Rocktron Pro-Gap Preamp

Pretty simple to use, nice (easy to read) digital display, 3 knobs, 2 buttons.....etc Couldn't be much easier to use. Comes with 5 Allan Holdsworth presets, and 5 Steve Lukather presets. The owners-manual is very easy to read through. I bought my Pro-GAP from Ebay, with NO manual, and still figured it out with ease. Not sure if this unit has been upgraded with any new chips?

I have a ton of gear & many effects, but 90% of the time I use either my 1985 Kramer Baretta or one of my new Fender American Deluxe Strats. I play thru an early 80's LANEY tube head, and a Marshall 4x12 (1960A cabinet). When using the Rocktron Pro-GAP, I really can not turn up the volume too much. My whole house shakes. It also helps to have nice quality heads as well.

This unit is pretty quiet. Hardly any humm whatsoever. Of course, musicians should always use high-quality cables.

The Pro-GAP's distortion covers a WIDE array of tones with ease. With a few hours of playing with this unit, I was able to get some nice clean blues sounds, all the way up to massive sonic distortion! I love bands like Priest, Maiden, Ozzy, Jag Panzer, Dimmu Borgir, In Flames...etc And this unit can basically cover all the styles. The gain output is quite good. It may not be a tube preamp, but it sure has some kick to it! I'm very happy with it, considering I'm not a huge fan of Solid-State items.

Overall, it's a really nice preamp/distortion unit. I only give it an "8", simply because there's nothing perfect when it comes to guitar effects. :)

I bought it used, and have owned it for a little over a year, still works great, sounds great, and it's mounted in my rack, so, not much is going to happen to it.

Sure, I'd gig with it....It's a pretty good unit. Of course, I'd always bring a backup unit, just because....

Ordered the original owners manual from them, took just a couple days to get it, and no problems there. But, I have never really needed them for any tech support. Would like to think they are helpful.

My style is mostly metal/progressive metal/death/black/ & 70's rock...etc And, Yeah, I'd have to say this preamp serves my needs!

Been playing for 20+ years, and have owned TONS of guitars, amps, pedals & effects. My current gear includes the following: Mesa Boogie V-Twin preamp pedal, an Electro-Harmonix Tube Zipper, Morley Bad-Horsie Wah, Rocktron Pro-GAP rackmount preamp, Tech-21 Comp-Tortion pedal, Marshall Jackhammer distortion pedal, Electro-Harmonix Holy Grail reverb, ZOOM-505 multi effects pedal, Ibanez dig-delay rackmount, LANEY 50W tube head, Marshall 4x12 cab (1960A), and 7 guitars.

If this unit were lost or stolen, I might look for a Rocktron Pirahna instead of another Pro-GAP. The Pirahna is a better unit. Used by such greats as Dave Mustaine, Glenn Tipton & KK Downing.

My favorite feature on this unit is just the fact that it produces a very good "metal" distortion for the price I paid for it. The Pro-GAP has killer gain, and it can replicate a wide array of different "heavy metal" styles. Which is really why I bought this unit.
Now, my LANEY produces some AWESOME, SWEET distortion also, and I use it often, but usually when I'm jamming to some classic British rock, where a good British tube head is needed! ie. Zeppelin, The WHO, Sabbath, Kinks, Cream...etc

I NEVER use my Rocktron for classic rock. Although, I "can" get a decent classic-rock distortion from this unit, I just stick with my LANEY head for that. It's all you need! :)

Overall, the Rocktron Pro-GAP is a very nice unit if you're a metal guitarist. It covers alot of heavy metal bands' sounds. getting one used for under $100 is a great value. I'm very happy with it.

features - too many to list.
i have owned my pro gap scince i bought it used in 1991.

humbucking and single coil sounds great
it seems to suit me well
choose your weapon
clean as a virgin or dirty as a whore
you pick either or
this unit can sound like anything
i like making my rhoads v sound like a strat
or my ibanez 550 into a tele
it freaks people out
the seamless patch switching ,the dist. gain, and hush make this unit a must in live performance situations.

its great.
no problem
have used in gig with no back up several times.
except when every guitar players nightmare happened.
my whole rack ate a hard floor from atop a 412 cab.
this tragedy left me stranded for a while (broke the knobs off)
but i never had problems after i fixed the poor little bugger.

a little slow
i called the factory several times before i got anywhere
finally i kept buggin the same dude and he sent me the pots for free.

ive played for a long time .
and have several other preamp/fx units
boss, digitech,bbe,tubeworks,korg,zoom,art,
ive played in many bands rock covers,neoclassical shred, blues , some clean acoustical type also this unit is 1 of the best ever produced .
if it had fx it would be on a alter being worshipped.

Rack mount preamp- has pre and post eq, Hush, gain, bass and treble, as well as some sort of a compression type thing when you swith the "curve" to "A". See other reviews for more detailed explanation. No effects.

I play really heavy death metal/hardcore. My guitar is a Jackson DR-3 with EMG-85s. I go into the Progap, into a BBE Sonic Maximizer and into a Mesa Boogie 50/50. The whole mess comes out of a cheapo Ampeg 4x12 cab.
Considering that I've never seen one of these go for more than $100 used, it sounds pretty darn good. I mean, it's no substitue for a Triaxis or anything, but you can get a real heavy sound out of it if you try. I used to have an ADA MP1 and the Progap outperforms it across the board. The Hush is really handy if you're like me and you use tons of gain.
As I said, it's not amazing, but certainly better than anything else you're going to get for the price, especially considering it's got a Hush.

Works fine for me. Seeing as how this thing's at least 9 years old I think that speaks well of it.

Rocktron has good support in my experience... I had to order a new power supply, which cost $30 and they got to me in 3 days.

Not too bad at all for metal or rock... The clean sound isn't great, but if you see one cheap it's not a bad buy.

Yeah! It's a cutting blade in my head! This preamp has a very powerful sound and with the hush a very clean one too. A single channel preamp but very great to use. A very good system for editing and controlling manually or by midi. It seems this preamp was born form great metal music, but I've found it very useful for every kind of music. With all its dynamics it sounds very great on clean sounds too. I use all the features of this preamp and they are all very useful.

With my Ibanez js-900 with I had a very clean sound at any level withouy any kind of saturation or noise. Both clean and distorted sounds are very powerful and clean! With my Gibson Explorer the sound becomes a less clean but have you ever tried a warhammer?

I have never had any problem.

In the last 12 years I've never had a so great clean and powerful sound.

Gain, bass, treble, 2 sweepable mid freqs and levels, hush and AGX. Midi includes program mapping, CC mapping, effects loop on/off, with no gaps in midi switching (a trademark for Rocktron products.) Phantom power capable with a 7 pin midi in jack. A full range output for direct recording plus 2 additional ouputs (A and B) that are voiced differently. Also a C1 control jack that can be used to switch other processors 1/4" jacks via midi and a foot pedal jack for those without a midi foot controller to control the pro-gap. It can be switched for a latched or unlatched jack to increment or decrement the presets. Solid state distortion unlike any other unit I've ever heard. Not sure which model I have but mine takes a wallwart. I've seen the upgrade models that have internal power supplies but they skip on the phantom power (!?!?!)

I play hard music using 6 and 7 string guitars with humbuckers. I've played it through just about every amp out there. Sounds great warmed up with a nice powerfull tube amp. This is a standalone distortion pre-amp with no effects. This unit can be noisy without the hush and AGX set properly. I've found that about 34 is the best hush setting for me and the AGX knob barely clamping down on my signal so as not to take away from all the gain I'm used to. For as long as I've played and as many units and pedals I've tried, there has yet to be a preamp that has as much ballsy sustaining crunch that this unit can provide. Even the new units that Rocktron has out, including the Prophesy and the chameleon, can't hold a stick up to it in regards to the wallop of gain you have. I've always wanted too much so I have headroom to back off instead of pushing a preamp to it's limits and still feeling unsatisified. Setting the 2 sweepable mids just right is the key to getting the perfect tone for you. This unit has and probably always will be the cornerstone to my tone. I keeping searching and playing the new stuff out there to take advantage of the newer technologies, but there's something everyone's overlooking that just doesn't compare to this preamps distortion. I must agree that playing clean through this preamp isn't as agreeable to other units. It's certainly not impossible though, for I get really nice shimmering clean playing by setting the distortion to around 13 and boosting the output. Switching your pickups to the mid or neck really makes the cleans jump out nicely. At one point, I stockpiled 3 of these units for backups since they were hidden treasure for $89 each. I kinda started a trend in my area since so many guitarists were turned on to my tone. I ended up selling all of them.

This unit has gone through hell and back hooking up to crappy power outlets on stages everywhere. There's been a few tragedies where They had my side of the stage set to 220 and it smoked it. Rocktron fixed it no problem. A few other times, the bad power outlets made the unit turn off and on repetitively VERY fast and scrambled all my presets to gibberish 2 hours before a show. I was able to reprogram them within an hour and played fine. For all it's went through, It's very reliable, and can take some abuse physically and power wise.

Rocktrons track record with me has varied greatly from quick and helpfull to not responding at all to my queries. I love Rocktron's product, but their customer support is something to be desired.

I've been using this unit since around 1993 or so, and have grown to feel helpless without it. It scares me that with all the new technology out there that not a single new distortion unit has sounded like this one. I recently bought the new Rocktron Repltitone 2x12 combo amp which has distortion simulations from all their current products plus others. Since it is a digital amp with midi capabilities, I was hoping maybe it would replace having to carry a rack of gear (including my pro-gap.) I was once again let down. The disortions were nice and just when I though maybe I just need to get used to it, I plugged my pro-gap into it for comparison. Laughing, I immediately realized there was no comparison to the massive amount of gain that the pro-gap can put out. I'm probably going to have to get a petition of pro-gap users to get Rocktron to put out a new model that incorporates some of the new features of today with the gain of the pro-gap.

This is a discontinued preamp with no effects capabilities (I believe that the Chameleon has a revised version of this DTR technology now -- I originally had a v1.0, and bought the 2.1 used later on to try seamless patching -- long story short, both active and passive A/B switches have too much signal bleedthrough, and runnign two of these babies with the switch causes some pretty nasty feedback)... Editing patches are super easy, though there is a limitation to your EQ frequency combinations (you have two "spikes" to move around for the high and low mids, as well as treble and bass settings)... It's very versitile...

I currently use the ProGap with a Mesa Simulclass 2:90 (with DEEP setting), a Rocktron Intellifex and a 2x12 Rectifier cab with Celestion Vintage 30's... I've used this preamp for everything from top 40 to extreme metal, and let me say that it kicks ass for thumpy high-sustain distortion... My secret here is holding back on the preamp output level and let the tubes of the Boogie to most of the work... Great combo, and the HUSH addition is amazing at cutting unwanted noise instantly... I;ve also used this unit previously with a Marshall solid state 9000 series poweramp -- still kick-ass distortion, if not quite as sweet and natural (a little too smooth and processed), but the cleans sucked (see below)...

On the downside, though the DTR technology is great at emulating tube reaction and definition, the ProGap is a little lacking on the clean end of things... The tone is a little plunky and dead... to compensate, I use a little gain to break up the signal a bit, and wash it out slightly with a chorus/verb... This makes the cleans crisp, but it's definitely not a Fender Twin!

Totally reliable... I originally got the v1.0 in 1989 and used it until I got the 2.1 in 1992... I then sold the 1.1 to a friend, who is still using it (though he's had to clean the pots some and replace the 1/4" input jack since)

Never needed it...

Great preamp for the price... SOunds fat with incredile gain (for Metal rhythms, I use about 2/3 of the gain available, and crank it for the leads...) -- Again, the cleans need some work, but because of the processed technology, I'm not sure that it's improved much for Chameleon, though I could be wrong...

Some day I plan on replacing in with the Mesa TriAxis, but I've been saying that since it hit the market a few years ago... Oh well... no harm in dreaming...

Solid State MIDI programable preamp. FX loop, Low, two tunable mids, and high, built in hush system, AGX gain expander, etc, etc...

Ok, my set up is as follows Custom shop Ibanez (with Duncan Screamin Deamon in the bridge and a Alnico II Pro in the neck) to a Korg DTR-1 tuner to the Pro Gap to a 60 watt tube mono block power amp to a carvin 4x12 cab.

This is a nive basic programable preamp. I've owned a MP-1 and a Boogie Studio Pre... this thing smokes them both. The distortion is brutal (My settings: Level 1: +15, Freq. 1: .69k, Gain: 66, Bass: +12, Level 2: -8.0, Freq. 2: .60k, Treble: +3.0, hush: -24, Output Level: -8.0) With the previous setting as my main tone I get a very fat distortion that has exellent string definition. The cleans as good too. Big bottom and glassy highs. My only complain here is the lack of head room on the clean settings.

I've had it for three years and no probs....

This is a very well built unit. I am planning to get the Camelion 2000 because I want some FX. So if it were stolen it woldn't be that big of a deal. I do, however, highly recomend this unit for those who want a strait forward solidstate pre.

Your adverage pre-amp features: built in HUSH, bass, treb, two selectable mid frequiencies.

I've used this unit off and on for the last two years. I can get nice heavy distortion, crisp cleans and all the inbetweens. I recomend that on really high gain settings that you roll your highs down to +5.5 or less. Or you're gonna cut someone's head off.

No problems yet.

This is a good unit. no fat, just raw meat.

Very simple to use as it was bought used without any manuals. Very intuitive.

Some of the presets in there sounded nothing like the artists patches. One that comes to mind was Dave Sabo's sucky tone. Allan Hollsworths patch was pretty weak too. Tinkering with the parameters can get you nice class A type distortions, as well as the ultra high gain stuff too.

I have had it now for over 5 years, but havent been abusing it. Never let me down.

Never tried. Did look at their website once for idea on cost for manuals. Then I subsequently ordered a Pro Gap manual. Cost was $5.00 I think?

I play a variety of styles of guitar. At the time of purchase I was into total heavy distortion, and this fit the bill for that. I ran it as a pre-amp through one of my solid state Randall heads for a long time before I got my Rocktron Velocity 300 tube power amp. AWESOME@!!! I am reccommending using a tube power amp or tube head for best gain sounds.

This single-space rack-mount MIDI controllable preamp features MIDI-controllable gain, bass, treble and output level as well as two programmable parametric EQ's. The unit also features MIDI mapping, a HUSH noise reduction circuit, speaker and full-range outputs, and the ability to phantom-power a pedalboard using a 7-pin (MIDI-plus) cable. The Pro-GAP features "Virtual Tube Circuitry" which means, of course, that it doesn't have any actual tubes in it. Programming is fairly easy; scroll through the parameters and change 'em until things start to sound good. I have to rave here about the HUSH. I'd never play without one again after using this little wonder. It can make all the difference in the world, especially in the studio. It's smart, non-intrusive and clean as hell. If I ever sold my Rocktron, I'd buy a HUSH unit for whatever amp I was using to replace it.

The distortions range from full-on buzzy Pantera-style stuff to a more mellow Marshall tone. It'll never sound like a tube amp, however. It also does warmer bluesy stuff pretty well too. The bottom end is a little loose unless you spend quite a bit of time EQ'ing. Clean sounds aren't very good, but then I have yet to find a preamp that gives good clean sounds and I've tried 'em all! I can get a good hard-rock crunch that still lets each note of the chord come through.

I've had a problem with the input jack that showed up right after I bought it. I think it was a cold solder joint problem. This resulted in a squealing that would go away if I wiggled the input jack a bit. Other than that, no problems with reliability.

Here's where the problems begin. I wanted to send my Pro-GAP back to get the input jack looked at and get the software updated to the latest version. The guy on the phone assured me that my presets would be saved. I sent the unit back and waited to receive an estimate for the work. The guy phoned me and said it would be a $40 charge, and that included shipping. I asked to have it shipped next day air because I needed the unit in time for a gig on the week-end. I said I'd be willing to pay the difference in price. The guy assured me that this wouldn't be a problem. Well, Friday came and went and no preamp, so I had to play the gig with my backup amp. Then the unit finally arrived. Turns out that it had been shipped normal ground service. I installed the unit back in my rig and punched up my "standard" patch. It was gone. Scrolling around, I realized that all my presets had been erased. Pretty much years worth of tweaking were now gone. I called the Roctron service line and asked about my presets. I explained that the guy on the phone had assured me that my presets wouldn't be touched with the software update. He said "did you put in writing that you wanted your presets saved?". I admitted that I had not. He said "Hey, we get about ten calls a day asking about updates, we can't remember everyone who wants their presets saved". I countered that ANYONE with a preamp who sent it back to the factory probably wants their presets saved. He replied "sorry". That was it.
So now I face the monumental task of re-patching 30 or 40 presets that I spent months tweaking during the 5 years I owned my preamp. Not happy am I.

I've played the Rocktron for the last 5 years or so. It's a good little unit, but don't let yours go back to the factory like I did!!