Category: Amplifiers

The Roland Cube amplifier

I’ve been using mine for over 10 years now and in that time a lot has changed in the world. I’m no longer out on the road playing gigs, hadn’t been for some time, and I wouldn’t have used this for my bass guitar anyway. Just too small and not enough power. I’d just moved in to a new flat and needed something in keeping; small, punchy but not loud enough to disturb the neighbours and with  a headphone socket in case I wanted to crank it up to 11. The Cube amp had been selling for 10 years when I bought the GX, nearly 10 years to the day writing this review so I thought I’d do a comparison looking at the 10Gx.  I’m a little disappointed. It’s still got the punch, still got the size but…

The most obvious thing when I looked at the 10Gx was No Battery Compartment!   You mean I can’t take this new model down to the beach and plug in my Telecaster? Indeed, this isn’t a portable despite being portable.  Still, they’ve left the Cube Link port, or Aux-In, as it’s labelled, so you can, provided you buy the appropriate adapter for your phone (USB-C to 3.5mm audio for most modern phones), plug your phone into it and play a track from that though the amp. You can get some from Roland but basically if it’s on your phone you can play it through the Cube. great if you have a track-1 recording.

On to the rest of the top panel. It’s a lot less busy, which is just another way of saying it’s got a lot less knobs on it.  Lets look at what we had in the past. On the lower row you have an instrument input (4.5mm) Gain, Volume and Tone controls with a master volume knob.  And a power button.  Above that there’s the afore mentioned Aux-In, a push switch labelled Memory (saves your set up) and 3 rotary knobs labelled Amp type (eight of them), EFX (3 areas: chorus, flanger, phaser) and Delay/Reverb (3 areas again, tremolo, delay, reverb) and a push button to turn the chromatic tuner on or off. It won’t tell which note your playing, just indicates if your note is sharp flat or actually a note.  And now to this bright future.  You’re down to 6 knobs and a selector switch split in to 3 sections.  from right to left you have the power switch, the Equaliser section of treble, middle and bass knobs, and the Amplifier section of volume and gain knobs and a selector switch for 3 amp types – Clean, Crunch and Lead, and the Input socket. What? You wanted to try the Brit Combo or Classic Stack amps of the GX?  All is not lost! You can download an app for your phone then upload the appropriate amp profile to your amp.  The Aux-In has moved to the rear, alongside the Rec/Phones and power socket.

On both amps if you plug something into the Rec socket it mutes the speaker. Now this is a minor point, but basically when I’m recording something like a guitar I reserve a lot of channels for it in my DAW.  I use a splitter cable to divide the signal from the guitar and take one lead to the amp and another straight to the input interface for the DAW, with an input from the amp. Preferably two leads from the amp. Take a DI from the amp and stick a mic in front of the speaker for another. Yes, you do get a different sound using the mic because the room you’re in shapes the sound – unless you’re in an anechoic chamber of course.  Doing it that way gives you a clean signal from the guitar, a clean, although shaped, sound from the amp and something probably very dirty from the mic. That’s a good set of mixing options, with no overdubs and timing issues, and remember, you don’t have to use them all or you might choose to use some, or combinations, at various points. But I’d like to have that option. a Mute Speaker push button would be great, if only so’s you could take that phone call from the record company. Ok, we all have our dreams 🙂

Prices: 

The GX cost £108 back in 2014. At the time of writing in 2024, Amazon are doing the 10Gx for £129 (RRP £155}.

Summary: 

If all you want is a practise amp for your bedroom or (as in my case) my living room then the Cube is a good amp. Good sound flexibility, good practice options,  and easy to connect to to your chosen DAW, although you will probably need a 3.5mm to 4.5mm or XLA converter.  Unless you mic it up. You can’t take it busking unless you can rig up some external power supply, which is a shame, but then it’s only 10W so you might want to look elsewhere anyway.

Value for money? Not bad given I also use it when recording my mandolin and various acoustic guitars.