Welcome back, readers! Today let’s review the NUX GP-1 Classic Rock headphone amp. We will be first looking at its price, features, construction quality and then will discuss its pros and cons.

NUX or NUXEFX is headquartered in China and is owned by Cherub Technology Co. Ltd. It also has its branch in California, USA.

NUX has consistently collaborated with online musicians, especially on YouTube to promote their wireless systems and compact yet powerful wireless electric guitar amps.

Price, Features and Construction

The NUX GP-1 is a very affordable headphone amp currently priced at around INR 1400 on Amazon. It is made in China and the entire body is made of plastic with a pocket for inserting two AAA batteries.

The package comes with free batteries, an instruction manual and a warranty card as well. It is a simple, no-nonsense headphone amp that promises to provide up to 40 hours of continuous playing time.

The headphone amp has two plugin holes – one for your 3.5 mm headphone jack and another 3.5mm AUX jack for plugging in any external speaker.

It has three control knobs – Level, Tone and Gain.

The Level knob is simply your volume control knob which can be adjusted as per your preference.

The Tone knob is similar to your electric guitar’s speed knob which “opens” or “muffles” the sound as desired.

The Gain knob acts as the controller for the amount of overdrive this headphone amp can produce.

Pros and Cons

Although the NUX GP-1 is a simple plug and play headphone amp for guitarists of all levels. It does come with a few pros and cons:

Pros:

1. It is really afforadble and is small enough to be carried around easily.
2. It is perfect for those late night jams and practice sessions where you don’t want to disturb your neighbours or your family members.
3. The Gain knob provides a variety of overdriven tones ranging from classic blues to even hard rock.
4. It supports 3.5mm for both input as well as output jack.
5. Highly recommended for those wo just want to pickup their guitar and practice at even given point of time and environment.

Cons:

1. It feels fragile when you hold it and might break if fallen from your table.
2. It has only one channel – overdrive. You cannot get clean tones from your electric guitar even if you bring down the gain at zero.
3. Gain knob at zero simply mutes the output.
4. The sound feels muddy at high gain levels.
5. For those who have a habit of adding reverb or delay as their effects, the sound may feel dry and unnatural.
6. Lastly, I cannot figure out how to connect it to my computer and record the sound on my DAW. (If anyone knows how to do it, please guide me in the comment section.)

Conclusion

The NUX GP-1 is a real pocket-friendly headphone amp for any guitarist who wants to jam peacefully at any given time.

However, due to only one overdrive channel and muddy tones at high gain levels, this can be a turn-off for your ears in the long run.

Overall, I believe NUX has done a pretty decent job and going head-to-head with brands like VOX and Blackstar.