Hartke LH500 500-Watt Bass Amplifier Head

The LH500 is deliberately simple: a 12AX7 Class A tube preamp feeding a solid-state power section that makes 500 watts into 4 ohms or 350 watts into 8 ohms. Instead of a graphic EQ or voicing presets it uses a passive tone stack with bass and treble shelves, so the amp keeps its own character and you nudge it rather than redraw it. Brite and Limiter switches cover the two adjustments most players actually reach for on a gig.

The chassis is a two-bay metal frame with a steel faceplate and steel handles, built for repeated load-ins. An effects loop with 0 dBm send and return levels drops a pedalboard or rack processor between preamp and power amp. Input sensitivity is set separately for passive and active basses, both on a 100k-ohm input, and the head is sized for a standard 19-inch rack.