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Today was v5 Test Drive day. The next version of TRIWATT was tested in bgroup's sly-fi studio. Mark da Silva from Strum Music in Picton, ON, droppedby to Test Drive. We couldn't be there, but bgroup was and his report and hopefully clips are forthcoming. By all accounts, it was a success and the TRIWATT passed muster.

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Stephen
Web: www.trinityamps.com. Facebook: facebook.com/trinityamps. Twitter: @trinityamps

Can't wait to hear them! Need to find a drool emoticon!

J

Clips are coming!! Sorry for the delay in getting them up here, pretty crazy session schedule of late... Anyway, will have some v4 and some v5 clips - depending on the tone and the cab, the difference between v4 and v5 is sometimes subtle, sometimes not so subtle. Here's what I'm hearing...

v4 had a really forward aggressive upper mid characteristic, and when the amp was driven to breakup, the top end got REALLY crunchy (as evidenced in the first round of clips). Depending on what you're looking for this is either an AMAZING thing, or not so amazing. Also, because of the detail in the top end, even the slightest amount of breakup was evident, so it didn't feel like there was as much clean headroom as you'd sometimes like...

v5 - now let me state this up front, the tone is still very forward, bright and crunchy... and there's still all kinds of detail... but what v5 does for me is remove the undesirable moments from v4 and replace them with desirable ones. So, if you want that really bright, crunchy, aggressive, forward thing - it's still in there, just not all the time, and it doesn't get ugly. And if you want more clean headroom, it's in there now too - probably about the same amount of clean headroom in the Triwatt as in the TC-15. The thing the Triwatt didn't have much of before was "smooth" or "round". v5 adds this - not at the expense of toughness, after all it ALWAYS sounds like a Hiwatt - but it's now possible to get a bit more creaminess out of it. It's also a bit "deeper" sounding... frankly, every tone you dial up on the thing gets a "YEAH!" from the guy with the guitar in his hands... And to put this into perspective in tangible terms, v4 was not all that pleasing when paired with TTA speakers. The TTA's were just too bright and detailed to yield any kind of warmth... Fanes and Greens were preferable. With v5, the TTA's sound incredible, different from the Fanes when Mark was playing but equally pleasing. I think Mark even preferred the TTA's to the Fanes!!

With the v5 mod, another interesting character has come out - because the amp is a bit darker, when using bright/normal the amp has a very "vintage" quality. I think before it was a bit too bright to sound vintage - I equate bright with modern. Anyway, so we're vintage in the bright/normal inputs... engage OD... and the bright modern thing comes back. I described it to Stephen and Phil as like having a JTM45 and a JCM800 in the same amp! But with a Hiwatt tone!! It really is like this though, no kidding around. Very cool...

Anyway, there was some talk that the OD stage could be darkened a bit too - how I feel right now is that I like the contrast between the dark/bright. I'll spend some more time with the amp/clips before I completely decide, but as of right now I'm really digging the amp exactly how it is...

What a fun journey this has been!! Clips soon!

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Brent Bodrug
Producer-Engineer/Songwriter

www.slyfichapel.com

Oh this sounds DAMN fun

Thank you Steven and Phil oops and B-Group
Can't wait for the clips.

Here comes another fine "Trinity" amp
Jac

You just hit on exactly the two main qualities I was aiming for with this design. I wanted it to sound like a vintage Hiwatt, and I also wanted it to be able to change character between an early '70s Hylight era Hiwatt and an '80s high-gain Biacrown era Hiwatt Lead amp. If you've found those qualities through your own tests, then it looks like I may have succeeded.

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Great tones come in small glass jars!

well exactly, but you still needed a little of the trinity sound. Which has come thru.

Especially in the distortion.

Very nice and congratulation's for both of you.!
Jac

p.s./

Where the hell is the production model's??

For the record, Version 5 had 2 subtle changes.

1. Removed a 47n cathode bypass cap on v3. It help address brightness, clean headroom, ability to crank the MV and smooth overdrive distortion.

2. Replaced the 2.2uf bypass cap on the OD circuit with a 1 uf cap for somewhat less bass when the stage was engaged.

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Stephen
Web: www.trinityamps.com. Facebook: facebook.com/trinityamps. Twitter: @trinityamps

Now Larry has version 5 for a taste test and stage practice. Hope to get some feedback in the next day or so. I had one call today and he was pretty jazzed about this release.

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Stephen
Web: www.trinityamps.com. Facebook: facebook.com/trinityamps. Twitter: @trinityamps

Indeed, I have spent a couple of days with V5 (or was that the M5 multitronic unit). Anyway, I like it a lot because.

1) It is fast. The notes (especially the midrange stuff) seem to come out of the amp just slightly before you play them. This is the same feeling I get from the clean channel of some Two Rocks. It can be frightening and is always revealing. This is evidenced by my flub in the attached clip. It couldn't be more out there and in your face. Careful kids lest your ass be exposed like your wearing a pair of Princes chaps!

2) The overdrive is freakin sweet. When I engage the overdrive I can get a feedback even when the tone is fairly clean. (once again see clip below). This happens at fairly low volume too.

3) Distortion - I cranked everything with a Les Paul and immediate heard the metal gods commanding me to Thrash!!! (that's right John). This will be my next clip cuz this sound is WAY beyond anything I would think of for this kind of amp.

4) See you at 12! - The amp sounds great with everything at 12 o'clock. You don't have to go too far from there for many tonal variants. Scoop the mids for a clean fender like tone (sorry got a fender for that) and crank the treble and presence for some TriWatt spank.

5) Tone controls are usable - and they actually do something without farting out or piercing your ears or anything nasty like that. No Bass on zero with this amp.

6) Clean and Dirty and the Creamy in-between. Clean sound is unique. Full bore distortion is absolutely psychotic but that area where the amp just starts to break up and get meaty is the place I like the best. I have the best time of it with the master pretty much cranked and the volume and gain turned up as much as I need to to get the guitar into that happy place. This is a different place with different guitars. Here are the settings I used to get to (and maybe just a little past) this place with the strat.

'62 Reissue Strat - Bright Input - Volume 12oclock - Overdrive Out 2 - Bass 12 - Treble 3 - Mid 2 Presence 2. Trinity 2x12 with TT alnicos

7) This thing sounds great with alnico's but it also sounded great with G12-65's in a 4x12 slant cab (really good). Fantastic bottom end clarity.

I have modified my rig for the next gig and did a quick test. It was very promising. I was using a two rock and TC2290 with some effects in the TC's loop (which was a great tone at the last rehursal). Tonight I will switch to stomp boxes on the floor straight into the TW set to the inbetweeny spot I like so much. Pedal board is as follows

Volume pedal > tuner > BB Preamp > Boss Dimention > MXR Flanger > Sparkle Drive > Keeley Compressor > Ibanez DE7 Echo > Verbzilla.

Early testing sounded pretty good with no spikeyness or skanky tones right from the start. This means I can have maximum play with how I set the pedals without getting into the tinny skank zone that cuts in an ear peircing way and not a happy way.

Coco will post the link to the clip later. It is recorded quick and dry. I stuck a 57 about 4 inches in front of the amp and hit the record button on pro tools. No tweaking no nothing. I will do a little more setup for the dirty tone. I went flat into and out of protools and mastered in Audition. Once again, no comp, no eq, no nothing. (yes it was difficult).

We'll see how it sounds in the big room tonight.



Cheers
Larry

Clip: Take1

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Guitologist at Large
"How does that feel?"

You really have such a way with words!



I think I just heard my favourite Hiwatt tone there!

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Great tones come in small glass jars!

now that was sweet!

AJC

Spot the TRIWATT!



The TRIWATT handled this setting in a good size room at Half Vol, Half Master 1/2 - 3/4 OD. Rest of the settings were pretty well in the middle as you can see in the picture below. I was really impressed at how well it hung in there. On slide guitar it was nice and clean, at times very country. But on Sufragette City, 3/4 OD it was rockin. Larry likes the OD on. Fantastic sustain. This amp is very articulate and fast - I could hear the pick at times. I am very happy with it.

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Stephen
Web: www.trinityamps.com. Facebook: facebook.com/trinityamps. Twitter: @trinityamps

Well, I asked for a Gilmour-ish clip & that one delivers. Awesome...

And then he gigs with the thing! Following in the footsteps of Mr. Reeves...prototypes used by gigging musicians! Nice to hear it held up well (like there was any doubt). It must have brought a big smile to Stephen & Phil's faces!

I've always felt that if an amp sounds good with all the knobs at about noon the designer(s) did their homework & you have a special amp on your hands. You have a base tone that you can tweak. My Laney is like that too. The difference being the Laney does one trick well (incredibly well in fact) while it appears the Triwatt has plenty of tricks in it's bag.

Notice he's not using the linked input just the normal. ??
Stew

Yes, I let my ears do the talking. (WTF?) I guess my mouth has been doing most of the listening? What I mean is I just plugged in to where I got happy tone. Didn't care what knobs went where or who was plugged into what. I got the best feel from the amp for my playing style by plugging into the Bright input along.

Mind you this lack of front end gain is heavily mitigated by the fact that I have been running the amp EXCLUSIVLY in overdrive mode. This has been true even when I am seeking a clean sound.

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Guitologist at Large
"How does that feel?"

You better bet it did. Especially given that this is a prototype that's been hacked and modded umpteen times.

It's actually the Bright input, as Larry says here.

I'm pleased to see the Bright input is so usable.

I found you can get real great sparkly clean tones in the overdrive mode.

BTW what kind of Marshall cab are you using there? It looks like a bass amp cab...

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Great tones come in small glass jars!

The cab was a standard issue Marshall 412 with G12-75s. Even so, the sound sparkled from the back of the room and stood out. I guess it was the bright input that helped there.

On Suffragette city, Larry used the linked input and more OD to get a great sound that was very close to Bowies 'Spiders' band on that tune.

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Stephen
Web: www.trinityamps.com. Facebook: facebook.com/trinityamps. Twitter: @trinityamps

Will I need to pull my V30s and install the G12T-75s I have sitting around, in my 2x12" Cabinet? I know Hiwatt currently uses the G12T-75 in their "cheap" cabinets.

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ROB

why not one of each

Not so sure about that. These were just the studio cabs. I'm sure Larry has other opinions on the speakers, as does Brent.

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Stephen
Web: www.trinityamps.com. Facebook: facebook.com/trinityamps. Twitter: @trinityamps