Blackstar U700 Reviews?

[zbass1976]

Hey! Have more people had a chance to try the Blackstar U700 amp? I have a chance to buy one pretty cheap, but I don't see many reviews on this amp. What I do see looks great. Thoughts? First-hand experience? Thanks in advance! 

[BassmanPaul]

I found a few on YouTube. It seems to be a fairly versatile amplifier. I must admit that I didn't like the distortions built into the unit for my purposes as I don't like distortion on my bass tone. 

[markbunney]

Following, as also potentially interested in this amp

[ped]

I’ve got the U500 combo and 250act extension if that’s any help. Briefly because I’m pissed I’d say I’m super happy with the amp, especially the built in compressor and range of sounds available, even if I tend to use ‘classic’ and ‘linear’ modes mostly. My last amp was a Mesa 400+ and matching cab and the Blackstar gives me just as beef. 

[40hz]

I was interested in one of these, they have a great feature set. However, the power rating is slightly misleading. It's 700watts into 2 ohms, not 4. Seeing as I like clean headroom, I'm not sure this would be up to it for my uses.

[markbunney]

7 hours ago, 40hz said:

I was interested in one of these, they have a great feature set. However, the power rating is slightly misleading. It's 700watts into 2 ohms, not 4. Seeing as I like clean headroom, I'm not sure this would be up to it for my uses.

That’s very interesting to know. My cab is 8 ohms so not sure that would be suitable for me

[40hz]

1 hour ago, markbunney said:

That’s very interesting to know. My cab is 8 ohms so not sure that would be suitable for me

In terms of outright 'volume' and decibels, it's probably still loud enough, I just find lower powered heads will start to drive the preamp harder to get there, and personally I hate any form of 'hair' or overdrive on my tone, so for me, higher powered heads, just ticking over, is what I look for. You might find this still works for you though? 

 

Having taken a look at the manual it's listed as:

700watts into 2 Ohms

500 into 4 Ohm

250 into 8 Ohm

[Chienmortbb]

 It is basically a 500 watt amp with 2 ohm capability. Probably more than enough for most people. 

[fretmeister]

I’m tempted to try one of these. Built compressor and a little drive could be great.

 

Anyone know if it does a good John Deacon slightly farty mids P bass tone?

[Russ]

I actually posted a review in the reviews section yesterday.  This is what it said. 

 

 

Been playing with a U700 head a bit, into my Barefaced Big Twin II. 

 

I like the tone. There’s a lot of stuff in there, and the power amp emulations are excellent. Good, powerful EQ, and the two pre-shapes give you instant good tone. The compressor is decent for a one-knob job. However, the little toggle switches are flimsy, hiding the effects settings round the back is a bit silly (some people might not even notice they’re there!) and, well, despite 700 watts of power, it never feels like it actually gets very loud. 

 

Also, NO MUTE SWITCH!  

 

Great first go at bass from Blackstar - it’s really got potential. But a Mk2 version needs to address some of these issues. Proper pushbuttons for the EQ, preamp, effects, etc please. Include the full-featured footswitch. And, if they’re keeping the effects, put the settings on the front. And add a futtockin’ MUTE SWITCH!

[fretmeister]

No mute switch? Controls on the back that might a tweak at a gig?

 

That's not very clever.

Thanks for the answer. I won't buy one!

[Jo.gwillim]

I bought one a while ago but it's sat on the shelf and never been gigged. It sounded great at home but it has too many options for me to get confused with for live. Not a fault of the amp, more a fault with me. I'm gonna dig it out today as i spent yesterday figuring out how to get Reaper to give amp frequency response plots, so I'm interested to see what they look like. I suspect it'll be up for sale here in a wee while.

[Russ]

4 hours ago, fretmeister said:

No mute switch? Controls on the back that might a tweak at a gig?

 

That's not very clever.

Thanks for the answer. I won't buy one!

There's a switch on the front to switch between no effects, chorus and octave, and you can run both effects together if you get the better footswitch from Blackstar. But the chorus depth and octave blend controls are on the back. I guess they're expecting people to "set and forget" them. 

 

I actually looked into the volume issue a bit more. It only delivers 700W into 2 ohms - at 4 ohms, it's only pumping out 500W. Which is good if you're running two 4 ohm cabs, but not so good for everyone else. 

[funkydoug]

I’m also curious about these.

 

500w at 8ohm would be more than enough for me. 
 

Does anyone know if the footswitch is midi? And if so could an external midi controller be used instead?

Thanks all.

[Russ]

4 minutes ago, funkydoug said:

I’m also curious about these.

 

500w at 8ohm would be more than enough for me. 
 

Does anyone know if the footswitch is midi? And if so could an external midi controller be used instead?

Thanks all.

Nope. 1/4” TRS jack. 

 

I think it’s actually more like 350W into 8ohms - 500 into 4, and 700 into 2. 

 

As I was saying above, the tone is great. It’s just a bit… quiet. 

[markbunney]

I was looking at one of these but the low volume put me off.

 

FYI Andertons currently have a b stock one for £458

[BassmanPaul]

Just for idle curiosity: how do you get the pound symbol to show? 

[markbunney]

26 minutes ago, BassmanPaul said:

Just for idle curiosity: how do you get the pound symbol to show? 

It’s just there on my phone when I toggle to numbers

[funkydoug]

51 minutes ago, Russ said:

Nope. 1/4” TRS jack. 

 

I think it’s actually more like 350W into 8ohms - 500 into 4, and 700 into 2. 

 

As I was saying above, the tone is great. It’s just a bit… quiet. 

Gotcha, my mistake. Thanks for that.

Still enough for me in all likelihood. 

Edited August 28, 2023 by funkydoug
Courtesy!

[fretmeister]

23 hours ago, Jo.gwillim said:

I bought one a while ago but it's sat on the shelf and never been gigged. It sounded great at home but it has too many options for me to get confused with for live. Not a fault of the amp, more a fault with me. I'm gonna dig it out today as i spent yesterday figuring out how to get Reaper to give amp frequency response plots, so I'm interested to see what they look like. I suspect it'll be up for sale here in a wee while.

 

How do you get Reaper to do that?

 

All I do is record with it!

[Jo.gwillim]

1 hour ago, fretmeister said:

 

How do you get Reaper to do that?

 

All I do is record with it!

it's not too hard though there's probably freebie software out there that will do exactly the same thing.
Set up 2 reaper tracks. track 1 has the white noise FX, output that on the master bus. track 2 has a slightly modified JS: Frequency Spectrum Analyser  FX. the while noise output goes into your amp input jack  and the DI output goes to the track 2 input. That pretty much works out of the box. You can change the amp EQ and see what happens. the only problem is the Freq spec analyser FX graph is rather noisy and I had to edit the FX to give a longer integration time to make it more useable. It currently goes to 10,000ms and I had to increase that to 50,000.  I have quite a few amps kicking around at the moment and it's been fascinating to see  the (far from) "flat" response of the amps before the EQ is applied. I'll write it all up in a day or two and post with the modded FX.

[Chienmortbb]

22 hours ago, Russ said:

I actually looked into the volume issue a bit more. It only delivers 700W into 2 ohms - at 4 ohms, it's only pumping out 500W. Which is good if you're running two 4 ohm cabs, but not so good for everyone else. 

What cabs are you using? 250 watts into 8 ohms should be more than enough.

[Russ]

1 hour ago, Chienmortbb said:

What cabs are you using? 250 watts into 8 ohms should be more than enough.

I'm using a Barefaced Big Twin II, which, in general, requires quite a lot of juice to work properly. My main amp head is one of the new Trace Elliot TE-1200s, which throws out 1200W.  

 

We're also getting into that murky discussion about "class D watts" not being equivalent to class A/class AB watts. Technically, a watt is a watt - one joule per hour. But the best explanation I've heard is that a Class D power amp is super-clean and flat in response, with no additional harmonic colouration, so it sounds quieter. A more traditional valve or MOSFET power amp adds additional colouration and harmonics to the sound, so it ends up sounding "bigger" per watt of power.

Edited August 29, 2023 by Russ

[agedhorse]

Never directly measure the output of a class D power amp with a sound card input. Most are BTL (bridged) and there is no ground reference. If you try to ground the speaker minus terminal through the sound card you have a good chance of destroying the amp and/or the sound card.

 

Generally such measurements are made using differential probes and the subtract function on the scope, or a 1:1 measurement isolation transformer capable of the voltages and frequencies required.

[Jo.gwillim]

Quite agree, i was using the DI amp output so a nice line level.