Thoughts on Jim Lill’s new video

Agree with Matt on the need for normalization, but yeah, that was kind of interesting. A few things came to mind for me:
1. I wonder if the feel is exactly the same regardless of distortion type (SS versus tube)
2. I suspect our magic black box takes advantage of what he's found, and adds a lot.
3. There is rarely one magic bullet. The differences between things are usually a combination of a bunch of different factors, and while attempting to isolate them is interesting, it really isn't the whole story.
4. Nobody sets their tone stacks to strive for flat in real life.
5. I could definitely hear differences in some of the areas where he claimed there weren't any. Night and day? No. But they were there. See #3 above.
 
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Reading Cliff's posts here about amps and tone prepared me for the conclusion, but I was still floored how close that tackle box got to the amps it was emulating, all using analog solid state circuits.

Amp topology, rather than specific components, seems to be king.

Ultimately, the only thing that matters is if what you play through inspires you and makes you love what you hear.
 
I was still floored how close that tackle box got to the amps it was emulating, all using analog solid state circuits.

Amp topology, rather than specific components, seems to be king.
I mean....

That's pretty much exactly what the Fractal does. Just at a much finer level of detail.

It's all math in the end.

Also, yeah...I heard things that he said weren't there. Specifically the shape of the attack for the rectifiers. They compress differently. Which, as far as I'm aware, is all anyone has claimed. They just describe it different ways.

I found it flawed but fascinating...much more convincing than his "guitars all sound the same" video.
 
This guy's videos are just awesome.
I'm sure the are lots of gear snobs that are tweaking about these vids.
He is one of the best things on YouTube IMO.
 
The "tacklebox" is the analog equivalent of a first-generation modeler, i.e., Pod, V-Amp, etc. One or more stages of distortion with EQ before, between and after.

While you can get passable results the differences vs. a real tube amp become quite pronounced under even modest scrutiny.

To really capture a tube amp you need to model all the fine points like bias points, bias excursion, dynamic clipping behavior, dynamic bandwidth, dynamics, dynamics and more dynamics, output transformer behavior, speaker impedance effects, etc., etc.,etc.

While the video is interesting I doubt even a novice guitar player wouldn't be able to immediately tell the difference in a blind test.
 
The "tacklebox" is the analog equivalent of a first-generation modeler, i.e., Pod, V-Amp, etc. One or more stages of distortion with EQ before, between and after.

While you can get passable results the differences vs. a real tube amp become quite pronounced under even modest scrutiny.

To really capture a tube amp you need to model all the fine points like bias points, bias excursion, dynamic clipping behavior, dynamic bandwidth, dynamics, dynamics and more dynamics, output transformer behavior, speaker impedance effects, etc., etc.,etc.

While the video is interesting I doubt even a novice guitar player wouldn't be able to immediately tell the difference in a blind test.
I think a blind test is an excellent suggestion! He should bring in some of the top players in Nashville he plays with and see what they hear.
 
Not surprised as I've experienced many times not hearing any difference whatsoever in isolated advanced parm changes in Axfx - ie most tube types sound exactly the same to my ear, but, if I display the sounds on an analyzer, I can see the very small differences. Doesn't matter though as I can hear the distinct differences between the major amp classes + many of the sub classes and I can hear how much closer Axfx comes to replicating these than other modellers I've owned (somehow I can hear the cumulative precision in tone / feel despite not being able to descern differences in individual parts aspects). And, as mentioned above, feel is a key indicator often overlooked that's difficult to compare on youtube which is why I've also mostly lost interest in "can you hear a difference" vids.
 
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The "tacklebox" is the analog equivalent of a first-generation modeler, i.e., Pod, V-Amp, etc. One or more stages of distortion with EQ before, between and after.

While you can get passable results the differences vs. a real tube amp become quite pronounced under even modest scrutiny.

To really capture a tube amp you need to model all the fine points like bias points, bias excursion, dynamic clipping behavior, dynamic bandwidth, dynamics, dynamics and more dynamics, output transformer behavior, speaker impedance effects, etc., etc.,etc.

While the video is interesting I doubt even a novice guitar player wouldn't be able to immediately tell the difference in a blind test.
Soooo, what you are saying is we can get "passable" dual amps in the FM3 if we are clever enough? ;)
I watched this video earlier today and that was the first thing I thought of.
 
Oh, it is that simple? So I wonder how that many manufacturers that tried to built a solid state amp that could rival tube amps failed? Maybe they even succeeded but the market ignored them?
 
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I really liked his video. It was entertaining and he does show a lot of things already said in comments. The thing about a lot of videos like this is that they're focusing on tone. Tone is essentially just a frequency response so of course EQ and the drive (adding harmonic content) is going to be the biggest factors. I do think a lot of little things that people brush off as having "no effect" such as the components that he tested in this video or the wood in a guitar or the size of a sustain block in a floating bridge can add up, but of course the pickups in a guitar or the tone stack in an amp are going to have the biggest effect on tone.

But I think a lot of people look over dynamics. Attack, sustain, decay, sensitivity. Those all come across in music but can be hard to A/B compare. It's much like the adage of "you feel it more than you hear it" when you add certain styles of compression into your chain.

In the end, I think it's lame for gear snobs to argue over which tube type is better or whatnot. A piece of gear is the sum of all its parts. I just think it's cool that we can change so much in our amp models on the Axe FX III if we choose to do so.
 
Oh, it is that simple? So I wonder how that many manufacturers that tried to built a solid state amp that could rival tube amps failed? Maybe they even succeeded but the market ignored them?

LabSeries did it. IIRC, they were so expensive to make that the company went out of business. IDK...I'm probably wrong about why they disappeared.

Also, the new Super Crush head has been getting a lot of praise in certain circles. Also the Roland JCs. And while I don't think many are gigging with them, a lot of people like the Friedman/Soldano/whatever mini-heads that are basically just drive pedals and a class-D power amp in one box. Plus, I'm pretty sure the Nextones and Blues Cubes are also like that....computer controlled solid state everything. And there are at least a few people who think that the Marshall MGs (with better cabs) are every bit as good as DSLs/TSLs. There are a couple of solid state dumble style preamps that are very highly regarded in certain circles (Ethos, for example).

So, they're out there.

I think part of them not gaining the traction is history/tradition. Another part is that they're very often paired with cheap/crummy speakers. And, I think, the last is a bit of chicken-and-egg thing....since there's less of a market for solid state amps, pretty much no one makes them high-end, which stops them from being "halo products", so people still just don't dream about them.

Which is part of where modeling comes in, completely independent of the flexibility.

A large part of it, at least to me, is copying the interaction between the output transformer and the speaker....and the compression characteristics that (for vintage style amps) seems to come significantly from the rectifier only when the amp is played loud. That's a thing that matters to me that could be done with solid state electronics...but almost no one does. Boss Nextone comes very close....but I'm pretty sure the reason I sold mine was that the cab didn't match my preferences in a way that just a speaker change couldn't fix.

Technically, all of this is math. If you can do something with tubes, you can do it with solid state electronics...or code...or freaking gears. It's largely a matter of figuring out what math you need to do.

I believe this has been spoken about, and Cliff was not interested in losing fidelity.
Nor should he be.

But, I thought of the same idea. At some point, I want to experiment with 2 EQs, a Drive Block, and a Compressor for a parallel amplifier. But...I'm also 100% certain that it would be more difficult to do than just upgrading to an AF3 and dragging in another amp block. It might be nice to hear it for myself, though. It's been a while since I played into 2 amps.

But I think a lot of people look over dynamics. Attack, sustain, decay, sensitivity. Those all come across in music but can be hard to A/B compare. It's much like the adage of "you feel it more than you hear it" when you add certain styles of compression into your chain.
I mean....that's one of the things that jumped out at me during the into/comparison thing.

The rectifiers sounded very different to me...exactly along the lines of the forum posts he made fun of: fast vs. squishy. You can easily hear it from the looper. Feeling it while playing would make it even more obvious unless you just don't listen to the sounds you're making.
 
Oh, it is that simple? So I wonder how that many manufacturers that tried to built a solid state amp that could rival tube amps failed? Maybe they even succeeded but the market ignored them?

I followed this topic pretty close and even talked with the main developer of the mythical SS Randall amps, and he (or her) said that higher ups fuc*Ed the design of those amps because they (well, it's a long story) didn't like her persona, it was a pretty sad story because she was pretty smart
 
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