Harley Benton PA-100 Power Attenuator Reviews

Breat little box

For the money, this one is great. I like the sound too, altho its not as good as reactive but still very nice and sturdy. And lets not forget about the fan.

Nice little passive attenuator.

great for those needing an attenuator/loadbox without breaking the bank.

not as good as my rivera rockcrusher (reactive better for recording with cab impulses) but at a fraction of the price it doesn't need to be.

i'm quite happy with it as i needed a second attenuator for my many tube amps and i didn't want to spring for another expensive one.

Replacement after 1st Failed

Nice little bit of kit, I use it with my Vox AC30 and Bugera T50, both work great through it when it works properly. Unfortunately my first one worked okay for a short while and then it developed a fault which caused all the sound to be distorted through the speaker even whebn the amp was set to a clean signal. I use it with my Bugera T50 to allow the use of a 25W Greenback in a Harley Benton 1x12 Cabinet and it works great like that. I have used it with the Vox AC30 to allow a line out signal to go direct to the mixer.

Works well, and good value compared to similar items.

Sounds great. Easy to use . Affordable

I use it with JTM45 HW clone and the amp finally came to life. I have MV installed and it is maxed, so now I can easily mix in normal and treble channels. The loss of high end is easily compensated with the eq on the amp or pedals. Actually, it tamed my "trebly" strat, so now I enjoy it even more. Would recommend to anyone, with loud amps. Regarding quality and reliability... time will tell. So far, so good. :-)

Exactly what i wanted

This is great. its lets me drive my valve amp at decent levels at a volume similar to a normal conversation. My neighbours are happy, im happy :-)

Big improvement from the previous model

I use this attenuator as a load box for a silent recording rig next to my (7 times more expensive) Aracom attenuator.

It does an as good job for silent recording. For attenuating, you will get some hi loss which is expected from non reactive loads.

I'm happy they finally implemented a fan in this unit, although I doubt that this one can handle a 100W continuous power loading.

For the price, can't be beaten.

...review...

I had bought an American Fender Blues Deville 4x10 from `94 built in Brea, California about this time last year. We couldn`t really play it because of it`s power.

60 watts is a lot of horses and trying to get the valves into crunch-mode a deafening experience with this baby. So I had found this Attenuator online and bought it. We now have it for about a month and it`s doing what it should. We are getting all the benefits of the Fender-Sound at a reasonable level.... No more doubts about the purchase of both items... they are the real thing...

Alone and with Helix

I got this unit and hoped it would work for me, and it does.

I wanted the mic sim and line out to be before the the dampening,

and thankfully it was easy to convert it to this.

I did not want the line out and mic sim to follow the dampening.

I added a 25 k pot on the mic sim out to add more control. Now I use it with my Marshall 6100 head and a VOX AC-10 (with a speaker in mod), and am quite pleased. I do find that mic micsim signal kind of collapses. But when using the linesignal through a Behringer Ultra-G Di. box I have a beautiful full signal. Of course it would be nice to have the micsim do it, but the Behringer just sounds better in every way. For the price of the PA-100 and the Ultra-G and my mods, you have a package that is hard to beat. ;-)

I do run presence on 100% on the 6100, and raise the treble on the AC-10 but it's fine.

What this unit allows for also, is use of the lineout in different ways;

1: Load your amp into a Helix.

I have patches in my Helix based on a VOX AC-15, but if I want to have my real AC-10 replacing the modelling amp, i can patch it in via one of the loops (line level) and it works like a charm.

I hear my amp in real life, the FOH gets a lineout from the Helix with the real amp through the Helix, and then I play with IR's, mainly Celestion Blues and Golds - sweet!

2: Lineout + IR's

The lineout without the micmod can have IR's added (Moer Radar etc.) to add flexibility and quality to the sound. Even using my Digitech RP-155 just as a cabinet simulator opens up a lot of sounds.

So there are a lot of sounds waiting to be heard.

Also in a DAW. Cheers ;-)

03-07-2018 Update

I tested running a JOYO JDI-01 from the line out, and man what a difference to the mic-mod out it is, it really works now, the cab sim on the JOYO is sooo much better in fidelity, the AC-10 really shines through the mixer now. It also beats the Behringer in clarity (the Behringer only has 1 cab sim, a 4x12, the JOYO has a 2x12 combo sim and a 4x 12 sim), I am very very pleased with this new dicovery!

Great Entry to the Attenuation World

Im updating my review, this attenuator is excellent device after testing it for couple of months.

It doesn't alter your tone, this is a big plus to me. works as expected exactly.

Features:

i only bought to try the speaker out, i didn't test the micmod or line output. the attenuation was working but barely handing 20 watts amp. This load box seems to be built like Jet City jettenuator.

Sound:

volume compression is noticed, i recorded with this load box and the level of volume was not consistent all the way unless you set your master and volume levels in some way depending on your amp.

Quality:

for the price i paid this is superior quality. Totally recommended.