Gems are in stock and will ship within two weeks of placing an order. Shipping time is one week via UPS Standard. You get your amp within three weeks!
Imagine... practice at home in the morning, lay down tracks in the studio that afternoon, rock out at rehearsal in the evening and work on that new song... at midnight in your bedroom! All with exceptional tone!
Mack Endorsing Artist Steve Gunner of platinum selling recording artists Creedence Clearwater Revisited demos the Gem at Ditch Road Records recording studio.
Mack Endorsing Artist Robert Renman plays his Gem for the very first time. He unboxed it, set it up, got the video tape rolling and started playing. This is the result!
We listened and the Gem is the result!
We asked the Mack community what we should design into our next amp. Here's what they said:
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LOW volume + great tone. A small amp that could produce 'real' tone at bedroom volume.
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LOUD too! It had to do both quiet AND loud - and sound good at both!
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Clean headroom. Unlike other 'under 10 watt' amps, the volume control couldn't act like a distortion on/off switch once it moves past 3!
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High-gain tones. Signature Mack crunch and distortion plus juicy high-gain rock tones.
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Affordable. All that at a Mack Budget Boutique price!
Tip: How To Get The Best Sound at Low Volume
Check out the new 1X10 OB speaker cab - designed for the Gem!
Mack Gem - Innovative Design
How did we pack all of that into a tiny amp? Innovative design that's how.
New Power Switching Technology
The Gem features a unique power switching circuit that changes its single EL84's power output from 4 watts to 0.4 watt.
This is a LOUD 4 watt amp. Perfect for rehearsals and even gigs in small venues. Yes, that's true!
The trick is that in low power mode the EL84 thinks it's operating at full power - its performance characteristics are unchanged.
That means you can dial in high gain distortion, set the volume so low you'll hear the strings of your electric guitar over the sound coming out of the speaker - and the Gem's tone doesn't change.
Listen to the sound clips to hear for yourself - whether it's spitting out clean, crunch or saturated high-gain tones, switching to low power doesn't change the Gem's sound!
Switchable Preamp Gain Stages
The Gem features a NOS 6AC10 preamp tube.
Learn why Mack is using a NOS tube in the Gem.
The 6AC10 is a TRIPLE triode tube - a single bottle encapsulates the guts of three tube sections. As a point of reference, good old 12AX7s are dual triodes.
The three tube sections in the Gem's 6AC10 provide a TON of preamp flexibility:
- Low gain mode. Two of the sections are paralled and cascaded into the third. Result? Characteristic Mack warmth and touch sensitivity with extra gain from the third stage.
- High gain mode. Flip the Preamp switch and the three triode sections are cascaded one into the other. This produces high gain rock tones unlike any other Mack amp.
- Power amp AND preamp distortion. We love power tube distortion so the Gem's preamp slams the EL84 with authority. However, three triode sections allow us to create preamp distortion too. Turn up the gain control, adjust the volume control and you can dial in preamp distortion or power amp distortion or BOTH - at any volume level. Talk about versatility!
Mack Gem Specs
- 4 watts switchable to 0.4 watts
- 1 - EL84 cathode biased, Class A
- 1 - NOS 6AC10 triple triode preamp tube
- Solid state rectifier
- Switchable preamp gain stages
- Volume, gain, tone controls
- Speaker output: 8 ohms - like any Mack amp you can use a 4 or 16 ohm speaker cabinet without damaging the amp or speakers.
- Anodized aluminum, red cabinet
- 8" W x 5 1/2" H x 4" D
- 117/120 VAC, 60 Hz
- 4 lb