home stereo receiver and speakers as a guitar amp?

[believo]

I've heard that you can use your home stereo receiver and speakers as a guitar amp? Is this true? Do you need any extra equipment? Are there any disadvanatges (besides the lack of overdrive, reverb, etc.)?

thanks

[iSaint]

I remember I had some sort of small amp that you hooked up your guitar to and listened via headphones. I hooked it up to my home stereo - Onkyo amp and JBL studio monitors - and it sounded ok without blowing away my speakers. It wasn't guitar amp quality but it was a nice, clean sound.

[CanadaRAM]

While you can plug your guitar directly into a microphone input on a tape deck or stereo, the sound will be horrible - thin and "doinky".

The characteristic sound of an electric guitar is created by:
1) The electrical interaction between the magnetic guitar pickups and the high impedence input of the amplifier,
2) Compression and clipping in the preamp and main amplifier stages (whether tube or transistor)
3) Heavy modification of the frequency response by the speaker, and the interaction between the dynamic load of the speaker and the amplifier as the volume increases.
--- the output from a guitar amplifier is anything but hi-fi.

In addition, many players add time-based and frequency based electronic effects, echo and reverberation to create characteristic guitar sounds.

So, a pure, clean hi-fi sound chain doesn't cut it.

There are a number of digital devices that simulate the amplifier, effects and speaker characteristics of popular guitar amps, quite successfully. Popular models are the Korg Pandora and Ampworks (http://www.korg.com/gear/info.asp?a_prod_no=AmpworksG&category_id=6) series, Line6 (http://www.line6.com/) Pod series and Behringer V-Amp (http://www.behringer.com/V-AMP2/index.cfm?lang=ENG) series. Digitech (http://www.digitech.com/), Boss (http://www.bosscorp.co.jp/products/en/index.html), Vox, Zoom (http://www.samsontech.com/products/productpage.cfm?prodID=1848&brandID=4), Johnson, Tech21 and others also make units. These go from $100 to $500. The output of these guitar amp/speaker/effects simulators is suitable for recording or hooking up to a hi-fi system. Just keep the volume below "shred" so you don't damage your speakers.

Note: There is an interesting offshoot of amp-sim technology that does the processing in your computer -- The Line6 GuitarPort (http://www.guitarport.com/) hooks the guitar to the computer; alternatively there is software (AmpFarm, Nigel (http://www.uaudio.com/products/software/UAD-1/nigel/index.html), Warp, Amplitube (http://www.amplitube.com/Main.html?prod_AT)) and others that come with somputer recording/sequencing software, that will take a clean recorded guitar tone, and apply amp simulation and effects.

In order to record guitar into the computer, you will likely need a preamp with a high impedence or "guitar" input, or a "Direct Box (http://www.behringer.com/GI100/index.cfm?lang=ENG)", a piece of hardware that converts high impedence signals to low.

DVForge (http://www.dvforge.com/products.shtml) has some interesting and inexpensive products for guitar and bass, including a tiny headphone amp and a guitar-to-USB plug.

More reading

http://www.amptone.com/
http://www.tweakheadz.com/guitarists_guide_to_recording.htm
http://www.digidesign.com/digizine/archive/digizine_august04/guitartools/

[alex_ant]

In other words... yeah, you can do it, but it'll sound different, low-end heavy and muffled, and you will have no tone controls (clean only).

[believo]

In other words... yeah, you can do it, but it'll sound different, low-end heavy and muffled, and you will have no tone controls (clean only).

hmm... thank you all for the responses, the research that I had done made it sound like it would be almost he same as an amp... but I guess not

[evil_santa]

I play Guitar (mostly Bass but some 6 string) through a home studio setup, this is made up of Roland gp16 guitar efects unit > small sound desk > Quad 306 Amp > Celestion domestic speakers. It work ok for me but i dont play it loud.

I would sugest if you want to use you home system you shoud use a guitar processor like the guitar pod or vamp. if you play it loud you stand quite a good chance of damaging the speakers.

[Kremikovci]

Arent there any home thater receivers that can be used for good quality guitar amplification? Lets say i have a preamp or a tube amp. Is there such a receiver i can plug the output of it into and get a good sound for guitar? With this heavy modification of the frequency response by the speaker, and the interaction between the dynamic load of the speaker and the amplifier as the volume increases.
Mybe kind of home theater receiver and a guitar power amp in one.