Power Attenuator Guitar Amp For Sale (2024 Update)

Great piece of kit. I am using it along side a 40watt h&k tube. When full powersoak is initiated, basically half the power is coming out the speaker. Incredible to be able to play a fully cooking 40 watt tube and having the output at living room audible level. Outstanding bit of kit for the price. Emulated mic if you are going to mixer, not that great but if you are using it for live play. It is absolutely perfectReviewed by Andertons Music Co.

I have a vintage 1978 Marshall 50w JMP half stack that was gathering dust in my studio. We all know that 50 Marshall watts is closer to 75w when dimed. With no master volume or effects loop I was seriously considering selling this rig as it was too loud for home studio use. This Bugera PS1 solved my problem!!!!! The unit is very well made, has three input options 4/8/16 ohms & most importantly a balanced mic emulation XLR & unbalanced line out. I tested these outputs on my Tascam 24 track & it sounds fantastic. I put the line out & xlr out into separate tracks & I got the classic Marshall sound we are looking for. I had my heads volume around 7-8 & used 4 ohm out. I attenuated till I could hear my guitar strings strumming. Even though the PS1 is rated 100w, my 50 w head got the PS1 pretty “toasty” so make sure you have plenty of air around it.marstegreg

I have a Princeton reverb amp that I love the sound of but always have to play it on the quiet channel. The amp sounds great but really springs into life with the volume dialed at 4.5. This is fine on the quiet channel but is still too loud late at night. Also, I'd been watching lots of reviews of the amp on YouTube and seen that it is capable of much more than I was making use of but that it meant cranking the volume. The Bugera PS1 had loads of great reviews so I thought I'd give it a go. Wow! Firstly I noticed that it removed the noise floor of the amp making it pretty much silent when not playing. I can now run my amp in the normal channel with the volume at 10 (though I prefer 4 to 8) and not disturb anyone else in the house (too much ). I've now got several new setting options to use with my amp from gloriouscleans to varying degrees of overdrive. I also found that recording is now easier with the reduced noise when mic'd and the line out works great as well. It's a really solid bit of kit that has breathed new life into what was already a great amplifier.Reviewed by Andertons Music Co.

Man. I got a Marshall SV20H that was just too loud for any normal house use. I've gone through like four attenuators and every single one muffled the sound to no end. This one PERFECTLY attenuates the amp without compromising any noticeable tone whatsoever, and the 18 different attenuation levels is insane. Get this NOW!Matthew

I am using it with a Mark V 25 Head + 1×12 slant cab. I was very much on the fence about buying an attenuator but after doing some research, i decided to go for the TK Ironman ii mini because: – The Mark V 25 does NOT have a single master, but a per channel one, which needs to be set between 10-11 for the amp to shine (otherwise it sounds bleak and thin). By using this thing, I have a single master, the amp is in "set and forget mode" – Sits on top of the head. It is light and relatively portable. – It is PASSIVE (no power adapter needed) – It is very granular. I personally do not use the "solo" function because it sits on the amp, but that gives another layer of versatility. Only downside is the small rubber feet which I replace for bigger ones to sit properly on the head. That's not a problem, just an observation in case you are wondering. Great bang for the buck.Nando

After reading tons of reviews decided on this guy. What a great piece. Simple to use, built well, and has a boost. There is zero done loss running this between my Plexi and my 4/12 cab. Even at bedroom volume it's just perfect. All metal construction. USA assembly and attention to detail. Would recommend this to anyone. Would definitely use this company again.Jared

Does a great job reducing volume but at the cost of tone. Even on the lowest attenuation setting it compresses the sound of the amp a lot. My amp sounds much better at low volumes without the attenuator. I ended up returning it. If your amp has a master volume skip this product.Josh

If you love loud amps but need that bedroom volume then this really does the job. It colours the sound ever so slightly but with an adjust to your eq settings after the volume is set it's not really noticeable.Reviewed by Andertons Music Co.

Great piece of kit. I am using it along side a 40watt h&k tube. When full powersoak is initiated, basically half the power is coming out the speaker. Incredible to be able to play a fully cooking 40 watt tube and having the output at living room audible level. Outstanding bit of kit for the price. Emulated mic if you are going to mixer, not that great but if you are using it for live play. It is absolutely perfectReviewed by Andertons Music Co.

I have a vintage 1978 Marshall 50w JMP half stack that was gathering dust in my studio. We all know that 50 Marshall watts is closer to 75w when dimed. With no master volume or effects loop I was seriously considering selling this rig as it was too loud for home studio use. This Bugera PS1 solved my problem!!!!! The unit is very well made, has three input options 4/8/16 ohms & most importantly a balanced mic emulation XLR & unbalanced line out. I tested these outputs on my Tascam 24 track & it sounds fantastic. I put the line out & xlr out into separate tracks & I got the classic Marshall sound we are looking for. I had my heads volume around 7-8 & used 4 ohm out. I attenuated till I could hear my guitar strings strumming. Even though the PS1 is rated 100w, my 50 w head got the PS1 pretty “toasty” so make sure you have plenty of air around it.marstegreg

I have a Princeton reverb amp that I love the sound of but always have to play it on the quiet channel. The amp sounds great but really springs into life with the volume dialed at 4.5. This is fine on the quiet channel but is still too loud late at night. Also, I'd been watching lots of reviews of the amp on YouTube and seen that it is capable of much more than I was making use of but that it meant cranking the volume. The Bugera PS1 had loads of great reviews so I thought I'd give it a go. Wow! Firstly I noticed that it removed the noise floor of the amp making it pretty much silent when not playing. I can now run my amp in the normal channel with the volume at 10 (though I prefer 4 to 8) and not disturb anyone else in the house (too much ). I've now got several new setting options to use with my amp from gloriouscleans to varying degrees of overdrive. I also found that recording is now easier with the reduced noise when mic'd and the line out works great as well. It's a really solid bit of kit that has breathed new life into what was already a great amplifier.Reviewed by Andertons Music Co.

I use this primarily as an attenuator. I’ve tried most of the products on this market which all have various shortcomings. The TAE allows you to actually use your tube amp without blowing out your ear drums. It’s the closest thing I’ve found to going straight into an amp. Very transparent. I had another reamper that was tube based and about half the cost that was very dark and colored the sound. Also significantly impacted the reverb/vibrato in my HW deluxe reverb. No issues like that with the TAE and also does well with pedals. Highly recommend. Very pricey, but gives you lots of flexibility. The onboard effects are very “digital” sounding to my ear, so I just turn them off.Joel Gilmore

I've had this device for two weeks now and am selling my PS2 in favor of it (although the PS2's attenutation is just as good). I've used many attenuators over the years and this one is probably among the best. The variable loads help with the feel and reactance of your amp – there's nothing else with this option on the market. The attenuator works great, as well and has a smooth taper for volume. Unlike the OX or other attenuators, doesn't effect your sound as you reduce volume other than removing some speaker drive characteristics. The onboard effects have Boss standard serviceability in their sound and having a boost EQ is very useful. For live use they would do the trick but in the studio I'd opt for some plugins. I expected the IRs to be lackluster, but actually compare very favorably to other 3rd party IRs on the market and are pleasantly satisfying through headphones. If you're looking for a good tube amplifier silent recording solution with effects, routing options, and attenuation for live use… this is the best one on the market IMO. In fact, if you've got an older lower wattage amp, this can bring it up to band volume through a higher power speaker cab. Pricey, but with all those options – worth it!Temple12

Unit itself: After watching all the YouTube videos and reading forum sites I was convinced for a bit that I was just doing something wrong. It seem to add some gain to every amp I had. The only way it sounded close to was to turn the volume of the amp itself down. The reactive load section didn't help at all and it wasn't real clear on exactly I was changing when switching them. The "suggested" settings in the manual did nothing for me. The only way I was able to get a sound even close to what I had without it was to crank the unit which defeated the purpose… For low volume playing at home I could have just turned the amp itself down and used an OD to get the drive… Other guitar player in my band mentioned the Bugera PS1 sounded better! This unit basically made my amps digital. If you're a fan of digital products you will be fine. If not, I'd look elsewhere. Effects/Rigs/Software: I like the effects that was in the unit and giving some tweaking I could see using them. If I could have gotten the tone worked out I could have easily set up rigs with just those effects and done away with half of my board…. Rigs work just fine, you save presets that are switchable with the unit for the controller. Some people complain but that lack of "on the fly" edits and that they can only be made within the software, it never bothered me. The software itself worked fine for me but I could see where someone with more experience using software to control music equipment might have an issue with it. At the time of this writing it can't be used with a updated iMac. Loading IR's takes forever so I used software instead. If there was no other option on the market it would be great, there's tons though, and Youtube isn't the best way to judge a product. Glad I tried it so at least I know but I'm very grateful for Guitar Center's 45 day return policy!Chris K

Works perfect, built like a Tank. No hum like the variac I had. Use this with a '68 AB763 silver face drip edge blackline Super Reverb. My line voltage was consistently 125. I drop the voltage to 117 or below. Now I can crank the amp without blowing the 2amp fuse. Would recommend this for all vintage amps. Smooths out my Mark V as well.Ken

I have never really been impressed by load boxes, DI, attenuators, power soaks, etc… – basically anything that get between the amp and speaker. This unit, however, has really impressed me – variable attenuation or re-amplification with almost no colorization of the basic amp tone and very little additional noise from the amp circuit. This thing actually makes cheaper amps sound better, mostly due to the filter controls for the reactive load and power amp section. With all that in mind, the thing that I have been most impressed with it the effects loop section. It works beautifully and is very transparent. All of a sudden, all my vintage amps with no effects loops now have dramatically more versatility. This box is worth the money, just for that feature alone. And, considering you are getting a very Fender like 6L6 power amp section in addition to the attenuation function, the moderate price tag seems justified.Checkbox Gearhead

I have a bunch of 50-watt tube heads, some without master volumes. The Power Station allows me to me to: – crank the output on any amp and manage the volume in my small studio – share the PS effects loop for all my amps — no more fussing with cables behind my stack of heads! – put a 50-watt power amp behind any preamp pedal or multieffects pedal – far better sound quality than any attenuator i have used (Weber, Rivera, THD, Koch) For these reasons, I can honestly say it's probably the single most useful piece of gear I've ever bought. I have experienced the high-gain squealing others mentioned, but it's not a problem with my back to the amp at a distance of 3 or 4 feet. My little studio is 10'x10' and the squealing is not a problem and I only play with high gain. I have contacted Fryette multiple times and always received a prompt and thorough reply.severalbeans

Wow! This is an amazing piece of gear. It is well worth the money as it's very transparent (100 watt Marshall in apartment sounds great). Obviously it will never sound just like it would live as you lose air being pushed, speaker distortion, and feed back but this thing is doing a much better job then my Rivera Rockcrusher ever did. The loop is better then the one in my amp and it also has foot switch to remove it from the circuit. the variable attenuation is great and lets you hit that sweet spot of volume for any situation, unlike most other devices that have set levels of attenuation. My only complaint so far is it's heavy.C. Richards

Understand that as an amp this amp can be described as a amplification "platform"' . If you you send a moderate input signal in, you will get moderate amplification., hot signal in and you get serious amp output! Logical… The attenuator/power-soak works great and offers good sonic sculpting controls..I personally like the "depth" controls as they seem to be tweaked in a way that "flubbiness" is none existent yet low mid tones are accessible and open sounding . Note these controls are for last stage eq so are supposed to keep you out of trouble.. The "feel"of this unit is great! The playing dynamics means a lot to me .. I am using it as a two channel amp presently with different settings for rhythm and lead, verb pedal in effects loop .. sounds great, feels great ,is great!Bill

If you own an amplifier that only has one channel, this pedal can be very useful. I've had three main uses for the Signal Pad: 1) Put in the FX loop and use as in a low-volume application. Great for home practice, or killing the signal if needed. 2) In a good, responsive/dynamic amp, switch between dirty and clean (tube amps fall mainly in this category). Great for old-style Marshall users, Orange users (the Terror line, for example), etc. 3) Peeling back the gain a bit for a rhythm/lead split. Solid-state amps tend to do this more than cut back to clean, but there are exceptions. If I had a complaint, it would be that the volume cut is too wide – I often never roll lower than 12:00. A more expressive range could be a helpful upgrade. All in all, this thing is great – no battery required, unless you want to power the LED. Throw some time-based effects in the loop of your JCM 800, put this thing straight in, and enjoy.Maiden-Canada

The Signal Pad simply turns your signal down by an amount set by the volume knob. I use it to turn down my guitar when not soloing, but you can also use it to clean up high output pickups, or any use where your guitar signal is too strong. The electronics are completely passive, so you only need to power the pedal, either with a 9V batter or 9V negative center 2.1mm power supply, if you want to see the LED lit when engaged. It's true bypass when not engaged. It works well, and I didn't notice any obvious change in the sound. However, I have noticed a bit more 60Hz hum when the pedal is engaged with my guitar and pedal board. It's possible that you won't experience any hum with your set up.Lawrence

This isnt a very complicated product. I basically use it as a mute button as I switch between instruments. Its wonderful for my setup.Andrew

This is a quality product backed by an amazing software. Almost all of the cab/mic selections and settings result in a good sound. Therefore the decisions become only a matter of taste, not a matter of quality.Reviewed by Andertons Music Co.

We all know that the valves have to be set to "stun" to get a great tone, and being someone who mainly does a lot of home recording, trying to get the amp to where it needed to be would shake the foundations of the house (along with the wife's temper!!). The Torpedo re-load puts all of that to bed. Along with a multitude of other uses (re-amping, DI'ing etc) I can't fault it. I'm chuffed to bits with it!!Reviewed by Andertons Music Co.

I bought two of these L-pads for my stereo speakers. I was retrofitting my older enclosures with new speakers. I used these to adjust the loudness of the tweeters with respect to the woofers. They worked very well.DAVID

I opted to place a pair of these between each one of my Definitive Studio Monitor 450's that have a 1" aluminum dome tweeter that's just too bright with almost all CD audio disks and for movie playback. I chose these after doing quite a bit of research as I didn't want to damage my expensive and nicely built Def Tech 450's.These are simple to mount right on the back binding post and cross-over plate that all Def Tech speakers have.I decided to use the 100 watt 1" which could have easily been the 3/8th instead. I thought I needed to go threw the 3/4" wood but the very thin plastic back plate ended up being the perfect mounting place, which means using the 3/8" are more than sufficient but the 1" will work just as well as the rear mounting plate is rather thin plastic.Don't hesitate to buy these for any Def Tech speakers that are too bright! Most complaints about these studio monitor 350 and 450 models is the extra brightness the well built 1" pure aluminum dome tweeters will produce.Great, well built speakers with expensive drivers and cross-over assemblies and speaker binding posts. These are easily mounted right above the cross-over and speaker binding posts and after soldering the copper wires you can get them in place nice and tight with the lock nut and washer. I also used hot glue to seal the L-Pad to avoid possible vibration.I recommend using hot glue around the two piece L-Pad and between its back plane and the plastic back plate for perfect alignment.They work perfectly and allow me to keep my vinyl sounding perfect and CDs tones back to avoid that excess brightness that anyone with good hearing has to admit is there.Great, well built speakers at 20 solid LBs but a L-Pad was really needed and should have been in the 350/450s' original design.So don't be afraid to drill a hole in the speakers plastic back plate right above the cross-over and get the fantastic option of controlling your peak high end back down where you feel it needs to be. Well built product that seems to be spot on and only attenuates the tweeter as needed with your source.These Definitive Studio Monitor 350/450 speakers are great well built speakers but the 1" aluminum dome is just too bright for most sources except when using a solid preamp, with a very good M.M or M.C. phono stage for vinyl.My Carver C-1 preamp that's been updated to top some of the best of the new breed of preamp sounds great and now I don't need to use the tone controls at all which is what all audiophiles expect from a quality preamp/amp and speaker system.Shipping cost is a bit on the high side but worth it for hard to find audio equipment like L-Pads and 3 to 12 DB inline attenuators that do not affect the quality of the sound output.Running a Carver C-1 preamp with a Hafler DH-500 255+ watts per channel amp 6 DB line attenuators are needed to get the best possible dynamic range as per the Carver C-1s manual written by genius, Mr. Bob Carver himself!Levman0549

The sensitivity of my new woofer and new horn did not quite match with the horn being slightly more efficient. This made the horn sounded harsh and overwhelming. I connected the L-pad between the crossover and the horn which allowed me to attenuate the horn so that the woofer and horn are balanced. Very happy.Darrell

This is the most affordable loadbox I could find that had good reviews. I've been using it every day since I received it and it does a great job. I have all my tones from my tube amps while recording and playing silently. Complementary Wall Of Sound IRs sound great and this completely solves my problems with recording at home. I highly recommend it.Reviewed by Andertons Music Co.

Dead easy to use, speaker in goes to the thru (0 attenuation)or -20 DB out. Juice the output of your amp and keep the DB down. Works great with speaker or without. Comes w/Wall of Sound download thats a great gateway to IR and silent recording. Must have to not annoy family or neighbors. Or both. Highly recommendGearJunkie35

Sometimes you don't know exactly what you're going to get front a house send or feed from a stage board, instrument, pc or playback device. Nice to have flexibility with selectable pad switch just in case!!lindervox1

I use this on a 20 watt tube amp combo.The 1% output let's me practice with great tone without annoying my wife. The speaker simulated output sounds exactly like my amp! Can't wait to try it live. If there's any gigs after covid.Tc key