Harley Benton AC TrueTone Reviews

Still trying to find my way with this

Looking for Iconic AC30 sounds i.e Brian May/ Edge despite trawling you tube for set ups still have not found my way with this. It does not mean it is a bad Pedal, it just needs a lot more experimentation.

The build quality is excellent.

Fun but noisy

This is a quick and cheap solution for anyone looking for this kind of "british" sound, but the noise really gets in the way and with time I just stop using. It's still fun to try different tones.

Guitarist bargain of the century

It's an exact replica of a Tech 21 Liverpool for 30 euros!

It sounds fantastic and is a simple, affordable, option for getting a great direct sound for recording guitars. Sounds every bit as good as most speaker simulation pedals at 10 or 20 times the price. If this is what you need don't think twice

Awesome pedal

Tonnes of different sounds really impressed

At ¤30 is a great buy

exactly what was expected.

I intend to use it at home but it will do well for gigging also. It does what was advertised. Great price and great value.

Great AC Sound at a Great Price

A Vox AC amp emulator with speaker sim is what we have here and I must say I think it is fantastic. Great range of AC tones to be dialed. Sounds particularly nice with my strats and semi-hollow . You have to decide whether this kind of on/off preamp has the flexibility that you need for your purposes but for my home and recording use it is great: just made some knob sheets to take note of settings I may wish to return to. Only weakness really is the battery hatch cover which seems flimsy compared to the rest of the unit but does work fine

Good Pedal.

I first purchased this pedal just to have that pinch of a VOX amp.

Its VOICE feature is very interesting and offers a wide range of amp types sound of VOX.

Knobs are very sensible....which is a good thing.

Casing is in metal and shows to be very robust,

Nice finish paint.

I recommend anyone to buy this pedal and experience it......hummm...at this price...I believe you got nothing to loose anyway....

In my way...it was a very good quality vs price deal.

Ivan

Best thing sinds sliced bread!

When you loved your back, buy this gizmo now!

You'll never miss the heavy amp, it sounds like the real thing too!

Some technical problem with footswitch

I must say that this thing can create a nice tube sound with lots of headroom. As for the sound quality, I have no complaints. The sound is really surprisingly good. Overall, I can?t be very satisfied with this effect, because it has one major drawback. There is some kind of problem with footswitch. After pressing it (on or off), it is followed by a strong blow from the speakers, even I am afraid that I might blow up speakers at higher volumes of amplifier. The problem occurs immediately by the first use. This issue make impossible to use this thing live; and at home, it is also very annoying. That?s a pity, I practically don?t use it. I believe that this problem has only my piece. I also own Brtitish TrueTone and American TrueTone pedals and there everything works OK.

Superb product at a great price

I am using this both for recording a guitar through a USB interface and into Logic. I am also using it live to run an electric guitar direct into the PA so I don't have to carry my amp with me to small gigs. I'm really impressed by the tone this pedal produces. It is designed to take the place of an amp so it won't sound so good going into a guitar amp, it's better to feed directly into a PA or hifi sound system. This pedal does the Vox Amp thing, everything from clean chimey sounds through a bluesy breakup and into full on distortion. The 'voice' control gives a wide range of tonality. At this price it is a great pedal to have with you, even if it is only as a backup in case your amp goes down mid-gig.

Regal tones for the masses

Queen. Brian May. Tie your pedal down - you may wish to do that, once you've tried it! A huge range of tones, most evocative of a certain wild haired gentleman still rocking out at the present time. In order to have the full gamut, you'll need a 'Red Special', a collection of sixpences and those particularly expressive fingers.

However. If you want to get 90% of the way to certain sounds like the above - this pedal can get you there. It's quite amazing how one little pedal (which I've tried in British, California and AC variants) can do so much - and be tuned to such different amps. OK, so the circuitry is obviously different, but the whole idea of one little pedal that can do this is - just - the Biz. All you need is a clean amp (any one will do, but if you use a clean one, then it won't affect the tones output form this little Magic Box) and you have Stadium Rock in the comfort of your own living room, or the local pub/club. All for a pittance.

You want these tones? It's a Must Buy.

The pedal produces very good sound and very good quality. It is of great value for the money and I would recommend it to everybody for this amount of money.

Sound great!

Much better and smoother sounding than its digital counterparts.

AWESOME pedal

Had this pedal lined up with my boutique pedals and it killed them TOP NOTCH

Great starter effects pedal

Bought this and another as my first effects pedal.

Great variety of sounds, good build quality. Easier to understand than the built-in effects in my amp

soft - nasty - vintage - modern, it covers it all.

What I love the most is that you can start with a clean sound when the pedal is on. So you can use the pedal as a boost & give it more body or mids to your liking.

With the voice knob you can go from a vintage sound to a more modern overdrive, just sweep it until you find your sweet spot. The drive goes from clean to a sound that's not usable anymore (although someone might like it).

Everyone can get a good sound out of this pedal, but if your a metalhead I think you should look elswere.

I played with various guitars with humbuckers, single coils, p90's over a Roland bluescube & over an old 30w tube amp. This pedal eats all guitars, but with single coils it's a bit harder to find a good sound.

So you get a lot of sound options for a very good price.

Great pedal for (almost) free!

The HM Ac True tone aims to reproduce the legendary AC30 chime and put it in a pedal-sized box. It won't replace your real amp in terms of sound, but it does sound great. Just a bit different. However, it retains the characteristic chime and breakup of the ac30. In terms of sound sculpting, it has a very sensitive 3-way eq and a voice knob, which affects the mids and the gain of the pedal and can take you from perfectly clean or a tad dirty classic ac tone to a modern hi-gain version of the ac's tone. Very versatile pedal. It's produced in china and has all the pros and cons that comes with this fact. The wires inside this beast are thin and don't seem sturdy. It also produced quite some noise if you crank the gain real high (and its got more gain than anyone needs). However, the casing is solid and made of metal. It could take some serious beating and still be intact. The price, however, for this good sounding pedal, is a steal. All in all, a great pedal. I recommend it to anyone looking for an ac tone in a convenient box to use live, with a wide range amp or with a guitar amp to add that special chime.

versatile clean and gain pedal

I bought this pedal as I do not own a valve amp and the reviews of the joyo version of this seemed very positive.

I was surprised how versatile this pedal was, with control knobs for bass, middle, treble, as well as volume gain and voice, the voice control when used with gain has a great deal of versatility and even small tweaks can change the sound dramatically.

When used with a transistor amp, in my case a Fender 65 dsp, its like a different amp altogether, smoother tones, especially from gain/voice control, you just have to tweak the amp controls along with pedal controls tofind the sound your looking for.

However, this particular amp has an effects in/out loop, so when this pedal is plugged directly into effects loop and guitar plugged into pedal, its just like using the amp as a stand alone cab, as the guitar is not going through any of the amps build in effects/controls, its just using the ac tone pedal for everything, giving you much more control when tweaking the knobs to find your sound, and then you can just add reverb/chorus/delay or which ever other pedals you desire, as the ac tone is a true bypass pedal, awesome piece of kit for the price

As a preamp

Few months ago I got Vox vt50 from friend with broken preamp , because that amp is discontinued , I have ordered this pedal to use it as preamp (going right into poweramp) . I like the sound and it's features and would definitely buy it again :)

Versatile pedal.

Someday I will buy a Vox. Until I do, the AC TrueTone does a great job of emulating one. I didn't expect too much because it was cheap, but I was pleasantly surprised. It's solidly made and weighty.

What I found even more surprising was how it sounded. It really is an amp in a box. I set my old solid state Peavey to a neutral sound and plugged in with a Telecaster. It completely changed the sound of the amp. At low gain, it gives a sparkly, Voxy chime I wasn't expecting. With more gain it gives that ragged Vox snarl. So far, so good I thought. But then I started playing around with the voice control. It's incredible. It sweeps from Beatles jangle to Brian May growl. It completely alters it's nature. Every couple of mm seems to bring out a new voice.

The 3 band eq means you can tweak it to perfection. With gain, level and the amazing voice control, there is literally no end to the possibilties.

Because of the seaker emulation, you can DI it into a desk but is just as useful to shape an amp's tone or even as a simple overdrive pedal.

It is the most versatile pedal I've ever used. Unless metal is your thing (and it's probably not if you're checking out the AC TrueTone) this one box will do everything. If I had to travel light, this pedal would come with me for it's sounds and versatility.