Vox VT40X 1x10 inch 40-watt Modeling Guitar Combo Amplifier w/ DSP and Hybrid Design

I've been playing guitar for 30+ years. It was my whole life from about 14-24. Played in a world famous (well locally anyway) band. The whole 9 yards. I never had money but had to fork over enough to allow me to play with other professionals and play live frequently. So I've owned a couple of Marshalls and a Peavy. Slapped on an ADA for effects and I was off. Suffice to say I am not an audio file/sound geek. Of course I LOVE good sound as much as the next guy but rarely did I mess around with it. It was just - get a couple of good sounds and jam. So 25+ years have gone by since my last amp purchase as regular life, supporting and raising a family etc has taken over. Oddly enough, even though I am much better off than I was back in the day I decided to just start small and find something under 200 bucks. Amazon lead me to this Vox vt20x modeling Amp. I've read over the years that solid state simply cannot compete against tubes and I had heard results that certainly solidified that view. I am sure that still may be the case overall but after spending two days with this amp I must say they have come A LONG way. I will just list the pros and cons as I have come across them AND point out the one issue that I am trying to resolve regarding the volume. PROS: Price ($179 - are you kidding. My bluetooth headphones are $100 more than that) Weight and size: This thing is tiny. No more lugging around my 1/2 stack to jam with my best friend. At my age lifting the cab was not fun anymore. This thing is LIGHT. Volume: LOUD. Wow. Like I said - I haven't purchased an amp in years so my perspective is certainly dated, but I had no idea a small amp like this could get so loud without cracking. I am buying the 40 Watt just in case but I really think this thing could handle most jam sessions. My best friend is not great but he has been consistently loud since we were 16. I look forward to our next jam to test it out (will update). Controls: A ton of options but sweet out of the box. The layout is simple and almost self explanatory. That said there are a ton of options (presets and controls) so it is worth taking some time to learn. Tuner works fine. The Tone Room software (free) changes the game completely. Tone Room Software: This is where my mind exploded lol. Inside the software, which installed easily and detected the amp automatically, there are dozens of preset tones. They label these tones so most people familiar with the song would know what they are talking about and in some cases use the name of the song directly. I probably cannot play a song start to finish that is not my own BUT I can play the main riffs of countless songs over the 60's, 70's, 80's, 90's and beyond. So as I went along and in most cases easily matched the label of the tone to the actual song my jaw just dropped. Black Dog - play - CHECK! Day Tripper - play - CHECK! Cliffs of Dover - sort of play - CHECK! Raining Blood - play - CHECK! Sandman - CHECK! Walk This Way - CHECK! Have a Cigar - YES! Paranoid - CHECK! This went on and on. You get the picture. AGAIN - a true audiophile/purist would notice issues but to my ears when I dropped Unchained I felt like a kid again. If I owned this as a kid I never would have left my room. CONS I can only think of two cons with only one being a real issue (not enough to reduce my rating from 5 stars however). Volume Spike on preset change: this really bugged me at first. I THINK I have found an obvious solution but will be following up to be sure. Essentially when you start moving around the presets by turning the knob the volume jumps WAY up. You can see this on the software on the interface. The trick is turning the VOLUME knob on the amp all the way down and using the POWER LEVEL to control overall volume. Not sure if this is ideal but it now seems to be working fine with me. I have ordered the pedal and I hope the issue does not reappear while switching with the pedal. No DAW interface: this I think for this price and all things considered is more of an upgrade suggestion but it sure would be nice to dial this right into something to record without having to mic up. VOX - do it. This would be cool. OVERALL There is not much more to be said. I read one review that stated you would get better use of the tube in this preamp as a light on your Christmas tree. That may be true. It's hard to tell if the warmth and quality of the sound is helped by the tube or if it's just the improvement in digital tech but I really don't care. It sounds frickin great. I'm not a big guy and I'm old (46) so I cannot lug around a big ass amp and this weighs almost nothing. On day 1 I played for 8+ hours for the first time in AGES. I went to pick up this morning to play and my fingers were toast. Going to take a few days to break them in. I am going to make a video review where hopefully I can duplicate the songs and the tones to give potential buyers a better idea of what they are getting.

Does the Model for the AC30 sound exactly like an AC30? No. But then again, you didn't PAY for an AC30. This amp is about 1/3 the cost, but gives you MORE than 1/3 the sound of the AC30. Same with all the other models. I tell people this, unless you HAVE to have that exact tone, most Modeling amps will get you where you need to be. I have a Fender GTX100 (used to have the LT-25) and BOTH are great amps. No issues, but I also really love this Amp. In fact, I doubt my GTX100 will see much action now that I have this (unless I just really need a specific Fender tone and 100W of power output)... But if you want some great tones for small club size or home / studio use? You could do a lot worse with $350.... Build was as expected at this price point. It doesn't blow you away, but it absolutely doesn't seem "cheap". 40Watts to that 10" driver sounds really "whole" and the sealed cabinet really helps reinforce the low end that would likely lack in a 10" driver (over a 12" or 15"). So plenty of power for most situations. The effects aren't as nice or varied as the Fender GTX series, but it's also noticeably cheaper (so you get what you pay for effects wise) and still has most things you'll need (just not as many OF them)... The only real snag is the operation. Yes, if you're used to traditional amp knob controls, this isn't so bad. But if you really want to tune the modeling aspects, I'd suggest using the Tone Software to do it, and the panel interface is a little harder to use than say the Fender Mustang series... Overall, here is my breakdown: Fender LT-25 - Great for early beginners and people who want to try modeling amps or new players who want to explore tone without investing too much. Fender GTX100 - Full on Modeling goodness. Great Solid State Tones and TONS of amp sims. Nice Speaker, Nice output. Great unit, though it may be "too much" for some home or hobby players (so it may not feel worth the investment). This VT40X - Great midpoint between the LT-25 and the GTX100 (but the with addition of a valve preamp and some really nice VOX tones). Priced inbetween the two fenders. More features than the LT-25, less features than the GTX100. A good purchase.

I'll concur with another who mentions this is the most amazing bang for the buck they had spent! I have had for several weeks now and this little amp has caused me to substantially reduce the playing time of my other amps. I have other quality tube and solid state amps. Some are very recent. Yes - I'm a bit of a gear slut. I enjoy playing with new technology and the search for TONE. A lot is made of the holy grail of tube tone. I will admit I still like tubes in their ability to tweek just so - their mostly organic smoothness that can be lost with lesser solid state. Except today solid state is not so much lesser. Perhaps this is not quite tube tone in every sense of the word to a tube snob - but - it - simply - sounds - great. Whatever it is, I really like the sounds coming out of this amp, and that is what floats my boat at high tide. Another nice coming of age with today's solid state is that quite a bit of the presets are very useable. Usually I hate 90+% of the presets of modeling amps and gear, and only the cleaner ones are useable. And usually require some tweeking above that. This comes with an amazing spectrum of presets that sound great and out of the box useable. That includes some that are clearly dirtier, warmer, fuller than the typical cleans that solid state amps tend to be good at. I find that I can just move to a great sounding preset and just - play. It does sound wonderful and I find I forget everything but playing the guitar. To me - that's the ultimate compliment to an amp. I tend to play more cleanly, but love rich dynamics, lush, punch and warmth too. As mentioned I can usually adjust to a preset and be happy. The presets seem to be pretty well thought out and easy to get adjust across a range till you find the one. I've honestly not tweeked as much, nor played with the tone room software. I haven't *had* to. But - I have I've found the tube control really is nice at shaping a tubish tone they represent. A bonus above the other standard EQ, gain, channel and master volume controls. Also you can interplay between the channel and master volume much like a tube amp if desired. I've not played it loud, but the speaker sounds great. I would consider it an amazing value for simply for the features I've mentioned. And it still has quite a bit more. The only ding might be its construction. Pretty obvious it's not built like a tank, but so far so good... Probably could not recommend *anything* else I've played through above this amp for a fun light use workhorse and practice amp. Addendum 8/29/2016: I've got quite a few amps and I tend to cycle through them - each for awhile and with various guitars. What strikes me most about this amp is what you are getting for the money. The presets are wonderful. I tend to prefer clean, but can certainly appreciate warmth, grit and smooth overdriven breakup. The Fender, VOX and Marshall emulations in the above realm are very nice! Some they model I can't verify if they indeed sound like the original - but they simply sound great to me. What I have found - and is true of many SS amps is that you need a strong input signal. So using a clean boost as needed goes a long ways to avoid a lot of the artifacts that you can get otherwise. With a weak input - yes - I sometimes get the snare drum envelope and crappy fade out on sustained notes. Heat up your guitar input and use the volume attenuator - then adjust the input down and volume up till you hear it. Tube amps seem to be more tweakable and tolerant on the guitar input. But this new hybrid matches up well once you get a zone it likes. Then the other perks really leave behind what you will get on the typical tube amp. Again this amp really does sound good with well chosen presets to showcase a fairly good range of different amps. It has it's own effects and uses many of them on it's preset - so likely good quality. I tend to use my modest pedals which work well in front of this amp. I like the presets and find exploring them rich enough that I've not tried to fool with this amp manually. It does seem to have a reach feature set to adjust in sound - again likely good as they have quite a good rand of presets sounds. Done nothing on the software side of this amp - so can't attest to it. It's load and proud perfect for an apartment or small setting. Short of giggable on a scale past that. It is holding up well. I'm not gigging and moving this around. It is light and doesn't look like it will take abuse. All in all though -- *very* well liked and holds its place in my stable of amps...

I like this amp, but there one thing I don’t like as well. For example, it isn’t a grounded plug amp and if you use it just at home to practice you will have to make a ground plug cord to ground it to a wall plug. After I figured this out my practices are nice and without static hum. It looks great in my opinion and the app is easy to use with my laptop to change up my preferences. Overall I like it , it’s just stupid that I had to make a ground to rid the static hum. Just my personal opinion

I have a 100W Marshall JVM 210H W/ Cabinet and a 40W Roland Cube 40GX, and this amp was going to replace in my Roland. The appeal of the VOX is great modeled amps with plenty of options to fine tune those amps and pedal effects into multiple user defined banks. An app (Android/IOS/Windows/Mac) to further aid in customization. After a run through on the modeled amps, I jumped into using the Android App (There is an IOS app tool and Windows and Mac app as well). I would say the app actually broadens the scope of the physical amps console controls. There are plenty of customization options which can be saved to User Preset Channels. This is the primary reason I bought this to replace my Cube. Its ability to save more customized channels - much easier. Possible, Bad Tube Problem Simply put, there is almost no sustain. I would hold a note with multiple bends with gain, and it would fade very fast. One note hammer on leads would fade whichever Amp model I used. I raised the Volume and Power Level - increased the gain; still the same. I looked into the Global Noise Reduction setting - No luck maintaining sustain. Reading the very few incidents online the effect is attributed to a bad tube in the VT20X and VT40X models. Needless to say, I didn't want to have to replace a tube on a new amp to see if that was the problem with mine. Pros Great selection of Modeled Amps Great price to performance Built in adjustable Noise Reduction - great on Single Coil pickups Very good App/Application - Not limited to tablets - Can be used on PC or Mac as well Solid Pedal Effects with good control parameters Supports optional Foot Switch - Which I purchased Cons Bad Tube Lottery - With all the positives, a key feature shouldn't be a problem. This is easily a 5 Star Amp if the tube was not an issue. I'm probably being a bit too generous giving this 3 Stars given that one of the Selling Points is that it is a Tube Amp. I'll just say its reflective of the overall positive features.

Greetings fellow Shred Masters :) I've owned several amps during the last few years, a Flextone II, a Line6 Spider IV (returned it), a Line6 MKII SpiderValve (returned it), a VOX AD, a VOX VT120+ and now this amazing VOX VT40X. I love it. The other reviewer made some good remarks about tone and sound that I totally agree with. Most of my amps have had two speaker cabs so I was a bit concerned with just one 10" speaker but the sound is great! AND it is plenty loud and really light compared to a 2x12 and super quiet... My other amps had just a bit of hiss but this thing doesn't even have that. It's astoundingly quiet. The VOX VT40X is pretty good as a stand alone amp but it really doesn't come alive until you access the ToneRoom deep editing software - too much fun, and with KORG being in charge of the sounds you won't be disappointed. So much better than Line6. There are some things missing like the pitch shifter, the brown octave, and rotary but I never really used those things much anyway. The available pedals include distortions, tremilos, comps, drives, phasers, flanger, VOX lead, and a dozen others. One REALLY cool thing VOX did was include compression in some of the metal tones (Cal Metal) and in so doing freed up another pedal for you to use instead of a compressor :) Nice. Not all the heavy tones are compressed though which is nice for sustained notes or when you roll off the volume. UK ROCK with the Gold Distortion Box is KING ~ very Jorn sounding. The cleans are WAY better than anything I ever got on my VT120; bright, shimmery, and with the RC Boost pedal I can control a nice amount of over drive with my volume knob. This amp is by far the most "tubey" modeling amp I've played. So much fun to roll on the guitar volume knob and have the tone move from clean to crunchy with just a slight increase in volume. And church mouse quiet. Another awesome thing about the deep editing software is that you can collect or create up to 33 custom tones (3 files of 11 tones each) and then as you want to, click and drag them to and from the on board bank of 8 that you'll need for your song, gig, or whatever. Saving tones was a bit cumbersome on other VOX amps. Also, like I mentioned before I tried the Spider IV and even put up $900 for an MKII but found too few useable tones. The other thing that drove me nuts with the MKII was that after spending a lot of time setting up tones in the editor, when I unplugged it the tones would be different!! Grrrr :( This is not the case with the VOX. What you set up in the Tone Room is what you get. The amp is beautiful and nicely made. In my other amps I have swapped out tubes for tone improvement or lined the cabinets with fiberglass to tighten up metal or dampen the brights but I have no such need with this amp. It's just great. Like the other reviewer I did my homework but based on passed experience with VOX and gleaming reviews from the likes of Rob "the monkey lord" Chappers, I ordered it straight away and received it by mail through Amazon. I was tempted to shell out another $100 for the 100 Watt model but I'm glad I didn't. This 40 watt lets me turn the power up enough to properly drive the tube without knocking stuff off the walls. I'm not sure it would compete with a loud drummer though. It'll definitely handle a small live venue; coffee shop, fellowship hall, wedding but if you plan on playing a club you'll want the bigger brother.

Get this: I sold my top-rated BOSS Katana MKII 100W 1x12 solid-state modeling combo when I heard and played this beauty. The modeling is way better and the tone is indistinguishable from a good all-tube amp. You get all the big power without losing the clean nuances of clean tube tone. It offers lots of crystal headroom and still delivers searing crunch tones when you want them. The on-board effects are usable and easy to set. This amp is so reactive to your attack, which is where most modeling amps fall short. I get compliments on my sound everywhere I play. The compact design makes great use of the dimensions of the unit, maximizing its tonality and keeping it easy to move. It is visually stunning as well. If you are looking to reduce size and number of items to haul to gigs, this is the answer. It can handle most rooms without a mic when necessary. Do purchase the rugged control footswitch, though. It gives you access to two banks and a total of eight assignable patches, instead of a bulky pedal board bristling with wires. Believe me, you need to try this amp.

UPDATE: Unfortunately, after just 6 weeks of use, the speaker died. That was really disappointing. I reached out to the seller, who was absolutely incredible and quickly refunded my money, but I had to switch to another brand. My son was really bummed because he loved this amp while it lasted. ORIGINAL REVIEW: The Vox VT20X blew me away! For a 20-watt amp, this thing delivers incredible tone and flexibility. The hybrid design really shines—combining a tube-like warmth with the convenience of digital modeling. The built-in DSP offers a wide range of amp models and effects that sound authentic and full, not tinny or digital like some other practice amps. The 8-inch speaker is surprisingly powerful for its size, and it's perfect for home use or even small jam sessions. I also love that you can customize tones further with the Vox Tone Room software. Whether you're playing blues, rock, metal, or clean tones, this amp has you covered. If you’re looking for a compact, feature-rich amp that sounds fantastic right out of the box, this is it. Highly recommend for beginners and experienced players alike!