Boss Katana Mini - 7-Watt Combo Amp Ultra-Compact and Travel-Ready

Boss can thank Ola Englund for why I purchased this great sounding little amp.Ola Englund is a guitar player and works for a guitar manufacturer in Europe.He has his own YouTube channel with a series called "Will It Chug".Ola did a nice video on this product, and Ola is the reason why I decided on getting this little amp.I'm not trying to plug Ola. This is a material fact statement, I bought this product because of Ola.This little solid state amp sounds great for it's size.it's so loud, I never cranked it up.The built in distortion is OK, but it sounds great with my BOSS Metal Zone pedal.I love the digital delay sound on it.The amp does have a slight tinny sound to it, but it still chugs. Only it doesn't chug with the beefiness in Ola's video because he has expensive recording microphones recording the sound. However, with the proper settings, and additional distortion pedal support, it's a great little portable practice amp.It sounds great with my Boss Metal Zone distortion pedal.It's great that you can put batteries in it. But I don't like using batteries because when they start to go bad, they usually slowly negatively impact your sound without you realizing it.I bought the extra power supply cable and love it. (Boss PSA-120S Power Adapter)I make home recordings with a Zoom hand held, open room recording device, with this amp, and the recordings come out great.If you're looking for a great sounding, inexpensive practice amp to travel with, or practice with at home, I highly recommend this little guy.I've been using it regularly for the past 6 months and am a satisfied customer.Thank you BOSS for this fine product, and thank you Ola for helping me decide on this!! Cheers!!

I had been looking at various battery powered amps for a while trying to decide which to get. Since I already have two full size BOSS Katana amps I almost went a different direction but now I'm glad I went with the Katana Mini.For starters it's super lightweight. It's perfect if you want to practice around the house but also to grab and go for singalongs while camping or at BBQs or family gatherings etc. It's also the perfect amp to keep on your bench if you work on guitars like I do.The sound quality lives up to the BOSS Katana name. You get a choice of 3 different amp types for everything from pristine cleans to heavy distortion. While the amp has built in delay with level and time controls I would have preferred Reverb with a couple of different options for type. But that's just me, and the delay the amp provides is excellent.Battery life seems to rip out around 7 hours give or take. I would suggest you get rechargeable batteries and if you use rechargeables rated at 2500 or greater mAh you will get closer to 9 hours on a single charge. Some people have complained that they can hear a low hum or buzz when running on battery. I have not had this experience but YMMV.There is also an input for use with an AC adapter. This, in my personal experience is where some problems come in with noise. Using a third party adapter that was recommended with this amp caused a serious amount of hum both with and without batteries installed. Buying the BOSS PSB-120 at $30 improved things, but there is still some noticable hum even with a guitar with humbucking pickups.That small issue aside, it is a very lightweight grab and go amp with great sound and lots of possible uses.Pro tip: I also have the BOSS Katana GO. I bought a 3.5mm TRS male to 1/4 in. TS male adapter cable here on Amazon and plugged the output of the Katana GO into the input of the Katana Mini. Now I have a full powered Katana amp with all the effects and sound editing possibilities that I can throw in a backpack and take with me anywhere!!!

With realistic expectations most will find this to be an excellent, portable practice amp with really fantastic, fun sounds. It does not sound like your 1x10 or 1x12 combo - it can't. But it produces inspiring, room-filling sounds that defy logic. I didn't want something with a ton of effects, and this only has a delay which can get you a small room reverb, slapback or a longer delay with a few repeats. I prefer reverb, but this works fine to give some ambiance.The EQ works pretty well, but you don't get a huge amount of variance - this will never produce huge bass, but it can give you pleasingly warm, larger-than-expected guitar sounds. You can dial in a substantial variety of tones with the gain knob - clean can get pretty crunchy, and you can get a clean sound out of the crunch channel, etc. The headphone out sounds really good - basically just like the speaker - and an aux in lets you pipe in jam tracks or whatever you want to play along to. I've gotten over 12 hours of life from my first set of batteries - and still going strong, but I play at conversation level. Cranked this gets loud, but about what you'd expect from something this size. You could be heard if you tried to busk with it, but even dimed the volume isn't substantial - but it's plenty loud for what it's intended to be.This is exactly what I wanted - it sounds great and is very portable. I now plug in to practice in places where I used to just play an unplugged electric guitar. It makes practice more fun, and I find I'm practicing more. Without a ton of effects to hide behind I practice better - I can hear when I make a mistake. The Blackstar Fly 3 is cheaper - I don't know if it's better, I don't have any way to compare. I'm very happy with this amp - it does what it was designed to do very well.