Any 'no hiss' Amp/speaker solutions?

  • I'm thinking mostly about the the portable PA speaker/full range route but am so used to very quiet monitoring that the usual hiss associated with modestly priced live gear drives me nuts and was wondering if anyone knows about/uses such a solution.

  • If you play a strat with magnetic picups you can`t go completely noisless.. hiss and noise will occure even in the most expencive PA`s In my band we use in ear and it works real nice. I also have a DXR8 for some amp feel. We use JBL PA, dont remember series.. 18" subs. Presonus studiolive mixer. it`s not noiseless but ok for us

  • Thanks.


    I should have been clearer, I mean self noise, so when nothing's plugged in and the volume is up are there any truly quiet units. Obviously I'm not expecting silence.

  • The noise threshold of an active cab is probably different for every brand and models... the CLRs I use are actually quite silent for example.
    I think the best "trick" is a proper gain staging, that reduces the gain to be used on the cab. Many times you can see that the signal sent to the cab is not robust enough: this forces to raise the cab's volume, hence its intrinsic noise.

  • CLR looks good, proper marine ply but that probably makes it fairly heavy? I was a little surprised when I recently paid attention to all those little PA cabs in the shops today that most of 'em are plastic. A friend has one of them he keeps in his man-cave for vocal duties. I tried my K one day but it sounded pretty awful and was way too hissy a unit to live with, hence my concerns.

  • There's a version of the CLR with neodymium transducers, that weights about 5 kg less. For its size it's light X)


    Hissing of course also depends on the profile and EQ, the best way to appreciate a cab's intrinsic noise is to listen to it with no device connected.
    Then, if the noise floor meaningfully raises when you use the Profiler, and you know (for example from using headphones) that the profile you are using is quite silent, properly gain-staging the rig is the key :)

  • I changed course completely.


    The K stays in the studio and I picked up a second hand Blackstar combo for the occasional outing.


    Maybe I'll use the K as front end for the most expensive fx pedal ever. :)