• Registered: 2010-08-25
  • Posts: 24

Topic: amp hiss-please help.

Got out my hughes and kettner statesman combo and set it up with my pedalboard for a gig at the weekend in a small pub.It was so noisy so i took it to an amp tech who checked it over and said it was fine and that it will have some hiss. Anyway set it up side by side with my dsl, plugged a guitar in each amp and they both had a hiss.When i plugged in the pedalboard with the h&k the noise was terrible but its fine with the dsl so it cant be the pedalboard can it ?

  • Registered: 2008-10-02
  • Posts: 373

Re: amp hiss-please help.

This could be a lot of things:

Bad cable/cables
Dirty Power at your house or where your playing
High Gain amps tend to hiss more
one of the pedals adding more hiss to your amp

Only thing you can really do is check each pedal and cable one by one until you find the hiss. Does the amp still hiss when its just a guitar and a cable? How noises is the amp without a guitar plugged in?

  • From: Florida, USA
  • Registered: 2008-06-04
  • Posts: 1,420

Re: amp hiss-please help.

Ah, the good 'ol Hunt for The Hiss...  BigE is right on the money with some basic trouble shooting.  There are a lot of things you can try to eliminate your humming woes.  BTW if you are playing a single coil equiped guitar that doesn't have proper pickup shielding or reverse wound middle pickups you can get a lot of the dreaded 60 cycle hum.

1) GROUNDING.  The most important factor in eliminating hissing and humming.  I like to keep my amps and pedals seperated from the same power source.  A Voodoo Lab Pedal Power 2 is HIGHLY recommended to power your pedals quietly and efficiently.  The amps are powered on their own specific power strip.  I also use the VoodooLab Amp Selector (I use more than one amp) which helps me isolate each amp from each other which really cuts the racket down.  Other than that, high quality cables help immensely.

On a side note, sometimes you'll always have some kind of problems with noise at certain venues.  As Big E mentioned, some older houses or buildings have very dirty power or tons of neon lights.  Those are a nightmare for your rig lol.  Perhaps investing in a nice power supply/conditioner like a Furman would help?  Good luck stamping out that noise!

'67 and '74 Fender Twin Reverbs, '74 Marshall 1987 lead mkII, Metro Superlead 100. Pedals from TC Electronic, Ibanez, Dunlop, BK Butler, Electro-Harmonix, Fulltone, Maestro/Gibson, Loopmaster switching, VoodooLab, Boss. Gibson and Fender guitars, Dimarzio pickups.
  • Registered: 2010-08-25
  • Posts: 24

Re: amp hiss-please help.

The h&k hisses and the dsl hums when no guitar is plugged in,when guitars are plugged in they both hiss but not excessive, tried every pedal on its own with one power source and the hiss increases with every pedal other than the wah,including the delay in the effects loop.Even tried a pedal with a battery and still increased hiss.Tried exactly the same thing with the dsl and the hiss doesnt increase.I dont do the dual amp thing so dont have to worry about amps effecting each other.

  • Registered: 2008-10-02
  • Posts: 373

Re: amp hiss-please help.

Have you cleaned the jacks in the loop? It could be a cold soder joint that is going bad, but usually you have a volume drop with that problem.

  • Registered: 2010-08-25
  • Posts: 24

Re: amp hiss-please help.

No i havent done that and no there is no loss in volume.Im wondering whether the earthing system in the h&k is not as effective as the dsl or something like that ?

  • From: York, PA
  • Registered: 2010-08-27
  • Posts: 1,749

Re: amp hiss-please help.

mart-prs wrote:

The h&k hisses and the dsl hums when no guitar is plugged in,when guitars are plugged in they both hiss but not excessive, tried every pedal on its own with one power source and the hiss increases with every pedal other than the wah,including the delay in the effects loop.Even tried a pedal with a battery and still increased hiss.Tried exactly the same thing with the dsl and the hiss doesnt increase.I dont do the dual amp thing so dont have to worry about amps effecting each other.

You may still want to try using a Voodoo Lab PEDAL POWER 2 and go one by one with each pedal.  I'm guessing since you are powering a single pedal at a time with it's own wall adapter or something, there will still be interference where as with the Pedal Power, each output is ISOLATED.
You gotta suck it up and buy one, there is a reason why all the pros use them!  If you can plug your amp into a seperate outlet on a different breaker that will also help.  -Seth