Modern attenuators

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Findthetone1
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Modern attenuators

Post by Findthetone1 »

There is ceratinly a great choice of attenuators these days and I read about people raving at how good they are. Are they really that much better that what was available 10-15 years ago? I have a Weber Mass Lite that is around 10 years old or so and haven't used it in forever. I bought to tame the monsterous River K-Tre I had and I hated it. Could've been user error but I felt like it put a blanket on the tone.
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harddriver
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Re: Modern attenuators

Post by harddriver »

I have an old THD hotplate and a Rivera Rockcrusher. The Rivera is very wellbuilt it's overbuilt actually but any setting attenuating more that -8DB it starts to affect the tone just the same as the THD. I only use either to make playing my 68 plexi and 72 Superlead tolerable while shaving some volume off, if I use -12DB or more on the either I notice the tone seems to be more affected like less punch and diminished highs but again that's how our ears perceive it so I don't think there is a way around it even if technically the overall sound is 100% identical but just more quiet. So I think the Flecther Munson curves/effect still applies even to modern attenuators even though we would not like it to be the case.

I think one might be better off slaving into a Suhr Reactive load then reamping with a another power amp like a Matrix for lower volume playing. As long as you understand something attenuated -12 to -20 Db just isn't going to have the same audible dynamics because of the Flecther Munson effects.
Findthetone1
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Re: Modern attenuators

Post by Findthetone1 »

That’s kind of what I was thinking. Great info. Thanks brother!
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RockyStar
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Re: Modern attenuators

Post by RockyStar »

The modern variants do well.

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lll
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Re: Modern attenuators

Post by lll »

Semantics here, but the Suhr Reactive Load isn't an attenuator, but a load box.

Some attenuators attenuate and serve as a load box as well (Hot Plate).

I'm not a fan of any attenuators unless I'm just shaving a few dBs off... any more than that, and the tone literally gets compressed (squashed) and loses dynamics.

AFA loadboxes, there is a big tonal difference between reactive (Suhr Reactive Load) and resistive (THD HotPlate).
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RockyStar
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Re: Modern attenuators

Post by RockyStar »

lll wrote: Sat Jan 15, 2022 1:37 am Semantics here, but the Suhr Reactive Load isn't an attenuator, but a load box.

Some attenuators attenuate and serve as a load box as well (Hot Plate).

I'm not a fan of any attenuators unless I'm just shaving a few dBs off... any more than that, and the tone literally gets compressed (squashed) and loses dynamics.

AFA loadboxes, there is a big tonal difference between reactive (Suhr Reactive Load) and resistive (THD HotPlate).
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