Line 6 has managed to do the impossible; they have married digital modeling with tube preamps and a tube power section, allowing players veratility and feel. Imagine owning 6 to 10 tube amps (all reliable) and 6 stomp boxes with the ability to switch from amp to amp at the touch of a button and you ahve some idea of what they have accomplished.

I play lead and rythm in a variety dance band and need to be able to vary my sound frequently. With the simplest of footswitches, I have immediate control over 9 banks of user presets, a built in tuner, and a volume/wah pedal. With over 200 factory presets, this amp has no limits!

The only reason for giving a 9 and not a 10, on our first gig, a mike stand knocked into one of the selector switches and shattered it; frankly, as beautifully made as the cabinet was (even the Tolex covering is well-adhered, at least compared to my Randall) I was disappointed to find such inexpensive knobs on the front panel.

Everything else about this amp is amazing, so I just look at it as an opportunity to buy some cool new knobs (Dice, perhaps, or maybe some chrome skulls...). Come to think of it, this amp may deserve a 9.5.

Oh, one more thing. I purchaed the 212 and was concerned about the volume of a "mere" 40 watt amp playing in a 6 piece band...No worries. I could easily have gotten by with the 112 version. Many times my drummer (my very loud drummer) has asked me to turn it down if the master volume gets beyond about "3". I am looking forward to: a.hooking up in the studio and writing and recording. b. getting outside in warmer weather and cranking this thing up to se just what happens when you approach "10" on the master volume!

In conclusion:

If you play more than 1 style of song, stop reading this and buy this amp!

If you, like me have been impressed with Line 6's work with amp modelling in the past but always thought that you would not swap your tube amp for live work. You really need to plug one of these amps in and prepare to be amazed. I used a Laney LC30 because it had a lovely bluesy tone and a nice clean that muddied up as the volume went up. But I had to put a warp7 distortion pedal in front of the pre amp for proper distortion.
But now we come to the Spider valve. you want loud to 11 cleans like a hiwatt, yes tick that box. You want chimey Fender twin sounds with a edge of breakup when you hit your guitar hard. Tick number 2. Lets see Marshall plexi, yes, Marshall DSL yes, and of course Mesa boogie yes it ticks that box too. What most modelling amps miss is bottom end and is the reason why most people put a POD in front of a good tube amp to get the best of both worlds. No need to bother any more, this puppy can make your trouser flap with the best of them. A real tube expert might tell you that these amps do not sound EXACTLY like the amps we are talking about. But for the majority of people they are 95% close enough, and anyway I do not have the £7,000 it would cost to collect all these amps to find out.
But my friends, that is only half the story. You can play with the amp models and the built in Delays/modular effects and find a few tones that perfectly match your mood, but now we come to the best bit, built into this amp is around 200 preset sounds of bands/songs that will blow your mind. You want to sound like Gilmore on Shine on you crazy diamond, yes that patch is available, the Police message in a bottle, yep, Led Zeppelin's the lemon song, Smoke on the water, (spot on), cat scratch fever oh the list goes on and on, if you are in a covers band this will save you hours of work. Not only do they sound fantastic you can't switch the thing off it is so inspiring. And the best thing of all it is more than loud enough to gig. At our last practice I had it about a 1/4 of the way up the master volume and it coped easily with the drums and a very loud bassist. And it also does something no other modelling amp has ever done and that is you can have a distorted sound that you can clean up by rolling back the volume on your guitar! A proper valve amp. If you see reviews on other forums with people saying that this amp is Fizzy or lacking depth. This has been written by someone who has not tried the amp out at volume. You can play the amp quietly but when you turn this baby up it will take your head off. I tried this amp back to back with a Peavey ValveKing 212 and a Marshall DSL 401. It could do any tone that either amp could produce from clean to distorted but had more of everything. More clean headroom without breaking up, Twangy Fender cleans right up to 10, wonderful bassy blues tones with just a hint of breakup when you hit hard, great GNR hard rock distortion, and then into Metallica enter sandman distortion and it was only £100 more so it was a bit of a no brainer especially as I now no longer need my Digitech delay (£95) Chorus (£80) my WARP7 distortion (£65) and because I bought the FV Express footboard I no longer need a Wah Wah (£95) as this unit has a built in expression pedal for volume and wah!
Of course if you run out of patches and you just need more, you can just log into the Line 6 website and download the latest patch and stick it into your amp. For a beginner I cannot recommend the SpiderValve enough. It took me ages to understand how valves work and through much trial and error and pain I slowly worked out how to interact with them. Well this amp does all that for you and if at the end of the day you can't work it out Line 6 has a preset that has already been worked out for you and you can just press and play.
If you do play live you will need a pedal board and I think I will eventually work up to the bigger pedal board as this gives you the opportunity of cycling though the presets from your footboard and a handy boost switch which you can kick in for solos. I have 4 presets on my express footboard which is ok at the moment, if I want to go to my next set of presets (you have about 10) I will need to walk back to my amp and choose them. Not a big problem really but with the bigger board you can control it all by your foot. Oh did I mention it has a built in tuner as well. I can work this from my footpedal too. So my Korg tuner can go as well.
In conclusion I have to say this amp will probably be the last amp I will ever buy. It has all the sounds I will ever need and more and is so flexible. Try one next to any amp and you will see how good they are. and remember to make sure you can turn the volume up when you try it out. Line 6 has some good demos of some of the sounds available on their website showing everything from country to blues to Jazz to heavy rock to Metal, but remember its only 1 amp, but what an amp.

Highly recommended.