Fender Super-Sonic 22 22W 1x12 Tube Guitar Combo Amp  

    This amp is one of the finest I have ever owned in my 40+ years of playing. Line out, effects loop, burn channel, dual gain, 4 button footswitch, plus spring reverb,,,,,,,,WOW,,,,now those are usable features.

    It seems well built , but I had to re-tighten the power transformer that was basically hanging there when I received the amp. Come on Fender, this was such an obvious flaw,,,didn't anyone notice this before the amp came off the line ????!!!!

    A bit pricey I thought until I plugged in my Strat and started playing,,,,great Fender tone. BTW, I bought this used from Musicians Friend and got a killer deal !!!!!

    Overall, I would recommend this amp to any professional player,,,even the most critical tone snobs. It covers almost any style of music out there,,,,and with the effects loop you can place your effects where they do the most tonal good.

You can check out this amp's features on its listing.
I've had many amps over the years and 4 or 5 Fenders to include the Twin Amp, Twin Reverb, and Concert Reverb 4/10...and the Fender SuperSonic 22 simply ROCKS!
As the years go by and gear gets smarter...you come to appreciate smaller gear that does not compromise on sound quality and versatility.

Simply stated, this amp has a beautiful clean side to this amp with that great Fender Clean that we all have come to love over the years and the long spring reverb is no acception and a welcome Fender feature.

The Gain side with the twin cascading gains are a joy to explore while searching for your favorite tones.

This amp goes from pristine clean to growl to screaming Rock!

The 4 button footswitch is built like a tank and comes with a quality long cord.

The FAT switch on the clean side is a welcome addition that we single coil players appreciate.

The supplied speaker is a great speaker, no kidding.

If I had one complaint it's that one of the 12AX7 preamp tube was microphonic.
Musician's friend promptly mailed me a new one though. :-)

One really welcome feature also was a very nice, quality amp cover. That's important to me during transporting it to gigs as well as the 40 lbs which makes this amp a "grab-n-go" delight.

At 54, I've had many amps and several Fender amps and all through those years, Fender has always stood by their amps.
With a standard 5 year warranty issued by Fender....you can feel comfortable purchasing any amp they produce.

From this amp's cabinet and blonde tolex to the oxblood grill to the cream knobs, handle, and the beautiful operation and tone of this amp....I feel comletely comfortable rating the quality of this amp as a 10.

It's a really beautiful amp with great tone and versatility.

If you're just starting in music...it may sound like a lot of money and in the grand scheme of things, it is.

But for an all tube Fender amplifier that looks and sounds this good with a 5 year factory warranty, this amp is a bargain.

Over all, I'm going to give this amp a solid 9, but don't  be misled...this is one great amp!

The reason for a 9 is....the one microphonic tube and a couple of items I wish this amp had.

The Supersonic Big Brother...the 100w version has the AUTO BIAS so that if you change out Power Amp tubes, it automatically rebiases the tubes and then you can set them at Low-Medium-or Hot on their bias settings.

That, or a feature I had on a Fender Concert Reverb which had Bias point on the back of the amp along with the adjustment pot.....so that you don't have to remove the entire chassis to make adjustments.

This is simply a great feature that I wish this 22 watt'r had...but then....it wouldn't be at this price range either.

Thankfully Fender did not choose to call this a Deluxe Reveb III or Deluxe Reverb XD or Super Deluxe. It has it's own sound - kinda like a "Bassman Jr-packed-into-a-1x12-with-6V6s-and-spring-reverb, sorta. I owned a blackface deluxe, and the of the SS22 tone is much bassier and flatter, not as warm. Dispite the advertising hype of being "based on the Deluxe Reverb" it does not even sound like the two DRRI's I have owned. It lacks high-end definition and warmth. There is plenty of room on the front panel to include a bright switch and midrange control for the clean channel. There is also room for a master negative feedback presencec control that would also help add some sparkle. I hate the radio knobs and replaced them with classic Fender blackface knobs. I also replaced the logo with a raised Fender blackface logo. I was shocked to see the baffle was glued in. The tubes are impossible to change without removing both back panels and the speaker. The reverb driver is one eigth of an inch away from the speaker basket. So that limits the speaker swamp. The reason I am complaining about this is because I had to replace every preamp tube and both power tubes. There is a quarter inch gap between the chassis and the baffle. The rattling Groove Tubes were replaced with Mullards in V1 and V2, the reverb driver and the phase inverter were replaced with Phillips NOS AT7s. Not sure what V4 does, so it got a Mesa 12AX7SA to try to quiet down the horrible hiss. The hissing is unbearable. There is also a very loud vibration when the volume get past 3, similar to a jack hammer. There is noticable hum. I use a Clapton strat with noiseless pups, and a Gibson Les Paul. The volume on the clean channel is "on/off" 1 = off 2 = loud enough for my wife to complain from 4 rooms away in a soundproof studio. Other than that, it sounds great.  I use a good 2x12(Rolas) or 4x12 (V30s) cab tol get some top end sparkle back, since replacing the speaker is limited to what will fit under the reverb driver tube. The Jensen is very dark-sounding and breaks up very early. My Celestion Century neodymium sounds good in the SS22. EV, JBL will not fit, niether will alnico Eminence.

Fender should consider switching tube vendors. 7 bad tubes.

Very expensive. Used, it is grood deal. The Super sonic 60's I have tried sounded much better than this, but not as loud.

Overall, great for bands that play medium sized gigs, even large gigs. Not good for home studio unless you have a noise gate to control the excessive hiss. I'll probably keep mine, despite the fact it probably fell off the back of the UPS truck.

Overall, I'm extremely pleased with this amp.     The reverb goes way deep, the clean is everything you'd expect from Fender, and the gain sounds amazing.     You won't be playing metal out of this but it can definitely handle blues, jazz, country, rock, hard rock, alt, etc.     If you want to "chug-chug" then that's what a mesa's for.     Or if you're looking for that corse gritty gain then that's where Marshall shines but for everything else this amp has you covered and you'll sound awesome.

I gave the SS 22 a 7 only because I felt it was lacking in some very minor areas.     On the clean channel I would have prefered a 3-band eq over 2 but not a huge deal at all since personally I like mids to shine on the gain channel and highs on the clean.

The foot pedal is decent but I took a point away here too for the loud channel switching.     Probably won't be noticable when playing with a full band but at home the switching between clean and gain is noticable.

On the plus side, the best feature on this amp in my opinion is the "gain 2" knob.     This is where you can dial in your sustain/compression to just where you like it.     My strat sounded sooo nice with this turned up to about 8.. think hotel california solo sound.     My Les Paul sounded so sweet through this amp even with very hot ceramic pickups the tone was warm and creamy... and the sustain dailed up on a les paul makes for some easily controled feedback.

Overall, having a classic fender clean channel and a modern gain channel - with 6v6 tubes which sound sweet at any volume - makes this a very versatile amp without sacrificing any tonal quality.

Very sturdy casing, has a metal cage in the back to protect your tubes, a very comfortable thick rubber handle, and the retro knobs are much more solid than my Marshall JVM205H knobs.    

The foot pedal is very sold, looks like it will hold up just fine with gigging.     Couldn't find a reason not to give a 10 here.

Fender clean, "groove tube" tone, a gain channel that saturates more than I've ever heard on a Fender amp and all for about a grand.... to me, that's some serious value.     The tonal quality is well worth the price.

I really like the sound on both channels and I have been playing for over 30 years and have gone through alot of good gear. I play Strats , Teles and Les Pauls Through this thing and they all sound great...I also was able to do a side by side test after delivery next to some nice amps and was convinced that I wanted to keep it. I have a Blues Jr. that I like but it lacks bottom compared to the clean on the Super Sonic 22. I had it next to a Blues Deluxe Reissue and while the Deluxe has a nice chimey sound with a firm bottom it sounds thin on the drive channel and it fell short because you have to share the tone knobs on both channels,the drive channel on the 22 blows the Deluxe away. The deluxe also suffers from the "move the volume knob a quarter inch and it is screaming syndrome" the 22 does not have this problem, the volume knobs are very smooth and work like they should. Last I put it next to my Marshall TSL 601 and the Marshall sounded like I had a blanket over it next to the 22, it was muddy on both channels while the 22 sings. The 22 does start to break up on the clean channel around 4 on the dial and you will have to pull the bass down to clean it up a little but I would never play it that loud. I play in a classic rock band and a 9 pc. horn band that does weddings and corporate events and it has all the volume I need at lower settings. I was let down at first by the reverb issue but since I replaced the tube I could not be happier. This is the perfect size amp for me. I hope my comments can help others decide if this amp is right for them.

Reverb is a little overbearing, it is really deep so I did not have much use for anything past 2 or 3 on the dial. I checked the numbers on the unit and did some research and discovered that it is the same accutronic long decay reverb tank used in many of the older larger Fender amps from the past ( Twins, Pro Reverbs etc.), but now these accutronics tanks are not made in the USA.

The amp I bought had a bad pre-amp tube in the reverb section, it would feed back at anything above half volume. I swapped it in place of the first gain stage tube and got alot of hiss so I knew it was bad. I replaced the tube with a new one and I have been happy since. Fender quality control should have fixed this so it gets an 8.

Fender is asking a lot for this amp.