Every guitarist has heard of Marshall, particularly after nearly 60 years of them being in the business, and many will associate them with the iconic ‘wall of speakers’ from the rock era.
There’s nothing more stirring to the soul than a legendary JCM800 and JMP 1959SLP with a wall of Marshal 4×12 speaker cabs standing in front of you from the stage; sadly, noise regulations and modern PA systems mean that you don’t see this often anymore – and if you do, they‘re more for show than sound.
With that, let’s take a quick look at two popular Marshall amps, the DSL40CR and JVM210C.
| Features: | Marshall DSL40CR | Marshall JVM210C |
|---|---|---|
| Price: | £649 | £1,279 |
| Max Wattage: | 40W | 100W |
| Weight: | 50.4 lbs | 76 lbs |
Marshall DSL40CR
Marshall’s DSL40CR has been a real winner for the company and working musicians who want a versatile rock/blues amplifier at a fair price.
If there’s any guitar amp brand that’s an iconic part of rock and blues history, it’s Marshall. Even many non-musicians recognize the white script logo against a black background, associating it with loud, powerful guitar sounds.
Design
Marshall’s DSL40CR is a 40W all-tube combo amplifier with 4x 12AX7 preamp tubes and 2x EL34 power amp tubes. It’s a two-channel single input amp with “Classica Gain” and “Ultra Gain” channels. It has a 1×12″ Celestion V-Type speaker. Marshall opted for a built-in digital reverb rather than the traditional reverb tank, and the amp features a Softube emulated output (1/4″). The rear of the amp has numerous speaker output options as well as an effects loop, footswitch jack, MIDI in, and a 1/8″ audio in jack. Marshall has added a two-button footswitch.
The front panel controls on the DSL40CR, from left-to-right, are as follows and will help give you a sense of the versatility of this combo: classic gain channel (volume, gain, clean/crunch switch), ultra gain channel (volume, gain, OD1/OD2 switch), middle, treble, bass, tone shift switch, presence, resonance, reverb (classic gain channel), reverb (ultra gain channel), master select switch, master volume I, master volume II, loop on/off switch, power output switch, and power switch. While the amp includes a two-button switch, with Marshall’s 6-button switch you can access all four tones (Clean, Crunch, OD1, & OD2).
Sound Quality
The clean sounds in the DSL40CR amp are incredible.
While we’re not talking about the tones of the Roland JC-120, no one will confuse this with a vintage Deluxe Reverb anytime, as the clean tones from this amp are great. This is one of the most “pedal-friendly” Marshall combo that you’ll come across. The cleans are clear from the DSL40CR and have a great deal of depth. It’s a good fit with a wide array of overdrive and distortion pedals. With dedicated master volume knobs for each channel, you can dial in just the right amount of balance between the overdrive and clean channels.
The overdrive channel is a typical Marshall – classic rock, metal, and blues tones are made here! From classic overdrive to more modern high gain, the sounds available on its ultra gain channel are all high quality, full of depth, and actually usable. While the amp takes pedals really well, you could quite easily leave your overdrive and distortion pedals at home. Given the versatile sounds, it’s not unrealistic to say that the DSL40CR is sort of an all-in-one homage to various Marshall sounds.
Finally, some of the “little things” that Marshall has included to help round out an already great amp. When properly implemented, it ups an amp’s reliability and sonic versatility. Although the reverb is pretty subtle. You have to crank it to get much of an effect, although it sounds good and is quiet.
Marshall JVM210C
Marshall’s JVM 210C is a 100-Watt, 2×12” speaker that’s equipped with some very cool features. Marshall continues to draw from their long heritage of iconic tone machines—from the earliest models, like the JTM-45, the Super Leads, and Plexis, to the JCM models. All are represented in the spirit of this amp in some way; the modern modified Marshall sound is found in abundance here as well.
Design
The power for this fairly small-sized amp is created by 4x EL34 output tubes. The preamp section contains 5x 12AX7 tubes. Its speaker compliments an interesting combination of a 12˝ Vintage series speaker and a 12˝ Heritage speaker, both 8 ohms and wired in series for a total of 16 ohms.
Straightforwardness is the name of the game as on the front panel you have two sets of controls, each with Gain, Treble, Middle, Bass, and finally Volume. The channels are designated Overdrive and Clean/Crunch; each is governed by a small rectangular button equipped with a 3 colored LED in the center.
Features
The JVM 210C is equipped with two separate controls for the onboard digital reverb. One controls the reverb level on the Overdrive channel, while the other controls it on the Clean/ Crunch channel.
All reverb, effects loop and master volume settings are stored in memory after each use. This means that if you have dialled in a pounding, heavy rhythm tone without any reverb on the orange LED setting on the Overdrive channel, it’ll be remembered when you leave and return to that channel. Unfortunately, the amp will only store reverb, effects loop, and master volume settings and not changes to the gain and tone settings. However, having a total of 6 settings available (with three-per-channel availability) makes many different tone settings possible.
The effect loop on this amp is very versatile, as it can be configured either in series or parallel. There’s no need for true bypass; when the delay is no longer needed, you can just turn off the loop. If for some reason, you wanted the whole tone to be changed by a device in the loop, such as an equalizer, then the series loop directs the whole thing through the loop. This is also the setting that you’d use if you were accessing the power amp for use with an external preamp such as a JMP-1.
Sound Quality
The Clean/Crunch channel selections are, of course, for the cleaner side of things. When the green LED is selected on this channel, means that the volume is bypassed effectively, putting it on 10 for the cleanest headroom. The orange selection is a great Super Lead/Plexi tone and can be overdriven very well while using higher gain settings.
Its Overdrive channel starts where the Clean/ Crunch channel ends, with its green LED setting at another JCM 800 type sound. This version has a bit tighter bass, with more gain available if needed. The orange LED setting is a high-gain Super Lead or Plexi, reminiscent of older modified Marshall amps. And finally, the red LED setting of this channel has all the gain anyone could ever need, although with a tightly focused low end.
On the right side of the control panel are the master volume controls. These two controls can be used to adjust the overall loudness of any selected tone. It’s possible to set these up as a lead volume boost control through either MIDI control or with the supplied foot switch, which is a very convenient feature. Just to the left of these two controls are the Resonance and Presence controls. The resonance enables adjustment of the low frequencies to compliment the speakers that are being used. The Presence, as on many other Marshalls, sets the upper high harmonics and brightness.
Conclusion
While both of these amps come with a high reputation, the JVM is more versatile. However, when all things are considered, the price, sound, and versatility of the DSL would be considered to be the better buy/sound amp out there for pretty much any genre.