Well I already have an SE Custom 24 in spalted maple with a vintage sunburst. What info exactly should I post for suggestions? My music taste is enormous, I love everything from Slayer to meshuggah to dave bruebeck and miles davis.
The rig!
From amp to guitar:
Orange crush 20 -------------- Boss RC1 looper-------- Donner golden tremolo----- MXR phase 90 ----- Donner yellow fall delay ----- Donner tutti chorus ----- Boss Mega distortion 2 (for my chug and djenty tones) ------ Dunlop Crybaby wah ----- TC Electronic Dark matter distortion --------------------- PRS SE Custom 24 in vintage sunburst (from the exotic wood run, I have the spalted maple veneer) and overall, I like it, I can get everything from mac demarco warbles to warm jazz licks to steve vai goodness and to dimebag squeal's.
Overall, It's fairly versatile, but with the orange amp's in general, excluding amp's for Jim root, they don't have the tightness of a 6505 or dual rec or JCM 800, it's more floppy and raw. It's at most meh for classic rock tone's but you need the crush at like max volume to get a good tone out of it. But I just use the clean channel and run a distortion through it.
Amps I have seriously considered:
- 6505 MH (the mini one)
- Orange Micro dark terror (tube/solid state head that's well in my price range)
- The orange stomp amp (amp in a pedal sort of deal, you can run a cab through it and it has an FX loop and everything)
- Questioning buying a helix or something similar, not too familiar with stuff like that
- PRS MT15, it's very good but the volume is what I worried about
If you could offer any advice for me, that would be great.
There were tube amps around when I started to get into them 15-ish years ago, but nothing like the MT15.
Not all, but most tube amps under a grand and under 20 watts are really just a toy, because they skimp on important things like transformers, tubes, and other features. The MT15 comes with respectable tubes, not the top shelf stuff, but very reliable and good quality. With some other amps, you'd have to shell out close to $100+ to get tubes like the MT15 has. The transformer thing, you can't fix afterwards, and that has a lot to do with the low end authority of the tone.
I guess if I could sum up what the MT15 would do for you, as a 15 year old guitarist, is give you an amp that will have the tone, volume, and reliability to serve you for a long time. You can use it for a lot more than hard rock and metal, the clean channel is very good and takes pedals extremely well, so even if you want to get a Marshall in a box pedal, or some lower gain overdrive, you'll have a good platform for it. The other amps you listed are compromises and toy-like, IMO. The Helix, on the other hand, is a great tool, just depends on whether you want an amp for the volume, or a multi-effects board for the versatility.
Now, whether that's worth more to you than a good acoustic, only you can answer that question. The SE acoustics are fantastic too, and they have many models with different woods, and different tones as a result. Just depends on what you'll use most.
One path that might be good, get the MT15 and matching cab, and then save up for something like the Helix Stomp. Again, being a bit older than you, there was nothing like the Helix units when I was your age - there were multi-effects units, but they were a joke. The Helix units are legitimate contenders, at least in the realm of stompbox type effects, save yourself some money and a lot of pedalboard building!
