Thinking of buying a III or possibly FM9 Turbo as an upgrade for my II - Curious what folks think is most improved.

jesussaddle said:
You mean the 7-pin phantom power thing? Or glitchi-ness overall?
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No, it’s hasn’t been glitchy for me, and I haven’t missed phantom power.

I mean that the move from MFCs to FCs made MIDI low priority, so current gen lost a lot of capabilities. You can’t transmit from USB to DIN and vice versa, you can’t use the FCs to control other devices (well, you somewhat can, but in a super limited way), can’t record what you’re doing with footswitches/pedals for automation, can’t use an external hardware controller for anything beyond footswitch suff.

Even the stuff you can control is kinda silly sometimes, like there’s no freaking commands to stop and start the looper, the thing is a toggle in III.

I bought it years ago to replace the IIs for live gigs but couldn’t use it after all in my setup, so it just stayed at home until I sold it. Despite the fact that it positively sounded better.
 
It’s difficult not to assume that the 3’s MIDI “devolvement” vs. the 2 was intended to make it harder to implement 3rd party control schemes — so as to sell more of their “native” (and easily-implemented) FC controllers. Some users believe that simple/comprehensive MIDI/FC “mapping” should be possible in the 3.
 
touch33 said:
It’s difficult not to assume that the 3’s MIDI “devolvement” vs. the 2 was intended to make it harder to implement 3rd party control schemes — so as to sell more of their “native” (and easily-implemented) FC controllers.
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I think it’s much more benign than that. Specifically for FC replacement, there’s a 3rd party MIDI spec which is public, available, and works.

But the fact that FCs don’t need MIDI converted it from must have functionality to some kind of an afterthought, so automation, controlling other gear, controllers like RAC-12 aren’t possible (or much more difficult).
 
vangrieg said:
No, it’s hasn’t been glitchy for me, and I haven’t missed phantom power.

I mean that the move from MFCs to FCs made MIDI low priority, so current gen lost a lot of capabilities. You can’t transmit from USB to DIN and vice versa, you can’t use the FCs to control other devices (well, you somewhat can, but in a super limited way), can’t record what you’re doing with footswitches/pedals for automation, can’t use an external hardware controller for anything beyond footswitch suff.

Even the stuff you can control is kinda silly sometimes, like there’s no freaking commands to stop and start the looper, the thing is a toggle in III.

I bought it years ago to replace the IIs for live gigs but couldn’t use it after all in my setup, so it just stayed at home until I sold it. Despite the fact that it positively sounded better.
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Oh, I see. MIDI is a bit frustrating for me - I was going to get into DMX programming or OSC because I wasn't totally happy with the MIDI II stuff - not that I needed it for guitar performances - I'm happy to multitrack. But for my other projects like computer game music interactivity and lighting control, I felt it could be done better than with MIDI.

This was generated by Perplexity.ai

"Axe-Fx III requires separate IN/OUT cables for bidirectional communication, breaking the simple single-cable loop that II supported via hacks like "USB Adapter Mode" or RJM's proprietary wiring. This setup risks MIDI loops, latency, or glitches when chaining multiple devices, forcing manual preset/scene configuration instead of automated sync, and limiting thru-chaining to 1-2 units max without active splitters. Users can still achieve multi-device control with dual cables plus an active MIDI splitter, but lose automation features like preset name sync or DAW integration during shows. Fractal prioritizes reliability and scenes over expanding legacy DIN chaining, pushing toward FC footswitches or USB for editor control rather than full bidirectional DIN revival. "

Maybe there's a rhyme and reason - let users focused on less common performance needs use other devices rather than face very complex customer support needs from that small subset of users.
 
jesussaddle said:
Fractal prioritizes reliability and scenes over expanding legacy DIN chaining, pushing toward FC footswitches or USB for editor control rather than full bidirectional DIN revival. "
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This doesn’t make any sense, just a bunch of words AI statistically found to look good together. :)

There is a 3rd party midi spec, and if all you need is a footswitch controller you can do it via midi ports without any special cables as soon as you can program that controller to send sysex messages and calculate checksums and such. So not any controller will work, but it’s possible.

If you want to control a looper from a DAW to precisely launch it at a certain bar/beat during a performance and then play the loop later at another precise moment you may be in for a bunch of surprises. :)

While unwillingness to support a full third party spec may be a legit reason, making looper play stop functions a toggle has no reason except that’s how we did it and don’t want to bother with it anymore, take it or go get lost.

Lack of communication between DIN and USB (or inability to send MIDI over USB) is pure unwillingness to spend resources on something they don’t consider important. I don’t see any other reasons at least.

That the FM3 doesn’t support MIDI over USB at all is nothing but a desire to save a few bucks per unit. :)

All of that was available and worked fine in the previous generation where MIDI was more important to Fractal themselves.
 
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vangrieg said:
This doesn’t make any sense, just a bunch of words AI statistically found to look good together. :)

There is a 3rd party midi spec, and if all you need is a footswitch controller you can do it via midi ports without any special cables as soon as you can program that controller to send sysex messages and calculate checksums and such. So not any controller will work, but it’s possible.

If you want to control a looper from a DAW to precisely launch it at a certain bar/beat during a performance and then play the loop later at another precise moment you may be in for a bunch of surprises. :)

While unwillingness to support a full third party spec may be a legit reason, making looper play stop functions a toggle has no reason except that’s how we did it and don’t want to bother with it anymore, take it or go get lost.

Lack of communication between DIN and USB (or inability to send MIDI over USB) is pure unwillingness to spend resources on something they don’t consider important. I don’t see any other reasons at least.

That the FM3 doesn’t support MIDI over USB at all is nothing but a desire to save a few bucks per unit. :)

All of that was available and worked fine in the previous generation where MIDI was more important to Fractal themselves.
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Okay, gotcha. Thanks for the info.
 
vangrieg said:
All of that was available and worked fine in the previous generation where MIDI was more important to Fractal themselves.
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Every little thing the Axe-Edit does with a device is still communicated via MIDI SysEx. It's just that this is an internal protocol with basically no details available to the public.

Also, looper control is part of the public MIDI interface...

Screenshot 2026-03-05 225521.png
 
jesussaddle said:
Does the community have any for-$ preset experts I could run questions by like, here are my II settings, why did they work the way they did and how might I dial this in on a III?
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Before spending money to convert old presets I'd go through the factory presets and those contributed by @2112, @Burgs and @Cooper Carter. Then, if I wasn't happy or hadn't figured out what I'd been doing wrong I'd buy Cooper's Master Class and/or packs by @austinbuddy and tear those apart to see what he did.
 
kvik said:
Also, looper control is part of the public MIDI interface...
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Yes, it is, the problem is that play/stop is a toggle, whatever cc value you send what happens next depends on previous state, not on what you’re sending, you just cannot deterministically start or stop the damned thing.

Sysex works the same way, it’s not a command, it’s an emulation of a footswitch press.

Previous gen had a much saner implementation with distinct command for state control.
 
If you want to replicate your axe II presets exactly you will not be happy. I have the fm3 and axe II, they both sound great but different, the fm3 has a different feel. But copy the sound of my axe II presets, can't make them sound close at all. As time went by I started to enjoy the presets I tried to copy in the fm3 better, it just took some time.
 
vangrieg said:
But Play still acts as a toggle, so any change in cc value changes state. So no, this doesn’t let you have play and stop controls in practice.
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Send a single value on separate CC#'s and Play and Stop work as expected. The trick is to send only the "On" value for the button or switch on press and no "Off" value on release.
 
I probably don't know what I'm talking about, lol. It just seems to me that the AXE fx is neither meant to be a true ideal MIDI master or true MIDI slave. It can act as a mediocre master, like JAM Man could in the 90's, but as a slave it isn't going to be reliable since it has it's CPU dedicated to other functions. In my experience the hardware MIDI devices that did a manageable job of syncing (matching DAW tempo changes or drift) had to be masters because they weren't capable of following tempo changes precisely - at least not enough to be considered ideal or even reasonable for long periods - so they could not function adequately as slaves (because they lacked the level of precision and fine tuning and computation ability). For example, I think Jam Man worked well (kept it's delay loops synced with the DAW sequence) only because it was able to be set as MASTER - sending out it's MIDI tick, whereas DAW's running on CPU's were able to sync to that simple (non-tempo-changing) received MIDI tick Probably if the tempo changed, the DAW would still do fine - because it's all about that. In my imperfect recollection, if things were set so the Jam Man was slave, then the Jam Man always drifted, because it simply could not properly slave for any length over 20 or 30 seconds - as ticks gradually shifted away from a rock solid imaginary perfection of beat counts, it would not be able to adjust, and "warp" the delay loop it was playing back. What DAWs (like Cubase in the day) were designed to do, Jam Man couldn't even begin to attempt. So I'm theorizing that Axe FX as a platform CAN be a very rudimentary master, but it simple is not a good candidate to go full bore into the MIDI show control world, where other complex events should want to slave to it (in which, if we swap out JAM MAN, would possibly rely on full SMPTE in more involved show control implementations. So in my mind axe fx has a niche, but it doesn't belong with the set of products that are designed for setting up shows around them.

So on the topic of sending and receiving start and stop, if you want axe fx to be master this is much easier. Then "start" and "stop" can be accurately programmed per CC's, in the DAW. But if not, I still don't understand the problem completely. Axe FX is not a transport responder like a sequencer is. To request it to become one pushes Fractal toward making Axe-Fx a more sophisticated slave to DAW transport, not a simplified master. Fractal would need to add native MIDI Song Start (#FA)/Stop (#FC) parsing with internal actions like tempo phase reset or effect retrigger, turning Axe-Fx into a transport follower. That bloats its guitar-FX focus with DAW-grade positional logic it's not built for. As simplified master (like Jam Man was), Axe-Fx just sends Clock + explicit CCs for "Start" and "Stop"—DAW does the heavy lifting (bar 1 reset, position tracking).

The basic idea as I understand it is: Axe owns tempo/guitar tone, DAW owns show timeline. Fractal's lane is temp/guitar tone - if Fractal worked on "true slave" upgrades it would be more than just making a few additions - because those would also require other additions, etc.

I'm here to learn but obviously I'm just getting started.
 
Hulkko said:
If you're still not in a hurry for a new device, I'd wait for the next-generation flagship model.
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That’s what I am doing. I still can get good tones out of my Axe fx II. I don’t have FOMO. I would love to have an Axe fx III though but I don’t like the 3U form factor and the big screen. That’s what is keeping me from making the jump.
 
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