Bugera V22HD Infinium

Bought this because I've never owned a tube amp before and wanted to try it out. Always played solid state amps due to price and low maintenance. I would describe myself as an intermediate guitarist with music as a hobby, with a background as a semi-professional a long time ago. So it's mostly used for rehearsal and the odd gig every once in a while. I run it through a Harley Benton G212 Vintage. Dialled in lots of different sounds from jazz, blues, funk, rock and 80's heavy metal with little to no effort. I can't tell how well it does modern metal sounds though. Little to no experience there.

Pros: - Clean channel. It's just awesome, there's a lot of different tones, from sparkly cleans to cool funk or clean blues, even without pedals.
- Takes pedals well. Tested all my pedals and most sound better than ever. Some I can't seem to get to sound as i want them to, but that could be my own fault. I will edit this in the future, should I resolve this issue.
- Switch between triode and pentode is just so great to have. You can decide if you want to push the power amp hard without making your ears bleed, or if you want lots of headroom. Love this feature.
- A wise man said loud is more good. It sure is loud enough for me. Highly doubt anyone would feel it's not.
- Build quality and durability. Seems sturdy and while it does have that plastic look when you are really really close, it doesn't seem to be fragile in any way. I have had no issues whatsoever so far with it. From afar it's just amazinly vintagey, if that's a word.


Cons: - You cruel people who designed this, why did you give me a mid boost button that I can't control with the included footswitch? The features is great, walking up to the amp and pressing a button isn't very good at all. I'm upset.

- Brightness. It is to my ears a very bright sounding amp so i tend to gravitate towards just using the normal input. The bright is just too bright in my opinion. This isn't a dealbreaker ofc, because there are so many ways to fix that. And it does have low end too if that's what you need. But if you are in search of a more "transparent" amp (or neutral or whatever), you might want to keep searching.

Summary: To me, this is a versatile and good sounding amp. I feel happy with my choice, even though my main reason for the purchase was the price tag. I'm considering buying the combo as backup. I have to mention that I also use it together with my Line6 Pod HD500X, with great results. Using preamp models in the Pod and going strait to the poweramp makes me feel like i have access to all the amp sounds I need. I recommend this amp, not just for someone on a budget, but for anyone.

Now to a very important matter! When I got this delivered by UPS the outer box was damaged with a fairly large hole in it. I was of course nervous that something inside would be damaged aswell, but thanks to Thomanns great packaging everything was as it should be. This has happened to me once or twice before, but never had any issues with damaged products. Big thumbs up to Thomann!

I have owned an original V22 combo and Bugera have put a lot of thought into the build quality of this upgraded model. I have only owned this amplifier for a couple of weeks but the amplifier seems to be much more rugged and a more practical size of cabinet. Sound-wise the amp does well with the right type of speaker, I have chosen to use the brightest sounding speakers I can get to stop the sound being too dark which I noticed happened initially.

A good variety of sounds from clean to classic rock though I think you would struggle with metal sounds without a pedal.

Very happy so far though it has only been used in rehearsals.

** 10 months later **

What a great purchase this amp has been!! My Fender has been to the repair shop twice in that time!! (Great QC Fender!) and this little beast has stepped up to the mark and held its own both times for numerous gigs. Running into a cab loaded with Eminence Legend speakers and it just sings. For a 22 watt amp, it has coped easily with all the venues (Small to 300 seaters) i have played and has been super-reliable. Works best with my Pedalboard through the FX loop and it is really quiet noisewise.

Performance has been good enough for me to revisit my initial review and update!

I bought this amp some time ago because I couldn't afford anything more expensive at this wattage.
I didn't have high expectations, so when I heard it for the first time, I was pleasantly surprised..

The clean channel sounds amazing and it has plenty of headroom and power to be heard in a rehearshal/studio/small venue without a mic.
I play at my home studio on a fender strat with a celestion g12k100 and the pedals I've used on it are od, wah, delay, reverb, eq, dist..none of them presented issues(I haven't tested the fx loop cause I never use the drive channel of the amp)..
Every feature works beautifully, even though I would've liked it to have an amp-output for direct monitoring..
The reverb sounds ok to my ears but I never use it, the tone knobs are pretty usable and the presence knob works like a charm!..

I've noticed two drawbacks:
there is a boost button but the only way it can be activated is by hand
the dirty channel is not tasty enough, even though that's more of a personal opinion

I recommend this amp head to everyone on a budget looking for a great vfm amp!

Ive heard mixed opinions on bugera, but seeing the price i thought id give it a try.
That was the best idea ive had this year.
Everybody talks about the amazing clean tones, and they really are nice, but what makes it a winner is the overdrive channel. Most reviews i read said the od channel is garbage, but thats because they don't know how to set this beast up.
Firstly, the mid boost switch should always be on. This changes the tone to a more mid focused sound. Set the eq to where each knob is at the point where moving it makes the most difference as then it is most responsive. Then dime the master volume. Keeping the master on full will color the tone with power tube saturation. If you are using an attenuator (or in a place where loudness is no problem) push the volume up to anywhere over 6 and viola; you have a powerfull overdrive with beautifully rich harmonic content. Slightly reminiscent of the van halen 1984 album sound.
That out of the way, the build quality is good, knobs, switches, jacks seem sturdy enough.
It is on the heavier side, but hey, its meant to be played, not juggled :)
Oh and one final thing: dont think that 22 watts is quiet, with a 2x12 cab you can make the drummer sound like he's banging on milk cartons.