As we hurtle onwards with our pick of the best Cyber Monday music deals, I'm reminded of my mother. She always told me to remember two things when I was little; treat people how you'd want to be treated, and never, ever use cheap pedalboard power supplies for expensive effects. She was right about one of those things.
Harley Benton bent the rules again with its PowerPlant range – cheap can equate to high quality. I know because I bought three of power supplies from it. They're still going strong on two of my pedalboards that I've used for gigs and for testing with MusicRadar and Guitar World. These pedal power supplies shouldn't be this cheap in the first place – and now somehow they're even cheaper. The Harley Benton PowerPlant ISO-3AC SAG Modular is just £41! But it won't stay that low.
A bargain just got even better: we've been so impressed with the PowerPlant range it's earned 5/5 in our reviews. Nothing touches these pedal power supplies on spec for the price, and with four 500mA isolated outputs plus changeable SAG controls for fuzz pedal fanatics, this expandable model can cope with the hungriest of effects pedals.
It's as good as examples I've tried costing over twice the price. And this model is even better spec'd in one way than the ISO-1AC Pro Modular I decided to review after buying it and being so impressed (it got a very rare 5/5 from me). The ISO-3AC SAG in Thomann's Cyber Week sale has 28% off and features a SAG option for voltage reduction to get better tones out of certain distortion and fuzz pedals.
Even without that it's a very capable power supply with four isolated outputs each capable of powering 500mA current draw each – that means things like Universal Audio pedal amps and Strymon delays are a walk in the park for it. A fifth outlet can supply a 12V DC input.
In addition to being built like a tank, using the musicians' favourite IEC ('kettle) leads and being pretty low profile for installing under pedalboards, a huge bonus I found with this Modular series is you can connect two or more together (Thomann even includes the adaptor) as your pedal power needs expand. Which is exactly what I did on my own main Rockboard pedalboard as you can see above. I bought a third to power a mini 'board and it's been great too.
Even buying two of these is a great deal that none of the competition that deals in high mA-capable isolated outputs can match.
And if you do want an extra output and don't need the SAG option on a second supply, you can always spend £9 more and buy the ISO-1AC Pro Modular. Or go all the way and get the 13-output Harley Benton PowerPlant ISO12AC Pro Modular for £109. Again, similar spec'd competition is well over double that price elsewhere.
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Check out the full PowerPlant Modular range of pedal power supplies at Thomann.
Rob is the Reviews Editor for GuitarWorld.com and MusicRadar guitars, so spends most of his waking hours (and beyond) thinking about and trying the latest gear while making sure our reviews team is giving you thorough and honest tests of it. He's worked for guitar mags and sites as a writer and editor for nearly 20 years but still winces at the thought of restringing anything with a Floyd Rose.
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