Designed to be the ‘largest’ sounding 1×12” combo ever produced and delivering a true wall of sound playing experience that players can carry in one hand, Black Spirit 200 Combo’s secret is in its enclosure: a closed-back front-ported birch plywood construction, it features perfectly tuned Thiele/Small ports for enhanced low-end response.
Meanwhile, well-balanced dimensions dampen the speaker’s movement and at the same time allow it to breathe, letting it unleash its full sonic potential and delivering more output than any other comparable housing.
The result is the punchiest yet most balanced frequency response ever in a combo of this size!
HIGHLIGHTS
The secret behind Black Spirit 200’s incredible sounds is a groundbreaking new ‘bionic’ tone generating technology called Spirit. This strictly analog circuitry faithfully recreates the complex, dynamic processes known from classic tube amp designs, thereby delivering world class tone and responsiveness.
The compact 1×12 Thiele/Small enclosure which houses a UK-made Celestion G12H-75 Creamback speaker features perfectly tuned Thiele/Small ports. The result is the punchiest yet most balanced frequency response we’ve ever designed for a combo.
THE SECRET BEHIND THE WALL-OF-SOUND PLAYING EXPERIENCE!
To give you that genuine wall-of-sound feel and sound, we paired a unique Thiele/Small cabinet enclosure with a UK-made Celestion Creamback speaker.
What is Thiele/Small, we hear you ask? Well, it’s a common term these days, and it’s all about achieving the biggest possible sound out of a smaller sized, ported/vented speaker enclosure. Thiele/Small is named after A. Neville Thiele of the Australian Broadcasting Commission, and Richard H. Small of the University of Sydney, Australia.
These two audio pioneers developed a way to calculate how large a speaker cabinet would need to be – and how wide and long the vented port should be – in order to achieve maximum low frequency performance.
The Thiele/Small development approach leads to well-balanced dimensions that dampen the speakers’ movement, while at the same time allowing it to breathe. Only in this way can the speaker unleash its full sonic potential and deliver more output than in any other housing – as you’re about to find out!
SPIRIT: THE BIONIC TONE GENERATOR
Over the years, we’ve been exploring the origin of the tonal magic of tube amplifiers more and more deeply. And what became obvious is this: it’s about way more than just the tube. The true tonal magic emerges from all the ‘weird’ dynamic interactions between the single circuit sections and the amp stages, the transformers and the speakers.
Together, these highly complex and dynamic physical phenomena create that rich, organic and tactile sound experience guitar players are looking for.
The Spirit Tone Generator technology faithfully recreates the natural yet wildly complex interactions of traditional tube amp circuits on a digitally controlled but strictly analog working platform. This miniature masterwork houses the essence of the physics behind tube amplifiers, with all of the intensity – hereby creating the rich and responsive tonal behavior that gives you an unbridled joy of playing. Put simply, Spirit is made to inspire guitarists to perform at their best.
INNOVATIVE POWER AMP SAGGING CONTROL
Much of the fascinating tone of the great clean, crunch and lead guitar sounds is down to a drop in power supply voltage when spiking transient signals hit the output stage hard. Now, for the first time in an analog amp, Black Spirit 200 lets you adjust the amount of power amp sag and dial in creaminess and growl regardless of the volume level.
CHANNELS AND FX
Black Spirit 200 combo features four channels that take you on a trip through all the trademark tones of the last 60 years. And like four external stomp boosts, the channel-tailored boost will give you an even more assertive, creamier, or punchier tone! Four inspirational, strictly analog channels plus a complete range of built-in digital reverb, delay and modulation effects make it a perfect all-in-one solution, while a sophisticated FX Loop lets you connect external FX units. And it’s all accessible directly and with the trusted handling you expect from a real guitar amplifier.
SAVE YOUR FAVORITE TONES WITH THE PUSH OF A BUTTON
All parameters apart from the Master Volume can be stored in up to 128 presets and recalled any time you want! Black Spirit 200 combo is the perfect solution on stage and for your sound library in the studio or at home. Recalling all your favorite Black Spirit 200 tones couldn’t be simpler: just use the optional Hughes & Kettner FSM-432 MK III MIDI board, where every one of your presets is the tap of a toe away!
CAPTURE AMAZING TONES WITHOUT MICS
Hughes & Kettner’s award-winning Red Box has been the music industry’s go-to device for recording guitars without microphones for decades. Black Spirit 200 combo features the most highly evolved Red Box ever: Red Box AE+. It’s the simplest, easiest and flat-out the best sounding way of sending your tone to a mixer, a PA or a recording device. But what truly sets Red Box AE+ apart is its versatility: choose from eight different cabinet types
– from monstrous 4×12 stacks to compact 1×12 cabs, and anything in-between – to truly personalize your tone. This option is not only more convenient than miking up a cab. In most cases, it sounds a whole lot better!
SUPERIOR CONNECTIVITY
Your personal connection to Black Spirit 200 is matched only in its totality by the amp’s connectivity to the musical world outside! Here’s how to get your Black Spirit 200 heard:
Black Spirit 200 Combo features the most highly evolved Red Box ever: Red Box AE+. It’s the simplest, easiest and flat-out the best sounding way of sending your tone to a mixer, a PA or a recording device. But what truly sets Red Box AE+ apart is its versatility: choose from eight different cabinet types – from monstrous 4×12 stacks to compact
1×12 cabs, and anything in-between – to truly personalize your tone. You can switch the output level from Mic to Line, so whatever you want to connect your amp to, the level will match.
Together with the Black Spirit 200 head the Black Spirit 200 combo also features a truly new kind of speaker output. With the cabinet type switch you decide if you want to play through a guitar speaker or a Full Range Flat Response (FRFR) cab. The Output Power switch limits the wattage according to the location or the power capacity of the cab you’re using.
The Black Spirit 200 Combo offers an additional connection for a second guitar box compared to the head.
And it’s the perfect amp for world tours: Black Spirit 200 runs on every voltage between 100 and 240 volts without affecting the output power or sound consistency!
NEVER LOSE A GREAT TONE AGAIN: APP FOR IPAD AND ANDROID
The official Black Spirit 200 App for iPad is not yet available from the App Store.
The beta version of the Black Spirit 200 App already offers all the features.
Create, edit, save and share all your favorite
sounds via Bluetooth using the
Black Spirit 200 Remote App for iPad!
The App, which you can download for free
at the Apple App Store and runs on all iPads
running iOS 10 or later, lets you:
• Store and backup all your favorite sounds
• Manage an unlimited number of presets in as many libraries as you need
• Visually monitor all of the amp’s parameters in real time
• Remotely control all of those parameters in real time
• Load/send presets via email
With the Black Spirit 200 Remote App, you’ll never lose a great tone again!
Much of the fascinating tone of the great clean, crunch and lead guitar sounds is down to a drop in power supply voltage when spiking transient signals hit the output stage hard. You can adjust the amount of power amp sag to add creaminess and growl to your tone regardless of the volume level.
The Clean Channel offers endless pristine headroom, and way more besides: engaging the Boost and tweaking the gain and sagging controls will give you access to an awe-inspiring array of sounds.
Crunch delivers classic overdrive sounds at their most assertive! From light levels of breakup to thickly compressed, turbo-charged all-out distortion, the Crunch Channel delivers a knockout tonal punch.
The Lead Channel celebrates the unique sound produced by cascading tube gain stages. With oodles of gain on tap, classic hard rock riffs and licks will fly off your fingertips courtesy of this channel’s painstakingly tweaked compression!
Perfect for modern metal and high-gain sounds, the Ultra Channel delivers sumo-sized low end and an ultra-fast response up to the highest volume levels.
Kick in the Boost to target specific frequency ranges in your tone and kick them up a notch. Depending on the channel, it will yield an even more assertive, creamier, or punchier tone. The Boost is tailored to each channel’s character, meaning that it works like four individual external boost pedals.
These are classic passive tone controls that influence one another. For example, if you crank the Mid knob, the Bass knob will be less effective than when you back the Mid knob down. The are also savable, which means you can store different EQ settings for each of your sounds, or do things like using the Mid knob to create a mid-boosted sound for a specific song or tone.
The world’s most musical Noise Gate guarantees you a noise-free yet natural sound experience. The Intelligent Dual Breakpoint (IDB™) technology gauges the signal the Input jack and cuts post preamp, but pre effects, it does not cut off Reverb and Delay signals.
The Presence knob controls the amount of harmonic overtones generated by the power amp –the higher the setting, the more intense the effect!
Set the Resonance knob to 12 o’clock to hear the standard resonance of the amp (with cab). Twist it counterclockwise to dampen the resonance for a looser, softer sound that sweetens up clean tone. Turning the knob clockwise intensifies the resonance for a tighter, punchier low end that works well with distortion!
The digital reverb matches the warmth and musicality of classic spring reverbs. A genuine improvement over its analog ancestors, it automatically adjusts the reverb tail –the higher the Reverb volume setting, the longer the reverb time. Reverb is blended directly with the analog signal so you get to keep all the dynamics and vitality of that sweet analog tone.
Built-in studio quality chorus, flanger, phaser and tremolo effects. You can adjust speed and intensity of the modulation. They are all blended directly with the analog signal so you get to keep all the dynamics and vitality of that sweet analog tone.
You can adjust the level, feedback and time. Tip: the FSM-432 MK III MIDI Board also features a handy Tap function, so you can control the delay speed on the fly with your foot. The delay is blended directly with the analog signal so you get to keep all the dynamics and vitality of that sweet analog tone.
This serial loop lets you patch in external effects devices: connect the Send jack in the FX Loop section on the amp’s rear panel to your effects processor’s input and the Return jack to the processor’s output. The FX Loop button on the fgront panel activates and deactivates the loop.
Using the phantom powered Hughes & Kettner FSM-432 MK III MIDI board, you can control the amp just as you would with an ordinary footswitch without having to first bone up on MIDI. Of course, any other MIDI gear will connect and work as well.
All parameters apart from the Master Volume can be stored recalled any time you want! For remote control of any knob, simply connect an expression pedal to the FSM MK III and
adjust controls like gain, EQ or reverb in real time.
With 128 presets on tap, you can go through any gig without the need to tweak your tones. The perfect solution on stage and for your sound library in the studio or at home.
Create, edit, save and share all your favorite sounds via Bluetooth using the Black Spirit 200 Remote App for iPad. With the Black Spirit 200 Remote App, you’ll never lose a great tone again!
Choose from eight different cabinet types from monstrous 4×12 stacks to compact 1×12 cabs, and anything in-between, to truly
personalize your tone. You can switch the output level from Mic to Line, so whatever you want to connect your amp to, the level will
match.
With the cabinet type switch you decide if you want to play through a guitar speaker or a Full Range Flat Response (FRFR) cab. Hook your amp up directly to non-powered PA speakers and wedges, hi-fi speakers or studio monitors.
With 200 watts of output power, Black Spirit 200 is one of the loudest guitar amps ever. You’ll probably never need this kind of volume, but you’ll always love the dynamic headroom. What’s more, the unprecedented Spirit technology delivers that great sound even at whisper quiet levels.
Aux In allows you to connect any kind of music player, and it can also be used to connect drum machines or additional instruments.
The room emulated stereo headphones out let´s you enjoy great tone in the still of night; you can even use it to jam to your favorite tracks! Just connect your music player to the built-in Aux Input or stream music from any Bluetooth-enabled device direct to your amp!
Stream music from any Bluetooth-enabled device direct to your amp!
The bionic Spirit Tone Generator faithfullyrecreates the natural yet wildly complex interactions of traditional tube amp circuits. It houses the essence of the physics behind tube amplifiers,
with all of the intensity –hereby creating the rich and responsive tonal behavior that givesyou an unbridled joy of playing.
