions in great detail, and less than a week afetr I sent him out a check, I had his homemade footswitch in my hands! It works excellent, looks really cool, and I highly recommend him to anyone needing a fottswitch!

The only thing though, I thoguth the price was a little high at first, but then I found out what he said was true, that the original one made by Randall costed even more brand new, so I'm very pleased I got a great product at a very fair price!