Support???? Think I'll leave Blackstar alone until it matures

[iand]

I bought a Series 1 45 about 18 months ago. I had issues with the clean channel -when it was on full gain and chords were played fast and consecutively, the volume dropped and made a fizzing noise (like when you switch an amp to standby and play a chord-it just breaks up). The harder I played,the worse it got until the signal disappeared almost completely. It only recovered when I stopped playing.
Blackstar were very helpful and said that the amp shouldn't do that, but after 2 trips to HQ, where the amp was tested, it still does it. In fairness to Blackstar, both times they offered to courier it.
The only solution seems to be backing off the pickups on all of my guitars. However, I have started using my HT Boost pedal again, and it seems even worse now. Thing is, I can't afford not to have an amp for a week or so while it is being looked at. Other than this, the amp sounds great.

[Bigsmudger]

Hi everyone. I'm the new guy on here, thought I'd share my Blackstar experience.
I was also a hardened Marshall man until the S1-45 came out. I tried one and it blew me away. Then it started to make a noise like an earth hum so
as it was only 3 months old, it went back to the factory. Faulty pre amp valve they said and it came back within 10 days repaired. Then 14 months trouble free until recently I got to a gig and couldn't get any drive. I use the amp drive so this was a problem temporarily solved by borrowing a Marshall!!
Back to the dealer, said it sounded like a loose pre amp valve. Sure enough we get the back off and one is looser than the rest. Push it back in and the amp is back to normal. My guess for the cause of this: I recently got some castors from Blackstar and it seems the vibration from pushing the amp along the floor instead of carrying it may have loosened the valve.

I bought a Studio 20 combo, 2 months of rehearsal studio use and the output valves blew. Back to the factory for replacement valves. So far so good!

Bought an HT-1R combo, within 2 weeks the volume/gain knobs had developed wiring issues. I could play on zero volume and gain and still scare the pets!! Back to the dealer, replaced the amp on the spot.
He did say that he's only had to return half a dozen amps to Blackstar and 3 of those have been mine.

I'm still using Blackstars. Sound to kill for, good build quality generally, but there do seem to be reliability issues.
Or have I just been unlucky? So far customer service has been OK although most of this has been done through the dealer.
I'm certainly keeping a Marshall DSL head as backup now, unless Blackstar would like to "donate" an S1-50 head
Worth a go!!

Smudger

[Zado]

I've been a Marshall man through and through for years and there hasn’t been much that has managed to grab my attention until I tried my first HT-5. This led me to buy one for which I think is a fantastic little amp.
Naturally, I've been thinking of selling my JCM 900 and going for the HT100 which also sounds fantastic but from what I've seen thus far, the support for Blackstar from both Blackstar and forum needs lots of development time putting in.

I'm not knocking Blackstar products at all because the quality both sound and build are second to none but because of the lack of support and call centre knowledge, I won't be buying a HT100 just yet.

I understand costs need to be cut somewhere but after service care is vital to the reputation of any company.

Please sort your customer service department out Blackstar.

I'll be back in six months.

Regards

GaryM

Mmmm I think I won't agree with that. I mean,I don't have a blackstar amp,not yet at least.Why am I in this forum? Well I'm registered in tons of forum,just because I want to check opinions customers have about purchased products,and eventually buy them.

Then I'm not biased at all about this amp brand.

We share the same opinion about the importance of the customer support: I'm a Schecter player,and I couldn't be happier just because of how loyal the brand is with people that purchase their products.Very often the SGR vice presindent itself comes to our unofficial schecter forum and tells us 'bout news,infos and so one.And no,that forum is not wide populated,so he could avoid doing such a thing and everything 'd be fine anyway.

I wrote just 3 mails to schecter,and I always got the answer immediately (and must be considered that I live in italy) ; one of them was due to a lost tshirt I purchased from their merch store...a guy at schecter asked their shop and the custom about my Tshirt and the problem got solved quickly.That's why Customer Support is fundamental to me.


What about blackstar? Still dunno,I've nothing in common with that brand.I notice this forum is poor of members,but this cannot be considered BS's fault. I wrote some mails using BS site ,asking for silly things,just to test their courtesy (and to get some infos indeed).

One was about tshirts (i do love that kind of stuff),another about an HT40w head and some other 'bout don't remeber what.

Always received the answer quickly.




That email thing is something I do very often.It's a test like I said,and it must be passed.


Now,I consider BS being one of the most disposable and helpful CS I wrote to with schecter,Rondomusic and Brunetti.


Enought for me.

[bjc]

Greetings,

I will say that when I first attempted to contact Blackstar I got a big fat nothing. However, just recently I tried again and recieved a reply in one business day. So, I think maybe there were some growing pains at first, but it appears to have gotten better. It's a good thing because when I was looking for a new amp, Blackstar was mentioned in 3 of the 4 stores I went to shop.

PeacE
bjc