ORI20C Origin 1x10" 20-watt Tube Combo Amp Review

Exactly What the Doctor Ordered

Was super easy dialing in the range of tones I wanted. Sounds great with straight onboard controls. Ran my pedal board through the fx loop...super clean. Great clean tones, sweet, disks up all the crunch I want. Putting a MOJO MOJO on the front end brings the amp all the home. Speaker, even pre break in, is very nice. Good upper mids, highs aren't shrill even when tone shifted to… read more the brightest set. IMHO, great amp, priced right, and my welcome back to the first half of the 70s.

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It's an Old School Marshall

If you want a proper old school Super Lead/JMP sort of sound, (basically the sound of 70's classic rock) this will do it. It's as basic as the old Marshalls, but it might not be intuitive to some (like me), on a lot of amps, you can turn up the gain, and turn the master volume way down, and get all the distortion you want at a low volume. Not with this amp. You have to run the… read more gain and master high in order to get that good old marshall filth (it's power amp distortion). So yes, it's going to be terrifically and terrifyingly loud, even on 0.5 watt mode! If your guitar has humbuckers, you'll naturally get more amp distortion than with single coils. With the boost, you get a bit more amp distortion (it's a 20db clean boost, it doesn't actually make the amp louder, it pushes the preamp to distort a little more) The boost also adds a little bass, which can actually be helpful with cleaner settings and single coils. The tilt feature is pretty neat, they say you can replicate the different sounds from the 2 channels of old Marshalls with it, in reality it's simply an over all tone control. But you know, marketing... The EQ is what you'd expect from a Marshall, the bass control doesn't do a lot, (guitars don't need much bass anyway) the mids are quite dramatic, and smooth, even on 10. The treble control doesn't do a whole lot once you have the mids turned up (there's quite a bit of high end in the mids) The presence control is where it's at. If you're going to run a fuzz, that needs to be set high. If you don't turn the presence up high, the fuzz is going to sound absymal. Doesn't matter how you have the EQ and Tilt set, it will be too bassy, and just very muddled, and a pretty bigh perceived volume drop once you turn it on. But if you run the tilt around half way, the presence all the way up, and the treble all the way down, you'll have the marshall "bite" when bypassed, and with a fuzz, you'll have a loud and simply berserk fuzz tone. Think of a live Hendrix sort of fuzz sound. It won't get messy even with the volume and gain at full blast. Anyway, the amp does have a pair of EL34's and 3 12ax7's and it's Cathode biased. Meaning as long as you use a matched set of tubes, it's plug and play, no rebiasing necessary. The cabinet is nice, the tolex is well done, and inside there's more than enough room for a 12" speaker. Wonder why they decided on a 10? But the V Type Jr does seem to be a good speaker anyway. All in all, I have no complaints at all. This is a really good Marshall.

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Fantastic Pedal Platform

This thing sounds wonderful clean and takes pedals really well. I posted a pic of my board to give you an idea of what is running into it. I don't use the effects loop, so no opinion there, nor do I run it dirty. The 2 best things this has going for it is the 10" speaker, and the fact that you can adjust the high end at 3 points along the signal path. These are Tilt, High, & Presence.… read more Coming from mostly Fender amps, the mid knob is also welcome. The knobs aren't like some vintage, where they don't do much, but are quite reactive. The "10 V Type is nice and focused. Non pedal users may miss the low end of a 12" driver. What I've noticed with the 10", is that I'm able to utilize more of the range on my mod and time based effects. No muddiness or thumping, but a clear and focused tone. I would argue personally that the amp has enough low end. I think anything you're missing is falling victim to the mix anyway. Weight is great and it's roughly the size of a Princeton.

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Marshall Amp

Beautiful product with amazing sound and plenty loud for small room practice. Another great Sweetwater purchase. Tim

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20c

I love it . It’s a low gain amp so take that into consideration when buying. I also have the 50h but I got the little combo for when I feel silly bringing a head and cab to a little gig. Feel and response is my favorite quality of this amp and how well the controls work to tune it. Most every time I thought my rig didn’t sound right I have been able to fix it with the dials.… read more I’ve added a video. Take into consideration that I owned this amp for 3 hours before taking to this show and since learned to get a little more out of it. Also it’s camera audio. The camera is right in front of the bass amp and directly over a 60 watt hot rod deluxe ... I’m surprised you can hear me at all with that camera location. The little combo is kicked back against the wall behind me across the room. I have a prince of tone overdrive on for the whole song. I was very impressed with the output and handling of this little amp.

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