It's a 100 watt, 1x12" solid state combo with digital effects. What I just wrote would normally have my former self running away screaming, but boy, let me tell you, this amp sounds amazing. The pricepoint only helps solidify that statement. It retails around £260 and it is chock-full of features.
Five "channels"; acoustic, clean, crunch, lead and brown. We all know what these are. Volume and gain, a three band EQ, presence (only on the 100w version) and a master volume. Add to that a power scaling/standby knob. This works just as you'd expect. On standby you can use the amp with headphones.
The built in FX are kinda cool, too. You have three banks. Each bank is represented with an FX knob and a button. The button lets you select between three banks, and the knob lets you set the intensity of two different FX per banks. It makes no sense describing it like that, but here goes. On FX slot 1 you can select between green, red and yellow. On the green preset, bank 1, you have two effects. From 0-5 on the knob you adjust effect 1. When you dial it in a 12 o'clock it shuts off. Dial it further, from 5-10 another effect engages. You adjust the intensity of the effect with the knob. Like bank 1, green preset is overdrive from 0-5 and chorus from 5-10. It really works quite intuitively, but you can only have one effect active per bank. Go try it out - it's easy enough to grasp. And the effects sound GREAT! Using the Boss Tone Studio software you can access 55 effects in all, and they are varied and allows for very deep editing. There's everything from overdrives, distortions and fuzzes to delay, chorus, flanger, reverb, and even slicers, nice-sounding rotary effects, etc. These effects really sound MUCH better than what I've encountered in my former Line6 POD HD500X and M5. I am geniunely amazed at how good these sound.
On the Katana 100 you can store 4 presets to the amp, which are then controllable by footswitch, eg. the Roland GA-FC controller. Each bank can be accessed, and more. I haven't gotten the foot controller. Yet. There's even the possibilty of a footswitchable boost.
Just today, I tried it with my pedalboard. It has a Dunlop GCB95F wah, a Nano Big Muff, a BB Preamp clone, and OCD clone, a Line6 M5 and a Flashback X4 delay. My board actually sounded very good through the amp. Minor EQ adjustments had to be made, but the clean channel is genuinely a very decent clean platform. My Big Muff sounded very much like a Big Muff. It also has an FX loop for doing the more advanced pedal chain order.
So far I've only tested the amp on the 0.5 watt setting, as the 50w and 100w modes are super loud. I've tried them very shortly at home and all three settings sound very full, only with increasing levels of volume.
I would write that I'm at a loss for words, but the wall of text above says otherwise, so let me just say this: This amp is a Line6 killer. Maybe even an Orange Crush killer. It's that good. Of course, it's not meant to compete with Line 6 Helix, Kemper or Axe-FX, but at this pricepoint, what your getting is beyond amazing value for money, and the amp is even better built that the Blackstar HT-5R. The Blackstar had a faulty transformer, so it was ringing all the time and the tolex started coming lose - I had less that a month, only kept it at home, in my living room.
Sorry for the sales pitch, but I think you guys need to check out the Katana series, even though we're probably all Orange die-hards here. Not to worry, it hasn't made me reconsider my Rocker 30, and it hasn't swayed away from desperately wanting a Rockerverb 100 Mk. III.
Cheers.
