Postby lono » 23 Apr 2012, 19:58
Hi noise 5150. I'm new to this forum, but I saw your post and thought I might be able to help. I have a TSl122 combo and the matching 2x12 extention cab that I got about five years ago. I just got a JVM410H and a 1960AV cab.
When I first got the tsl, I thought it was kind of wimpy sounding, especially at low volumes. The overdrive sounded thin, fizzy and brittle, and if I raised the bass or decreased the treble or presence to thicken the high end, the low notes turned to mud, and the fizz was still there to some extent. I cranked it through a hotplate to get power tube overdrive, and that helped a lot, but then I started having all the problems these amps seem to be famous for, like drifting bias and overheating, frying power tubes etc...
Eventually, after researching it as much as I could, I sent it to Trace Davis at Voodoo Amps. He fixed it and also did his "standard mod" package. Oh yeah, I had problems getting correct levels and good tone with the effects loop, and he modded that too.
Anyway, the thing sounds absolutley killer now: from warm beautiful cleans, to bluesy grit, classic rock crunch and punchy metal tones. Nice fat smooth leads and endless sustain, even with fairly low levels of gain. It's also been totally reliable for three years so far. If you can pick one of these up cheap and send it to Voodoo and spend two or three hundred bucks, you're golden.
Then I got the JVM. It's a great amp just as it ships. Lots of channels and modes to set up a variety of tones from jazz or country clean to the highest gain metal tones you could want. Awesome footswitch, MIDI controlable... except it has the same underlying fizzy, buzzy distortion tone... :(
I've dialed it all sorts of ways, checked out suggestions on the JVM forum...and I've had good results, but compared to my TSL, it's still lacking both tone and dynamics. I'm saving as I write this to send the JVM to the witch doctor (Trace) to get some voodoo... If he can (and from reviews I've read, he can) do what he did for my TSL, all will be good... I hope this was of some help. :)