Roland Introduces Battery Powered Acoustic Amp
(MattG | Posted 2010-03-17)
Roland has just unveiled a very cool little acoustic amplifier, the AC-33. It can run on AC power or 8 AA batteries. And yes, rechargeable batteries work just fine. This little amp is packed with cool features including Roland’s very popular stereo chorus. It also has a reverb and other as Roland calls them, “ambiance effects.” It has an instrument input, an XLR and auxiliary inputs. It is a thirty watt amp so it should be a fairly powerful amp for small venues. It has an anti feedback feature that claims to sense the feedback from your guitar and stop it before it happens. If it works it is a truly genius feature. The sound comes through two 5 inch speakers which I’m sure helps the feedback situation because they won’t be too bass heavy.
As far as vocals go, it will be pretty tough to get them to sound good because the amp doesn’t have separate EQ for guitar and voice. However, the reverb should help to get them sounding decent. It beats bringing a PA to a coffee house gig any day. I am concerned that the anti feedback function might limit the gain on the microphone but it really depends on what the function actually does.
The amp has a couple other very neat features. It has a tilt stand attached so you can set it at your feet and still get good projection without having to get it off the floor. It also has a loop function which could be very cool for many acoustic musicians. It loops up to 40 seconds which is plenty for a slow gritty blues loop if you wanted to play some solos over yourself. It can be controlled with a foot pedal which is not included but an option which would make it very usable in a live setting.
The amp has some great features will make it a must have for many open mic guys. The retail price is $558 so you should be able to pick it up for around $400.
