Got myself one of these after spending some time in the local GAS emporium - great sound.

Planning to go on a busking weekend to Whitby in the summer - so this will suit perfectly.

Will go battery powered - twin pandoras for effects.

Hope to earn enough during the day for beer money at night..

Cool, are you using it with a full-range Stick or short scale (or both)? I tried one briefly with a Stickup running straight in, and felt that I really needed my preamp or effects unit in front, as there was an impedance mismatch. The sound was still good though.

I saw a lot of BA-330s around the streets of Adelaide during the Fringe festival this year, most notably used by a couple of beatboxers, and also a 3-piece band who were running looped violin, guitar and vocals through it. The sound is impressive, without being overly loud. It's obviously not intended to pump out massive bass, but there are a lot of people using these as free-standing small PAs for 80-100 people gigs.

I've rarely seen an amp cause as much discussion as the BA on various forums. Generally speaking, most reactions seem to range from "pleasantly surprised" to "stunned". Acoustic guitarists love it, while DJs think it's all a bit of a joke (30 watts running on AA batteries, come on...?).

Let us know how it works out, and happy busking!

Andy

When I auditioned it I used my grand with ACTV2, via a POD X3 live, and ran it off the power adapter.

I'm going to experiment also with my MacBook, with Guitar Rig, and Apogee Duet2.

Really good rich tone, lots of bass, filled a busy large music shop well.

I'll use it with the twin pandoras when busking though, and will need to experiment to get a decent tone.

Will report on the busking!

I believe the power rating is slightly lower on batteries, but Roland have really led the way with their portable amps in recent years - I know about half a dozen "guitar guys" with 5w Cube Street amps, and they can be heard loud and clear on the street.

I looked at a Pandora for busking a few years ago - I think they'll do the trick if you don't need to change patches a lot. If not, I recommend Zoom G-series (G3 is exceptional, G2 is good and smaller) for battery powered, foot-friendly gear. What's your impression of the internal reverb on the BA-330? (Once again, I've heard mostly good things).

If you haven't done a lot of busking, try to keep the setup as simple and mobile as possible to begin with. Too much stuff just causes stress!

Cheers,
Andy

BTW how does it stack up against the AER Compact?

Cheers,
Andy

Mmh, just test played the BA330 in a music store today. Sounds superb but unfortunately lacks power. Instrument inputs are very weak (I have an ACTV 2 PU). Mic inputs are OK.

I have a BA330 and love it. It really has a rich full sound with my ACTV2 grand. But, as Olivier says, it's not very loud. That said, you can buy two of these babies for the price of an AER60, and hook them together to acheive a real stereo system. The BA330 is also quite light weight and easy to cart around. The reverb/delay control is a single dial and can be enabled/disabled on each channel separately, and it sounds good, but is pretty rudimentary.