Peavey Classic 20 Mini Head

2 sentence review: This is the best pedal platform amp for the money you pay! If you are someone who owns many pedals and need a very good clean amp with lots of nice features, this amp is for you!

FEATURES:
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This amp is packed with lots of really good features. The Most important are:

1) Attenuator: to select between 20, 5, or 1 watt output. So, you can put it on 1/5 watts at home, and crank the volume, to get POWER-TUBE break-up at home/bedroom level!

2) Direct out with cabinet simulation. (Nice for recording directly into your DAW or playing at night without speaker!).

3) Effects loop (send-return): for delay/reverb/tremolo pedals for example.

4) Foot-switchable boost/reverb/channel selector.
Boost is remarkable! And boost is after pre-amp, so gives pure clean-boost when you want to play solo in a band.

5) Cabinet ohm selector.

6) Can work with either 115 or 220-230 volts. So if you travel to US, you can use it also there.

7) Power-tube indicator: show if your power-tubes need replacement! So, you can replace them as soon as needed! This helps avoiding problems during live performance!

SOUND:
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There are two channels.
- Clean Channel: Very clear, very warm, very punchy, very dynamic. Works very nice with overdrive pedals.

-Overdrive: I HATE IT! even though the amp is called CLASSIC, the overdrive channel has scooped-mids (and it CAN'T be fixed with the mids knob on the amp). It is not warm sounding! It is NOT vintage sounding! It is USABLE, but I really prefer my overdrive pedals over this channel.

-REVERB: It is usable, but not a high quality reverb. I have set it to OFF, and using my T.C Hall of Fame in the effects loop. Works very well!

PROS:
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1) Very nice, warm, clear, punchy clean channel which also takes pedals very well!

2) Very good attenuator (does not kill your sound on 1 or 5 watts setting). You can crank the gain to get power-tube break up at bedroom/home level.

3) Really good foot-switchable boost. Gives better harmonics, and also helps jump in front of the band when playing solos.

4) Good effects-loop. But unfortunately (and like many other amps), it does not have any send or return LEVEL knob.

CONS:
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1) Even though the overdrive channel is usable, I hate it as I have described above. But consider the fact that a good overdrive pedal costs about 200-300 euros, and you are paying about 500-600 euros for this amp which has lots of other features. Maybe good for modern-rock but not for vintage blues/rock.

2) Reverb is not good! I never use it.

Conclusion:
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- BUY IF: you have different pedals (at least a good overdrive/distortion pedal and a reverb pedal), and you are looking for a very warm sounding pedal platform amp which has lots of features like attenuation, effects-loop, direct out and cabinet simulation.

- DON'T BUY IF: you are a minimalist player who hates to use pedals and prefers to have just a guitar and an amp with both clean and overdrive channels and reverb.

I am the first type of guy, and I play mostly blues, country, blues/rock and rock. I use it with many pedals. I suggest you match it with Vintage 30s (not green-backs), because the amp is really warm sounding, so Vintage 30 speakers balance the sound: you will get the top-end clarity of the speaker and warmness of the amp. By the way, this amp is also very good for jazz, not just blues, rock, country.