The Grandmeister 40 Deluxe is here!

When I get around to it I will rename this forum to the correct amp name.  

If you know the official name for this new amp then I can update this thread!

GM36 V2?
GM36 II?
GM36 MMXVI?
GM37?  One more watt to get it to 11 on the volume knob?

I vote for "Grossmeister"!

GrassMaster?

My bet is "Grandmeister 40 Deluxe".

Or "Toaster-sized Heaven".

Grandmeister 40 Deluxe, shipping at the end of September (27.9.)
about 1190 Euro in Germany/Thomann

looks very similar to the 36, got a better/more flexible RedBox
technology closer to the Triamp

GrandMeister 40 Deluxe it is then!

If its not... It's on you guys!

for sure

hughes-and-kettner.com/de/products/grandmeister/grandmeister-deluxe-40/

Well, it's here! And not much more expensive than the 36, for which I've been saving for a while.

The renewed Red Box is definitely a plus, but I wonder how were the channels revoiced, since it's advertised as having "Deluxe Tone Technology, which pairs groundbreaking new circuit design advances with renowned tone-shaping capabilities, all inspired by our flagship TriAmp Mark 3".

Will it sound that much different than the 36?

A GM 36 with four more watts.....well I'm blown away.

Great picture IRocDave!  I saw Alex in an Ice Skating rink in Springfield Illinois in June 1976 (2112).  They rocked then and sounded just like the album.

Sorry, back on topic... And now, for something completely different...

I visited the page and watched the video... Huh. That's cool!

So is it a Triamp Mark 3 in a small box? What about the effects? Did they make them better or are they the same?

I'm assuming one could import their GM36 midi files into the GM40? Safe assumption? But the presets might sound differently if the channels have been revoiced?

I did post elsewhere that there are 15 soundclips on the H&K site of the GM40 which are worth a listen.  I'm afraid they're disappointing for me but they may show that it is just what you want.  H&K maintain that the preamp is a completely new design based on the Triamp.  As I said before, they did make a big deal recently about discovering the contribution of the cathode follower as a tone shaper when following a common cathode stage and I would have thought that they would have built that into the GM40.  It should give a more classic and valve like characteristic to the overdrive with less reliance on the solid state stages which are there before and after.  If that's the case at least the overdrive should sound different, but to my ears it doesn't.  I'd be interested in what others think of those soundclips.

I would have assumed they would keep the basic format of the patch files the same but with different settings to adjust it wouldn't be absolutely the same.  There will be new fields in the GM40 file and old ones may be missing from the GM36 file.  Good software should have been written to cope with that, ignore any unused fields and put default values into fields which may be missing, so the two amps' files are compatible.  I'm not staking my family's future on that!



EDIT: Duuuhhh! Looks like the soundclips were for the TM40 not the new GM40. My ageing cells let me down again. Ignore me I'll just stand in the corner and drool!

I just went looking for those sound clips and couldn't find them! Doh!
Here are some...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=akO-8oS2FoU

I got one pre ordered today and got a great deal. H&K rep told my dealer early Dec. to put hands on it in the USA which I was a little surprised since initially thought they were slated to hit streets in Europe end of September. If anyone hears different please chime in on the USA release dates

If anyone gets a chance to hear the deluxe live please give us a report!Iwas waiting it to be completely different soundwise from the old one,warmer more like an old school tube amp...but the only difference that i recognise is the clean channel.There the sound is more organic and fenderish,the hifi characteristics have gone away.BUT the drive channels still sound harsh and not so warm.It might be my ears but can't hear great differences!Anyone tried the tubemeister deluxe,just to give us an idea?Don't know ...

I've just mistakenly posted that there are sound clips to the GM40 on H&K's site. They were actually of the TM40 so you can hear it there.

TM40 soundclips

Strangely I counted 15 when they first came out, there are only 9 there now? Better hear them before they evaporate!

I am seriously considering going for one of these bad boys, though I must admit my current rig is a stereo set up of a Mesa Boogie LSS and a Princeton reverb so the sound quality must be on a par with that which I have already.

I have the ears of a bat when it comes to tone unfortunately (it has cost me an arm and a leg) its the bane of my life....

Ideally I want to get to hear one live before pressing the button on it and do an A and B against my current set up.... that said I currently utilize a Boss ES-8 switching to select a lush combination of nice pedals, and the midi possibilities here have me salivating and potentially reducing the pedals on my board significantly... think I would keep the Eventide H9 however for reverb/ delay etc.

Difficult to make a decision on just hearing the amp on line, particularly as guitarists like Rabea are from some other worldy planet and can make a first act guitar sound splendid.

Anyhoo... hope to press the buy button soon and be a regular contributor to the forum.

If it turns out anything like the 36 did at launch we won`t see it here in the States until March. I *might* be able to get a bit of play time on one on the 15th of this month. If I do I`ll definitely give a report and some clips if possible.

Any one know what you need in terms of cables to get the iPad app to connect? is this a direct cable from the ipad to midi in on the amp? in which case.

in which case how would I connect my boss es-8 to the amp to be able to select one of the amps 128 presets?

j200george wrote:Any one know what you need in terms of cables to get the iPad app to connect? is this a direct cable from the ipad to midi in on the amp? in which case.

in which case how would I connect my boss es-8 to the amp to be able to select one of the amps 128 presets?

Do you mean instead of using the h&k wifi midi adapter they sell for that purpose? Really that's what most people use I believe and I'm not sure why you'd want actual cables unless the cost of the adapter is your reason. Sweetwater sells the midi adapter $199 Same price as the footswitch

Wasn't aware of the wifi adaptor I will have a look at that, seems an expensive option though (but I guess that's relative to everyone's own wealth).  Shame they didn't add a simple Bluetooth circuit like in the H9 for the control of the app, I am sure they had their reasons though.

Just checked out the WM-1, so it connects to the midi through and offers a midi in for the footswitch (in my case it will be the boss es-

this seems the way to go, thank you!

I've got to say I think the WM-1 shows huge opportunism on H&K's part.  The price is basically for a wifi dongle which deals with the transfer of piddling little amounts of data between two specific devices so needs to be the lowest throughput spec possible.  It should have been a lot cheaper.

Also, as a cable user in the past, I just made up a snake for a couple of pounds and had reliable connections not at the whim of all of the other RF traffic and interference around me.  I'm too old fashioned with my love of simple cables I'm afraid. I'm also sure that most gigging musicians will use the WM-1 and count it money well spent and good luck to them, but it is possible to work reliably for much much less than £175.

I'm curious, how many of us using this gear really set it up more than a few feet from the amp to accomodate stadium sized stages?

My performance snake is 25 feet.  I bought a inexpensive (as opposed to either cheap or $199 ) midi cable.  Probably done over 100 gigs with that cable and my GM, the GM has never dropped a message from my HD500X.  WiFi is cute, but I already run a snake from the front of the stage to the backline, so having a midi cable doesn't make much difference.

The bass player, other guitarist and myself use the Line 6 G30 wireless system (a pretty good system in our opinion).  As part of my standard stage setup, I put an 18 foot George L right next to my HD500X for backup.  About every 4th gig we find either rf dead spots on the stage, or on very rare occasions, one or all of us switch to instrument cable.  With stage lighting, PA amps, flaky house wiring or generators (and bug zappers and beer coolers and microwave ovens and etc) I would be afraid to use rf in my signal path, if it wasn't necessary for the "show".

Now that I think about it, if you were to perform with the WiFi adapter, you'd have to bring your own WiFi router, eh?

Edit:  there are a few stages we play every year that require I use the full length of my snake.  Winter Park Hideway Park, Littleton Clement Park band shell, and Dickens Opera House are three that come to mind. On those stages I can't hear my amp, so also as part of my snake is a speaker cable that run from my active power soak to a small 1x12 cab I put on the front of the stage tilted pointed right at me - my own personal monitor - that is the best damn part of my whole setup. Being able to hear yourself as loud as you want without blowing out the band or pissing off the sound guy is fantastic.