Harley Benton HBAC-20 Reviews

does the job, no fault.

Does what it needs to do. No reason to fault and is respectably priced.

Outstanding for this price!

I bought this product recently and I am very satisfied. Appearance and quality are an excellent combination!

I recommend!

Harley Benton HBAC-20 - real beast!

Price = quality is not an empty phrase. And HBAC-20 proved it.

Small, elegant, with enough power, the HBAC-20 is a true home friend. Clear and crystal sound, flexible frequency settings, chorus and reverb effects will perfectly complement your guitar playing. A big plus is the microphone connection. All this is collected in one box.

UNFIT FOR LIVE GIGS

This amp has one extremely irritating feature: the automatic standby mode...f.i. when you switch it on, you will not immediately have sound...it seems to have a life of its own deciding when to actually let the sound through. After 30 secs you think , "okay, maybe turn up the volume", but that has nothing to do with it...and then, because the volume was turned up, when in its infinite wisdom it has decided to suddenly let the sound through, you get a heart attack and so does your audience because it is so darn LOUD!!!. Totally UNFIT FOR LIVE GIGS !!!

I had this amp for almost 2 years now and everytime when I switch it on, I wonder: "how long until it actually does something??"

A pity, because for the rest it is not too bad. Though I doubt the usable, clean volume exceeds that of a 10 watt amp, because it tends to oversteer.

Another bit of greatness

Yet another fine product from Harley Benton, sounds great, looks great and does everything I need.

Parfait

Pour le prix, c'est un très bon investissement, rend bien les basses... J'adore

MAGIC

Exactly what it says on the tin.

Many Thanks as always, service second to none.

Noel.

Unacceptable Humming an Buzzing

This amplifier is humming/buzzing quite a lot. It looks like the amplifiers of 30 years ago.

With current modern electronic this is totally un-acceptable, even at it's low price.

However it sounds good and powerful. Easy to use.

Good product but I don't like the sound personally.

This amp has a European plug, needed to order an adapter for US wall socket. Also, it needs to be a step up to 230volts to get sound. I should have asked but oh well. It looks like a nice little amp

Great acoustic amp, but be careful

Let me start by saying this amp sounds great. I don't think I've heard my acoustic guitar sound better. And this thing cranks!

The only drawback for me was the fact that I didn't realize it is NOT compatible with the the power in the United States. I had to buy a power converter. This is easy, when going from the U.S. to Europe. But not the other way around. Literally, all they'd have to do is put a switchable power supply in it, and the problem would be solved.

Its okay for this price

Well, you cant expect much for this price, an annoying thing is that the sound needs a certain level of input so that the Amp activates, and if you just plug in a microphone, it wont work. You have to plug in your guitar, play a few chords, until the amp "activates" and then you can use the microphone. If you dont play guitar for a while, the microphone will go silent again. Annoying.

Very good

Bought this combo for personal use, at home, with a nice guitar and microphone.

Balances of volume between both inputs are not equal obliging always to set guitar volume a bit lower.

The sound is quite bright and it has enought power to play and sing in pub without noisy people.

Both Chorus and Reverb work nicely, lacking those controls for micro.

The combo is lighter than I expected, meaning it's easy to transport it anywhere.

Finishings are not awsome when you look at them closely but, from far, it has a nice visual impact.

I am playing with it, regularly, for one year and a half and it maintains the original caracterisitcs.

Concearning the price, sound quality and durability I'd say is a very good buy.

Good for the money.

Nice sound, looks good.

Has a chorus and a reverb effect, but only for guitar channel. You can't apply effects to mic channel. That's a down side.

But it doesn't cost much, so can't expect too much.

I am disappointed

I am a beginner and this is my first acoustic guitar amplifier.

While I waited for delivery, I took from a friend Harley Benton AC PRO 120.

Even at home, in a small volume HBAC-20 it sounds much worse.

I was expecting that if I setting all frequencies to 0 value I get a clean guitar sound.

Unfortunately this is not true.

I suppose that because of the woofer amplifier frequency curve is not linear.

I observe some abnormal gain of medium frequencies.

Also the effects have been some kind of synthetic.

Reverb I think is similar to the hall effect than normal reverberation.

But the chorus seems that only distorts the sound and not add real effect, and is not usable.

I'm really disappointed.

I can not say anything bad about the appearance or quality of manufacture.

But I suggest that before you purchase this amplifier try it in live. Maybe only I think that the sound is bad, and others like it.

Excellent Acoustic Amplifier

I love it!I have busked all my life and for the price this amp is a pleasure to use nice reverb/chorus 2 inputs xlr and jack.Dont be put off with the low cost buy it and be amazed

Great Amp for Second Instrument.

I bought this amp to amp my ukulele during gigs. I don't use the ukulele for every gig so I wanted something affordable but still good quality. This amp is perfect and gives a really good sound quality.

There is a small delay in picking up the signal from the instrument but a good strum of the strings should do the trick and then you will be good to go.

Affordable, easy to use, and easy to transport.

Highly recommend.

Disappointing Overall

The sound levels begin to distort at about 6/10, greatly limiting how you'll use it. Also, the front panel (control buttons area) is loose and when you try to pull out the XLR or jack the panel kind of wants to come with it. Likewise when inserting a cable, the face depresses in about 2-3cm.

I do like the ability to control where abouts in terms of frequency where "mid" is, that's what attracted me to this amp. It's a good feature to fine tune the sound.

It's also got this weird thing where when you turn it on, it won't play out sound until it feels an active signal, then it changes mode (light turns from green to red) and only then will it output sound. This was not affected by toggling the active/passive switch on the amp, I have to use my finger on instrument cable to complete the circuit whilst using my other hand to toggle the chorus button several times before it will change modes and play. Now that I think about it, it's actually a pretty awful amp.

To be honest, I'm here looking at what could be my replacement amp.

Great Little amp

Wanted a small stage amp for mandolin that included a line out facility to the desk.

This little amp is sturdily made and sounds good. Bass, para mid and treble controls to sculpt sound PLUS reverb and chorus! Makes mandolin sound great on stage.

Great amp for a fantastic price!

Blast the Neighbours

I am new to amps, so I got this one because it was cheap enough to sell on if I didn't like what I got. A good choice for what turned out to be the wrong reasons. I love this amp.

First, the reason it gets four stars rather than five across the board. I found it a little difficult to start off. It goes to a green (standby) light when you turn on and only goes red (let it rip now) when it picks up a signal from the plugged in guitar. Fair enough, but I didn't realise that it needs a hearty strike on the sixth string (it works for me) to get it up to speed, after this it's all systems go. A minor criticism, but it frustrated me until I read a previous customer's review which talked of a strong signal on start up.

The good points- it looks good and better than its price would suggest; it lets you produce sounds that are truly wonderful, I turn up the chorus when I' doing slow slide and it makes the hair on the back of my neck stand up; it's GREAT value for money, the nearest I could find elsewhere was more than double the price; and for fans of Spinal Tap, these go to fifteen!

Recommended.