Sovtek Mig 50

vol, bass, mid, treb, pres. You know the deal. The simplicity is the beauty of it. Purchased used... serial #000769. This thing is in fantastic condition.

Using a tele and a les paul, playing classic rock and funk. Running it into a 2x12 cab with 50W weber speakers. Guitar straight into amp is an incredible sound. I used to use a Marshall 401 tube combo and there is no comparison.

I usually plug in to the bright channel or run a Y cord into both. It seems to overdrive earlier with both channels going. With the les paul humbuckers, it starts overdriving good about midway on the volume dial. With the tele single coils, I have to go to about 1 or 2 o'clock. It is very loud at those levels and can be a very loud amp in general. No problem with small to medium gigs.

At practice or in small rooms, I have to step on my fireball overdrive to get what I need. I just turn the volume until the power tubes start to kick in a bit then hit the overdrive pedal... and it is sweet. This a most perfect arrangement for me because I still have just enough clean headroom when needed. Sometimes I have to roll off the guitar volume a bit to get there. It's not crystal clear clean... just a tad of breakup.

Oh my god, this thing sounds GREAT!

Bought it used and had to replace the preamp tubes. One was making a fizzing noise when cranked. I just replaced all three with groove tubes and it's marvelous. Took it to am amp tech for a tune up and when I picked it up, all three guys working there were gushing about how great the thing sounds.

Playing for 6 years. I have a 40W Marshall combo (which sucks), a 15W fender blues jr (great for band practice and sounds terrific), and this guy, which sounds far better than anything I've ever owned.

The only questionable thing about it is the knobs and power switches don't inspire alot of confidence. THis is the only reason it doesn't get a 10 across the board. But this thing doesn't live in the back of a tour van or anything, so I don't expect to have problems.

I paid more than the average going rate, but again, it's in great shape. For 300 bucks, I would do it again in a heartbeat. The best value I've seen in an amp.

Made in Russia in the mid 90s-discontinued now. As others have stated, this amp is a copy of the '59 bassman/marshall JTM circuit. It has two channels, normal and bright. You can use a Y cable or an A/B box to blend the channels together. I like to get most of the volume from the regular channel, and bring the bright channel up slowly to a desirable level. The bright channel by itself is too bright.

Amp has treble, bass, middle, and presence controls which are shared by both channels (I guess that makes it a one channel amp?) The tubes are 5881s (6L6s) which are found in most larger Fenders. Newer Marshalls tend to have EL34s.

This amp, rated at 50 watts has plenty of power. I have heard people say things like "this is the loudest 50 watts I've heard). Not to preach, but a 50 watt tube amp has about 85% of the "loundess" of a 100 watt amp. In fact, a 50 watt amp is only half as loud as a 250 watt amp-and how many of those do you see? So yes, this amp has plenty of power. BTW, if you've ever heard a 15 watt amp cranked all the way up through a 4x12 cab, you will get a better idea of the whole wattage thing.

I do sometimes miss reverb in this amp, and I dont really like delay or reverb pedals. This sort of limits the versatility of the amp. I do find, however, that the amp has a sort of natural "echoy" tone at medium-high volumes that make up for the lack of reverb. And if you happen to be in a room with good acoustics, you won't miss the reverb at all.

I mainly play a MIJ Telecaster or a Hamer Special FM through this amp. I use various distortion pedals: Boss DS-1, Ibanez TS-9, Fabtone, ProCo Rat 2 in different combinations for a variety of sounds. The amp is a little noisy at times, but nothing noticeable in a gig or rehearsal situation. I do have a strat, but I like the strat through my fender amp a lot better (again the reverb thing)

I play punk and old school metal through this amp. Even the cheap MIJ tele sounds great. Harmonics jump out of this amp and any of the above distortion pedals sound good. I also have an MXR phase 90 that I use for some trippy Pink Floyd sounds or Randy Rhoads/Van Halen stuff that sounds great through this rig too.

I have been playing through a 1x12 closed back VHT cab, and the low end is brutal. I have heard this amp referred to as the "grunge amp" and I have to agree. Its ability to get along with a variety of distortion pedals and retain its low end character make it very suitable for grunge, punk rock and yes, even metal. The mid control is very responsive and can get the scooped out sound easily, especially when combined with the right pedals.

I have not had the opportunity to crank this amp full out yet, but I've had it to 6 or7: very loud with a nice tube breakup. A simple TS-9 or some powerful humbucker can easily bring this amp into nice power tube saturation at these levels.

Seems reliable so far, although I don't know about the knobs and jacks on the outside-all plastic. I am the second owner of this amp, which is about 7 years old, and it has held up so far. For the people complaining about the plastic parts-consider the price you paid for this gem, and the fact that many people in Russia couldn't even get a loaf of bread or some toilet paper without waiting on line for hours. So they were out of metal parts-BFD.

I don't think any exists anymore. But I have a good local amp tech.

My overall rating is a 9, for what it does, it is a great amp with real tubey tube tone.

I have compared this amp to my Princeton Reverb. The two are voiced very differently, with the PR being much "sweeter" then the Mig 50-which is more aggressive and wants to be overdriven with a good pedal.

I would buy another one of these for the simple reason that it is one of the best sounding amps I have ever heard-along with my PR, the fender twin reverb and '59 fender bassman.

Low S/N, its an early one. Very straight forward if you can handle an amp without a master vol. Has a Bass (1)and Treble (2) inputs,Treble,Middle,Bass, Presence controls,Standby,on/off . A very loud Euro 50 watts! As loud as any amp needs to be and louder than most. Nice feature on back panel is the seperate 4 - 8 - 16 ohm speaker inputs, you will also find the fuse holder and a/c cord outlet here. If you dig KIS (keep it simple) technology, you'll dig this amp.

Play Gibson guitars with stock pickups and components. Great rock amp. If you go straight in, you get that old flappy loose bass sound, to tighten it up i run into a Rat first, run the vol.s on the amp (they seem to bleed a little into each other) wide open and bring it back down with the Rat, set the Rats dist. at the second mark, a little filter and viola, Rock City!, if you need more edge, run the dist. up to third mark on the Rat. Makes a nice Metal sound, clean and tight. Amp adds no color to the sound like a Marshall, very pure, stays fairly quiet even all the way up. I like to run it high and turn down at my guitar, then for lead breaks you got some headroom. You'll have to experiment to suit your needs, the Rat definitely tightens up the bass though. I use it thru a Marshall 412 w/75 watt speakers. I've had a lot of old amps and vintage celestions, there nice but the 75's have a nice bit of snap to 'em and can handle high vols. better. Depending on what pedal you use, its a very versatile amp.

I havent done nothing to the amp in ten + years, only recently got some new high bass 5881's,seem to brighten up the bass response a bit.

I was going to replace a jack ,they sent me one free of charge w/resistor too, i still havent put it in, i leave my guitar plugged in all the time anyways.

Playing a long time, 30+ years, also own a Marshall 50 1987X and a JTM 45,A Randall and a SLP (which i recently sold.) I have also owned several original plexis in the past. Some people say these sound like a Marshall but i dont think so, they do compress a bit when opened up and have the ability to run clean and tight all the way up - a la Marshall, but they dont have that familiar Marshall sound - but a great pure un - colored sound thats hard to find with all the Hy Gain shit on the market today. Great Amp! I Use a Rat to tighten up the bass and add distortion and control the overall volume of this Lil' Monster, trying to get it to distort naturally will blow your ears off and give you a flappy loose farty bass sound, the Rat is a must or some other pedal that works for you like a Tube screamer.

Just an update...

In my review i was using my old Epiphone LP-100. Since then I have purchased a new g&l asat (telecaster) and thesound through the sovtek is very sweet indeed :) . I have used my old solid state fender m-80 combo for a gig once (with my new tele) since buying my mig, but the mig puts it to shame! I am so impressed by the mig that I am interested in buying some more sovtek heads! For such low price they are a bargain..

Amp was purcheased new in 1996 It is one of the misspelled presence models. Very basic in design 2 inputs 1 vol. 3 eq 1 presence All tube.
Input 1 seems to have a lower gain than input 2
I have used this amp in small to med. sized clubs and it has performed well.

This amp has a great tone, very true to the guitar being played. I play through a Marshall 1936 cabinet with 2 12' speakers and play mainly blues and R&B. With a Gibson ES-335 the sound is very resonant ( Input 2 ) with the eq around 12 o'clock position( maybe back off the bass a bit ) and the volume at 2 o'clock keeping the guitar volume down around 3 or 4 you can dial up a great blues tone. The amp is not noisy and for real bite you ned to add a pedal. I did compare this amp to a fender vibrolux reverb and while it does have a unique sound (Marshall? ) it was not as sweet or as bright as the fender.

Never had any problems with the amp, used it for 2 years as my main rig.

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Playing guitar for over 30 years, I do like the warm tube tone of this amp and have used it for recording work. I think that it is a great amp for blues and can be good for other styles as well. For the price, it is a true bargain.

not much feature wise... regular and bright inputs. cioupl eof volume controls (no master gain) and eq.

I am using it with a sovtek 2x12 upright slanted cab. The clean sound is brilliant - turn it up enough and it starts overdriving into a 'bluesy' classic rock'n'roll overdrive. I am using it currently with my epiphone lp-100 and it sounds much better than my old fender solid-state m-80 chorus, and I am hoping it will sound nice with my new g&l asat I have ordered.

the amp is only new, but i ordered it inter state from sydney to hobart (thats in australia folks) and the store i boughrt it off put practically no cushioning for it in the cardboard box. Juts two peices f bubble wrap on the top and bottom (none on the sides and front & back). The fact that it worked fine when i finnaly got it indicates it at least deserves a 7. Howver the switches and knobs are all plastic and i have heard they have a tendency to break so I will see what happens... Howver considering the cheap price any repairs are not much of a problem..

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brilliant budget all tube amp that sounds great with most pedals. I'd give it a 10 for blues and 60's rock'n'roll (sounds extra neat with a ultra short delay 50's style delay), with i do often play in a covers band, but for added versatilty you do need to shell out extra for some stompboxes. For their amazingly cheap price, every guitarist sould have one as either a back up amp or as their main amp.

plastic inputs and switches suck. apart from that it is clean as hell.

amazing. i use it in recordings for relatively clean sounds and it is very fender esque - maybe even a bit brighter (if you use input II that is).

just acquired it. fingers crossed.

doubt there is any since they've been discontinued.

i was really impressed with this. i use a mig 50 for heavier riffage and this for the clean stuff. it really sounds vintage - all warm and gooey. can't praise it enough.

Russian production Amp, one channel, two imputs (high and Low), 3-band EQ, 4-8-16 OHM spkr. outputs, no reverb, no FX loop. I mostly play blues and classic rock covers in a 3-pc bar band, and my main guitars are a hammer special with mini-humbuckers and a Gibson Les Paul studio. I use the "hot" channel, and control it with my volumes on the guitars for dynamics. I always did this even with channel switching amps, as there was always too much distinction between clean and gain stages for a smooth transition for soloing. The low imput sounds a bit flat, but I haven't really given it enough attention yet to pass judgement. This is the closest thing to an old marshall you'll find. My 'holy Grail" was an early 50wt Plexi with matching 8-10 cab that I sold in a moment of idiocy and confusion as a scatterbrained teenager, and have been experimenting and accepting my fate for years. This amp will raunch and bark with the best, and for a fraction of the cost too. Would I prefer more features like 2 channels and FX loop etc? maybe...and maybe not! For $249.00, I'm not complaining. The only other Marshall Amp I've enjoyed over the past decade or more was a little JTM30 combo and that was $500 bucks! I match this Sovtek up with a 2-12 celestion greenback bottom and it kicks!! I'm eager to hear it with a 4-12 too! I was considering upgrading the tubes, but the originals (Sovtek 5881's) are sounding great, and ...who wants to spend the cash anyway! If it ain't broke...don't fix it!

The amp is a meat and potatoes straight ahead balls to the wall rock and blues amp...no frills!! End of story. Match it up with a good cabinet for all it's sonic raunchiness!!

i use it on all my bar gigs without a back-up and am considering purchasing another for odd and even gigs (he he) and back-up. Has never broken down yet in the past year I've owned it.

warranty was for 1 year, I think, and I've never contacted electro-harmonix.

I'm playing for 35 yrs and would replace it if it were stolen. It's as good as most marshalls out there, if not better, and is dirt cheap.

I bought the amp used through a friend's recommendation. He swore that it was a JTM-45 copy (like the Bassman) and that it would blow me away. I checked out the schematics of a JTM-45/bassman and the amp it nearly identical except for the layout on the control panel and the size of the head, of course. Input 1 has a nice, clean, warm tone at low volumes. If you want a distorted sound similar to Mick Taylor, just crank it. Input 2 is a little too bright, but still sounds good. Those looking for reverb and channel switching are out of luck, but the amp is great if you want the JTM-45/Bassman tone.

I use a 1962 Fender Stratocaster reissue that is a solid body (no tremolo). For old classic rock like Cream, the Stones or even some early Zepellin, you can't beat the sound of this amp when it's cranked. Most of the noise I hear is from the single coils on my guitar, but that's no big deal. The amp also sounds great at lower volumes if you're looking for a Steve Cropper-type clean sound. If you're looking for a reverb, I'd suggest getting a Danelectro delay pedal (analog) or even an older DOD reverb/delay (digital). I use the amp through a 1970's Marshall cabinet which probably has vintage Celestion 30's in it. I was using a JCM 800 50 watter (late 1980's) through the cabinet and it does not really compare to the Mig 50.

I recently bought the amp, so no problems. The amp has Soviet military tubes and is built like a tank, so I don't really foresee any major problems other than changing the tubes when I wear them out

There's no warranty, but I'm sure any technician could work on it because of its simplicity

I've been playing for nearly 15 years and this is one of the nicest amps I've played through. My first amp was a 1980's Marshall 50-watt combo. I thought it was nice. Then I had the pleasure of playing through an older 100-watt MKII which is the nicest amp I've played through. For the money and the sound, the Mig 50 is definitely worth buying if you can find one. Try it through a Marshall cabinet and you'll be glad you bought it. The only thing is that it looks kind of goofy sitting on the wider cabinet. If you can get past that cosmetic problem, then you'll be OK.

Don't know what year it was made in. I bought it four years ago for $175, and have practiced and giged with it religiously ever since. The head has eight states, hundreds of gigs, and even more practices on it, and has never let me down, EVER!

We play pop punk (in the vein of Green Day), and this amp blows away any other amp I've ever heard. I use a 1965 Fender Mustang (all original) with a Danelectro Fab Tone distortion pedal through the normal input (number 1), with a Sovtek 4x12. The clean sound is ubeatable, and the Fab Tone has a ton of crunch. The two together give me a big, meaty distortion, with just enough bite when palm muted (which is saying a lot, with 36 year old single coil pickups).

I've giged with it for four years, and it's the only amp I own.

I've never had to deal with customer support.

Does Anyone know where I can get another Sovtek 4x12? Mine still sounds great, and is still sturdy as a mule, but four years of road wear are starting to take a toll. I would LOVE another, but they're increasingly difficult to find. If anyone knows, they can email me at BenEndless@aol.com. Thanks.