Anyone tried a Peavey Vypyr yet?

[graeme]

Because I work with three totally different types of bands - one jazz/swing oriented, one basically Motown and one early rock/rockabilly - I seem to have acquired all sorts of extra pedals, external FX units, etc. to give me the sounds I want.

I'm fed up with carting all this stuff around (I carry everything, to avoid leaving something essential behind ) and I've been looking at modelling combo amps to reduce the load. I've played with the Behringer LX210 (not powerful enough) and the Line 6 Spider (wasn't very impressed by the sounds). Also, neither of them performed well with my GR33 synth.

Now I'm looking at the Peavey Vypyr 100. From what I read and have heard on You Tube, this looks as though it might suit me well, but nobody within 600 km of where I live has one and would only get me one if I guaranteed to buy it.

So, my question is, does anyone here have first-hand experience of this amp?

[cleggy]

Hi, graeme, I have a vypyr 15 to practice with when the kids are in bed. I use my headphones. I have not tried a 100 watter, but I think that it is just a more powerful version of mine with extra effects. To summarise, the 15 is quiet in operation & the effects are pretty good for the money. I like the fact that I can get delay & reverb on together unlike other makes whereby you can only get one or the other. It also has a cd/mp3 input for practise. Other makes don't always offer that facility, which is strange when they are making practice amps. The only bad thing about my 15 is that the onboard tuner is faulty. This is my second vypyr 15 amp with this problem (original one exchanged under warranty.) I use a separate tuner to tune up. I think this must be a common problem with this amp.
The manual comes on a disk rather than a booklet type.

cleggy

[graeme]

Thanks for the input. I'm finding myself more and more drawn to one of these amps. It's a bit odd about the tuner, but I doubt if I would use it even if it did work.

I'm currently using a Hughes & Kettner combo for live work and although I quite like it, the on-board FX are just not to my taste - more suitable for a HM player - hence all the external stuff .

[cleggy]

Hi graeme, I personally think all modelling amps are a bit of a compromise fx wise. Like I said earlier I went for the vypyr 15 because it had echo & reverb together & it had a cd/mp3 input, not because it sounded the best. Line6 & vox valvetronix didn't have these 3 features on a low watt amp, so I bought the Peavey. I agree that the line6 sound isn't convincing, & line6 sting you £'s for the foot pedal that is a must have optional extra. I have played a vox valvetronix & it sounded as good as the peavey, but at the end of the day you must try these amps out for yourself to make your own decision. You don't say which area you are from, so I can't suggest which retailers to try. I went miles to a dealer with all the gear in store I wanted to try, to buy my amp. Sometimes it's worth it to get the right thing, rather than shopping online & ending up with the wrong thing.
Don't forget that peavey now make a vypyr valve version. Worth checking out!
On the whole I have always found peavey to be the make with a good name that doesn't charge the earth for it.
cleggy

[graeme]

Dec 17, 2009 21:57:17 GMT cleggy said:

I personally think all modelling amps are a bit of a compromise fx wise. Like I said earlier I went for the vypyr 15 because it had echo & reverb together & it had a cd/mp3 input, not because it sounded the best.

I agrre about the compromise thing, but I'm fed up with carting all this gear around. It wouldn't be so bad if I didn't have the PA and lights as well .

I downloaded all the written stuff I could find about these amps and it certainly looks good on paper. I've yet to see a really bad review and the only one that wasn't too happy had obviously chosen the wrong amp for what he wanted to do. Like you, I also need the CD input (in my case to run my GR33 into it when not using the PA).

Dec 17, 2009 21:57:17 GMT cleggy said:

...line6 sting you £'s for the foot pedal that is a must have optional extra.

To be fair, the Vampyr really needs the foot controller as well, if you want to get the most flexibility out of it.

Dec 17, 2009 21:57:17 GMT cleggy said:

....at the end of the day you must try these amps out for yourself to make your own decision.

That's precisely the advice I would have given to someone asking my question. However, I live in southern Spain and the nearest dealer to me is either Barcelona or Madrid (both about 700 km drive) and neither have the model I want in stock! They'll get me one, but only if I pay up front for it. It's actually much cheaper for me to buy online from a company that will let me send it back if I don't like it.

On the plus side, I already have a small Peavey amp and I've been very happy with that, given it's limitations, so I'm reasonably sure a Vampyr won't be a huge disappointment.

Dec 17, 2009 21:57:17 GMT cleggy said:

Don't forget that peavey now make a vypyr valve version. Worth checking out!

Not for me - I haven't used or wanted a valve amp for years . I'm primarily interested in the cleaner sounds one gets from a transistor amp. I only need to dirty it up occasionally, which is why I can get away with modelling, rather than the 'real thing'.

Dec 17, 2009 21:57:17 GMT cleggy said:

On the whole I have always found peavey to be the make with a good name that doesn't charge the earth for it.

Agreed.

[cleggy]

Hi graeme, sorry I haven't got back to you earlier, what with Christmas & all that!

Taking into account of your full situation, I think you won't go far wrong with the vypyr 100. At the end of the day, Peavey are a very good make & have been making amps for decades. All round for what you need, it has all the spec. It don't cost the earth either, so if it don't float your boat you haven't wasted your life savings!

cleggy

[George Lewis]

Hi Graeme,

I agree about the compromise thing, but I'm fed up with carting all this gear around. It wouldn't be so bad if I didn't have the PA and lights as well .

Just a thought you have probably already had. Why not consider using a pedal type amp simulator eg korg Ampworks, POD, V-Amp2, Zoom G2 etc etc, straight into the PA. Relatively cheap and a LOT easier to cart around than an amp. ;D All have a wide variety of sims and effects but do require experimentation when you want a particular sound. Also the best sim for a particular amp is not necessarily the "official" one.
Regards
George

[graeme]

Dec 29, 2009 19:57:21 GMT George Lewis said:

Just a thought you have probably already had. Why not consider using a pedal type amp simulator eg korg Ampworks, POD, V-Amp2, Zoom G2 etc etc, straight into the PA.

For the sort of small venue work I normally get involved with, putting the guitar through the PA doesn't really work that well, because all of the other instruments are 'on stage' and doing this rather divorces the guitar from the rest of the band. In big venues, where everything goes through the PA, this is the best solution. I also get to dep sometimes with all sorts of weird combinations and I need to have a complete rig of my own, rather than rely on what might be a dodgy PA.

I already have both a V-Amp II and a V-AMP Pro, also a Zoom 505 and RFX 2000 and I find all this stuff just a bit of a PITA (I know that doesn't sound like a lot but you have to remember I often have a midi guitar rig as well). I like the idea of a modelling amplifier that has a bit of wellie (I had a Behringer LX210 which did 90% of what I want, but was quieter than my Laney 30w amp). If I can find a modelling amp that does what I want, all this stuff becomes redundant and I can ditch it.

My H&K Matrix combo gets pretty close, but it only has one clean channel, the other three are dirty - which I don't use a lot. Thus, I can only really setup a single FX patch on that one channel, so it's a bit limited in that way.

In fact, since I made the original post, I bit the bullet and ordered a Vypyr and a Sanpera II pedalboard. As cleggy says, they're not ball-breakingly expensive and if I really hate it, I'll just sell it on. I do have a little Peavey practice amp and that has always sounded good for what I like to play.

The new amp should arrive tomorrow, but being New Year's Eve, I'm not holding my breath on that date .

[cleggy]

Hi graeme, good luck to you on your new purchase! I would like to know how you get on with it for my own reference! Keep in touch, that is what this forum is all about!
ps. the vypyr 100 has some stompbox models that I don't have on my model. Let me know how they sound?

cleggy

[graeme]

Sadly - although not suprisingly, given the time of year - no delivery has been made. I'm banking on Tuesday being the most likely, although Monday might just happen.

I'll certainly report back on how I find it.

[graeme]

My Vypyr 100 and Sanpera II foot contoller finally arrived last Monday, a full week later than I expected. To my utter astonishment, it came via the normal postal system - not a courier!! I amazed the post Office would handle something as big and heavy as a 2 x 12 Combo, it only just fitted in the boot of our postwomans car and she couldn't even lift it out - but there you go, I'm sure it was cheaper to ship that way . Unfortunately, post only comes once a week here, so it was probably sitting in the local sorting office for several days.

Because of other commitments, today was the first day I have fired it up - and that wasn't for very long, so it would be unfair of me to make any definitive statements about the whole package.

These are my initial thoughts;

1 - The supplied patches are totally useless. Agreed, most of them are distorted (and I prefer a 'clean' sound) but they are too distorted for the most aggressive HM player! Also, no attempt seems to have been made to balance the sound level across the range of patches. You set one up at a reasonable level and the next one blows your head off (or is so quiet, you think something has broken).

2 - I was surprised to find that this was an 'open-back' cabinet design. Not having seen a photo of the back, this came as a bit of a shock. Although I'm not a fan of open-back cabinets (too easy for something floating around inside to puncture a speaker cone, etc.) plenty of really popular amps are the same - but usually there are two strips of wood across the back, one at the bottom and another at the top. In this case, there is only one at the bottom and it makes the whole thing look a bit 'unfinished'. This causes an unexpected additional problem for me, as I use a "Standback" amp tilting device and it rests where one would normally find the top strip of wood. I see I am going to have to modify the cabinet in some way or other.

3- Although I heven't really got to grips with it yet, I do like the control layout and having all those stompbox models is going to be a real blessing for me. That said, this is not a device that can be very quickly programmed. You need spend a bit of time working out the individual patches and where you are going put them. As there are (with the Sanpera) 100 banks of four patches, it would be only too easy to scatter them all over the place. This could become a real problem in a live situation, when you need quick access to several patches within one song.

4 - Sound! At the moment, I am in two minds about this. Partly because of the factory patches being so bad that it's impossible to make any proper judgement, but more importantly, because I am finding it difficult to build a basic, completely clean, patch on which to build other patches. Even on the cleanest sounds, there is a small underlying level of distortion that I have not yet managed to stop. Reference to the Peavey forum indicates I'm not the only person to have found this and it would seem to be inherent in the design - but I'll keep working on it .

5 - Looks! It largely looks like any other 2x12 combo in black. There's a rather tacky (to my mind) plastic moulding at the top front that I will probably remove, if that proves feasible.

6 - I think the Sanpera II is probably quite a nice design (except for one thing, see below). There are only a few controls to leap around on and the best thing is the ability to set up a patch and then have individual control over delay, reverb etc., within that one patch. Since this makes any one patch very versatile, I rather think the Sanpera I (total of 12 patches, rather than the 400 of the Sanpera II) would have provided all I need but hey, it's only money and it looks flash.

7 - The construction of the pedal is solid (cast aluminium with a steel bottom plate for access) and should withstand the knocks of gigging. It's quite big and I do need to find some sort of a case/bag for it.

8 - Although the construction might be good, the QC is awful. As received, neither of the pedals would change status when pushed fully down. So I took the bottom off and had a look. As supplied, the internal switches - which are operated by a plastic paddle attached to the pivoting axle of the foot pedal - were not being operated and I had to put a couple of turns on each of the adjustment screws to rectify the problem (two turns represents a *lot* of travel). Since these screws had been locked with Glyptol or something similar, it would seem reasonable to assume that someone had set these up at the factory, but I can see no mechanism whereby the adjustment could be so far out of kilter by the time it reached me. I think the inspection department is under-performing and this problem should have been picked up before it left the factory.

8 - This leads me on to my next point, which is more of a design fault. It's far too easy to operate these switches. There is no resistance to be felt at the end of the foot pedals' travel and it's only too easy to operate them accidentally. In a live situation, this could lead some interesting, if not disastrous consequences. A sudden switch from modelled sound to tuning mode in the middle of a solo, or a sudden change from Wah to pitch shift is definitely not what a player expects or wants. What is required is some form of increased resistance at the near end of the travel, just before the switch operates, this would give the player a tactile warning. On older foot pedals that had switches, these were usually of the type that are fitted to the rest of the Sanpera and they require a fair degree of force to operate and accidental operation was virtually impossible. The switches on the Sanpera pedals require virtually no operating force (and indeed, even less when you take into account the mechanical advantage of the lever). Personally, I am going to add a stiffish rubber stop (Sorbo, or something similar) under the leading edge of each pedal, to warn me when it's near the end of its travel. To operate the switches, I would have to step on the pedal quite hard.


OK - that's it for the moment.

The conclusion is, the jury's still out.

In it's defence, it was not expensive and even if I don't gig with it, a spare amp is always worth having around for emergencies.

[cleggy]

Hi graeme,
I hope you get to grips with your new amp soon. After editing or programming your own patches you might find sounds you are more familiar with. I created quite a nice hank sound with mine after some tweeking.
I haven't got a footpedal with mine because it is the basic model & doesn't feature it, so I cannot comment on that. I hope your mods will fix the problems you have with it.

Best of luck

cleggy

[graeme]

Jan 14, 2010 21:43:11 GMT cleggy said:

After editing or programming your own patches you might find sounds you are more familiar with.

Well, I hope so . I'm mainly concerned by the fact that a really clean and undistorted sound seems to be asking the impossible. However, I will work on it.

Jan 14, 2010 21:43:11 GMT cleggy said:

I created quite a nice hank sound with mine after some tweeking.

Not that I spend my life trying to emulate Hank Marvin (or any other player) but you really need a multi-tap delay unit for this. I have an RFX2000 that does the job well enough for me.

That's another point against the Vypyr, there's no external FX loop. I suppose they thought, with all that internal modelling, nobody would need one, but this is a case that proves otherwise.