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How to overdrive pre-amp?

StickmanJamStickmanJam Posts: 425
edited March 2008 in Musicians and Gearheads
Forgive me for my stupidity, but I recently bought a Blues jr., and am still getting use to all thie controls (most notably using the Master and Volume knobs effectively)

I know the volume knob adjusts the pre-amp gain, but when people say to overdrive the pre-amp for good sounds, what exactly does this entail?

Thanks
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Post edited by Unknown User on

Comments

  • mccreadyisgodmccreadyisgod Posts: 6,395
    The term "Overdrive" means making it do more than it can handle. On an amp, this is what creates "distortion" of the audio wave signal, also known as "clipping."

    To overdrive the preamp of your amp (or any amp with both preamp and master volume controls), you would turn the preamp gain up until it overdrives/distorts. Usually, you would keep the master all the way off, or VERY low, and turn the volume up past half-way (depending on what guitar you use and how "overdriven" you want it to be), then turn the master up for actual volume. Using this method, a preamp volume of 8 and a master volume of 1 can be too loud, so be careful at first! The lower end especially of a volume knob (potentiometer, or "pot") is very sensative, and small adjustments may result in large increases/decreases in volume.
    ...and if you don't like it, you can suck on an egg.
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