In my opinion the Reference series of builds are ,seing their age,nothing short of friggin amazing.
When one starts to dwell on how the constructors must have reasoned...this is one of the few apart where i tip my hat. The Dynacord Reference,in this case a 502,is nothing short of a real engineering excersize.
Funny part is..."we make this absolutely fantastic amp...then we ran out of money so the cab for it we pull of out of either POS plywood that we STAIN or MDF board that we PAINT."
Yeah right.
That doesn´t deprive the AMP of what it is tho. It is to this day one of THE most thought through tube amps in existence. It´s that simple. Yeees...by "our" standards these days the digital part of it is a friggin joke,who cares. That digital side of it is IMO the least of its features.
As stated above tho..sound out of it stock is so-so,however..as noted that is easy enough to remedy.
My own i modded the living crap out of,soundwise that is,and tossed a PPIMV at it too.
Funny part of it is that these at the time REALLY expensive amps (they cost about 2.5*what a Marshall JCM did) can be found dirt cheap. Just about for a song,and it is redicolous. Seing that value for money gets a whole new meaning with a used Reference....
Common faults are oxidized jacks for the various loops. More then that the amp has one serious flaw and that is it´s cooling duct ontop. It´s a simple mesh...and at the same level as the rest of the top of it. Well...musicians have been known to enjoy a beer or two,and if one tips over ontop a Reference combo that beer poors right into the amp. So..it is common to find residual "liquids" within.
No matter.
I say..if you run into one,pick it the F up. It won´t be expensive and i guarantee you´ll have a REAL hard time finding an amp better designed. Ever.