Roland KC vs Traynor

[Charlie Labs]

Hi,

I'm considering picking up a Traynor K4 keyboard amp. I currently use a Roland KC550 and have used KC's for over 10 years. Besides losing an occasional tweeter, I've found these amps to hold up quite well under heavy gigging conditions. I'm just looking to see (and hear) if the Traynor K4 sounds better.

I'll be using the following boards with this amp:

Alesis Andromeda
Hammond XK3
Yamaha P90
Moog Voyager
Moog Taurus3

The Voyager and Taurus 3 are both connected to my Boss RE20 which is then connected mono into my amp.

For live settings most PA's are mono. The K4 claims to be a stereo monitor so I'm interested in hearing how it sounds.


As far as power goes.

Traynor K4 = 300 watts
One 200 watt amp drives a 12" woofer
Two 30 watt amps drive two 4.5' midrange drivers
Two 20 watt amps drive two 2.5" tweeters.

Roland KC550: 180 watts
Not sure how much power goes to the 15" woofer and 1" tweeter.

Some concerns I have are:

Will I lose bottom end going from a 15" to a 12"?
Will I lose bottom end going to what appears to be a smaller cabinet. I'm not sure if it is smaller or just looks that way in pictures.
Will I gain more clarity going from a 2 speaker 1x15", 1x1" amp to a 5 speaker 1x12", 2x4.5", 2x2.5" amp?
How well built are the Traynors?

I see that the K4 doesn't have a stereo link function but If I ever needed to have it, my KC's will be at my studio.

Some of the things I like about the Traynor is that the power cord is detachable, It's lighter, Can be tilted up like a wedge. I've never heard one so I would greatly value an opinion of someone who has.

Thanks!

[ricknboogie]

Can't really answer much, but I can tell you the difference in low end cannot be judged by spkr size alone. The smaller box is a bigger indicator, but there are many variables. A side by side test would be ideal, of course. I use a KC350 at our little studio, but a bass rig for gigging. If you do get the Traynor, I'd be interested in your thoughts on it. Good luck.

[slabwax]

I can't do a comparison ,but the Traynor is a great sounding amp . I play in a project with a guy who uses one It alway sounds good he uses it with a modular and a VOS. For bass with the VOS I see no problem for real loud thunderous T3's No Idea. Good luck let us know what you come up with.

[David Smyth]

Hey there,

Yes, it is not definate that bigger driver sizes = better low end. My new 4x10" bass cabinets actually have a lower frequency response than the 1x15" bass cabinets of the same product range.

I think that different speaker sizes do have different character though - for example 10" speakers are quite punchy and fast-responding, whereas 15" speakers are less defined/slower and give a more 'round' bass tone. 12" speakers get a bit from both worlds and for that reason I think they're recently becoming quite popular with bassists.

There are also two main different speaker cabinet designs - ported and sealed - with sealed being airtight, and ported having 'breathing' holes for air to get behind the speakers. In the case of ported cabinets, the size and construction of the cabinet effect it's 'tuning' (strengthened frequencies), so a small ported cabinet may mean it's not tuned for the low frequencies you desire. Sealed cabinets are more to do with the pressure inside the enclosure - so there's no clues there.

All this technical stuff is all good and well, but the only way to know for sure would be to try it out and see if it has the frequency range & sound quality you're looking for.

Regards,
David Smyth
NZ

[Voltor07]

The Traynors sound very heavy to my ears. I had the pleasure of playing a Little Phatty Stage 2 through one. The 12" speaker puts out a lot of low end while keeping up with the midranges, however the speaker is tuned for heavy midbass output. Still doesn't get as low as my Kinetic Audio Amp Eater II, but it definitely kicks.

As far as build quality, they rank up there with the older Peavey KB/A amps. Not too heavy for the size of the amp, not necessarily a bad thing. Sturdy hardware all around. Never heard of any blown drivers under strenuous conditions with a Traynor, either. My twopence.

[anchovyd]

I just wanted to chime in here. I've got the Traynor K4 and love it. It gets super loud and sounds great. For heavy bass though you are going to want some extra beef. When I started playing left hand organ bass, the K4 seemed a little weak. Then the bassist in my band split so I was asked to take over bass duties on keys. So I wanted some more beef.

I bought a 15" Proel powered subwoofer since it was inexpensive and the specs looked good. All I can say is holy crap does the K4/15" Sub combo sound incredible. That weakness in left hand organ bass is gone. For bass in the band I normally use a Minitaur and have run a Taurus 3 through it occasionally. You won't believe how much bass the Minitaur/Taurus can put out with this rig. It is scary.

The Traynor K4 has a subwoofer out but it is the full signal (no crossover invloved). My Proel sub has a fixed crossover somewhere over 100Hz but I can adjust the gain so that it blends in well with the K4 and cut back on the Low EQ a bit with the K4 to ease the load on it's amp. Extremely heavy and super loud with synth bass and electric bass patches that I use from my Kurzweil. The Traynor sounds clear and the Sub really adds a ton of weight to the bottom end.

Before getting the Traynor K4, I compared it to the Roland KC550 and the Behringer 3000FX. For me, the KC550 sounded really boomy in the bass with no definition and the highs were really shrill. The Behringer seems like a copy of the KC550 but with a nice EQ and some digital effects. I actually preferred it to the Roland, the bass wasn't as boomy and while the tweeter was shrill, the 7 band EQ made short work of taming it. The Traynor though had a much higher level of fidelity and could play much louder with lots of headroom. A nice feature of the K4 is the tube preamp on channel 1 which can be used for overdrive and distortion. It sounds great on organ for the Jon Lord sound and Rhodes as well, plus you can use a footswitch with it.

I bought mine a few years ago for around $750 new, I see in recent catalogs that they are asking around $1150 or so now. With it over a grand I might go for something cheaper. When I got mine, it was only about $100 more than the KC550.