1.19b3 pitch block first impressions

hippietim

Axe-Master
I was planning on doing a side by side comparison with my Drop pedal, but my bass player has it. So a demo will have to wait. I had done a demo of the III vs. the Drop a while ago and the III was very close at the time. I'm pretty sure the III will come out the clear winner this round.

Last night I got a chance to try out the pitch block improvements. It is quite an improvement.

Drop tuning:
In my experimentation last night, I found that setting tracking on the III to around 6 instead of the default of 5 made a noticeable improvement when I was down a whole step. I could play things like an Eb major in the 6th position in the neck pickup and there were barely any artifacts. Dropping down to B, the warble was present with chords like that Eb but in a mix you'd never know. Increasing tracking to 10 cleaned it up but added more latency than I was happy with. If you have to drop down to B, I would keep the tracking setting at 5-6 and add adjust the tone/effects to give it a little more edge or maybe some subtle effects (modulation/delay/verb). Going down an octave was still totally usable.

Capo:
Using it as a capo, the III sounded way better than anything I can recall. Somehow, that often off-putting metallic sound is all but gone. I tried 2, 4, 5 half steps and it was really impressive. Then I did an octave up and brought the mix down and brought the highs down with high pass filter. The results were darn good. In a live setting you'd have a usable 12-string - it really is nice.

Harmonizer:
Tracking an octave and diatonic 3rds was no problem even with chords - arpeggiating chords and letting things ring worked way better than I expected. Then I added the 7th. Individual note tracking was excellent. Even most double stops were good. Chording and such got a little sketchy at this point - the 7 really makes things tough but the reality is it still sounded better than anything I could recall.

That's all I got to last night with the III.

I did try some similar things with the HX Stomp real quick. The HX is usable but has way more warble at more moderate settings. No contest here really for the pitch block.
 
This is exciting news - thanks for the write-up! I usually avoid any pitch effects since they pretty much all suck across the board, but I might have to give it a go :)
 
Cant wait to try it after the show this weekend. I tried it before and while it did sound good, it was not as good as the Drop pedal. I set up a patch and did an A/B test with the guys in the band before one of the shows. It was set up first in the chain which is where I thought it sounded best. It wasn't the latency, it was the affect on the overall sound. Anyway, I am hoping that is resolved so I can finally go straight into the AXE3.
 
Half step down works great. I played around with it in combination with the 5150 amp last night and really dug the results. I tried a full step but there was a little bit of perceivable latency. I will mess around with the tracking settings next time and see how that does for me.
 
I was planning on doing a side by side comparison with my Drop pedal, but my bass player has it. So a demo will have to wait. I had done a demo of the III vs. the Drop a while ago and the III was very close at the time. I'm pretty sure the III will come out the clear winner this round.

Last night I got a chance to try out the pitch block improvements. It is quite an improvement.

Drop tuning:
In my experimentation last night, I found that setting tracking on the III to around 6 instead of the default of 5 made a noticeable improvement when I was down a whole step. I could play things like an Eb major in the 6th position in the neck pickup and there were barely any artifacts. Dropping down to B, the warble was present with chords like that Eb but in a mix you'd never know. Increasing tracking to 10 cleaned it up but added more latency than I was happy with. If you have to drop down to B, I would keep the tracking setting at 5-6 and add adjust the tone/effects to give it a little more edge or maybe some subtle effects (modulation/delay/verb). Going down an octave was still totally usable.

Capo:
Using it as a capo, the III sounded way better than anything I can recall. Somehow, that often off-putting metallic sound is all but gone. I tried 2, 4, 5 half steps and it was really impressive. Then I did an octave up and brought the mix down and brought the highs down with high pass filter. The results were darn good. In a live setting you'd have a usable 12-string - it really is nice.

Harmonizer:
Tracking an octave and diatonic 3rds was no problem even with chords - arpeggiating chords and letting things ring worked way better than I expected. Then I added the 7th. Individual note tracking was excellent. Even most double stops were good. Chording and such got a little sketchy at this point - the 7 really makes things tough but the reality is it still sounded better than anything I could recall.

That's all I got to last night with the III.

I did try some similar things with the HX Stomp real quick. The HX is usable but has way more warble at more moderate settings. No contest here really for the pitch block.

Very interested in a 12 string solution that is as good as or better than the Digitech Mosaic. Can you share the pitch block settings for this?
Thanks!
 
@hippietim Is your bass player using the Digitech pedal to drop tune his bass? With the pitch block improvements in the AF3, I'd like to some of the old down-tuned Sabbath stuff with my band, but my bass player would have to pitch shift as well, so wondering if the Drop would work for him.

I too am really digging the pitch block improvements. I had to hi cut in the pitch block down to like 4000 and it sounds great. If you pitch up +3 from standard tuning, you can switch between that and standard like Ed did with the Steinberger TransTrem in Hot Summer Nights. Might try that one with the band too.
 
@hippietim Is your bass player using the Digitech pedal to drop tune his bass? With the pitch block improvements in the AF3, I'd like to some of the old down-tuned Sabbath stuff with my band, but my bass player would have to pitch shift as well, so wondering if the Drop would work for him.

I too am really digging the pitch block improvements. I had to hi cut in the pitch block down to like 4000 and it sounds great. If you pitch up +3 from standard tuning, you can switch between that and standard like Ed did with the Steinberger TransTrem in Hot Summer Nights. Might try that one with the band too.

Yes, he was using my Drop pedal for some stuff we do a whole step down. He has switched to the HX Stomp and it does just as good as the Drop for the single note stuff. So I get to sell my Drop pedal now lol.
 
Yes, he was using my Drop pedal for some stuff we do a whole step down. He has switched to the HX Stomp and it does just as good as the Drop for the single note stuff. So I get to sell my Drop pedal now lol.

Cool - thanks. I might have him look at both.
 
Have him look at the FX8 and/or AX8 as well. They are just superior units across the board. The AX8 has the Darkglass drive which is pretty cool.

That's a good idea actually - no reason he couldn't go direct like I do and prevent carrying a bass amp.
 
Capo:
Using it as a capo, the III sounded way better than anything I can recall. Somehow, that often off-putting metallic sound is all but gone. I tried 2, 4, 5 half steps and it was really impressive. Then I did an octave up and brought the mix down and brought the highs down with high pass filter. The results were darn good. In a live setting you'd have a usable 12-string - it really is nice.

My experience is quite different... the "Virtual Capo" does nothing when selected. I'm using "axefxiii_dsp_rel_1p19_beta3" and have reset the blocks and all the other new firmware rituals. Still nothing.

When I turn the mix to 100% there is no audio at all, if that offers any clue. The other types appear to work fine, just not the "Virtual Capo" .
 
My experience is quite different... the "Virtual Capo" does nothing when selected. I'm using "axefxiii_dsp_rel_1p19_beta3" and have reset the blocks and all the other new firmware rituals. Still nothing.

When I turn the mix to 100% there is no audio at all, if that offers any clue. The other types appear to work fine, just not the "Virtual Capo" .


Oops, just noticed I forgot to remove the "Virtual Capo" pitch type. Ignore it for now. That was supposed to be a simple, single-voice chromatic shift for down-tuning and virtual capo use.
 
My experience is quite different... the "Virtual Capo" does nothing when selected. I'm using "axefxiii_dsp_rel_1p19_beta3" and have reset the blocks and all the other new firmware rituals. Still nothing.

When I turn the mix to 100% there is no audio at all, if that offers any clue. The other types appear to work fine, just not the "Virtual Capo" .

I didn’t use the virtual capo type, just the dual shift.
 
I use the Pitch Block for 80's Rock / half step de-tune generally and I was starting to miss my Whammy DT. However, the III is my first Fractal and I waited at least a year before I made a purchase and read this board and others. I knew these guys were the best and lucky me I started with the best AXE. The latency is totally gone as far as I can tell and I am totally pleased with my purchase and how things are coming together! I thank everyone that contributes and am happy to help!
 
Good to hear that the Pitch block finally improved! That was on lots of people’s wish lists. This gives me one more reason to make the leap from the Axe fx II to III eventually.
 
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