ORANGE OR30H HEAD
The first offering from Orange in a while highlights some very cool features such as a footswitchable solo volume control and a valve rectifier
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It’s been a dire time for the music industry over the past few years, and yet with the memory of pandemic lockdowns receding, there’s cautious optimism as festivals return and live music comes to terms with the new post-Brexit normality. Orange has been quieter than usual, like most amp manufacturers. However, confidence is climbing and once more we’re seeing new models being announced, including this much-anticipated British-made head, the new OR30H.
While Orange’s well-known steeljacketed Tiny Terror was one of the first compact and lightweight heads, arguably kickstarting the ‘small and portable’ trend, it’s fair to say most people’s perception of Orange is the big, heavy picture-frame plywood cabinet surrounding an armourplated steel chassis (that needs a weightlifting course or a team of roadies to move it). The OR30H just makes it into the lighter end of that category, with a heavy white-enamelled steel chassis surrounded by a thick birch ply sleeve.
Our sample is covered in Orange’s alternative black vinyl and finished to a typically high standard, with a smart goldtrimmed carry handle set off by two neatly inlaid lines of gold piping.
Essentially an OR15H on steroids, the OR30H boasts a quad-EL84 power stage driven by typically outsized transformers but with a GZ34 rectifier valve instead of the OR15H’s silicon diodes. Inside the chassis, most of the electronics are held on one large high-quality PCB, including all the front-panel controls and valve bases. A smaller PCB strip holds the rear-panel jack sockets, which have gold-plated contacts to prevent corrosion. All the wiring is neatly twisted and bundled to keep noise pickup to a minimum.
The control panel features Orange’s ‘pics only’ graphics, which first appeared in 1972 and add to this amp’s bell-bottomed vintage appeal. From left to right, there’s a presence control followed by two master volume knobs, the first of which is footswitchable, allowing for easy level-boosts for solos. A trio of smaller knobs handle the passive bass, mid and treble EQ, followed by the allimportant gain control and a bright switch, which is a first for Orange. This switch has two bright options, with a centre off.
On the rear panel, there’s a trio of speaker outlets and a send/return for the OR30H’s valve-bu
