Which is the better choice, M101 or T500?

[jwhite1362]

If both were in good condtion, which would be the better choice, a T500 or M101?

[enor]

Depends. Do you want the classic Hammond tone as heard on rock, pop and soul recordings from the 60s? M-100 in that case. Do you prefer 70s easy listening organ a la Klaus Wunderlich etc? T-500 in that case.

[Papus]

M101 any day of the week.
But you’ll want to do some modifications to get it sounding closer to its console siblings.
The Hammond engineers added filters to tame the key click - get rid of them!
Lower manual bass foldback will drop it down a whole octave.
These mods are easy to do, if you’re patient with a soldering iron.

BE EXTREMELY CAREFUL WHEN TINKERING WITH VALVE ELECTRONICS!!!

There are LETHAL voltages inside the organ - learn how to mitigate the risks!

[tobeycat2007]

Yes the M100 is closer to the C3/A100 model if thats what your looking for, if you add leslie sounds very similar.

The t500 is ok but is further away from the C3 in sound and design.
The m100 also hold value well, buyers always want good ones.

[Brendon Wright]

+1 on all of the above.
The M100 is already a perfect blues machine.
Most of the 60's/70's rock and blues stars who ended up on a B3 or C3 started on an M100. (two BIG examples: Booker T and Jon Lord)
It took WAY too much work to turn a T500 into what an M100 was straight out of the box.

The more you mess with something, the more fragile it becomes.
Tonally my T500 with leslie 760 sounds more rocky than the bluesy M101 with leslie 122, but I never get to play the T: it's always waiting on some repair or other.

[markimark]

I have both here. As already said, for Rock the M is way better.

[Drawbar Dave]

T100/200 were good prog machines. I had a lovely T202 10 years ago which I preferred to my L122 at the time. I also had an M102 which was fantastic. If you can only have one, go for the M101 - and it doesn’t have to have loads of mods, they sound fantastic in stock form. Listen to Rick Wright, Steve Winwood and John Paul Jones playing stock M100s!

[theseacowexists]

I'll admit that my T200 hasn't seen too much mileage since I got into the M and L series. I removed the multi-trigger percussion and key click filters on the T, and that made it exponentially more enjoyable to play. Drawbar Dave is right, they really do work well with prog. Unfortunately I don't have the prog chops to go with it! When I want to just sit down and play and not wait around for tubes to warm up or to hook up the Leslie (impatient, I know), the T is the go-to. But for gigging and recording? The Ms and Ls hands down, they are built like tanks. I've had problems with those janky connectors in the T coming undone just moving the thing around my house!

On the other hand, my friend has an unmodded T200 in his studio. He picked up an early M3 a few months ago thinking that it would be an "upgrade", but found that he still prefers the T. His M3 sounds super dull, even through a Leslie.

[Sweet Pete]

My T212 is waiting for the mods,as it sits unaltered it works fine.Reluctant to go where Doon went on this model.
Somehow I already knew in my heart he would be thrilled to get his hands on an M101.
That organ was dull because of AO29 caps etc.,the genny is redcaps."Oh Pretty Woman" by John Mayall's Bluesbreakers was recorded on such an organ, along with a Leslie 45.

Met John Mayall in Montreal sharing stage/bill at the Spectrum with Long John Baldry.
Yeah, he gave Goldy McJohn the A100 he played with Paul Butterfield in Pacific Gas & Electric. Goldy also used it with Steve Marriot/Humble Pie.
"I Don't Need No Doctor",taking Ray's classic to a whole new place.....Mayall is a good organist,so was Goldy.

Last I heard Doon play? Great stuff!

[Organfella]

I own two M-100's and one T222. All in perfect condition. If I have to thin out (which I will have to soon...) those will be the last to go, except maybe the E-100... Eh, I am confusing myself now...:-P

Nico

[Drawbar Dave]

Met John Mayall backstage in Brighton years ago. The strongest handshake I’ve ever known. Fantastic organist.