Marshall’s Tube Amp Bargain: Is it really any good?
The Marshall Origin 20 is their tube amp bargain! Is it really any good? What’s it really like? A close up of inside before I mod this tube amp in to a veritable fire breathing monster with the Head First Amps mods. Is this a Marshall Vietnamese bargain? or something else?
Contents:
00:00 Start
00:16 Intro & Preamble
04:19 What did it cost?
05:02 What we show
06:18 The Origin Chassis
08:08 Main PCB Overview
10:56 PCB Components Closer
15:59 Rear I/O
18:29 Front Controls
20:45 My Opinion so far
21:45 Observations
23:40 Let’s be Honest!
25:11 The Score
26:56 A Few Other Points
30:28 Playing Use Headphones
What you will learn:
Does this amp have a great tone?
What is the cost of these amps currently?
Is this Marshall quality from Vietnam?
Is it worth buying?
Related websites:
Part 2 – changing the amp: https://youtu.be/cP0mKFPSqvA?si=wl690TzJeybmZg_8
My website: https://tonymckenzie.com
Fair Deal Music Website: https://www.fairdealmusic.co.uk/
Headfirst Amps Website: https://headfirstamps.com/
Evolve DIY Amp PCB’s etc: https://evolvediy.com/
Marshall website: https://www.marshall.com
Marshall Factory Tour 2023: https://youtu.be/sjMgLOlc9e4?si=-wC8I1IL7KA3icvR
My original Marshall Factory Tour: https://youtu.be/WeerxAO3oRU?si=fRcaJEukPEp1DSEk part one!
My original Marshall Factory Tour: https://youtu.be/rhe7qXP08qw?si=97YOTSB_UyYNmWBF part two!
The Marshall Origin is in my opinion the forerunner to the studio series of tube amplifiers from Marshall. Often somehow ‘down graded’ because it bears ‘Made in Vietnam’ on the back of the amp, somehow many guys might just not even bother looking at the Origin 20. I bought this one from Fair Deal Music in the UK used.
But that would really be a mistake on their part. You see, Marshall do manage that Vietnamese company, and as you will see if you watch the tour above part one – even back then they were making exact designs for Vietnam to create from the designs from Marshall Milton Keynes in the UK. But being a little skeptical too, I really did want to check out this relatively low cost amplifier (especially second user) and see the quality and hear those tones for myself. I viewed the amplifier in an ‘unbiased’ way.
So what did I find? Taking a close look at the chassis, the power and output transformers, the tubes, the three PCB’s and components I saw what is basically a very similar sort of internal design to something like a ‘pre’ studio amp. And while there could be questions about the Vietnam build, in fact everything I saw inside (and you can see it too) looked about the same as the Marshall amps coming from Milton Keynes – except for one weird anomaly.
On the amp under review, the Tolex seemed ‘cheap’ and was considerably different than that on say a Marshall 1959HW amp or even the studio series amps. It felt cheap. I don’t criticize when its not necessary, but on this Origin 20 amplifier it did let the amp down a little.
However, its not why this amp is under review… this is an amplifier that is going to get modified like Headfirst Amplification do (those guys in Australia) and I wanted to show this amp before the mods. In part two of this video I will show how I modified the amp and the results I achieved from a simple Origin 20 tube amp from Marshall.
You might be surprised at the results and if you want a great rock sound then its probably worth looking at those headfirst amplification Jose (or not – maybe other HF mods) mods they show for the Origin 20 and indeed other amps too. Link above.
Listen to the playing at the end of the video, but use headphones to get those tones out properly – it is intentionally not over driven to show the clean tones with everything set at 12:00 on the knobs as shown on the screen. I did NOT crank everything to 10 (or was it 11?). Ha there’s no Tonex pedal on here either! This is all Tony McKenzie Marshall!
Watch for part two (it will probably be linked when I create the video and that will show the mods I did to this origin 20).
I have spent considerable time creating this video entirely at my own expense:
PLEASE SUBSCRIBE, RING THE BELL, AND THUMBS UP to give my channel a boost and thank you for watching – I hope the video is enjoyable for you and that you see the tings in it that other reviews NEVER show!.
(c) A B McKenzie and https://tonymckenzie.com 2009-2024
All Rights Reserved. All Trade Marks Acknowledged
Visit https://tonymckenzie.com for more incredible reviews or my YouTube channel
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#Marshalls #Tube #Amp #Bargain #good
Originally posted by UCuuNmrkOEmTPnz4Dcc-Hi5w at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9LijFoFZhqQ
Where is part 2? Can’t find it.
Tony. You are an absolutely fantastic story teller! There is no one better in the music industry I can think of.
Are you still planning to modify it in the future Tony?
Those Vietnamese DSL combos are cheaper and still great, so there's that! I'm still thinking of getting one, I only have 2 Marshalls (Class 5/JVM410JS) which are both UK made, so it's not like I'm missing anything…but they're cheap and sound good too.
Hi! I've watched a few of your reviews and read your comments. I really like the depth and impartiality of your reviews, especially the high amount of effort you put into it!
I myself am looking for a new amp. Something that won't annoy any neighbours and sounds great at such a volume for bluesy and hard rock tunes. Do you have any recommendations under 650ish?
Ok where is the follow up vid my guy
I played a origin at GC. I wasn't expecting a clean amp.
Maybe using OD pedals I might like it.
The internals look purty clean.
I prefer handwired amps.
This is the best clean tone Marshall ever done, i love it, the amp sounds perfect, specially the 50H, i'm particularly not a fan of Marshall high frequencies it's too nasal for me….and this amp remove that which is why i LOVE IT.
Dude, your channel is awesome ????????????
Would look so much better with some gold piping across the front… right under the logo.
Looking at the chassis… you can't tell me Marshall couldn't offer a Vietnam made 2204/1987 style head for not much more than what these sell for. Why not?
Great amps run them in stereo two 50watt amps into (2) Marshall 1960 cabs..
Hi Tony,
enjoyed the video thanks. Found it extremely interesting. Very much looking forward to the second half and hearing what your mods do this particular amps tone. I have the DSL20HR myself (also MIV) and along with a Bugera V22 head I have exactly what I need from my amps.
I was certain I’d subscribed after watching your CODE video recently, but for some reason I hadn’t managed to. My age perhaps. Anyhow you’ve definitely found yourself a new subscriber and a well earned like. ????????
BTW that’s some very nice playing indeed. Thanks again.
Cheers,
Si.
“Well, I don’t want cleaner tones”
Precedes to to the audio demo in clean/breakup tone????????????
Idk if it sounds like the hype or not, but that demo you played at the end sounded pretty damn good. The phrase sounds like a Marshall is a bit of a convoluted phrase. Are we talking 60’s, 70’s, 80’s or modern Marshall’s when we say that? All those amps sound different. Either way this is a nice sounding amp and if you need more breakup, buy a damn pedal ???? thanks for the review!
Fella down under mods these to incredible sounds…Headfirst Amplification…Jason Tong!
It’s going to be tough to wait 2 months for the follow up mod video! ????
Should have got the 50 watt one…..they say it’s closer to the plexi in circuit.
Hello and good day to you Sir! What do you think of the EVH 5150 Iconic amps internals . It’s a hybrid and it’s a fckn screaming metal machine.❤❤❤
Hay Tony ????
I just fried my origin 20 using an attenuator and master and gain on 10 with a DOD250 in front. Working on the solution
Hey Frazzle – Dave O here…remember me, occasional bass player and I often think of Evo. Yet another awesome video. My first amp was a 20 watt or so second-hand Marshall. I bought and fitted new valves from that wondrous place, Ham Radio, in Hartshill. It was a cracker and why or why did I ever sell it to get a Peavy combo for the bass!!? Anyhow – keep being inspiring and amazing.
Good stuff. Tony €411 at Thomann.
Hi,Tony thank for another great review,and I always appreciate your in depth reviews. Tony when you were pointing out the resistors I noticed that Marshall used the precision resistors by the five bands instead of the 5% four band
resistors used on some of the inexpensive amplifiers.
I bagged one of these in 2019 when guitar guitar was blowing them out for £250 new. Then I swapped it for an old Mesa. 50 cal that I had previously owned. I had forgotten how much I hated that Mesa. A couple of years later I swapped that back for a Blug amp1 Mercury. Good luck with the mod Tony.
The early Marshall circa 63-64 had smooth tolex . Nice video Tony
Interesting review, nice to see that the amp internals appear to be well put together. I have gigged with my Origin 20 head for the past 2 years and its been really reliable. The cheap tolex vinyl matches the cheap vinyl on my speaker cab exactly so im quite happy with that! I use mine as a pedal platform for which it works well. Also, i have found that the Amp sounds best, for me, through a Celestion Greenback loaded cabinet, compared to a few other speakers i have tried. Looking forward to your follow up video with the modification.????
I had picked one of these up along with a 2×12. Found it impossible to get any break up, volume control was basically 0 and 10, and materials felt very cheap. I returned it and got a nice used custom JCM800 and 2×12, which is one of my favorite amps. Thanks for the review!
The introduction was an interesting take. In my experience, guys who have valve amps are far more likely to bad mouth modelers than guys who have modelers are to bad mouth valve amps.
Marshall the company that at one time made great amps and today what do we get? Bluetooth speakers and a damn mini fridge.
Whats going on with Marshall anyway?
Theyre out of stock everywhere in the US, and their prices are slashed by almost half?
Those Origin amps can be modded into high gain monsters.
With all due respect, the Marshall Group should have released a 100-watt version of the Origin amp model. Why they didn't, I don't know.
Sincerely, Ed.
this's hopefully an amp type that will inspire new players to use real amps.
The Marshalls I like best are the 80's solid-state ones.
This one is as clean as a Marshall ever gets, it is not intended for pure clean players like me
but if you like clean with an edge to it, this one does it very well.
Great piece of playing Tony, i could listen to more of it.
Mark Knopfler has just realeased a new album, how about one from Owl Studios?
Why are you still here? You clearly do not understand
This amp sells for $549 at Sweetwater… also Marshall owns the factory in Vietnam therefore they have more control over the products
Hello my dearest friend!
It’s a great amp for what they cost