Dean Markley - CD30 Amp - I'm in love

[Twhjelmgren28]

Hey there, yesterday was NAD day for me and I ended up settling on Dean Markley CD30. I'm absolutely in love with this amp.

I'm basically moving into an intermediate level of playing and wanted to upgrade to my first all-tube amp and away from the Fender Frontman 15G. As bad as it sounds, I was basically looking for about as cheap an amp as I could find and initially bought a Crate V33 - the clean on that amp sounded good to me however the overdrive was horrible - it was even worse after I had it at home. The amp ended up having issues so I brought it back.

After seeing the Dean Markley when I bought the Crate, I did a little research. I couldn't find a lot of info on it but what I could find sounded really positive. After playing it I was blown away - I feel like I basically stole it for the price I ended up paying. With all that being said, I obviously don't have much experience with tube amps in general but I could tell a world of difference between this amp and the V33. I was basically going for the clean sound of a hot rod deluxe, in a cheaper and smaller package. I feel like I really found it in this amp.

I was just curious if anyone else has any experience / criticism / thoughts on the Dean Markley amp line. Not that it will change my perception of the amp . . . it's just that I had never heard of the brand before seeing it used and, like I said, it's not that I've played a lot of tube amps (only real experience is testing them at stores and listening on youtube). The sales associate said the acoustic Dean Markley's sold like crazy but he felt the electric amp line was just not that well known.

[Fumble fingers]

never played one but it looks like a real nice amp with the big tubes (6L6's) ..... it's roughly a 800.00 amp new with foot switch ... HNAD !!

[Twhjelmgren28]

Thanks, I'm having a blast with it!