Like 1960s British fashion, Orange amplification has always stood out from the crowd. And the lively looks of their cabinets and heads are a physical manifestation of the Orange sound. Orange’s new OB1 Series was inspired by bassists who use two amps to get their clean and dirty tones, and to achieve this dual-prong approach, the streamlined amps integrate class-AB technology with a flexible overdrive section. There is a 300-watt model in the series, but our attention was directed at the more powerful OB1-500.
Dig if You Will, the Pictures
One of the ways some bassists produce thick, distorted tones is by splitting their signal and running into two amps—one clean head and an overdriven guitar amp. The OB1-500 is inspired by this philosophy, yet packs everything into a single 2U rackmount chassis that also stands alone on burly rubber feet.
When you plug into the 500-watt OB1-500, it splits your bass signal into two separate paths: One amplifies the clean sound, the other seasons it with upper-harmonic distortion. Gain and blend controls balance the intensity and level of the distortion before the combined signal is sent through a simple but robust EQ.
Visually, the OB1-500 reflects Orange’s familiar styling. The amp is suited in white powder coat, painted in the company’s colors, and crested with their iconic logo. The front panel is labeled with clever and easily discernable images like the footprint indicating the footswitch jack and a speaker symbol representing the volume. Creativity points go to Orange for the blend and gain knobs, respectively signified by a kitchen blender and a snake and arrow.
Orange Jam
In my home studio, I paired the OB1-500 with an Epifani UL3 112 cabinet and three different basses—a Sadowsky Will Lee 4-string, a Fender Precision, and a Ritter R8 5-string. The OB1-500 was designed to deliver beastly bass tones, but one of the first things that actually caught my ears was the pleasing sound produced by the clean section. It didn’t matter what bass I used: The amp conveyed a warm, defined voice that was responsive to my touch.
The EQ is an excellent problem-solver and small adjustments produced noticeable results. Bassists who rely on bridge-pickup sounds will appreciate the level of thickness and punch the bass control can add, as well as the mid attenuator’s ability to dial in different dimensions of snarl. P-style players will appreciate how the OB1-500’s treble dial works in conjunction with their instrument’s tone control to transform the timbre from edgy to brooding.
Active instruments aren’t exempt from the benefits of the OB1-500’s EQ. The Ritter responded nicely to tonal tweaks from the amp, but what was equally impressive was how the OB1-500 could be left flat and not color the sounds shaped by the Ritter’s sophisticated onboard preamp.
It’s easy to plug in and play with the OB1-500, but I recommend spending some quality time experimenting with the gain and blend knobs prior to performance. Doing so will allow you to find the right mix of harmonic saturation and original signal to create tones from gutsy roars to synth-like sizzles—qualities I enjoyed on soloed neck pickups and the Precision.
Ratings
Pros:
Very satisfying spectrum of drive tones. Great clean settings. Well voiced EQ.
Cons:
Might not appease disciples of classic tones. A bit pricey.
Tones:
Ease of Use:
Build/Design:
Value:
Street:
$899
Orange OB1-500
orangeamps.com
On top of that, I was able to sculpt a grinding clang with the active Sadowsky that’ll make your older brother pull out his Rush records. There is overdrive aplenty available with this amp—from sublime to downright nasty—and the manner in which it interacts with the EQ offers multiple tonal personalities.
All the aforementioned characteristics shined onstage when I ran the amp at much louder volumes. Impressively, the OB1-500 stays ultra clean at high levels. Orange was wise to install an active/passive pad switch that was a major factor in keeping things from getting too hairy. This was evident when I paired the amp with a Bergantino HD212 and plugged in the Ritter R8. The rig combined warmth and presence while moving major air. I was able to lay a solid foundation with a horn band, and the amp transmitted Prestia-like 16th-notes with impressive immediacy.
I further explored the OB1-500 at a local jam night by pairing it with an ’80s Peavey 4x10 and working the Sadowsky over rock tunes both sublime and absurd. The band smiled in unison when I dialed in a sound that came close to nailing Geddy’s aggressive tone on Permanent Waves, though this quickly sparked several other attempts at Rush classics. I found that the OB1-500 was more than adept at handling a wide spectrum of musical styles.
The Verdict
It’s relatively new, but Orange’s OB1-500 should already be considered one of the company’s standout offerings. It has an abundance of both clean and crass bass tones on tap, and while it might not completely placate the tube obsessed, the amp’s all-analog signal path is a welcome alternative to today’s class-D frenzy. Some might balk at the steep price, but the OB1-500’s tonal rewards outstrip many of its contemporary counterparts. If you’re seeking a responsive, powerful amp that gives a finger (or two, if you’re in the U.K.) to modern amp design, the OB1-500 is certainly worth a spin.
Watch the Review Demo:
Guitarists are used to coveting cranky, old gear, but if you’re not a rack user, the H3000 might not be for you! If you ever see one of these in a studio, be sure to take some time to check it out, and maybe give the plugin a try.When it debuted in 1987, the H3000 was marketed as an “intelligent pitch-changer” that could generate stereo harmonies in a user-specified key. This was heady stuff in the ’80s! But while diatonic harmonizing grabbed the headlines, subtler uses of this pitch-shifter cemented its legacy. Patch 231 MICROPITCHSHIFT, for example, is a big reason the H3000 persists in racks everywhere. It’s essentially a pair of very short, single-repeat delays: The left side is pitched slightly up while the right side is pitched slightly down (default is ±9 cents). The resulting tripling/thickening effect has long been a mix-engineer staple for pop vocals, and it’s also my first call when I want a stereo chorus for guitar.
The second-gen H3000S, introduced the following year, cemented the device’s guitar bona fides. Early-adopter Steve Vai was such a proponent of the first edition that Eventide asked him to contribute 48 signature sounds for the new model (patches 700-747). Still-later revisions like the H3000B and H3000D/SE added even more functionality, but these days it’s not too important which model you have. Comprehensive EPROM chips containing every patch from all generations of H3000 (plus the later H3500) are readily available for a modest cost, and are a fairly straightforward install.
In addition to pitch-shifting, there are excellent modulation effects and reverbs (like patch 211 CANYON), plus presets inspired by other classic Eventide boxes, like the patch 513 INSTANT PHASER. A comprehensive accounting of the H3000’s capabilities would be tedious, but suffice to say that even the stock presets get deliciously far afield. There are pitch-shifting reverbs that sound like fever-dream ancestors of Strymon’s “shimmer” effect. There are backwards-guitar simulators, multiple extraterrestrial voices, peculiar foreshadows of the EarthQuaker Devices Arpanoid and Rainbow Machine (check out patch 208 BIZARRMONIZER), and even button-triggered Foley effects that require no input signal (including a siren, helicopter, tank, submarine, ocean waves, thunder, and wind). If you’re ever without your deck of Oblique Strategies cards, the H3000’s singular knob makes a pretty good substitute. (Spin the big wheel and find out what you’ve won!)
“If you’re ever without your deck of Oblique Strategies cards, the H3000’s singular knob makes a pretty good substitute.”
But there’s another, more pedestrian reason I tend to reach for the H3000 and its rackmount relatives in the studio: I like to do certain types of processing after the mic. It’s easy to overlook, but guitar speakers are signal processors in their own right. They roll off high and low end, they distort when pushed, and the cabinets in which they’re mounted introduce resonances. While this type of de facto processing often flatters the guitar itself, it isn’t always advantageous for effects.
Effects loops allow time-based effects to be placed after preamp distortion, but I like to go one further. By miking the amp first and then sending signal to effects in parallel, I can get full bandwidth from the airy reverbs and radical pitched-up effects the H3000 can offer—and I can get it in stereo, printed to its own track, allowing the wet/dry balance to be revisited later, if needed. If a sound needs to be reproduced live, that’s a problem for later. (Something evocative enough can usually be extracted from a pedal-form descendant like the Eventide H90.)
Like most vintage gear, the H3000 has some endearing quirks. Even as it knowingly preserves glitches from earlier Eventide harmonizers (patch 217 DUAL H910s), it betrays its age with a few idiosyncrasies of its own. Extreme pitch-shifting exhibits a lot of aliasing (think: bit-crusher sounds), and the analog Murata filter modules impart a hint of warmth that many plug-in versions don’t quite capture. (They also have a habit of leaking black goo all over the motherboard!) It’s all part of the charm of the unit, beloved by its adherents. (Well, maybe not the leaking goo!)
In 2025, many guitarists won’t be eager to care for what is essentially an expensive, cranky, decades-old computer. Even the excitement of occasional tantalum capacitor explosions is unlikely to win them over! Fortunately, some great software emulations exist—Eventide’s own plugin even models the behavior of the Murata filters. But hardware offers the full hands-on experience, so next time you spot an old H3000 in a rack somewhere—and you’ve got the time—fire it up, wait for the distinctive “click” of its relays, spin the knob, and start digging.
PRS Guitars today released the updated MT 15 and the new Archon Classic amplifiers, along with a larger Archon speaker cabinet. The 15-watt, two-channel Mark Tremonti signature amp MT 15 now features a lead channel overdrive control. An addition to the Archon series, not a replacement, the 50-watt Classic offers a fresh voice by producing retro rock “classic” tones reminiscent of sound permeating the radio four and five decades ago. Now twice the size of the first Archon cabinet, the Archon 4x12 boasts four Celestion V-Type speakers.
MT 15 Amplifier Head
Balancing aggression and articulation, this 15-watt amp supplies both heavy rhythms and clear lead tones. The MT 15 revision builds off the design of the MT 100, bringing the voice of the 100’s overdrive channel into its smaller-format sibling. Updating the model, the lead channel also features a push/pull overdrive control that removes two gain stages to produce vintage, crunchier “mid gain” tones. The clean channel still features a push/pull boost control that adds a touch of overdrive crunch. A half-power switch takes the MT to 7 watts.
“Seven years ago, we released my signature MT 15 amplifier, a compact powerhouse that quickly became a go-to for players seeking both pristine cleans and crushing high-gain tones. In 2023, we took things even further with the MT 100, delivering a full-scale amplifier that carried my signature sound to the next level. That inspired us to find a way to fit the 100's third channel into the 15's lunchbox size,” said Mark Tremonti.
“Today, I’m beyond excited to introduce the next evolution of the MT15, now featuring a push/pull overdrive control on the Lead channel and a half-power switch, giving players even more tonal flexibility to shape their sound with a compact amp. Can’t wait for you all to plug in and experience it!”
Archon Classic Amplifier Head
With a refined gain structure from the original Archon, the Archon Classic’s lead channel offers a wider range of tones colored with gain, especially in the midrange. The clean channel goes from pristine all the way to the edge of breakup. This additional Archon version was developed to be a go-to tool for playing classic rock or pushing the envelope into modern territory. The Archon Classic still features the original’s bright switch, presence and depth controls. PRS continues to stock the Archon in retailers worldwide.
“The Archon Classic is not a re-issue of the original Archon, but a newly voiced circuit with the lead channel excelling in '70s and '80s rock tones and a hotter clean channel able to go into breakup. This is the answer for those wanting an Archon with a hotrod vintage lead channel gain structure without changing preamp tube types, and a juiced- up clean channel without having to use a boost pedal, all wrapped up in a retro-inspired cabinet design,” said PRS Amp Designer Doug Sewell.
Archon 4x12 Cabinet
As in the Archon 1x12 and 2x12, the mega-sized PRS Archon 4x12 speaker cabinet features Celestion V-Type speakers and a closed-back design, delivering power, punch, and tight low end. Also like its smaller brethren, the 4x12 is wrapped in durable black vinyl and adorned with a British-style black knitted-weave grill cloth. The Archon 4x12 is only the second four-speaker cabinet in the PRS lineup, next to the HDRX 4x12.
PRS Guitars continues its schedule of launching new products each month in 2025. Stay tuned to see new gear and 40 th Anniversary limited-edition guitars throughout the year. For all of the latest news, click www.prsguitars.com/40 and follow @prsguitars on Instagram, Tik Tok, Facebook, X, and YouTube.
