Roland Cube-30 Combo

This is a follow-up.
This amp really lacks a tap tempo button!

I have hooked it to a bassman 410box loaded with alnico jensens(I own a bassman reissue, and the tentation was way too big!), and to a 115 closed-back box too, to see what happens. Read on.

With the 410 box this little cube sounds unbelievably good and loud, fresh and much detailed. It showed some critical trebles too, somewhat constipated if you forgive me.
I could hear very well the fakeness of driven tones, with their same frequencies which were displeasing. Just normal with such a box and such a type of amplifier.
The clean tone is perfect with humbuckers, very clean and fresh, nothing disturbing here.

With the 115 box the cube sounds way different, on the dirty side a la bluesman. And with a very noticeable delay due to the speaker's size (and quality, a Park 15-80w ). Again the clean is excellent, and the drives sounds processed.

In all cases the onboard eq is adequate and efficient.
The most important is: this cube really sounds awesome!

As long as you respect it, yes. The boxes I hooked it to were 8 ohms, so no trouble.
If you want pure ****, go buy a Vox AD series (any would do).
Roland stands for highest reliability, as you already know.

Very awesome little guy!
I don't understand the lack of tap tempo button, and the fact that effects volume does affect the signal in the same way, distorted or not. Everyone knows that if you set the reverb on 3 in clean mode it will be far too much in drive mode. So Roland could at least have done this differently, and I'm not speaking of adding controls or what.
For example, Hughes and Kettner do this on their analog amps: you have one reverb knob, but it acts heavier on the clean channel than on the drive channel. By the way, their bass knob acts the same on the tube 20th anniversary edition.
Can you hear me,Roland?

A short review. Feature are terrific for a practice amp and modeling is fast and intuitive. As I recall it lack an ext. speaker out, and that was an oversight.

Brutal with single coils, ice-pick, harsh, terrible.

This amp was voiced for humbucks or P90s and OD/High Gain players. It's not a pleasant experience using this for a Fenderish clean sound. If chimey high end is your thing, look elsewhere.

For what it's designed for, fine. The JC clean channel is particularly annoying and digital sizzle with good single coils.

Appears rock solid.

If you are a single coils player, try before you buy. If you're looking for decent OD/Gain thashing practice amp for your LP, SG, etc., go for it.

I own a 2005 example of the Cube-30. I bought it before I had an accurate knowledge of tube vs. digital/tranny, and only after a year of playing. I play mainly punk, grunge, metal, and some classic or hard rock. Tons of sonic options, 2 clean sounds (Jazz Chorus, Black Panel), 3 classic gain (Brit combo, Tweed, Classic stack), 2 high-gain (Metal, R-fier) and an acoustic simulator. This amp has a recording out, AUX. in, and a footswitch jack for channel switching, but np effects loop, and switching EFX on/off requires an expensive 2 footswitch thru stereo cable system. I use this amp for bedroom practice, but it can handle a band rehearsal. It's really too weak for gigging, though. Good practice amp.

I use a BC Rich Mockingbird with 2 super hot ceramic humbuckers, a Fender Mexico Strat with 3 stock singles, and a Gibson SG Special with 2 vintage-style Alnico 2 humbuckers. The amp seems to suit the Mockingbird for super high-gain settings, and the JC clean. The Strat suits the R-Fier setting, Acoustic, JC Clean, and the Black Panel clean. The SG loves the JC Clean, Brit combo, Tweed, and R-fier settings. The amp can make virtually any sound, but, the only well-mastered sounds are the Chorus effect, Jazz Chorus, and R-fier settings. Very good practice amp, but I wouldn't dare record with it, because the sounds are quite cold, and in some cases, extremely muddy. The EFX (Chorus, Flanger, Phaser, Tremolo, Delay, and Reverb) are o.k. The chorus and phaser were my favourite, while I found the Tremolo harsh, the Flanger and Reverb cold, and the delay was very hard to adjust to the perfect time (tap-tempo reqired maybe?) I found that the Black Panel was way too bright and harsh with humbuckers, and it was much louder than all the other settings. The Brit Combo was muddy and buzzy, also the Classic Stack, which sounded extremely similar to the Brit Combo. The tweed was nice, actually capturing some tube dynamics, but it was very harsh with the Mockingbird. The metal setting is nice for the Strat bridge-pickup and the Mockingbird, but isn't bright enough for the SG. As I've said before, this amp is a nice practice unit, but if you want an authentic sound, you need the real thing, or at least an all-tube circuit.

Very reliable! What can I say? It's a little solid-state combo that's never been past 5. Never had a problem.

I've never dealt with the company.

If this amp got punk'd, I'd get a Mesa F-50 or Mark IV, which I am currently saving up for. But, if I was limited to under $500, I'd probably choose this. I wish this amp had a MIDI-in for switching distortion sounds, rather than just channel switching. I also wish it had separate depth and rate controls for the efx, and a genuine spring reverb. But for $345 Canadian, you can't go wrong

je joue du metal et cet ampli me donne tous les sons dont jai besoin et plus.il y a 2 sectionss de son et on peut les changer grace a un petit bouton. sur ce bebe, on y retrouve du chorus, du flanger, du phaser et du tremolo. on y retrouve aussi du delay et du reverb. on peut brancher une boite de son pour faire plus de bruit et on peut mettre une footswitch. jaurais aime qu'il y aille de l overdrive. javoue que le tremolo et le phaser sont presque completement inutiles excepte pour se vanter davoir plein deffets. jutilise cet ampli dans mon sous-sol et je nai qu a mettre le volume au cart et cest deja tres fort.

pour jouer j utilise une laredo noire qui est vieille mais efficasse avec trois single coils, que jutilise plus souvent avec un behringer, et jai ma chere samick avion 3 (les pauls) de couleur cherryburst, qui a 2 humbuckers que jaime brancher dans le cube 30. le cube sonnes tres bien evec toutes les pedales, particulierement avec une boss od 20 drive zone twin pedal, que je reccomande d acheter tout comme moi, vous ne le regreterez pas. comme le lai ecris plus haut je joue du metal (heavy metal, thrash, black, speed, death ...) et sa me donne tous les sons, et meme plus, que jai besoin.passant du metallica nothing else matters au metallica hit the lights ou du quo vadis (groupe de death de gatineau) a tetris, tout les sons du cube sont parfait.(pourquoi ca sappelle cube 30 si ce nest pas un cube?)

on peut choisir entre du acoustic simulator(BOSS)ou acoustic, qui dailleurs ne fonctionne pas tres bien mais qui nest pas le plus utile

du black panel, qui donne un son particulier (clean)

du brit combo, qui est une distortion crue et sale

du tweed, qui est une faible distortion et est assez grave (fender)

du classic stack, qui provient de marshall, est un son de stack qui donne un son particulier

du metal, qui vient de peavey, est une distortion plus eleve en drive (gain) que les autres

du r-fier (rectifier), provient de mesa boogie, est une des plus grosses dist que je nai jamais entendu

bref, les sons varies beaucoup: dist brutale a simulateur acoustic

le cube 30 est mon bebe, je depend dessus. jai deja fait un consert devant 700 personnes avec ce bijou et cest parfait. il na jamais brise cependant cela ne fait qu un an que je lai

avec les memes vendeurs jai eu des rabais exceptionnels. ma guitare etait 660 $ et le cube etait 375. jai peille ma guitare 319 et le cube 30 300. malheureusement avec les rabais je nai pas eu de garantie

je joue depuis 9 ans avec une guitare Encore (classic), une guitare laredo noire (electrique), un ampli behringer 30 watts, une guitare samick avion 3 (av 3)cherryburst, une pedale boss od 20 drive zone twin pedal. si je perderais mon bebe ou bien je le racheterais, ou bien jacheterais le cube 60, dependemment de mon montant dargent.jaime tout de l amplificateur. avant de l acheter, jesitais entre le marshall mg15cd et quelques autres mais des que jai entendu le cube 30 je lai acheter sur le champ a cause de sa flexibilite sonore. jaimerais qu une footswitch vienne avec.


ps. je nai que 13 ans et jai fait une vingtaine de conserts solo et en band. a chaque fois que je donnais un show, javais mon cube 30 a cote de mois

Not sure what year mine is. it's pretty versatile for me: i play anything from The Beatles to Disturbed. it has two channels(one clean that is supposed to simulate a jazz chorus and another to simulate distortions, plus an accoustic simulation on the distortion channel). it has an MIDI footswitch but it doesn't come with the amp and i can't find out where to get one.it has a decent set of effects:chorus,flanger, phaser,tremolo(al on one knob;not overlappabble) and a seperate knob for reverb/delay.has a headphone jack/recording out. also aux in in the form of a 1/4 " input. despite all of these, i wish it had a tuner and that the effects had a seperate control for effects-level(all it has is speed)and that they wereoverlappable. i don't ever use the flanger because it simply isn't my styler, and i use the phaser occasionally. i use the reverb alot(almost always)and everything else moderately. i use this amp as a practice amp and as a backup for church.it would be plenty powerful for my church band but our band leader is obsessed with mic-ing anything and every thing that can be mic-ed. this is a solid-state amp.

i use an ibanez-style guitar very similar to steve vai's. both the sinle- coil and the h/bucker sound good. it makes a little noise when not playing, but why would you buy an amp just to pug in your guitar and not play. the sound goes away completely when playing.

alright, about the distortion models. it has the following:acoustic, blackpanel, brit combo, tweed, classic stack, metal stack, and rectifier stack. the accoustic sounds pretty convincing, considering that most other acoustic sims sound like poop. once while playing bass for my church, our acoustic player forgot his acoustic at home, but luckily i had my amp with me. so he plugged in his lite ash strat aand turned on the acoustic sim. the first words out of his mouth were "Wow, that accually sounds almost exactly like an acoustic". there were people in the audience that had some funny looks on their faces that day, trying to find out where the acoustic guitar sound was coming from without having an acoustic on stage. i don't personnally care much for the black panel, but both the brit and tweed combos sound good. the classic stack has too much unwanted bass for me. the rectefier has a fuzzy, nu-metal sound when the gain is turned up all the way which is good for metal leads too.but, my favorite is the metal stack on gain: approx. 3 o'clock. this gets a good marshal sound out of it, but not necessarily marshal with gain turned to eleven(wich is frankly too much for me). my favorite band is Audioslave and this setting gets me the perfect average Tom Morello gain (average being what he uses the most).

the clean channel sounds good, but the best thing about it is that you can crank it without losing your tone. althou it is good, it doesn't quite sound like the jazz chorus that it's advertised to sound like.

now to tackle the effects. im not much of an effects guy, buti understand that they occasionally have their uses and still try to make the best of them. the only effect that i can find a great deal to complain about is the delay. it doesn't have the length that i would like, but even more detrimentally, it is more of a bockground effect. each delayed signal sounds alot more quiet than the last, so you don't get a sound as if there are two guitars playing one after the other, more like an echo than a delay.

the reason this gets knocked down to a six is because of the speaker. i have had this amp for over a year and just recently i decided to try something new. i used the headphone jack to plug into my 16 watt bass amp (with an eminence speaker)an it sounded, well, completely stellar. simply beautiful. the clean acually sounded somewhat bright and the distortions all just sang. the acoustic sounded even more like an acoustic. everything just sounds overall better. the only problem is that my bass amp, being a 16 watt amp, cant handle anything above a loud practice setting(loud being about the sound of an average noisy washing machine)with the thirty watts of the cube driving it.

also, i tried running some dist/overdr boxes into the amp, but it doesn't seem to be very compatible with external tone shaping.

this amp has never broken down on me. just recently i pluged in my guitar in and i didn't get any sound. i jiggled the cable input and i sound for just a second and then it went away again. i was getting worried but it just ended up being the cord, thank goodness. i wouldn't use it on stage without a backup, but that is because i would use it as a backup. it sounds good enough to use it if you have to and is durable enough to be counted on as a backup, but i wouldn't use it with the stock speaker as a main amp.

haven't had to deal with company.

ive been playing for fun for three years but have only been serious for the last year. i have also played bass for a year(seriously all the way through) and im starting drumming (all around musician i suppose). in case you were wondering, my other bass amp is kustom kba 16 (with an 8" speaker) i think.

if this were stolen, i would probably get a tube driven amp. probably the classic 30.

what i love is that i got this a year ago on christmas as a present (because my cousin decided that he wanted to pick up guitar again and i had to give back the amp that he gave me after he quit playing; he has once again quit already). this amp is what made me get serious about guitar. if youy are looking to uprgrade from your crappy solid state 10/15 watt crate amp (just for example) and aren't quite ready for the responsibility of a nicer tube amp(or simply don't have mony for a nicer amp period), this is a great amp.

what i hate is that i payed for a couple of effects that aren't versatile enough for me and that i don't ever use. also, i don't care much for the speaker.

i didn't compare this to many other amps, but looking back on it, i needed an amp really badly beacouse i didn't have one and there really isn't much to compare this to. it is the best amp in its wattage range with all of the modelling crap on it.

musicians friend just knocked it down about 5$. but, they also have the cyber deluxe on sale for three hundred and thats 150 dollars off. it has more than twice the wattage and the effectgs are higher quality. i wouls get the cyber deluxe if i were you.

IM CURRENTLY IN THE MARKET FOR A NEW AMP, SO IF YOUR INTERESTED IN BUYING THIS FROM ME FOR AROUND 150$, JUST EMAIL ME.

awsome features. i was blown away wuth all the kick ass distortion and delay i could put on this baby. probubly the best jam amp around in turms of badassity. but i loved the octive option as well as all the other settings, and with a pedal pretty much put every other bass amp below 1000 dollers to shame. you could jsut about put this amp in any musical style adn not sound like its spread itself thin.

basicly i look like about 60 times the pro i am. considering im not a pro this means that thes amp has siccesfully distorted realaty itself in order to multiply by zero. i actually put my guitarist to shame as far as distortion went. and my style is discribed as acoustic industreal/ alternitive rock - like NIN + smashing pumpkins i guess. i it is way louder thatn other 30 watts and like i said befour, the badassity is through the roof.

well i cought it just recently so it hasn't exactly been gigged out. but it seems pretty damn solid and if it were a person, it would be some kind of commando.

it was a gift-im not as rude as to ask how the shopping went. meh

my only other amp was a kostom 10 watt (lol) witch i needed to put on overdrive to sound messed enugh. works well with a pedal. excuse my spelling

I just gave it high ratings two reviews ago, and in the meanwhile I could check out what other 30watters are on the market now.
So yes, I really think the cube is the best sounding out there.
However, I would like to see some improvements:
1-A built-in tuner, be it as simple and effective as the microcube's one
2-A master volume
3-The delay effect in the same department as the chorus&co, which then would allow footswitching on/off without losing reverb
4-A tap tempo button, so the existing knobs would do the effects mix
5-A very nice feature would be a recording out not affecting the speaker's signal.

With all these very minor interface-only mods this cube 30 would be good for the next century without more mods whatsoever.

Let's hope Roland hear me!

Achete neuf en 2005 a Paris pour 260 Euros.
Je me suis offert ce petit ampli essentiellement pour jouer a bas volume en appartement.
Il s'agit d'un ampli a modelisation (technologie Roland Cosm), d'une puissance de 30W. C'est plus que suffisant en puissance pour un appartement. Je n'ai eu l'occasion de l'essayer a un volume plus consequent que dans le magasin, et cela m'a semble tres convainquant.
2 canaux, avec egalisation 3 bandes commune aux 2.
1 canal clair, emulation d'un Jazz Chorus Roland 120, un master volume.
1 canal lead, gain et master volume, 7 modelisations : acoustic, fender twin, vox, fender tweed, marshall stack, peaveay, mesa rectifier.
U regret : le manque de progressivite des potards (pas evident a regler a bas volume).
Une section d'effets avec modulation : chorus, flanger, phaser, tremolo.
Une section d'effets avec retard : delay, reverb
1 prise casque, 1 entree auxiliaire, 1 entree pour footswitch (changement de canal)
Je trouve que ces caracteristiques donnent une grande polyvalence pour ce qui demeure un ampli de travail. Les reglages d'effet sont notoirement insuffisants, mais je suppose que ce n'est pas ce que l'on demande a ce genre d'ampli.

J'utilise cet ampli principalement avec une Fender Strat US Standard ou une Fender Telecaster Mexico avec micros Bill Lawrence, occasionnellement une Rickenbacker 330, une wha Morlay et une TS809, essentiellement pour jouer du blues.
Il s'agit de 3 guitares avec des micros single coil. Le canal clair est correct sans plus. On est encore loin du JC120... .
Le canal lead est beaucoup plus convainquant, en particulier les modelisations de Fender Twin et de Marshall Stack (Classic Stack), en tous cas avec la Strat et la Tele. En restant raisonnable sur le gain, on obtient des overdrive tres realistes pour jouer le blues et le rock.
Le HP de 10' semble etre d'une excellente qualite, ce qui joue bien sur beaucoup sur la qualite du son.
Sans revenir sur l'eternel debat, il evident que les sons obtenus sont assez eloignes des originaux a lampes. Cependant, la qualite intrinseque des sons obtenus est excellente quand on les compare a la grande majorite tres moyenne des amplis a lampes que l'on rencontre habituellement.
Le son obtenu respecte entierement les caracteristiques de la guitare employee et du jeu du musicien (attaques), ce qui est appreciable pour le blues. Avec une petite compression en entree, c'est le bonheur a ce niveau de volume. Pour en avoir essaye des palanquees, je n'ai pas encore trouve mieux.
Avec des micros double bobinage, les sons clairs sont bien meilleurs.
La sortie OUT/casque est relativement utilisable pour l'enregistrement, mais j'ai obtenu de bien meilleurs resultats en reprenant le HP avec un micro, y compris a bas volume, ce qui est surprenant.
Les effets embarques ne sont pas terribles, en dehors de la reverb, a petite dose. Pour les afficionados du traitement sonore, il faudra penser a investir dans les pedales adhoc...
Un regret : l'absence de boucle d'effet pour pouvoir mettre en insert les effets en question.
Possedant par ailleurs un modelisateur d'ampli J-Station et un preamp Marshall JMP1, j'apprecie l'entree auxiliaire qui me permet d'utiliser les 2 entrees du Cube 30 avec une petite A/B Box Roland. J'utilise egalement cette entree auxiliaire pour amplifier ma basse, avec laquelle j'obtiens un son tres correct (c'est une basse active Ibanez BTB 400).

Cela semble costaud. Il s'agit d'un ampli a transistor, peu sujet en principe aux pannes.

Je n'ai pas eu a m'en servir jusqu'a present.

J'ai 43 ans et joue depuis l'age de 15 ans. Je possede egalement un tombereau de matos divers et varie: ampli Peavey 60 (pour la basse),un HH 100W avec enceinte SoundCity 2x12 (pour les repetitions), un preamp Marshall JMP1, Ibanez Tube Screamer, Banzai Fireball, Wha Morlez, Phaser Electro Harmonix, Roland A/B Box, Art Tube Compressor, Art Tube Pre Amp, Art FX1, Multi-effets Zoom 2002... et j'en oublie. Je ne parle pas ici de ce qui m'est par ailleurs passe entre les mains ou que j'ai possede par ailleurs !
Cote guitares : Fender Strat US Standard, Fender Tele MIM, Rickenbackern 330, Vantage XX, Yamaha electro-acoustique Compass CPx15w, basse Ibanez BTB 400.
Ce que j'aime dans cet ampli : le (tres bon) son a bas volume pour le blues et le rock, le prix, le poids. J'apprecie egalement qu'il laisse entendre le guitariste...
Ce que j'aime moins : des effets qui font honte a Roland (en dehors de la reverb), l'impossibilite d'avoir 2 canaux "lead" pour beneficier de toutes les modelisations sur chacun d'entre eux, le manque de progressivite des potards de gain et de volume, l'absence d'une boucle d'effets.
C'est un excellent rapport qualite/prix, a recommander a tout le monde. Pour les debutants, ce sera l'occasion de faire un investissement rentable sans le mondre risque (y compris pour la repet., a moins de jouer avec un batteur fou). Pour les autres, cela fait un excellent ampli pour pratiquer a la maison ou pour enregistrer.

it's been covered. (could have come with a foot switch though) pretty good for the price.

this little guy really suprised me. it really does sound pretty good. by itself it isn't bad at all considering the 10" speaker and 30 watt power rating. i just wired up an extension speaker jack on mine (disconnects the internal speaker when a cable is plugged in. radio shack $4.00 for two) through a halfback mesa 112 it sounds stellar. blackpanel is particularly juicy sounding and will do both clean and slight break-up. i find that modeling amps have the hardest time with slight break-up sounds. all of the models are much more convincing through the 112. (remember it also weighs more than the amp) the high gain models are a lot of fun. good for fast noodling and actually have pretty tight bass. they don't sound just like the 5150 and dual-rec they were modeled after but they sound good. for a laugh i hooked the line out through a 100 watt tube head (effects loop return) and a genz g-flex. oh my, the models got exponentially better. actually made me consider using it as a preamp for some things. the clean channel is good but black panel and high gain stack are the stars of the show. (wish i could have both on seperate channels) the reverb is not bad but the effects are so bold they aren't really usable in most situations. the acoustic sim is a waste of a slot that could have housed a useful model.

as far as how loud it is. is isn't terribly loud by itself (very small gig at best) with the 112 it's about twice as loud. now we're getting somewhere it might actually cut it up against a drummer. pretty impressive for what it is. considering its price i give it a 9. it really is a fun amp

haven't had it long enough but i would guess it'll be ok

i've been playing for about 17 years. i have played through or owned almost every type of amp out there. some highlights include, mesa tremoverb, dc-3, marshall jcm800, mk II masterlead, laney vc30 112,peavey delta blues, and various rack setups. this little amp is the best practice amp ever. the amount of sound you get from this little package is astounding. i highly recommend the extension jack mod though.

I would give the features a ten, but the 4 effects don't overlap. The only one I think much of is the flanger. I like both the delay and the reverb, but those two won't overlap each other.

There's only one channel that can be manipulated, the auxillary in goes straight out.

This amp easily goes too loud to play when my mom's home, though it did start breaking up at about three o'clock with some of the amp models.

If I gigged (or when I eventually do) I expect this amp would work in small gigs, and it should work as a preamp in larger affairs.

I have a Lite Ash Strat with Seymor Duncan pickups, and I send it straight into the amp. I am primarily a rocker, 70's and 80's mostly, which I think this amp does excellently, and I also play some pop and a little country, and whatever else I feel like, and this amp fits everything I do.

I plugged in my Ovation Celebrity (what it lacks acoustically it makes up for plugged in), and it sounded pretty decent on the acoustic amp model.

When the gain is turned all the way up, there is just a little noise on all but one amp model, but it's not at all prominent, and it's unnoticeable when playing.

While some of the amp models do start falling apart at loud volumes, the clean channel seems to hold on well all the way up.

I like the distortion, there's almost too much for me at the top of some of the models, but death metalers won't find enough for their music. The distortion stays musical throughout it's range.

It seems like it's pretty sturdy.

Haven't had to deal with them.

I've only been playing about four years, and this is my first amp, and the Strat is my first electric, and only my second guitar. I was in serious need of an electric guitar to adequately play the music I wanted to. I researched many other amps, but for what I wanted and in my price range, this one was the best I could find. The other amp I was considering was a Behringer V-Tone GMX110, but people seemed to have less problems with this Roland.

It is a bit heavy, and the strap is a bit stiff, but these are minor complaints compared to what I really want: sound.

This amp is a lot of fun to play around with and sounds great, especially for the price.