Peavey Windsor Tube Amp Head  

Yes the stock preamp on this amp sucks. It distorts anything about 1/10th gain and the distortion on it is terrible, so you want metal or rock distortion but you can't plug it into the preamp, otherwise you'll get terrible preamp distortion in addition to your pedal setup.

You can get around this without making any modifications to the preamp. There is an effects return input on the front panel that completely bypasses the preamp and master volume pot and goes directly into the tube amplifier. Normally, this is for you to use the volume setting on your pedal (or a volume pedal) to control the master volume after you feed it through the preamp and the effects loop send.

However, if you plug a digital pedal rig with a fast processor (I use the cheap RP200 multi effects I had since high school, and it sounds incredible) directly into the effects loop RETURN, you can get any kind of distortion you may want with the benefit of a real tube amplifier, bright and ringy southern rock or heavy and very clean death metal. And it will go up to the full loudness of the amp with the volume setting on the pedal, although I haven't tested either because of respect to neighbors.

If you are deciding on settling between the cheap Peavey Windsor or some high end Solid State, please remember that Transtube, Virtube, Valvestate, etc.. are all just Words for solid state mosfet electronics. FETs are not amplifiers, (except for a very narrow G/S range, but this is not used) FETs are switches used to drive high load components: motors, fans, subwoofers, lights, etc by switching the load at a high frequency (PWM). This is not the audible frequency, instead this is a much higher fixed frequency used to re-generate the audio stream. It is for this reason that Solid state amplifiers cannot properly reproduce more than a single harmonic of a vibrating string. This is ok for car amplifiers because all car audio is encoded at a constant bitrate and sound quality depends on whether or not everything made it into the audiostream, but that's not the way it leaves your guitar, so try plugging your guitar into the car stereo if you want.

Vacuum Tubes are real amplifiers. Even the cheapest vacuum tube amp will sound cleaner, brighter, and more responsive than the best mosfet amp. Add to that the lack of two more components you never want between your guitar and your speaker: ADC and DAC,

Yes, my modeling setup uses a MFX which is a solid state preamp and I can't explain why, but it works great.

Great value, but its more expensive now that when it came out because it's not being manufactured anymore. It's still very cheap for a tube amp. If you can find it used, even better.

So if you're planning on buying this amp, its excellent for pure amplification but will require a good modeling and distortion pedal which MUST be plugged directly into the effects loop return input on the front panel (keep in mind to turn the volume on the pedal down before turning the amp on because the Master volume knob on the head will be overriden by the pedal). Read online for good setups, (fyi don't use the Digitech Metal Master).

My setup with RP200 -

Pickup off/wah off

Fasty compresson, gain 1, amt 6

Amp model Stack, Gain 60, level 60

Eq B-12, M-6, T12

Cab off, swell 3, thres 18

Effects off,

Delay off

Studio reverb,

Expression pedal assgn off

And whatever on the amp head. Once you bypass the preamp, there are only 3 usable knobs on the head.

This is where the amp falls short. The Peavey Windsor is a one channel no frills head. No reverb. It is what it is. A really good reproduction of an old Marshall. Doesn't get too clean, doesn't get too dirty. It really nails that 'Malcom' sound. The effects loop is on the front of the head instead of around back (love this). The knobs are black with a white stripe that are very easy to see/use. The front panel is laid out very simply and large bold black lettering on the gold faceplate make it easy to navigate on a dark stage.

This is where it shines. This is a big boy amp, for a practice amp price. Peavey does make high quality long lasting amps. This one is no exception. Solid roadworthy construction, high quality components, ease of use. With the right pedals, it comes alive. What I don't like.... It's ugly.

As long as you aren't expecting it to be something it's not, it's a fantastic value. It has a pretty specific, classic tube amp sound, but I run a tube overdrive in front of it when I want to get sick fat saturated modern 'tube tone' out of it. It'll make your pants shake in front of a 4x12 cab.

It does exactly what it's supposed to. What it doesn't do, is a couple pedals away from being available. Except for a really clean sound. You can dial up a decent clean, but I didn't get a 100 watt tube Marshall wannabe to play clean. Dig?

Not sure how to rate "features," because this thing is a big EL34-powered brick with one channel and a "gain" button that barely sounds like it boosts anything. As mentioned by another reviewer, the Class A to Class A/B "texture" control is more like a switch (the middle area doesn't affect the sound much), but the resonance and presence controls do give you some control over your tone.

There's no reverb, no channels, but there is an effects loop which I find essential. I wish the loop jacks weren't on the front, but that's not a dealbreaker in any way.

The amp is wired for fuzzy overdriven power, and when you turn the pre up at all it gives you breakup quickly, even though it's 100 watts. So I keep the pre low and use a Tubescreamer as a switch. You can get a pretty smooth overdriven sound, but it will be overdriven. I've read on forums where people replaced tubes to get a cleaner tone, but that wasn't what I was interested in in the first place.

In short, the amp does one thing, and it does it well.

Seems to be built really well. I haven't had it that long, so I've only just started gigging with it, but my experience with Peavey's crappy sounding solid state amps has been along the lines of "when will this die so I can replace it??" I have faith that the one that sounds a heckuva lot better can also survive abuse.

Again, this is a single-feature amp, but it's also a high wattage all-tube amp for the price. Hard to beat. No, it doesn't really sound like a vintage Marshall, or an Orange, or any other amazing single-purpose amps, and it isn't as flexible as my versatile Egnater, but it sounds better than all these solid-state digital effects modelers. I play it through a Crate 4x12 that I bought used, which isn't hard to find, so an entire half-stack can be had for a decent price. Crazy.

How you feel about the Windsor is gonna come down to whether you like the sound of the amp. You get that nice tube responsiveness (in spades, with the amount of gain this thing has) and a vintage, fairly midrange-heavy 70s heavy metal tone (no scooped Metallica riffs here). You get a couple tone shapers but not a lot. However, the effects loop helps a lot and with the preamp knob lowered and a Tubescreamer or similar overdrive in front of the amp you can get two levels of gain nicely.

I use effects to get a wide range of wild sounds, but tonally speaking they're all based on this one thing, and if I didn't like that one thing, I wouldn't like the amp. But I do — and I feel like Peavey has offered a great value.

This head has only one channel, which has a boost button.  My Marshall switch won't work with it, so I can't change to boost with a foot switch.  Otherwise, there aren't many 'features' to list.  The amp will produce most types of sound, but only with a little knob tweaking.  There is no reverb, but there is an effects loop that I haven't used.  This is certainly a 'bare-bones' type of amp head.  The various sound control knobs all seem to preform their designated functions as advertised.  The special 'texture' knob (controls A/B or just class A sound) does something, but not anything that changes the output of the amp from A to A/B (IMHO).

Did I mention that it is a tube amp?

I haven't had the head long enough to judge the overall quality, but, so far, it works well and sounds good to me.  I compare it to the 'low' gain channel on my Marshall DSL100, but the Peavey gain will go a bit higher.  The cab is bigger (deeper) than a Marshall head, but it still fits on the top of the Marshall 1960A cabinet. The fit and finish appear to be flawless.  All in all, this seems to be a quality head.

This is where this head shines.  Even at the 'standard' (for now) price, it is a good value.  My Marshall DSL100 doesn't sound a bit better than the Peavey Windsor, although it does have 2 channels and reverb (more versatile!).  Had I the choice at the time, I would have bought this and not the DSL100!

Compared to my other tube heads (Carvin, Crate, Marshall), this one was a really good buy!  It is certainly more than I ever needed, but I bought it as a 'guest' amp.  If you want a totally clean channel for jazz or blues work, you need to look elsewhere, but for all kinds of rock, this is a great amp, maybe not for the 'chug, chug, no-mids, screeching metal' sound (that I hope will die out!).

Not really many features. Just be thankful there's at least an effects loop. Kind of disappointing there's not one output (other than speakers), but you get what you pay for. Single channel, which is fine for me, but very limiting if you're looking for some crazy versatile sound/tones. People seem to compare this head to a JCM900, probably due to being single channel. Do not expect it to sound close.

Side note: The Class A/AB knob should just be a switch (or not there at all, haha). On or Off. Between hard left, and hard right, there really isn't much to play with.

Decent quality. Had it about 3 years now, and it's been reliable. I'm not hard on my equipment though. Tone is slightly above average for me (price consisdered). The higher the gain, the less clarity it has (muddy's up a bit). Recently turned the Pre down, and got a Tube Screamer for the gain, and it cleared it up quite a bit. Also solves the issue of not having a clean and distorted channel in case you need it. Before that, I had to be a "real" guitar player and turn down the volume on the guitar to switch to clean on the fly.   My only real big complaint on this amp is the EQ. It's almost an "all or nothing" deal with the knobs. Treble range goes WAY high, to where it's shrill and dirty. Mids have a large range as well. Even the 1 or 2 O'clock position is almost too much. The Bass can't go high enough, even with the Resonance knob set high, it gets to a "just enough" point. Would be nice to have a little more headroom.

Value is excellent. For that price, you'd normally get a total crap bottom of the barrel solid state head. With the Windsor, you really do get true tube tone. For this price, if I was dying for a tube head, and couldn't find a good used one, I might still consider this.

Bottom line, it's a decent tube head. Tone is dirty and gritty. Has a real Southern tone to it. I play pretty heavy to somewhat light, and this head is fine. Moves a lot of air. Many reviews read "NOT FOR METAL", but it's definitely OK in my opinion. There is more than enough gain, which I was skeptical about before ordering. Add a Tube Screamer, and you'll be melting faces.Think of it's tone comparable to a "hardcore" tone. Decent blend of Metal and Punk sounding.

Size wise, this head is HUGE! It is exactly the size as the top of a 1960 Marshall cab (horizontally, and depth).

I would say if you can, save a little more and get another head (Marshall, Mesa, etc.), but on a budget, you won't be disappointed with this amp.