Orange Micro Dark

Bought this originally for home use with a 1x12 Celestion Greenback, but this is definitely made for more.

Loudness:
If you're wondering if this has enough volume for your bedroom, the answer is clear. YES! Especially if you like to crank the gain. For some it would maybe be too loud with a 12" speaker as you need to reach a certain volume to get a good tone. The volume knob is really sensitive at the first quarter so it's either no volume, or a lot of volume. This is also powerful enough gor gigs, and you can connect it to a 4x12 with no problem.

Tone:
The tones on this thing is amazing, even compared to the more expensive amps. Even though it's a hybrid it sounds like an all-valve. Honestly, most people wouldn't even hear the difference.
It's versitile too. Grab a stratocaster and dial it in for the good old rock tones, or switch to a humbucker and crank the gain for some killer doom metal tones.

It works great with gain/booster pedals, but for myself I see no use in it, as the gain already is badass. I put a reverb/delay, and maybe a looper pedal in the effects loop, and I'm good to go.

Size:
I just have to point out, this thing is ridiculous small. It's smaller than a six pack of 0.5L cans. Traveling with this is the last of your worries.


Cons with this amp:

Only 1 channel:
This can be a problem if you like to switch between clean and dirty mid-song. To do this you must either use your guitars volume knob, or use gain pedals instead of amp gain.

No aux in:
Can make it harder to practice with backing tracks, but if this bothers you I must inform you that yes, you can work around this by using the buffered effects loop. although you might need some extra gear for it. Do a quick google search ;)

Shape instead of tone knob:
Not a huge problem, but this knob acts a bit different than the normal tone knobs. I like it, and I usually just leave it around the 1-2 o'clock position as I find that to be the sweet spot. If this really annoys you, you might want to add an equalizer.

The headphone output sucks:
Even though it got a 4x12 cab sim, I can't say it sounds any good. On the other side, I've never seen an amp with a good headphone out, so compared to them.. Maybe it's not that bad. Just don't have high hopes.

In the end i would say it's a fantastic amp where you really get what you pay for. There aren't many extra functions on this, but that's probably why it's so cheap. I would highly recomend it if you're looking for the good Orange tones at a low price.

I bought it to bring it with myself when I go to college, as it would be pretty difficult to bring its bigger brother, a full sized head and its cab I have.
I've played this little thing through a 2x12 and a 4x12 cab as well. Got to admit, it sounds pretty damn awesome. And it's surprisingly loud. You can easily rehearse, gig, keep up with a drummer, a whole band with one of these little bad boys, as long as you pair it with a bigger cab.
The clean and crunchy tones you can get out of this little head are gorgeous. And it's true that it has loads of gain too, but as you turn the gain up, let's say above 2 or 3 o'clock, it becomes a little bit too fuzzy, for me at least. I've played with the shape knob, and tried various type of guitars with different pickups (Les Paul, Strat, SG and so on), but the fuzziness is still there. I mean it's nothing crazy, it's totally fine if you're up to play some classics that require that kind of tone, but if you want to play heavier stuff, you'd have to consider adding an overdrive/boost pedal, just to tighten it up a little bit. So I've put a TS mini in front of it, and it works like dream for me.
Had it for almost a month now, and since I have it, I barely even touched my other amp. This little, affordable rock'n'roll machine deserves a big thumbs up. Although you can't just really limit its potential to rock'n'roll, as if it's set and used properly, it can play pretty much anything.

I always wanted a tube amp, but they are a bit too expensive for me and most importantly, they are simply too loud for a bedroom.
so after reading and watching videos regarding this head, I thought I was making the right decision by going with this head, due to its solide state power section.
(keep in mind I only play in my bedroom)
the cleans: you'd expect them to be just okay, well actually, they are very good. I was pleasantly surprised with them.
the crunch is very good as well, nothing to complain about.
when you start to push the gain and get into metal territory, things can get a little too loud, to the point where i have to keep the volume of both guitar and amp to 2.
However, the distorted sound is amazing, even at low volumes.
do I regret buying this? absolutely not, the sounds it offers are wonderful.
the only con I can find is the lack of a 3 band eq, replaced by the shape knob.
if you want to upgrade from SS but not really fond of tube amps, this is the perfect compromise

This is a compact, but surprisingly powerful, lunchbox size, one channel amp. Paired with a 12 inch speaker from my old Vox combo it’s really surprisingly loud. You can get good clean tones, although a bit harsh for my liking and there is only one knob for equalizing the tone. I think that with pedals such as reverb and a bit of delay (and it does have an FX loop for that) , it would soften the sound a bit. I don’t have those pedals. The amp does really good dirty tones, which is what Orange is known for. However, I also have an Orange Crush 35RT and I think the Crush has a superior sound, all round. The Orange Crush is 35W, not much more money than the Micro Dark (only CHF 50 Swiss Francs difference at the time of writing), has clean and dirty foot switchable channels, a pretty good quality 10 inch speaker, good quality really solid cabinet, built-in reverb and a tuner - does much better cleans (IMO) than the Micro Dark and very good dirty tones too. It’s not much money for all those extras. The advantage of the Micro Dark is it’s size and that you can pair it with any speaker you want. I do think it’s a good amp and I think it would be a good platform for someone playing higher gain stuff than me and with pedals. Also, I only tried it with single coil teles and a strat. I suspect that the harshness on the clean tones would be much less with humbuckers. Perhaps that’s where to find a better tone than with my single coil guitars. It’s a hybrid amp, meaning it has a valve in the pre-amp and a SS power amp. It really sounds like a SS amp and I would say even more like a SS than the Orange Crush which has no valves at all. Actually, the Crush clean channel breaks up really nicely when you start to push the amp. I also have a 20 year old Vox VT50 hybrid amp with the same valve as the Marco Dark in the pre-amp and that has a much warmer valve-like tone.

However, I still think this is a good amp - perhaps just not ideal with my gear and probably for higher gain stuff than I usually play.