On the fence between Axe FX II and Kemper Profiling Amp

gchapel

Member
Hi Everyone,

I have been an Eleven Rack user for the last 3 or 4 years and I am ready to step up to better equipment. I have been a long time lurker on this site lusting after the Axe FX II however now that the time is coming close to upgrade I am being swayed toward the Kemper Profiling Amp.

I don't play live and I am not in a band, I just like to compose and play my own music at home. I love the guitar and I love a lot of various styles of music. My favorite guitar tones are the melodic tones of David Gilmour, or Mark Knopfler. But I also love the searing guitar sounds of Jimmy Page and the classic blues sound of T Bone Walker or BB King.

The thing that I like about the Kemper Profiler is that it looks simple. There are 1000s of amp profiles, some free, and some are paid professional profiles, but all are easily accessible from a big beautiful display with dedicated tone and gain controls that are well lit and easy to see from a distance. The signal chain is simple and seems to possess all the stomp boxes and effects that I need for the tones I enjoy. The controls look well laid out and seem to all be analogous to real world amps and effects.

From what I can tell from the review sites, forums, and youtube, both the Axe FX II and the Kemper sound damn good and are very close to genuine tube amps in both sound and response. The Kemper is about $300.00 cheaper than the Axe FX II but the Axe FX II is more flexible and can be tweaked more.

The Axe FX II appears to be much more complicated, the display seems limited and the interface seems clunky but most feel that the flexibility is second to none. Support for the Axe FX II is great and online community is strong.

To me this is a very difficult choice. In reality I probably will never use more than a dozen or so really good tones and both seem more than capable.

What do you guys think that I am over looking and why did you choose the Axe FX II over the Kemper, if it was available at the time you purchased?

Thanks for any feedback.
 
Hi Everyone,

I have been an Eleven Rack user for the last 3 or 4 years and I am ready to step up to better equipment. I have been a long time lurker on this site lusting after the Axe FX II however now that the time is coming close to upgrade I am being swayed toward the Kemper Profiling Amp.

I don't play live and I am not in a band, I just like to compose and play my own music at home. I love the guitar and I love a lot of various styles of music. My favorite guitar tones are the melodic tones of David Gilmour, or Mark Knopfler. But I also love the searing guitar sounds of Jimmy Page and the classic blues sound of T Bone Walker or BB King.

The thing that I like about the Kemper Profiler is that it looks simple. There are 1000s of amp profiles, some free, and some are paid professional profiles, but all are easily accessible from a big beautiful display with dedicated tone and gain controls that are well lit and easy to see from a distance. The signal chain is simple and seems to possess all the stomp boxes and effects that I need for the tones I enjoy. The controls look well laid out and seem to all be analogous to real world amps and effects.

From what I can tell from the review sites, forums, and youtube, both the Axe FX II and the Kemper sound damn good and are very close to genuine tube amps in both sound and response. The Kemper is about $300.00 cheaper than the Axe FX II but the Axe FX II is more flexible and can be tweaked more.

The Axe FX II appears to be much more complicated, the display seems limited and the interface seems clunky but most feel that the flexibility is second to none. Support for the Axe FX II is great and online community is strong.

To me this is a very difficult choice. In reality I probably will never use more than a dozen or so really good tones and both seem more than capable.

What do you guys think that I am over looking and why did you choose the Axe FX II over the Kemper, if it was available at the time you purchased?

Thanks for any feedback.

The display is not limited and neither is it so complicated. You will have to work to get a great sound with the Fractal its going to be certain that you will.

Take my advice buy it,use it for a while. Don't like it in 15 days,then return it.
 
Buy the AFX II. it's the best, upgradable, and can grow as you do. I don't know about the Kemper and you MIGHT NOT NEED the AFX II. I play 100% at home, I'm a friggin Banker, but although I thought this was expensive, and it IS. For what you get and the upgradability, it is a Bargain.

I just looked up the Kemoer and it looks cool and different, $2,700! For jacking around at home and doing recordings, the AXF seems better for that application AND it is cheaper. The Kemper is a 600 watt amp too, but for what you are doing, sounds like that is something you don't need. If you were gigging, maybe. BUT, the AFX has so many sounds and is so powerful and limitless that I think it is awesome and I had it a few days and only turned a few knobs. I don't know anything. It does have a 15 day $$$ back Guarantee, so you could buy BOTH, play with them, and make a decision at your House. Then, it costs you shipping back and then you will KNOW 100% (or 70%, whatever) which one is for you after you use both for a few days.

That is a great suggestion if I do say so myself. Get Both on a credit Card and keep the winner, but looking at the Kemper for what I am doing doesn't interest me at all. I already have a Bogner Exstasy if I want a bad ass real amp. Just my 2 cents.

Tex
 
Buy both, a/b them for a while. Keep the one u like more, send the other one back.
No one can tell u which one is better (for u).

Axe is better but more complicated and expensive. Kemper can be better suited for u and for your budget.
But maybe u will luv the axe...try both and decide
 
I've owned both and ended up keeping the AxeII.

Either unit is great. Really just a question of how you work. For me, it was worth having the FULL amp model there to tweak as I see fit, not just as someone else saw fit. There are some great profiles out there that should cover all of your bases with the Kemper, but it's going to be a search. With the Axe, it's all in the box already. The effects on the Axe are better for sure. For the extra $300, I'd say it's worth it.
 
Ease of use can be deceptive as auditioning 100's or 1,000's of profiles to find some that inspire you can be a lot more work than dialing in an Axe model of an amp you are familiar with (the tone/drive/vol on the Axe models are calibrated to the real amps, the drive and tone on the Kemper are not calibrated to the real amps: when it comes to tweaking and deep parameters I find the Axe more natural and intuitive). Both can sound really good but with the Kemper you are starting with a profile of someone else's ideal rig - if you're comfortable with other people's rigs then that's not an issue; if you, like me, aren't comfortable with other people's gear then you'd better have your own gear to profile or expect to be doing a lot of tweaking of profiles.

Either way the cabinet IR, or cabinet part of a profile, is very important to getting tones you bond with.
 
get the ax man hands down it crushes,,, kempers are cool but the the axe is the best out on the market trust me you will not be sorry just updated to 11 and its so bad ass every update is even better and its flawless cant beat the tones you can get and axchange if you want 1000000 of tones already made it records flawless i seen a bunch of shows this year and lots of bands are useing the axe fx playing live sounding awesome havent seen any kempers live i know dino uses one from fear factory but most of the best players from vai to misha to the faceless keith merrow ola all the badasses are useing it for both live and recording its something much more than your normal guitar center processor its all you will ever need it took me a little bit to dial it in but now everyone wants my tone its very clean and its so simple to use not hard to get it down at all i was doing stuff to it the first day i had it and it was so simple and axe edit 3.0 is almost out its sick hands down !!!!!!!!!!!!!!
 
Thanks everyone for the feedback. It really helps to hear positive comments from real users of the Axe FX II.

It seems as though guitar players prefer the Axe FX II while professional recording engineers and studio heads prefer the Kemper.

Interesting!

I think my biggest concern with the Axe FX II is that it will take a lot of tweaking and learning to get the clean and melodic tones that I most want to sound good to me. I am not really into tweaking. I would rather just turn it on. Run a few simple pedals for sound modification and spend most of my time playing. Of course like some have said it might take a lot of time and effort to find the perfect Kemper Amp profile online or in one of the The Amp Factory Packs.

How many people here find that they have great tones right out of the box with the Axe FX II without a lot of messing with parameters and spending hours learning what each parameter controls? I know I had to invest a lot of time learning to tweak every aspect of the Eleven Rack and even though the Eleven Rack gave me acceptable tones (better than any Line 6 product) it still didn't sound or feel like a real tube amp.
 
It seems as though guitar players prefer the Axe FX II while professional recording engineers and studio heads prefer the Kemper

WHERE did read this at? I do not think that is true at all! Most recording engineers still prefer TUBE AMPS from what I can tell...not the Kemper!

I think that bit of information is false for the most part.

From what I have read, most recording engineers are very set in their ways and prefer micing up an amp to using something digital.

The tide is slowly turning though, as more and more recording engineers are embracing digital modeling and profiling, but I do not think we are there yet.
 
WHERE did read this at? I do not think that is true at all! Most recording engineers still prefer TUBE AMPS from what I can tell...not the Kemper!

I think that bit of information is false for the most part.

From what I have read, most recording engineers are very set in their ways and prefer micing up an amp to using something digital.

The tide is slowly turning though, as more and more recording engineers are embracing digital modeling and profiling, but I do not think we are there yet.

Sorry, that was phrased poorly. I didn't mean to imply that most engineers preferred the kemper to an analog Tube Amp recording. I meant that they seemed to prefer the Kemper to an Axe II where as most players tend to prefer the Axe FX to the Kemper.

I think this is due to the fact that a studio engineer can take a specific profile of each recording setup during a session and then later re-mix using the Kemper to re-amp and re-record portions of the tracks without have to go back into the studio with a band, re-setup and re-record. And after awhile a recording engineer can amass a very large library of professional profiles.

I think most players prefer the Axe FX II to the Kemper because it allows the greatest flexibility for creating a unique tone whereas the Kemper can only capture tones that have been profiled.
 
I have owned both, I kept the Axe FX II. I like to tweak, and the effects are better on the Axe FX II (though they are excellent on the Kemper - there are some effects that the Axe FX II doesn't do). The Kemper also doesn't record via USB, which seems very odd to me. I had to buy a separate audio interface.

The Kemper is an amazing piece of kit. It blew me away when I first plugged into it, it sounded and felt like an amp. However, there is something in the low frequencies that I don't like with the KPA. The Axe FX II doesn't have this issue. The Axe FX has full amp models, not just snapshots. The amp tones are incredible on both, but I prefer the feel of the Axe FX, especially with firmware 11. Firmware 10 closed the gap completely IMO, but firmware 11 feels amazing to play. The official release looks set to have even more goodies.

The Axe FX II is built like a tank. The KPA seems solid, but mine developed a fault with the display after 3 months. Not saying they are all like that, but it is what prompted me to try the Axe FX II. If you are in the USA, you would have to send your Kemper back to Germany via the retailer if it broke.

Try them both out. To me, the Axe FX II is king. However, the Kemper is still an incredible piece of kit. You can't go wrong with either.
 
I just looked up the Kemoer and it looks cool and different, $2,700! For jacking around at home and doing recordings, the AXF seems better for that application AND it is cheaper. The Kemper is a 600 watt amp too, but for what you are doing, sounds like that is something you don't need.

Tex

It's only one version of the Kemper that comes with a built in amp and that is only a recent addition to the Kemper line.

OP, you will also read that the Axe takes time to tweak. It does if that is what you want to do but there are lots of usable tones that come with the box, all of which can be changed for something else. There is also a preset axe change. The new graphical editor is about to be released anyway meaning for a home user all tweaking you want to do will be possible not just via the front panel but also via your PC or Mac.

The Axe can be simple to create presets, or you can tweak away but you don't have to.
 
The Axe FX II appears to be much more complicated, the display seems limited and the interface seems clunky but most feel that the flexibility is second to none.

Dont forget the brand new editor, AxeEdit 3.0, for your pc/mac will be released any day now. That will make tweaking a lot easier than using the front panel :)


edit:
seems my post was 2 minutes late ;)
 
Bad place to talk about Kemper

In the end ist your choice.

Yes learning curve is a bit steep in the beginning (but you come from 11R so not that steep) and once AxeEdit3.0 is out tweaking will get easy again

For 300$ Price gap you get
Best ever tube amp modelling(FW11b)-now virtually undectable which is which in Shootouts
A myrad of effects
Really High Quality IR's

I only tried Kemper for about 3 hours in a shop-its not my Thing and is tonal limited to profiling of somebody else

As Axe2,11R,MarkV,JVM410H owner and user (also rarely gig nowadays) I would always go down the AXE 2 road

my 2 Cents

Roland
 
get a new fence..

seriously, I've never owned a Kemper, but from what I've seen of it, the Axe appears to be far more flexible
the extra $ will be better spent..
 
I m just an amateur playing in its home studio. So not a great player as many of the guys in this forum (btw the best forum I get through).
I'm from many great tube amps such diezel Eeintein head 100w and still have 2 tube amps EL84 15W and 6L6 40W with pedals, just for pleasure variations. But I'm totally focused on my AF2 now.
The AF2 is clearly the best buy I did on guitar gear (damned I'm saying the exact thing the old forumers said when I was documenting on the axe on this great forum !).

When I get my Axe in FW 10.02, I was floored by the standard presets in Bank A about Marschall, fender, Mesa, and others I didn't know... with for a direct guitar & cable without any tweaking I mean. ANd the same for friends playing in bands and gigging all weeks=> so I would say more than 90% of the amps sound great without tweaking other than B/M/T as on a real amp.
With FW11 beta we have now an even better dynamic: such as the one I have with my amps.

And if you are on the Kemper & AxeFX2 route, this mean you have a "tweaker soul", and in this way the AF2 is heaven ! Along with great IR such as the last OH (just bought the modern studio pack) or FAS producer pack, I think you can't miss the sound you have in mind.

SO for me, hands down for AF2. Period !
 
WHERE did read this at? I do not think that is true at all! Most recording engineers still prefer TUBE AMPS from what I can tell...not the Kemper!

I think that bit of information is false for the most part.
No, it's true, and very coherent when you think about it. The Kemper has the possibilyt of taking a snapshot of a complexe live setup. That means that for a sound engineer that he can build a collection of live sounds, and call them back at will. Makes perfect senses for a professional that may not like emulated sounds for real or psychological reasons (E.G. "it's not tube!!!").
There was article about it a few days ago, I'll see if I can find it.... Even if I agree that this is a very specific use case...

Edit: there
Gearslutz.com - View Single Post - Kemper?
 
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