Boss

TOTAL GUITAR NOVEMBER 2017
106
A
s evidenced by this
month’s TG Test, there’s
no shortage of ways to
practise your guitar these
days. If the spec’d-up
models in our test have too many
features for you, the Boss
Katana-Mini is sure to grab your
attention. It joins the Blackstar
Fly3, Orange Micro Crush Pix and
others on your desktop as a
high-quality mini-amp, and
there’s just enough onboard to
keep us interested, without
becoming a distraction. Starting
with the individual gain/volume
controls and triple-voiced preamp
section (Clean, Crunch and
Brown), which take you from
some pretty crystalline clean
sounds all the way up to saturated
distortion. Crucially, Boss has
included a three-band EQ section
here, giving it the edge (in
control-count, at least) over
similar mini-amps. Being able to
tweak the lows, mids and treble
independently means you can
come up with some great tonal
variations. The next big feature is
the onboard delay, which acts like
a nice gluey ambience when
played in the room through the
Katana’s 10cm (4") speaker, and is
more noticeable as individual
repeats through headphones. The
headphone output is also
emulated to make sure you still get
realistic sounds when you have to
wear cans, and there’s an aux
input for jamming too.
Clearly, Blackstar’s diminutive
Fly is the battery amp Boss has set
out to beat. It’s bigger, so not quite
as portable (you’ll still fi t it in your
backpack), but also louder and has
more gain on tap. The downside?
It’s almost twice the price. We’d
recommend buying an adaptor or
rechargeable batteries if you’re
planning on heavy use.
Stuart Williams
BOSS KATANA-MINI
Battery-powered mini monster
TYPE: Battery-
powered amp
POWER: 7 watts
SPEAKER: 1x 4"
CHANNELS: 1 (three
voices)
DIMENSIONS:
[HxWxDmm]
181x230x116
WEIGHT: 1.2kg
POWER: 6XAA
batteries, power supply
(not included)
AT A GLANCE
£99
IT JOINS BLACKSTAR’S FLY3 ON YOUR
DESKTOP AS A HIGH-QUALITY AMP
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OVERALL RATING
SUMMARY
VALUE FOR MONEY
BUILD QUALITY
FEATURES
SOUND QUALITY
USABILITY
BEST BUY
AWARD
TGR299.gear_quick.indd 106 10/11/17 6:28 PM