The Spark Go is one of the most portable and affordable ways to enter the Spark ecosystem. A compact amp that provides many tone options and covers many of the practicing needs with a single device: good quality amp and pedal simulations, easy access to backing tracks (from YouTube or AI generated), chord detection, recording option, use as audio interface, and access to a myriad of community-created presets in Tone Cloud to quickly find a particular tone.
The amp speaker is obviously limited by the size of the device when playing loud, but it sounds great for practicing at low volumes or using headphones.
The only drawbacks are related to some unpolished aspects about the app:
- Connecting to the device is not always working at the first attempt. Especially on Android. On an iPad the connection was more reliable and stable.
Exporting your local presets across devices is not straightforward. The only option seems to be based on Dropbox.
- Recording feature is limited. It does not work on Android due to a bug. On iOs It is possible to record, but the sound is recorded from the device microphone which is not ideal.
- The audio interface functionality is not working on mobile devices.