IV anywhere on the horizon?

FusionFanatic said:
First off... wtf else do (we) really ‘need’?
You already have a serious piece of gear if you’re here. More than anyone can ever tap into. The big picture is YOU. How YOU play. All the sounds and programability are there.

With the FM9 & Turbo released not long ago ... are ‘we’ really expecting the 4 to be out by the end of the shitty year?

Will that finally make everything awesome... regarding your tone, chops and compositional skills? Oh... and we can’t forget satisfaction. Actually... no.

I only wish I had this magic box 35 years ago.

But, however and whenever it shall be... technology WILL advance, and what we have now will no longer sound legit anymore. But... you’ll still sound and play the same.

Funny how that works.
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These threads start up regularly when any digital modeler has been on the market for some years. Most often this is asked by people considering buying a current gen unit but don't want to end up disappointed when the next gen unit releases a few months later. That's very normal. As someone keeping up with this stuff, I was pretty confident buying an Axe-Fx 3 this year because I knew the FM9 release, their difficulties getting the units out there all meant that an Axe-Fx 4 would not come out anytime soon.

With each generation we will be running into more diminishing returns for sound. Yeah maybe the Axe-Fx 4 will be higher fidelity somehow but will it be that much better than the 3? I don't think it will. Because the current gen is already so very good.
 
Dave Merrill said:
I think mostly you're seeing backup units, and in some cases, units for more than one player, though those are often in separate racks at the megapro level.
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I mean the photos I’ve seen of more than one in a rack, with other racks containing more than one also. In those setups, it looks like each guitarist has two. Still one could be for backup.
 
Gtrsolo350 said:
I blame it on Apple and their ridiculous iPhone upgrade cycle. They’ve trained us to want a newer model every year. I think I’ll be happy with my FM3 for years to come.
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I feel like consumer products in general moved to this model as tech got better, faster.
 
smd24fan said:
This is a real possibility in my opinion. Another thing is some of these chip manufacturers are taking advantage of their customers. For example something I have experienced several times...."we can get that part expedited if you are willing to pay a premium price to move up the list". Sounds and likely is shady. We all of a sudden have what you need if you are willing to to 5x the normal price. Very frustrating.
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I suspect it’s a violation of their contract and needs to be discussed at their lawyer level, but in the meantime they gotta keep production moving, which means paying the extra money, with the suppliers hoping that they can get away with it.
 
Budda said:
I feel like consumer products in general moved to this model as tech got better, faster.
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Technology drives the market. People who want to be “cool” want the new technology because their hero has it.

They’re just a product of the downside of “Capitalism gone wild”, which Apple certainly didn’t invent. If anyone did it was the car manufacturers during the last 70 years, who added tail fins and chrome bumper bullets, i.e. pure glitz, to entice the masses without any technical reason behind them.
 
Tannhauser said:
Things are already indistinguishable, I think they'd have to make a major breakthrough to make a new model worthwhile. No idea what that breakthrough could be because people already can't tell what's a real amp or not.
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I agree.
Personally, I feel the only real ‘breakthrough’ would be... the ir’s used with a good FRFR sound and feel indistinguishable to a guitar amp and guitar cab. That ‘amp in the room’ thing. I don’t see / hear that’s going to happen. It’s two different things.
 
Dave Merrill said:
Neither should "Fractal should drop everything and focus on my particular wish of the day".
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Just because this kind of response seems to happen a lot, at what point was I demanding everything be dropped to appease me? I literally said ‘I’d like it if…’. Quite clearly not the same thing as ‘Fractal should drop everything…’. Scour my post history if you like, I’m pretty sure ‘it’s built for all of us’ is a direct quote from me elsewhere.

Something that isn’t completely uncritical praise isn’t automatically whining or trying to bury the current product or whatever. If it doesn’t happen I’m still gonna be on that waitlist and still gonna be spending my money on Fractal, because the sounds I get out of my III are simply the best thing available. That doesn’t mean people aren’t allowed to express a view, yknow?

THAT SAID. I don’t think it’s an Apple-style reprogramming of people to be looking for the next thing every year. I’m 5 years into owning my III and quite prepared for it to be another 5 before anything else comes out. There’s much more to be done with the current hardware I’m sure. People are still using the Ultra/II models and getting sounds that I couldn’t even begin to recreate. We’re on the cutting edge and it’s an exciting place to be. Whatever comes next will be wonderful, I’m sure of it.
 
JDR3009 said:
Just because this kind of response seems to happen a lot, at what point was I demanding everything be dropped to appease me? I literally said ‘I’d like it if…’. Quite clearly not the same thing as ‘Fractal should drop everything…’. Scour my post history if you like, I’m pretty sure ‘it’s built for all of us’ is a direct quote from me elsewhere.

Something that isn’t completely uncritical praise isn’t automatically whining or trying to bury the current product or whatever. If it doesn’t happen I’m still gonna be on that waitlist and still gonna be spending my money on Fractal, because the sounds I get out of my III are simply the best thing available. That doesn’t mean people aren’t allowed to express a view, yknow?

THAT SAID. I don’t think it’s an Apple-style reprogramming of people to be looking for the next thing every year. I’m 5 years into owning my III and quite prepared for it to be another 5 before anything else comes out. There’s much more to be done with the current hardware I’m sure. People are still using the Ultra/II models and getting sounds that I couldn’t even begin to recreate. We’re on the cutting edge and it’s an exciting place to be. Whatever comes next will be wonderful, I’m sure of it.
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My apologies, my reply was unnecessary.
 
FusionFanatic said:
First off... wtf else do (we) really ‘need’?
You already have a serious piece of gear if you’re here.

With the FM9 & Turbo released not long ago ... are ‘we’ really expecting the 4 to be out by the end of the shitty year?
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We probably didn’t “need” anything more than the axe2… but look how good the landscape of the axe3 is! The technology pursuit is never ending and cliff and co keep dropping surprise after surprise with the major and minor updates.

There are many “wants” from people, there’s always room to get bigger and better letting people use the box in newer creative ways. I personally want to see profiling as I feel that’s something g to open up a whole new ecosystem of sharing tones and rigs

Between the axe3 being so powerful and the world being what it is today I can’t imagine we see a new unit in the next 2 years. I’d be surprised if an axe4 equivalent hit the market before 2024/2025.
 
FenixIA said:
We probably didn’t “need” anything more than the axe2… but look how good the landscape of the axe3 is! The technology pursuit is never ending and cliff and co keep dropping surprise after surprise with the major and minor updates.
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I used the Axe-Fx 2 for years and was frustrated when operating it from the front panel. While the 3rd gen is better, there's still a whole pile of stuff they could do better. Soundwise I was happy with what I was getting out of the 2 already.
 
laxu said:
I used the Axe-Fx 2 for years and was frustrated when operating it from the front panel. While the 3rd gen is better, there's still a whole pile of stuff they could do better. Soundwise I was happy with what I was getting out of the 2 already.
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Agreed. I think the Helix and QC prove there is a real demand in the market for better user interfaces. Fractals 3rd gen is a big improvement, but still has lots of room to improve. I think the physical controls on the units are actually one of the bigger areas in need of revamping. Hopefully gen 4 will address this issue. That said, I still love all the little tone improvements. Especially at this point new effects and sounds.
 
AZG said:
Agreed. I think the Helix and QC prove there is a real demand in the market for better user interfaces. Fractals 3rd gen is a big improvement, but still has lots of room to improve. I think the physical controls on the units are actually one of the bigger areas in need of revamping. Hopefully gen 4 will address this issue. That said, I still love all the little tone improvements. Especially at this point new effects and sounds.
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Yeah, some people (including me) think the UI is the worst thing about the aFx, but don't say it too loudly or you'll get told it's your fault!
 
Tannhauser said:
Yeah, some people (including me) think the UI is the worst thing about the aFx, but don't say it too loudly or you'll get told it's your fault!
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I think everyone can see room for improvement in the Fractal UX. But it has been blown out of proportion a bit. I don't think it's your fault at all that you don't like the UI. It's fine to want to see improvements. Particularly if you participate on the forum by providing feedback and/or upvoting existing wish list items. Just saying the UI is bad is not helpful. Regardless, it's well worth the investment to learn the front panel - once you get the hang of it and learn some of the shortcuts you can move around pretty fast. When I'm editing, I often use the front panel and the editor at the same time so I can adjust different things at the same time.

Personally, I got an Ultra like 15 years ago and without cracking the manual I got my initial gigging presets done in an hour or so. I had to look at the manual to figure out how to do path splits on the QC and the Helix because they were not intuitive to me at all - even Boss does better in this regard.

It's interesting that nobody brings up all the actually really cool and powerful UI innovations that Fractal has come up with. The mini tuner that's pretty much always there, the grid view with I/O meters for every block (this is a huge feature for patch leveling), I/O controls that let you control balance and output for every block, customizable performance pages, graphs where appropriate, active visual feedback of controller changes where appropriate. Then there's dedicated hardware I/O and MIDI meters, dedicated hardware knobs for all outputs.

An important difference with Fractal is that if you make a request that is generally useful and reasonable to implement, they'll usually do it. Sometimes you will even see a new firmware in a few days with your feature request implemented.
 
Greg Ferguson said:
I don’t see how their existence proves that the market wants better interfaces. The logic isn’t clear.

Please explain.
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I guess my point is that both of those products seem to sell very well even though some users say they don't sound as good. Imagine how much more popular a Fractal device would be with a more competitive UI. I agree the current UI is a big improvement over previous generations and I can use it when needed. But it is not as intuitive, to me, as those other devices. Nevertheless, I did keep my Fractal gear over those other options because I prefer the Fractal tones and effects. So UI isn't everything, but it is a big selling point for many in these post iPhone times.
 
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