I’ve had many guitar amplifiers over the years including several Fender amps (Twin, older Super Champ, Deluxe Reverb, Prosonic). Of all the amps I’ve owned in my 40 years of playing, the Fender Super Champ XD is my favorite amp… and it only cost $299 new. You can see me playing it below. Sorry for the playing but the amp sounds good. I’m the one on the right.
This is a very versatile amp with many different sounds. I only use a couple, mostly the Fender Tweed models, but if you watch that video you’ll see the one I used sounds pretty good. Fender video at the bottom shows it in other roles.
I’ll give you the details, but the proof is in the playing. The specs make it sound like it’s just a modeling type amp, but it does have tubes including a pair of 6V6’s and a 12AX7. Those tubes make it sound great.
The New X2 Model
There’s a new version out called the X2. It has different models than the XD. I haven’t compared them yet but will soon. It has 16 amp models that include just about all popular amps. They all sound pretty good but the one I use the most is the Tweed Bassman. That’s what you’ll hear on the video. I use a Tube Screamer as well for extra punch. It sounds totally like a tube amp to me and I get no hint of “solid state” in the sound at all. There’s a head version of the X2 as well.
Here are the 16 “models” included with the X2. The XD’s are a little different but because it’s no longer available I didn’t include them. Comment below if you’d like to know, but I recommend just trying them out…
- Tweed Champ®
- Tweed Deluxe™ clean
- Tweed Deluxe™ dirty/compressed
- Tweed Bassman®
- 65 Princeton® clean
- 65 Princeton® dirty/compressed
- 65 Deluxe™
- 65 Twin Amp™
- 60s British clean
- 60s British dirty/compressed
- 70s British
- 80s British
- Super-Sonic™
- 90s Metal
- 2000 Metal
- Jazzmaster™ (fl at, solid-state clean)
The effects are all digital “models” and include…
- Vibratone
- Delay
- Reverb
- Chorus
- Tremelo
The downside is you can only use one effect at a time. No biggie to me cause I just use the reverb anyway. I’ve already got peddles for everything else.
The amp is only 15 watts but it’s plenty loud enough for a small gig (again check out the videos). I’ve been asked to turn down at some jams I’ve been to. It comes with 1 10″ speaker. There’s also a head model that you can pair with a louder speaker. You can use the combo with an external speaker and I use an EV-12L and the amp is twice as loud with that speaker and sounds much bigger! I can play just about any gig with that speaker.
It has 2 channels and you can switch between them. I seldom do that because the Tweed model sounds great with a little overdrive and I just turn down to clean it up for rhythm. I just kick in the Tube Screamer for more volume and edge. The modeling channel has a gain setting so I can clean it up pretty good if I need to. But I like things simple and the basic sound I use is great so I don’t need too many variations.
» Reverb.com is a Site Where You Can Find Used Super Champ Amps
The Pros of the Amp
- Great Sound
- Very flexible
- Super for recording
- Very light (24lbs)
- Did I mention it has a great sound.
The flexibility is definitely a plus. Check out the Fender video at the bottom to see it being used in the studio.
What I Don’t Like
I really can’t say that there’s much I don’t like about the amp. Perhaps more flexibility with the effects so I could use more than one, but that’s about it.
And maybe in another day and time, it would not be loud enough, but this is as loud as I want to play these days. I could always mic it if I had to and I even bought a louder amp (The Deluxe VM) just to use to make the Super Champ louder (just go right into the effects loop). You can also use an external speaker as I mention above.
Here’s a video Fender did to hype the amp. These are more metal players than blue players but it does show the flexibility of the amp. By the way they have a head version that just came out and that’s what’s in this video.
You can’t buy it any more, at least new. You can find it used on Reverb.com for abut what I payed for it.
