NAD with a side of disappointment.

[Mike Oxhuge]

I decided to scratch my Mesa Mark itch with an open box Mark VII that arrived this weekend. My disappointment is the noise, lack of low end noticably on Channel 3. I can tell the core tone is great but this amp seems excessively bright and severely lacking in low end compared to the Mark IIb Coli, and more fairly the Mark III's and IV I've owned previously. Even with the gain up and 80 hz slider maxed it just has less low end than my Carvin Legacy 100 which doesn't seem right. Also seems noisy so I guess I'll try some preamp tube swaps tonight. The Synergy IICP through the Legacy sounds similar but closer to a Mark IV tone and has way more low end balls, by like 25% and it isn't maxed on EQ. Just wondering if anyone else has experienced the VII vs other Marks and the low end available compared to them.

[nightflameauto]

Lack of low-end on any Mark doesn't sound right to me. Hopefully preamp tube swapping will give you some relief, cause that seems suspect to me, but I don't have any direct experience with the VII at all.

[heath]

I would try plugging the preamp out to another power amp as well just to rule out the power amp tubes.

Also how loud do you have the master cranked up and in which power amp setting? I've had a few mesa amps that sounded flat-out anemic until you got the master to about 10-11 o'clock.

[Mike Oxhuge]

I was on 90 watt master on 4. 4x12 Schecter USA identical to 1960b with x pattern of G12T75'S and Creamback Neo's. Wired to 16 ohm.

[heath]

Yeah, that low-end should have been thumping! I would try the mark effects send out to the legacy effects return just to eliminate whether its a power amp tube issue in the mark.

[ninjaraf]

Yeah, my experience with this amp is it had as much low end as a Mark IV. It is brighter, yes, but it doesn't lose low end because of that. Also, I didn't really have noise problems at all. It was an impressively quiet amp.

To me, this sounds like a problem of some kind. You should easily be able to dial in Mark IV big-ness with a bit more aggressive high end.

[Mike Oxhuge]

Thanks for the info and suggestions gents. I suspect a bad preamp tube as it also had significantly less gain than any of the other Marks I've owned. I can hear a great core tone, just gotta figure out if its tubes or defective. Even in Mark IV mode, gain dimed, bass at 11 which should be flubby, just no nuts.

[ninjaraf]

Oh yeah, the VII has more gain than every other Mark series. Like gain at 2 o clock is equivalent to maxed out on the Mark IV.

[holy-diver]

The mark vii has a ton of low end, I would suspect an issue

[RaceU4her]

i thought the mark VII's would have been a little more popular based on what i heard and the features