The Crate FlexWave65 is a mid-sized combo amp utilizing Crate’s now-legendary FlexWave™ Evolution 5 preamp and patented Sequential Cascading Gain™ technology to pump 65 watts of mind-boggling rich, articulate tone through a single 12″ speaker. Variable 3-channel operation lets you switch between clean, dirty and saturated channels with the included remote footswitch.
Don’t pass out yet, because it includes a whopping 18 DSP effects to add separate delay, modulation and reverb to your sound.
Crate’s legendary Channel Tracking™ technology automatically stores your effects settings for each channel and recalls the settings as you switch between channels using the footswitch we include—it’s a dance that can only be described as “beautiful.”
Dial in the perfect tone by tweaking the overtly musical onboard 3-band EQ, and for even more punishing leads, the Solo channel features Crate’s proprietary Shape Control circuit.
Specifications
- 65 watts RMS
- 1 x 12″ speaker
- 3 channel operation
- DSP with separate controls for effects, including delay, reverb
- CD/MP3 input
- Built-in tuner
This amp is in the new Crate FlexWave series of amplifiers. Sound quality is excellent and price is competitive with similar solid state amps. Features that this amp are missing from so many similar amps is modeling. The DSP effects are good and flexible. Footswitch operation is effective and allows switching between the 3 channels.
I couldn’t decide between a Vox Valvetronix AD50VT or a Roland Cube 60, but then I tried the Crate FW65 and it blew them both away (in terms of sound quality). The only downside of this amp is that it doesn’t have any modelling types, like the Valvetronix and the Cube amps have. I was able to look past that though, because this amp will sound much much better. The effects are pretty good, but not amazing. The footswitch included is very handy, enables switching between the 3 channels and change the effects. Overall this is an excellent amp for practice, jamming, or maybe even small gigs.