VFX5212 Review

The VFX5212 is a dual channel Class A/B amp that delivers 50 watts RMS from a pair of EL34 tubes, to power two internal 12" Celestion speakers. It feature 15 digital effects designed to replicate the best reverbs, delays, and vibrato effects available from any manufacturer from any era.

Features:	9
Sound:	8
Reliability:	9
Impression:	9
Overall rating:	8.8
Users rating:	7.9
Comments:	3

overall: 7.8

Reviewed by: TrigFunction, on september 03, 2007

Price paid: $ 650

Purchased from: Local Music Store

Features: I have no idea what year the amp was made, versatility wise it's not that great. I use it for blues primarily but you can't get that much distortion out of it. If you want to play metal, hardcore, or any time of very distorted music don't get this amp. The amp has two channels one clean and one distorted and does have an effect loop in it but no headphone jack. I've used this amplifier in quite a few places such as a show for our cities fourth and july (outside) and a county fair and it was load enough. 50 watts of tube gets plenty loud // 8

Sound: I'm using a Schecter C-1 classic and the sound suits my needs pretty well. I play blues and I really like the sound you can get out of it for that. It does get kinda noisy if you have the gain cranked and the volume past 5 but it's not horrible. Like I said, the distortion isnt that great for anything above a light rock. My amplifier does have tone tubby speakers though, not the kind that usually comes with this amp. // 7

Reliability & Durability: I think this amplifier is pretty durable except for a few points. I think that the cage that the put around the tubes in this amp is poorly manufactured because there too close and it rattles a little bit. Also I did blow a fuse on this amp once when I was playing it with the volume around 6. // 8

Impression: I usually dislike Crate amps, they have always been my least favorite brand of amplifiers. My local music store only sold Crate amplifiers and every now and then I would go in just to jam on new guitars. I plugged into the vfx and fell in love with and knew that the 650 dollars I paid was worth it. If I lost this amplifier I would purchase a Mesa Boogie if I had extra money. If you can get this amp for less than 700 dollars it is definately worth it. // 8

overall: 9.8

Reviewed by: Refixer, on december 23, 2005

Purchased from: Professional Musician Center

Features: I recently bought this amp a few weeks ago, and even after playing with it everyday, I'm still amazed by it. 16 built in effects, effects loop, and plenty of power. 50 Watts all tube. Even at pretty high volumes, this thing is amazingly quiet. I play mainly a lot of metal and post grunge on this, but it can cover anything. My friends have played classic rock, classical, jazz/blues, etc. and it sounded great. Definatley an amp to look at if you're looking for versatility. The built in effects are: bypass (no effect), small reverb, med. rev., large rev., slapback, delay 1, delay/rev 1, delay 2, delay/rev 2, vibrato slow, vibrato fast, chorus, chorus/rev, chorus/rev/delay, slap chorus, and t-wah (touch sensitive wah wah). // 10

Sound: Right now I'm using this through a B.C. Rich Warlock (crappy, yes I know), which was always noisy on my old piece of junk amp. But with this, when I stop playing, the amp stops making noise. As I said above, I play mainly metal and postgrunge, and this more than covers it. More gain than I'll ever need. But it can easily go to Jazz, Classical, Blues, whatever you need it to do. I've never had the chance to crank this baby up too much (highest its been is at 4 1/2), but I could tell the louder it got, the more the tone excelled. With the clean channel, I never use my bridge pickup, always my neck, which is a hassle because I hate hitting the footswitch then switching the pick-up in the middle of playing. With the B-pickup, the highs really come out and are sometimes earsplitting. Pretty much thats the only trouble I've had with it. // 9

Reliability & Durability: I haven't gigged with this or had it too long, so I don't know if its that durable yet. But I would never go to anything without a back-up of some sort, so I do have spare tubes that I keep with it. Thats the only kind of back-up I would use. It's built very sturdy and has already taken some beats, and I noticed not a single thing wrong. // 10

Impression: Overall, I'm extremely impressed with this amp. I compared it to a Peavey XXX (half-stack), a Peavey Valve Kind 212 combo, a used Fender DeVille (I think that was the name), and a Line 6 HD147, and I felt that this fit my style of music best. There's nothing I really hate about this, except that the built in effects are really soft and the higher the level of the effects, the more fuzz in the background. It's got everything I could want, need. If the reviewer has any more questions, feel free to PM me. // 10

Comments

[earache]

Very helpful! I'm in the process of bying an amp. I'm looking at this one (Crate VFX5212), a Peavey ValveKing 212 and a Marshall TSL602. This one seems decent. Thanks!

[Kid Fisto]

for chrissakes, why can't anyone fill in the price?

[Homestar1m]

I bought this amp used, and it plays extremely well. It has a very large variety of sounds you can get out of it, and it really has a nice tube amp sound, without a large tube amp price. Definitely worth every penny.