What´s with the Wizard W800 - is it just a super Marshall? Can we get close with Axefx3?

It definitely a JCM800/ silver circuit w Jose clipping
Cameron CCV would be another
model i would say is in that vein
Thanks - I will wait for the full release of cygnus and then try to tweak the brit800 and cameron. Not sure though how to accomplish that jose clipping....and if it is crucial....
 
Thanks - I will wait for the full release of cygnus and then try to tweak the brit800 and cameron. Not sure though how to accomplish that jose clipping....and if it is crucial....
The clip is just the saturation switch
in the amp block , that is the Jose mod , just turn it on and set to taste
i would also turn on the input boost
all of those amp Freidman HBE
Cameron have a diode clipping circuit that the AXE simulates w saturation
 
This is why I’d love a global block that could compensate for Fletcher Munson effect and tailor the EQ balance to the volume. Even if it couldn’t be linked to the output knob level to automate this, a quick change in the settings menu would get a quick fix for playing at different volumes. It wouldn’t be perfect, but would be good enough for making a preset usable at different volumes.

The trick with automatically tying it to the Output setting is you don't know how loud the device you're plugged into is. Is it a cranked PA, an 8" headrush FRFR at low volume, or your recording interface.
 
i hope that bad experience at the trade shows doesn't count us out of a model forever! They really are great amps with a different flavor and would love to see em (and not spend 4k)
 
I built a clone of a MC2 and it is basically a Silver Jubilee with an added gain stage in the front. It has a high cut for each channel and fizz is not a problem with the right settings. It does have a very nice thump to it but is more of a mid gain amp. It can be a bit noisy because of all of the gain stages that get built up and knocked down and then run through a LED clipper. That's a lot of compression I think.
 
I built a clone of a MC2 and it is basically a Silver Jubilee with an added gain stage in the front. It has a high cut for each channel and fizz is not a problem with the right settings. It does have a very nice thump to it but is more of a mid gain amp. It can be a bit noisy because of all of the gain stages that get built up and knocked down and then run through a LED clipper. That's a lot of compression I think.
Cool what is the diff between the metal ver just more gain ?
so the MC is a Jube with 4 gain stages then and the option to use the clipping for more
thats a lot of gain into Soldano
XTC red Zone even before the Jorge mod
 
My only experience with Wizard amps was at the amp shows. They were by far the most obnoxious vendor there. No one wanted to be located near their room and we were two doors away. We finally got management to move us to a different room farther away.

Their idea of "marketing" was to open the door, point the amp out the door and put all the knobs on 10. Their demo guy must've been deaf as a compost pile because he seemed oblivious to how painfully loud it was.

Wow, it's a shame their marketing team is full of douches.

I played through a Wizard Modern Classic I and II once in Nashville and I've never heard anything like them. I was on cloud 9 the whole time. They're incredible amps. Probably in "grail amp" territory for me personally.
 
Cool what is the diff between the metal ver just more gain ?
so the MC is a Jube with 4 gain stages then and the option to use the clipping for more
thats a lot of gain into Soldano
XTC red Zone even before the Jorge mod

Yeah, the MTL has another gain stage after the LED clippers. If your asking about the difference between them and the SLO 100, I built a clone of one of those too and it has much more gain with fewer stages. Totally different sound IMO. The Wizard is crunchy and the SLO is a little smoother.

@GreatGreen Did you play them at that amp and guitar show at that hotel by the airport a few years back? That was the first time I saw them. Sounded killer there but they were being behaved more than what Cliff sounds like he had to deal with.
 
This is why I’d love a global block that could compensate for Fletcher Munson effect and tailor the EQ balance to the volume. Even if it couldn’t be linked to the output knob level to automate this, a quick change in the settings menu would get a quick fix for playing at different volumes. It wouldn’t be perfect, but would be good enough for making a preset usable at different volumes.
I always thought it would be helpful to have something like that in the Global settings where you can increase or decrease the value, so if you're playing quieter, you lower it and if playing louder, increase it. You'd just have to make sure you set it to Zero when recording or have it auto set to Zero every time it's power cycled, so no chance of accidentally leaving it enabled. There would also have to be a way to apply it to certain outputs because you may not want it going to a PA mix and monitor mix at the same time.

I use a SPL meter when adjusting tones and keep my level close to 85dB but when I play live or with a drummer, I have to play louder. I currently use the Global EQ to compensate but I admit I've forgotten to reset it to Zero a few times :eek:
 
Yeah, the MTL has another gain stage after the LED clippers. If your asking about the difference between them and the SLO 100, I built a clone of one of those too and it has much more gain with fewer stages. Totally different sound IMO. The Wizard is crunchy and the SLO is a little smoother.

@GreatGreen Did you play them at that amp and guitar show at that hotel by the airport a few years back? That was the first time I saw them. Sounded killer there but they were being behaved more than what Cliff sounds like he had to deal with.

yes , i was more trying to say its level of gain would be similar to an Slo w 4 gainstages
but the Slo preamp is very different i believe with the cold clip stage
as opposed to a cascade overdrive circuit which i am guessing the Wizard is?
 
I always thought it would be helpful to have something like that in the Global settings where you can increase or decrease the value, so if you're playing quieter, you lower it and if playing louder, increase it. You'd just have to make sure you set it to Zero when recording or have it auto set to Zero every time it's power cycled, so no chance of accidentally leaving it enabled. There would also have to be a way to apply it to certain outputs because you may not want it going to a PA mix and monitor mix at the same time.

I use a SPL meter when adjusting tones and keep my level close to 85dB but when I play live or with a drummer, I have to play louder. I currently use the Global EQ to compensate but I admit I've forgotten to reset it to Zero a few times :eek:

The global EQ would be ok if it had more than one setting- if it had 4 channels I could switch between I could set them up for different scenarios- A = FRFR cab gig volume, B = headphones at moderate volume, C = FRFR at practice volume, etc.
 
yes , i was more trying to say its level of gain would be similar to an Slo w 4 gainstages
but the Slo preamp is very different i believe with the cold clip stage
as opposed to a cascade overdrive circuit which i am guessing the Wizard is?

I would say the SLO's still have a little more gain on tap than the MCII's. Still an apples to oranges style though. The MCII is the hot rod into a anode driven tone stack and the SLO is Marshall cathode driven with the full tube effects loop before it. The SLO's crunch channel does however sound a bit like the MCII. To me, this makes the SLO a little more versatile having a very useful crunch channel and a great lead channel.
 
I would say the SLO's still have a little more gain on tap than the MCII's. Still an apples to oranges style though. The MCII is the hot rod into a anode driven tone stack and the SLO is Marshall cathode driven with the full tube effects loop before it. The SLO's crunch channel does however sound a bit like the MCII. To me, this makes the SLO a little more versatile having a very useful crunch channel and a great lead channel.
When I had my MCI, I always need a slight boost in front..
I didn't need as much with the SLO, so I'd agree with your statement that the SLO has a bit more.
Also the clean/crunch of the SLO is so overlooked, it's not funny... (and that comes from a guy that plays with high gain 98% of the time)

I also loved my MC 50 so much.. until I A/B versus my 1992 SLO..
The SLO just had a bit more of everything, imo.

Anyhow both are now gone and replaced with Camerons (CCV and Atomica)
 
Yeah, the MTL has another gain stage after the LED clippers. If your asking about the difference between them and the SLO 100, I built a clone of one of those too and it has much more gain with fewer stages. Totally different sound IMO. The Wizard is crunchy and the SLO is a little smoother.

@GreatGreen Did you play them at that amp and guitar show at that hotel by the airport a few years back? That was the first time I saw them. Sounded killer there but they were being behaved more than what Cliff sounds like he had to deal with.

I did not. I remember hearing about that show and wanting to come by but I couldn't make it that day.

I played the Wizard amps at Vintage King Audio in Nashville. It was just me and a buddy in a room with a few of them and a couple of cabs to swap around. It was glorious. :)
 
My only experience with Wizard amps was at the amp shows. They were by far the most obnoxious vendor there. No one wanted to be located near their room and we were two doors away. We finally got management to move us to a different room farther away.

Their idea of "marketing" was to open the door, point the amp out the door and put all the knobs on 10. Their demo guy must've been deaf as a compost pile because he seemed oblivious to how painfully loud it was.

This made me laugh because Wizard’s idea of “customer service” is arguably worse than how you describe their “idea of marketing.” My understanding is it is a one man show with Rick doing everything aside from the head shells by hand himself. He is quick to respond to emails, but he is also not the most helpful or peasant person to deal with. It is very much like the “Soup Nazi” episode from Seinfeld. Dealing with this downside is an acceptable enough trade off in order to get what are arguably among the best amps you can buy. Unfortunately, not everyone out there is as great as you are Cliff. In fact, most other companies are not even close. But you have it all; nice guy, unrivaled support and commitment to the constant pursuit of perfection and improvement, and constantly having best overall product in this market segment.

Anyway, I am unbelievably happy with the 4 Wizards that I now own (MTL MkII, MCII KT75, MTL/MCII Hybrid, and MCI). I do fantasize about being able to profile/capture these amps in a Fractal product. The Neural Quad Cortex has admittedly done an unexpectedly great job at being able to Capture these amps, but I am sure you will eventually have something that is able to beat them at this game based on some of your teaser comments. I am going to continue to own both the QC and my Axe Fx III, but I am already itching to be able to drop Neural (or whoever buys them out once their private equity/venture capital investor wants to exit their investment) and go back to being monogamous with you Cliff/Fractal. Doing a model of the MTL and/or the Hybrid would be another way to do it.

Heck I could and would actually loan you any and all of my Wizard amps for you to work on modeling if you felt up to it at some point. Seriously! But in separate batches please haha. But seriously!!!
 
Here is another clip of the W800. We can probably get this from what we already have using the Brit 800 MOD amp model as a starting place. Although, having a Wizard of any kind in the Axe would be really cool as well. They are fantastic amps.


Edit: This is not my channel, but I would love to have this tone.


I passed on this particular tone, but it was offered to me. I instead bought the Hybrid and MTL from the guy in this channel. My MCI came from the Blake Mansfield youtube channel. The MCII KT75 was a new order. The Hybrid, which is the MTL MkII preamp paired with the MCII power amp, is becoming my personal favorite, but I have had it for less than 2 weeks and have been traveling a bunch. I need to dig up a comparison between the Hybrid and MTL that I wrote for a friend and post that here for anyone interested.
 
I passed on this particular tone, but it was offered to me. I instead bought the Hybrid and MTL from the guy in this channel. My MCI came from the Blake Mansfield youtube channel. The MCII KT75 was a new order. The Hybrid, which is the MTL MkII preamp paired with the MCII power amp, is becoming my personal favorite, but I have had it for less than 2 weeks and have been traveling a bunch. I need to dig up a comparison between the Hybrid and MTL that I wrote for a friend and post that here for anyone interested.

Copying in the comparison that I just mentioned I would in my previous post.

I can give you some initial impressions on the differences between the MTL MKII 100w e34l and MTL/MCII Hybrid 50w e34l. I do want to make the disclaimer that this is just based on a few hours of A/B’ing over a couple of days, so it is not from months or years of really getting to know every single nuance. BTW I kind of started just writing while half way zoning out on a conference call, so hopefully this makes sense and helps.

There are naturally a lot of similarities in what each amp can do given they have the same preamp, which has some of the most versatile and also easiest to easily dial in a wide range of tones and the amps seem to always stay in a great sweep spot.

The power amp changes the frequency focus of the mids from being naturally in the low mids with the MTL and the mid-mids to higher-mids with the Hybrid. That said, the Sweep/Front Bright control does change the frequency focus of the mids, and both amps have this. However, the MTL does not sound as great with the Sweep above 5 or 6, and between 6-8 might be where the MC mid focus might sit. The thing that I struggled with here with the MTL is I typically go for a mid-forward tone with a fairly present bite and crisp bottom end on palm mutes. The Hybrid balances all of this out perfectly for me, but the MTL requires me to push the Mids to ~7, Bass @ 5 or less, Depth at 5 or less, and then I struggle to get the Treble and Bright control on the back of the amp up high enough to get the bite and cut that I am going for without struggling with an annoyance with the mids that kind of borders on a very subtle cocked wah kind of thing. The problem here is I am trying to push the MTL to do something it is not naturally meant to do. It is not mid scooped, but it kind of has an imbalance in some missing high mids at times that the Hybrid and MCII fill in nicely. On the other hand, the Hybrid seems to be able to drop the Sweep control low and hang with the MTL’s low-mid focus quite well.

The Depth control, which is a power amp control, in the MTL allows the amp to go places that the Hybrid or MCII can’t. It really opens up the tailoring of the low end. It lets the amp get a fuller and slightly looser bottom end, which would normally require a higher Bass control setting coupled with a TS style boost up front to keep things from getting flubby and/or too bass heavy. But the MTL allows for very great balance and control without needing a boost or other EQ tricks to keep the bottom end in control when going for a heavier and looser tone.

The Hybrid’s Contour control that comes from the MCII power amp seems to kind of be like a second Presence control that affects more of the frequency spectrum. Presence really just affects the super high end frequencies, the Bright control on the back of the amp kind of covers all of the frequencies, and the Contour seems to be more focused in the mids and low-highs. Messing with the Contour and Bright controls can take you from blanket over the speakers to too present and bright territories very easily.

Finally, there seems to be a unique difference in the feel and attack in these two amps, and I need to stress that my attempt to explain this is relative between these two amps only. The Hybrid has a comparatively more aggressive, immediate, abrupt, and cutting punch and feel. The MCII KT75 that you tried is pretty much the exact same in this department. The MTL on the other hand tones it down on these fronts a little. It might be that the punch is either comparatively lacking in the mids or more accentuated in the bass frequencies compared to the Hybrid. In one way I kind of think of it like the Hybrid is a coarser sandpaper whereas the MTL is smoother with smaller gain. The MTL has been described by others as being comparatively smoother relative to the MC amps, and that is there but it is subtle. Gotta throw out a good skiing analogy given you are living the dream in Colorado. The Hybrid is like doing GS style turns on perfect corduroy conditions while the MTL is closer to that perfect chalk that is soft enough to still be able to dig your edge into and not skid out (or have to go back and forth between smooth and lumpy spots). Damnit I am having bad withdrawals from not being able to get out to the slopes at all last year due to COVID while have the best season of my life in 2019. It is almost like there is a slight bit of compression in the MTL compared to the Hybrid/MCII which is weird to say given that the MTL is certainly not a compressed amp. If the Hybrid was 100% on the scale, the MTL would be like 96%. It is not a VH4 kind of compressed at all.

I have been through 10 different drive pedals and countless variations of EQ in front of the amp, in the loop, and post impulse response over the past year. What I found was that all of these options neutered the natural feel, clarity, and natural presence of the amps. I could get it to work well in some cases, but it was such a hassle to try to fight against things that were bothering me and try to unnaturally correct them through these means. It is a breath of fresh air going from EQ overload with a Mark IIC+ (boost, pre-EQ, preamp settings, 5 band EQ, and then more EQ after the IR) to being able to just do a few simple turn of the dials on the Hybrid and MTL and seemingly always be in the sweet spot while covering all of the ground that I could possibly want (and having two tools that are similar to control but do their own thing well).
 
Copying in the comparison that I just mentioned I would in my previous post.

I can give you some initial impressions on the differences between the MTL MKII 100w e34l and MTL/MCII Hybrid 50w e34l. I do want to make the disclaimer that this is just based on a few hours of A/B’ing over a couple of days, so it is not from months or years of really getting to know every single nuance. BTW I kind of started just writing while half way zoning out on a conference call, so hopefully this makes sense and helps.

There are naturally a lot of similarities in what each amp can do given they have the same preamp, which has some of the most versatile and also easiest to easily dial in a wide range of tones and the amps seem to always stay in a great sweep spot.

The power amp changes the frequency focus of the mids from being naturally in the low mids with the MTL and the mid-mids to higher-mids with the Hybrid. That said, the Sweep/Front Bright control does change the frequency focus of the mids, and both amps have this. However, the MTL does not sound as great with the Sweep above 5 or 6, and between 6-8 might be where the MC mid focus might sit. The thing that I struggled with here with the MTL is I typically go for a mid-forward tone with a fairly present bite and crisp bottom end on palm mutes. The Hybrid balances all of this out perfectly for me, but the MTL requires me to push the Mids to ~7, Bass @ 5 or less, Depth at 5 or less, and then I struggle to get the Treble and Bright control on the back of the amp up high enough to get the bite and cut that I am going for without struggling with an annoyance with the mids that kind of borders on a very subtle cocked wah kind of thing. The problem here is I am trying to push the MTL to do something it is not naturally meant to do. It is not mid scooped, but it kind of has an imbalance in some missing high mids at times that the Hybrid and MCII fill in nicely. On the other hand, the Hybrid seems to be able to drop the Sweep control low and hang with the MTL’s low-mid focus quite well.

The Depth control, which is a power amp control, in the MTL allows the amp to go places that the Hybrid or MCII can’t. It really opens up the tailoring of the low end. It lets the amp get a fuller and slightly looser bottom end, which would normally require a higher Bass control setting coupled with a TS style boost up front to keep things from getting flubby and/or too bass heavy. But the MTL allows for very great balance and control without needing a boost or other EQ tricks to keep the bottom end in control when going for a heavier and looser tone.

The Hybrid’s Contour control that comes from the MCII power amp seems to kind of be like a second Presence control that affects more of the frequency spectrum. Presence really just affects the super high end frequencies, the Bright control on the back of the amp kind of covers all of the frequencies, and the Contour seems to be more focused in the mids and low-highs. Messing with the Contour and Bright controls can take you from blanket over the speakers to too present and bright territories very easily.

Finally, there seems to be a unique difference in the feel and attack in these two amps, and I need to stress that my attempt to explain this is relative between these two amps only. The Hybrid has a comparatively more aggressive, immediate, abrupt, and cutting punch and feel. The MCII KT75 that you tried is pretty much the exact same in this department. The MTL on the other hand tones it down on these fronts a little. It might be that the punch is either comparatively lacking in the mids or more accentuated in the bass frequencies compared to the Hybrid. In one way I kind of think of it like the Hybrid is a coarser sandpaper whereas the MTL is smoother with smaller gain. The MTL has been described by others as being comparatively smoother relative to the MC amps, and that is there but it is subtle. Gotta throw out a good skiing analogy given you are living the dream in Colorado. The Hybrid is like doing GS style turns on perfect corduroy conditions while the MTL is closer to that perfect chalk that is soft enough to still be able to dig your edge into and not skid out (or have to go back and forth between smooth and lumpy spots). Damnit I am having bad withdrawals from not being able to get out to the slopes at all last year due to COVID while have the best season of my life in 2019. It is almost like there is a slight bit of compression in the MTL compared to the Hybrid/MCII which is weird to say given that the MTL is certainly not a compressed amp. If the Hybrid was 100% on the scale, the MTL would be like 96%. It is not a VH4 kind of compressed at all.

I have been through 10 different drive pedals and countless variations of EQ in front of the amp, in the loop, and post impulse response over the past year. What I found was that all of these options neutered the natural feel, clarity, and natural presence of the amps. I could get it to work well in some cases, but it was such a hassle to try to fight against things that were bothering me and try to unnaturally correct them through these means. It is a breath of fresh air going from EQ overload with a Mark IIC+ (boost, pre-EQ, preamp settings, 5 band EQ, and then more EQ after the IR) to being able to just do a few simple turn of the dials on the Hybrid and MTL and seemingly always be in the sweet spot while covering all of the ground that I could possibly want (and having two tools that are similar to control but do their own thing well).
A wizard would be cool and awesome that you would lend the amps but they would still need accurate schematic unless the poster in this thread that built the clone has one
 
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