Gear 2021: Walrus Audio has expanded its premium Mako pedal series with the ACS1 Amp + Cab Simulator. The announcement comes just days after the ridiculously exciting R1 High-Fidelity Stereo Reverb, and promises premium grade tube amp tones for your pedalboard.
You will find three flavours of vintage valve amplifier on the ACS1. There is the Fullerton, which models the Fender Deluxe Reverb, the London, which puts the raw heat of a 1962 Marshall Bluesbreaker at your feet, while a 60s VOX AC30 is brought to life on the Dartford mode.
The ACS1 also ships with six custom cabinet impulse responses, and players can upload their own to the pedal via USB using the dedicated web app.
Appropriately enough, the enclosure has an amp-like layout, with dials for Volume, Gain, Bass, Middle and Treble, plus a Room Size control. There are toggle switches for selecting your amp model and speaker pairing, and the unit can be run in stereo or mono.
- NAMM 2021 is cancelled, but we'll be covering all the big January gear announcements right here on MusicRadar.
The ASC1 has a boost switch which can be programmed to add as much extra juice as you like.
There's a bit of fun to be had in stereo, as you can mix and match amp and cabinet pairings across left and right channels. The ACS1 is also programmable, and can save and recall three onboard presets and and up to 128 presets using MIDI.
It's all pretty clever, and underneath that handsome anodized gold enclosure there is a MAKO platform with Analog Devices SHARC processor doing the heavy lifting.
Elsewhere, you've got a headphones output for silent practice, and three bypass modes: true bypass, DSP+ true bypass (trails) and DSP bypass.
The ACS1 is made in the USA and uses 9V DC to get going, drawing a minimum of 300mA.
It is available to preorder now, priced £365 / $399. See Walrus Audio for more details.
