Blackstar HT-Club 40 or Soloist 60?

[AudioDemon]

Hi, I was hoping to get some information from those who have had experience with the Blackstar HT-Club, or the HT-Soloist 60.

First off, I am for the most part, sold on the Blackstar. It supports the genres I play, and it has a few other features I am fond of.


I am wondering which of these two amps (HT-Club 40 or Soloist 60) are best at the following:
- Playing at a low volume (I would use this amp for practice as well as gigs)
- Outputting a loud enough volume while un-mic'ed that can stand it own against a drumset

I am now leaning towards the Club 40, however, I really was interested in the Soloist 60, but am now hearing I would have to crank it up even during practice to get the right sound...

_____

NOTES:

• This is a "replacement" for my cabinet amp (Line 6 Spider IV HD150) which I am getting rid of due to it not being portable.

• I want to emulate the bands MuteMath, Switchfoot, Nevertheless, Red

• I play a Fender Jim Root Telecaster, and an ESP EC-401

• I would like to keep it under $1000

• I have a few effects pedals, and likely will have more.

Thankyou for your time.

- Zach

[rjwilson37]

I know a lot that think the HT-40 is the cat's meow and I know someone who had the Solist 60 and said it was great, but just too loud for anything he needed.

I think you would be very happy with the HT-40 and it would suffice for home and gigs. If you ever did anything outside, like a big gig, you could just purchase an additional 1x12 Blackstar cabinet to put under it, which you would probably do anyway even if you had a HT-60. You always want at least a 2x12 when playing a big gig outside, to push more air and get a lot fuller sound/tone without having to push the volume up too much.

[AudioDemon]

Thanks so much for the info! That is so cool I could buy a cabinet in the future, and not have to purchase another amp.

It sounds like I will be getting the Blackstar HT-Club 40!

ROCK ON!

- Zach.

[pdoodek]

I believe HT-60 Stage is better option than Soloist.

Compared to HT-40 :

- 2x 12" speaker: not only louder but also probably better sounding
- bigger cabinet: not so portable as HT-40
- some says that HT-60 has better OD sound than HT-40
- HT-60 Stage has double EQ which means is more versitale

If you have 100W head+ 4x12 cab, go with HT-40. For smaller gigs it is great.
If you don't own a full stack and that will be your biggest amp, go with HT-60, if you don't care much about size.

[rjwilson37]

The HT-40 and 60 are pretty darn heavy amps I hear, so there not exactly portable and just an FYI that a tube swap requires someone to re-bias the amp for the tubes your putting in.

[GeeJay]

I have an HT-40 and it is not a lightweight amp at all. I also have the matching 1x12 cab which helps to shift a bit more air when needed. The HT-40 is loud enough and has some great tones in it.

I was on the point of selling it, but I like it much more since I swapped the tubes out. It now has Harma 12AX7s in the pre-amp and Svetlana in the power amp. This just softened the overdrive a little, which to me was a bit too edgy/rough with the TAD tubes (one of which went microphonic anyway, so had to change them).
I didn't need to adjust the bias voltage, but I did measure it.

The clean channel is not affected by the Bass Mid Treble and ISF, these only apply to the OD channel. Careful use of the Tone and Volume controls gives quite a lot of variation on the Clean channel.

I think the HT-60 has a footswitchable 'boost' channel, which effectively gives Clean, Crunch and Lead.

One mod I'd like to see on the HT-40 would be to have the clean and OD voice options footswitchable, but it's not a biggy.

I do now prefer the HT-40 to my Marshall DSL401, but it's taken a while for me to get to that position. The Blackstar covers more range that the 401, but I have to use the guitar controls more, which in fairness the amp responds more to the guitar controls than the 401 anyway.

I haven't voted because I've not played an HT-60, but I hope my comments have been helpful in some way...