I never knew a AXE FX could sound like this

[dominus]

Re: I never knew a AXE FX could sound like this

What, what? Really?

That's what the Axe FX - a circuit modeler?

So the knobs and stuff react in the models the same way they do on the face of the actual amp?

Revalver does a lot of that too.

I owned an original 5150. Their 6505 does react the same exact way.

 

[scorch]

Re: I never knew a AXE FX could sound like this

He's right. The axe fx models the circuits.

You can even already do with it, most of what you describe... switching out parts and changing the values of various capacitors and resistors.

O.K. I think I need to clairify something. No, you can't go into the advanced tab and change out any part in the amp. Only certain one are available to mod. You can mod the brightness cap, the tranformer winding (small to large - effects the saturation factor), the tranformer resonant frequency, the B+ voltage in the power supply, the 'sag' of the power supply, and others I'm forgeting at the moment. One very cool mod the Cliff has given us is the ability to drop a different amps tone-stack into another amp. That is VERY powerful. You can actually create amps that haven't been built before. I've gotten super results dropping an AC30 tone-stack into a HiWatt amp, a JTM 45 ts into a Plexi, etc.

Another very cool trick I've just discovered is using a preamp of one amp in series into another amp to use as a glorified dirt-box. I have a Bogner Blue pedal and A/B'ed it with the Bogner Blue preamp in front of a Twin amp and it was superior in every way.

So, I've had this thing for over three years and I'm still learning tricks that it can do. It is incredibly powerful and incredibly versatile.

 

[dominus]

Re: I never knew a AXE FX could sound like this

One very cool mod the Cliff has given us is the ability to drop a different amps tone-stack into another amp. That is VERY powerful.

THAT is exactly what the Kemper is missing. The Kemper only has one "tone stack" which is strictly linear, and very digital sounding once you tweak it a little.

 

[Silver]

Re: I never knew a AXE FX could sound like this

I was thinking I wanted a Kemper, but maybe what I really should be looking at is an AxeFX II.

Different reasons to look at both, for my applications.

You should also be aware of the profiling thing that the Kemper does is also a feature of the Axe Fx 2. The AxeFx people call it 'Tone match'. I think the axe version is better because it allows you to profile amps independent of the cab, and also you can choose the amplifier type so that when you do use the EQ to tweak the sound, you're using a fairly accurate model of what you've profiled rather than just Kemper's own linear EQ. For example, if you profiled a JCM800 on the AxeFX. you could then use a modelled tone stack EQ from a JCM800 to tweak the tone; or if you profiled a Vox then you could use a Vox tone stack. The EQs work differently on different amps, but with the Kemper you just get the one proprietary EQ and some people don't like it much. The Axe has over a hundred amps so you'll be able to find a tone stack that's suitable.

With regards to tweaking amp components and things, as Scorch noted, it's not yet at the point where you can construct a whole amp from scratch but there's already a whole lot you can do. Just stuff i don't understand, i wouldn't know where to begin. If you take a look at the user manual then the amp parameters alone are taking up 7 pages! You could certanily create some never before heard sounds.

I can't mention enough too, the need to play one in person if possible. It's hard to judge things through a low quality youtube video and some pc speakers. I heard one through a solid-state Matrix Amplification power amp into a FRFR speaker cab, and it sounded incredible. I also heard a high end Roland keyboard through the same power amp and cab and that was awesome too. I think FRFR is the way to go with these things, rather than using the guitar power amp (such as the many rack power amps available from Mesa, VHT, etc) and a guitar cab. Although if the bulk of your sounds used a single type of cab, then i suppose buying that particular cab and using it would not compromising the sound at all.

 

[aleclee]

Re: I never knew a AXE FX could sound like this

Here's a clip I did over the weekend after playing with the Vox models. Definitely not high gain, at least on the rhythm guitar. Pardon the clam chowder. I was fighting a sinus infection and getting pretty hungry when I hit "record".

 

[everdrone]

Re: I never knew a AXE FX could sound like this

Here's a clip I did over the weekend after playing with the Vox models. Definitely not high gain, at least on the rhythm guitar. Pardon the clam chowder. I was fighting a sinus infection and getting pretty hungry when I hit "record".

cool! I read your posts on axefx over the years and am glad to have finally heard your stuff! I linked myself as a fan of your stuff on my soundcloud

 

[sosomething]

Re: I never knew a AXE FX could sound like this

This thread has convinced me that I'd get more value out of a Fractal rig than I would the Kemper.

Thanks for the info, guys.

 

[dominus]

Re: I never knew a AXE FX could sound like this

This thread has convinced me that I'd get more value out of a Fractal rig than I would the Kemper.

Thanks for the info, guys.

I was going back and forth between the two and chose the Kemper because I could get it with 6 months same as cash from Sweetwater and ended up selling it and using the cash to buy a bunch of amp heads.

If I could have gotten the same financing on the Fractal I would still own it.