JOYO Zombie-II BanTamp XL Hybrid Tube Guitar Amp Head

Great li'll metal monster 🤘😖🤘

Love it, sounds great and it chugs no problem and it pushes a 4x12 cab effortlessly.

Buy one!

This is without a doubt the best metal amplifier less than $500.

It’s my first Bantamp and with an EQ it the loop it sounds amazing. It’s Loud enough to play a small concert through an 8 ohm 2x12.

The Bluetooth feature through headphones is genius for quiet practice. I can jam on the couch while the kids play.

If you love, high gain amplifiers, buy one of these! You will not be unhappy!

Pedido incompleto

Recibí el cabezal pero no me llegó el Pedal Footswitch que decía en la descripción del artículo

The best mini head for metal music at the best price.

Pro,

1. It's small, sturdy build and easy to put on a pedal board.

2. It has Bluetooth, an effects loop, a headphone out and foot switch for changing channels.

3. Has two independent channels for clean and distortion.

4. The clean channel is super clean and the distortion channel has a ton of gain on tap.

5. It takes pedals extremely well.

6. Has a very tight distorted sound.

7. For a hybrid amp it didn't cost a lot.

8. Loud enough to keep up with a drummer.

Cons,

1. It only has a tone shift know, not a treble, mid or bass unfortunately. I'd use an EQ in the effects loop if you want better control of your tone.

2. This is a hybrid amp head, not a full tube head so don't expect it to sound like a real tube amps.

3. I'd modeled after a Mesa Boogie Dual Rectifier, but it doesn't quite sound like one. I'll admit it sounds great, but it's too tight to sound like a real Dual Rectifier IMO.

Even with it's short comings it's an extremely worthwhile amp head that can easily keep up with a drummer, practice and do small gigs with. I don't feel the short comings are really short comings for me personally.

Chris C.

May 30, 2024

Perfect for hard rock and heavy metal!

Very impressive little head. Great tones for a decent price! JOYO delivered big on this amp! Light as a feather and heavy on the sound, pair it with a decent speaker cabinet. It has 20 Watts of power, I can't get it off of 1, it's very powerful and can surely run my 4x12 cabinet with no problems. It is very small and easy to carry, and has the gain for each channel and a footswitch included! The distortion is killer and the clean is sharp and clear. Recommended.

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work well

works well

Crushing

I'm pretty impressed with this amplifier. It's rough and tough, loud as heck and sounds pretty good. As you can see, it has crazy amounts of gain and I tend to keep it down low. I've been doing some recording and folks seem to prefer this amplifier through a 4x10 cabinet above everything else I do.

Does it sound like a Mesa Boogie? How should I know? If I had the money I would probably buy a Mesa Boogie, but this thing sounds downright awesome on a budget. It certainly sounds like a Joyo Zombie - and I like that sound!

Maybe the only thing I'd want is a high / mid / low EQ, but I put a graphic EQ in the effects loop. Not that I actually use it.

It works pretty good for bass on the clean channel, too. This one is a no brainer.

Best tiny tube amp ever. Needs some work, but great for the money.

I started gigging with the Zombie II because I liked it so much. I am a tube amp geek and just can't seem to get the same response from solid state gear, so this little amp was an absolute game changer.

I do wish it had an on-board EQ. However, I started to run the JOYO cab simulator out the effects loop and giving the house my balanced line out from the cab simulator pedal. That way, I still get some on-stage sound, tube response, and the sound guy gets a great direct signal. On the cab simulator, I've been EQ-ing the amp. The cab simulator itself is a really cool piece of gear, but yeah, back to the amp.

It's got a lot of gain. A LOT of gain. I like that I can get a killer tone without any pedals, but it sounds great with pedals too.

In the studio, I still prefer my Fender tube amps or a Mesa, but for throwing into the car for a small bar gig, this has been incredible. It sounds great and is so incredibly light weight.

It's good. It sounds closer to the PRS MT15 than a Mesa DR2. And that is just fine.

I really like it. My pic is a mess....

Runs great on EMG and better on fishmans, doesnt love pedals but it takes em ok... overdrive not necessary... eq does help but the amps preset voice is legit af anyhow so... what else... just buy it... better than any pedal tone you're gonna push... it's a real amp. Sounds better than most Mesa sims.

Perfect for the money

Took this lil beast out of the box plugged it in and with min fiddleing in both clean and of channel I found my tones recommend 100% will be checking out the Jackman next

Brad Swaim

April 24, 2023

Amazing

This little amp is a monster I love the sound of this amp and will be buying more

Joseph Runyon (J-Run)

April 10, 2022

Mighty Mouse

I have to admit. I was a bit skeptical that these amps were as great as I'd beeñ led to believe.

But man was i ever wrong. If you are on a budget and want that dual rectified tone this is your dream amp.

I was blown away by this little guy. The Joyo Zombie II is like Mighty Mouse. Comes in a small package but packs a monster sized punch. Outstanding!!!

ShrEddie

April 2, 2022

Got tired of lugging my full size head unit to practice.

Great little head unit for the price. Awesome metal tone. Recommend

Surprising lil monster!!!

This thing CRANKS. pleasantly surprised by the tone and volume of this thing. Having the footswitch was the big selling point, as a lot of the "lunchbox" style heads are typically one channel. Excellent value.

Inconceivable!

I've owned several amps, including the small Orange amps. I was never very impressed by them. They'd often have decent output, but the tone was never anything great.

After watching several videos on this beast and seeing the price, I figured I'd get one to find out for myself.

When I pulled it out of the box, it was quite a bit smaller than I expected! I plugged it in and jammed for a while. Tested out on a 2x12 large sealed Vintage-30 cab (I'm a metal guy, what can I say?)

Pros:

-Unbelievable tone! The distortion at low to high gain is near-perfect! M-E-T-A-L for days!

-Power packed! About 1/2 way up the volume is more than enough. I could imagine a 4x12 cab would be pretty silly. Remember that 1 watt can do 100+ decibels in most of the pro-audio speakers. Double the power, +3dB or x10 power for +10dB from there. Double the speakers, +3dB. So if this can put out 20 watts into a 4x12 cab, we're getting close to 120dB! Even your drummer will ask you to turn it down at that point...

-Easy to use. There's not much to the knobs.. some like having a 4 hour tuning session with tons of knobs and settings, but I'd rather play my guitar. The few knobs that are there are really all this amp needs. Get pedals if you want more options.

-Small and light weight. Would you rather pack a boulder or a pebble? Flights of stairs?! Crowded stages... you could "probably" fit this amp on some pedal boards!

-Simple clean/dirty pedal, uses a TS cable which is nice, since most I've seen use a TRS.

-FX loop. Haven't used it yet, but it's there!

-Freakin tube?! Yeah. It glows. It's pretty.

-Stays cool! Class D amps are pretty efficient. After playing ~30 minutes, nothing felt very warm.

Mediums:

-Clean tone is pretty good, but not perfect. Can't quite get the gain just right for perfection, but the clean channel is acceptable.

-Bluetooth... it's there, but I don't need it. I'd rather either have other features, or rid of it and save size/weight and cost. But I'm sure others can find use for it.

-I haven't used a ton of amps on this 2x12 cab, but the low end seems a bit excessive. Further testing needed here, but it may be a little too thumpy for some people.

-Came with a cable that I can only assume is for amp-to-cab, but doesn't specify anywhere. Can't see what gauge the wiring is (not printed on cable), so may not be suitable for that power load. (though, we're talking 20 watts, so it doesn't need to be a 12awg speaker cable...)

Cons:

-Non-standard power supply. The ICE plug is missed, but when you get to this small of a package, it's not surprising.

-Instructions weren't too great, but if you know how to insert plugs and turn dials, it's pretty self explanatory.

You won't find ANYTHING... N-E-THING that is going to beat this at this time at this price level. It may not have the flexibility of some other high end amps, but it simply just doesn't need it.

Buy it

Just beautiful. I own the first zombie and wanted to grab the two channel updated version. Very happy with it. You can't beat the distortion on this thing for the price. Buy it!

Exactly what I was looking for

I wanted a small amp to use with headphones for when i just want to tinker late at night while my wife and son are asleep.

Not only did this amp meet that need it also blew my mind with the sound it puts out. The clean tone is amazingly clear and crisp and the gain channel is exactly the sound I was looking for. So many features that this little amp has are amazing. the FXloop is great, so is the channel pedal.... but the thing that stood out is the bluetooth feature. I can hook my phone to it so play along with songs.

For only being 20 Watts this thing was super loud. I posted a video with both clean and gain and a picture of my settings.

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