Differing amp model output levels

unix-guy said:
In my experience, this process works pretty poorly... Depends heavily on the dynamics of the songs being analyzed.
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Fair enough. Any reason why attempting them to be at least similar in volume isn’t worthwhile? I really am having trouble understanding why eliminating the nuisance of having an amp on the AXE be twice as loud as loud as another amp and that is somehow acceptable. We are dealing with one central unit. Can it not be expected to be consistent?

How can this even be a bad option to offer? Completely optional of course.
 
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King’s X - Jason said:
Fair enough. Any reason why attempting them to be at least similar in volume isn’t worthwhile? I really am having trouble understanding why eliminating the nuisance of having an amp on the AXE be twice as loud as loud as another amp and that is somehow acceptable. We are dealing with one central unit. Can it not be expected to be consistent?

How can this even be a bad option to offer? Completely optional of course.
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Did you ever mix a song, and exported it to client and normalised it so it is closer to mastered level without using a limiter on the stereo bus?

Its an off line process, cant be done live-on the fly as you are mixing. The results can easily cause clipping depending on how you change faders, compression or eq.

This is not much different than choosing a guitar, amp model, setting the amp...

Lets say with the default settings volume of a 100w jumpered plexi and twin are close....happy user for 5 seconds. usualy you would crank the mids and treble turn the bass all the way down on the plexi, you might crank the gain or clip the bright cap (turn bright off) than to get marshall cleans you would turn input trim way down. cool we have now edge of break up-clean plexi tone. but the level changed already a lot.

go to twin now. usualy you will turn the bass down (maybe even all the way down) turn the treble down and mids you might not touch. and lets say for this comparison i am using a high output guitar. so i would turn down gain to get edge of break up...now you get a nice fender clean. but the level changed alot again.

and at default settings you cant really compare them cause the plexi will sound probably shrill and terrible with everything left at default. and the fender would have farty low end with bass left at default (ofcourse this depends on the IR and guitar but i am talking about common situation).

At the end the whole level compansation - preprogramming in fw brings nothing.

and to really compare a fender and marshall clean you would probably use different IRs which would make you use scenes anyway.

Also, I am repeating my self but that normalization which happens in a daw is technically not possible.
 
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The default amp settings would ideally be in the same volume range as all other amps. It’s as simple as that. I would expect changing settings to affect that. Otherwise, I want levels to remain consistent so I can scroll through amps to make an easy comparison to what I need the end result to be. Again, what would one do with actual amps? Equalize volume of course.
 
King’s X - Jason said:
The default amp settings would ideally be in the same volume range as all other amps. It’s as simple as that. I would expect changing settings to affect that. Otherwise, I want levels to remain consistent so I can scroll through amps to make an easy comparison to what I need the end result to be. Again, what would one do with actual amps? Equalize volume of course.
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i get what you mean, but still since for most amps (especially older circuits) the default settings sounds nothing like the expected tone.

maybe another subject but thats why i am lately gravitating towards amps like morgan, twrain wreck, friedman, dumble etc...cause at default they give you a close tone to end result. where as with a jtm 45, plexi, most mesas you need to turn the settings-knobs upside down:)

but yes it bugs me also when i scroll to jazz chorus and its almost dead quiet.

still i am trying explain, the whole idea would not make things any easier....
 
King’s X - Jason said:
The default amp settings would ideally be in the same volume range as all other amps. It’s as simple as that. I would expect changing settings to affect that. Otherwise, I want levels to remain consistent so I can scroll through amps to make an easy comparison to what I need the end result to be. Again, what would one do with actual amps? Equalize volume of course.
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Have you compared multiple real amps at the same “12 o clock” settings? They aren’t the same volume. I’m don’t understand what this example clarifies.

Again, the wish is understood. But it is just not that simple.
 
chris said:
Have you compared multiple real amps at the same “12 o clock” settings? They aren’t the same volume. I’m don’t understand what this example clarifies.

Again, the wish is understood. But it is just not that simple.
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I don’t have my unit yet. But when you call up a specific amp does it open up with amp specific default settings or does it jump in with the gain and tone settings in place on the previous amp? That behavior and the option to change it might be key if I understand it correctly, the backlash seems unwarranted to me.
 
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chris said:
Have you compared multiple real amps at the same “12 o clock” settings? They aren’t the same volume. I’m don’t understand what this example clarifies.

Again, the wish is understood. But it is just not that simple.
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The cabs would offer different loudness levels due to the efficiency of the speakers or number of drivers. Do they exhibit the same inconsistencies as the amps?
 
King’s X - Jason said:
The default amp settings would ideally be in the same volume range as all other amps. It’s as simple as that. I would expect changing settings to affect that. Otherwise, I want levels to remain consistent so I can scroll through amps to make an easy comparison to what I need the end result to be. Again, what would one do with actual amps? Equalize volume of course.
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would you go to a music store, turn 5 different amps knobs all to middle, plug your guitar go throug them without touching settings and call your self you compared 5 amps and know how they sound? and probably you would already get thrown out of the store cause with one of the amps you made some people around temporarily deaf:)

Scrolling through is not a way of comparing amps. Set them, use scenes or channels and yes than you are comparing amps.

You are asking for a feature-alot of work on Fractal audios end....which wont help with anything.

i also wish with some amps the difference in volume was less but thinking through all these things as we have been writing back and fort, there is probably a reason for it.
 
Semih Yanyali said:
would you go to a music store, turn 5 different amps knobs all to middle, plug your guitar go throug them without touching settings and call your self you compared 5 amps and know how they sound? and probably you would already get thrown out of the store cause with one of the amps you made some people around temporarily deaf:)

Scrolling through is not a way of comparing amps. Set them, use scenes or channels and yes than you are comparing amps.

You are asking for a feature-alot of work on Fractal audios end....which wont help with anything.

i also wish with some amps the difference in volume was less but thinking through all these things as we have been writing back and fort, there is probably a reason for it.
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You are making this more complicated than necessary.

Scrolling though amps on the AXE FX should have them be close in volume. It is as simple as that.

What is the current arrangement between a 50 watt Marshall and 100 watt? What about a 5 watt champ versus a 100 watt twin? I’m pretty sure they are not that drastic. Same with 1x12’s versus 4x12’s.
 
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King’s X - Jason said:
You are making this more complicated than necessary.

Scrolling though amps on the AXE FX should have them be close in volume. It is as simple as that.

What is the current arrangement between a 50 watt Marshall and 100 watt? What about a 5 watt champ versus a 100 watt twin? I’m pretty sure they are not that drastic. Same with 1x12’s versus 4x12’s.
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scrolling through IRs is a totally different story. drive block or amp
block
is another one. as i said, i get what you mean and there might be room for some improvement there.

but i had to give detailed - complicated examples cause you came up with ideas such as "post setting normalization".

anyways i think you got what i mean and changed your opinion at some points, i also think there might maybe a room for little improvement with some amp levels. but still there might be a reason for this which we mortals dont understand (yet)

now i ll go to my studio and dial in some train wreck patches :) guys those trainwrecks sound way better than plexis or ac30s in my opinion. and way easier to dial in.
 
King’s X - Jason said:
I’d agree. Having patches, scenes and presets being able to be used together live seems much more important to me than having them vary wildly in level.
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Semih Yanyali said:
scrolling through IRs is a totally different story. drive block or amp
block
is another one. as i said, i get what you mean and there might be room for some improvement there.

but i had to give detailed - complicated examples cause you came up with ideas such as "post setting normalization".

anyways i think you got what i mean and changed your opinion at some points, i also think there might maybe a room for little improvement with some amp levels.

now i ll go to my studio and dial in some train wreck patches :) guys those trainwrecks sound way better than plexis or ac30s in my opinion. and way easier to dial in.
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i can dig that totally! Like I said... offer it as an option so we can all dial up we want.

It’s all good. These are definitely first world problems.
 
You simply can't "make them the same volume" ahead of time because it requires source material like a recorded raw guitar riff (or a range of them) effectively re-amping every amp, measuring the results, and then post-adjusting all amp levels accordingly. However, as noted by several here playing style, type of guitar/pickups, and volume/tone controls would significantly affect the level of each reamping due to compression and transients etc. Thus if normalized with a low output vintage strat, then a hot tele, LP, or shredder would likely end up with very different actual and subjective volumes again.

That said, to do it there could be an offline process that feeds the recording (of the user's choice, ideally his/her own) through each of the amps at "defaults" (e.g. FAS selected defaults or at 5.0 - ignoring many amps might sound shitty) measuring levels of each of them. Then at the end, the levels of each amp would be adjusted to be "normalized" according to the measurement method. Note that the measurement method itself has some arbitrariness, e.g. average volume vs. peak volume vs. percentile vs. some weighted "smart subjective level algorithm"...

And this *still* ignores significant effects of EQ filtering (e.g. low/high cut) and CABS/IRs any of which could radically change the subjective/actual levels again. One could also run each amp through every CAB (2000+!) and normalize each amp overall but this still doesn't guarantee equalized results for whichever CAB is actually used with the amp (and in my understanding there is no "data structure" that associates a particular amp with a subset of "appropriate" cabs - this would have to be done manually by a human).
 
yyz67 said:
You simply can't "make them the same volume" ahead of time because it requires source material like a recorded raw guitar riff (or a range of them) effectively re-amping every amp, measuring the results, and then post-adjusting all amp levels accordingly. However, as noted by several here playing style, type of guitar/pickups, and volume/tone controls would significantly affect the level of each reamping due to compression and transients etc. Thus if normalized with a low output vintage strat, then a hot tele, LP, or shredder would likely end up with very different actual and subjective volumes again.

That said, to do it there could be an offline process that feeds the recording (of the user's choice, ideally his/her own) through each of the amps at "defaults" (e.g. FAS selected defaults or at 5.0 - ignoring many amps might sound shitty) measuring levels of each of them. Then at the end, the levels of each amp would be adjusted to be "normalized" according to the measurement method. Note that the measurement method itself has some arbitrariness, e.g. average volume vs. peak volume vs. percentile vs. some weighted "smart subjective level algorithm"...

And this *still* ignores significant effects of EQ filtering (e.g. low/high cut) and CABS/IRs any of which could radically change the subjective/actual levels again. One could also run each amp through every CAB (2000+!) and normalize each amp overall but this still doesn't guarantee equalized results for whichever CAB is actually used with the amp (and in my understanding there is no "data structure" that associates a particular amp with a subset of "appropriate" cabs - this would have to be done manually by a human).
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Some nice points made. I refer back to my original point. You are trying out two different amps. You set gain and tone and then level volume between them to compare, Ideal. Is that completely beyond the capability of this unit? We can through in all sorts of variables but why shouldn’t these amps be at least *close* in volume?

Sounds like a lot of excuses to me. Again, make it an option not mandatory. FAS normalizes patches. Why not amps?
 
ugh, Level, not master volume. and if you're auditioning amp models with single coils, they'll all be relative to that guitar. Who auditions amps and switches guitars each time. As far as IR's go, they're all normalized. No one is complaining that a 4x12 should be louder than a 1x12.
 
yyz67 said:
And this *still* ignores significant effects of EQ filtering (e.g. low/high cut) and CABS/IRs any of which could radically change the subjective/actual levels again. One could also run each amp through every CAB (2000+!) and normalize each amp overall but this still doesn't guarantee equalized results for whichever CAB is actually used with the amp (and in my understanding there is no "data structure" that associates a particular amp with a subset of "appropriate" cabs - this would have to be done manually by a human).
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I can take a Plexi model (master volume defaults to 10 cause there is no master on a plexi), crank the gain, adjust the EQ every which way and the level doesn't change that much, no where near the level difference when switching between certain amp models
 
chris said:
The fallacy here is that it is not as simple as that, and it is that complicated.
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Actually, it is. Take one guitar and play through two amps,,, adjust volume so it is the same.
It’s no different than input trim for guitar. It’s output trim... automated.

I get that you can’t get my point. That does not mean it isn’t valid. Question: do you think the AXE FX isn’t doing normalization between other effects and cabs?

Essentially what you are saying is that two different amps with different settings can’t output the same volume.
I call BS. They certainly can. And it can be automatically adjusted for the user.
 
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