A few months with UA OX

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plexi59

Guest
After using the UA OX for a few months, I've come to the conclusion that all of the dissatisfaction people have with tube amp tone comes mostly from the inability to get anywhere near the power level they were designed to be operated at. The simple truth of the situation is that amps were designed to sound good at stage volume. No manufacturer gives a shit about "bedroom" volume levels, so hobbyists who buy the amps are not using them the way manufacturers optimized for. I pissed away so much time and money fighting this before I bought the OX.

No matter which amp I plug into this thing (including some I've built myself), it sounds awesome through studio monitors once I nail down the master on the amp to where it needs to be. In fact for some amps where I set the remaining knobs doesn't seem to matter all that much. Now I wonder what some of the amps I had really sounded like in their sweet spot.

And it sits well in the mix, too, after just a bit of EQ (basically roll off the rumble and the treble a bit, using built-in EQs in the OX). Moreover, this is not something you can easily replicate without an attenuator (or even with a shitty one), because perception of sound is affected significantly by volume, so even if you can crank the amp in the room, you won't be able to hear it the way it's captured by the mic (and therefore recorded in your DAW). The cab would have to be located in an isolated room, carefully miked and equalized, to get the sound you hear on the record in realtime.

I suppose Fractal's own attenuator does the same thing, except with effects and EQs in the Axe. If you use tube amps at all for recording, and don't have an attenuator, you probably should buy one and spend some quality time with it.
 
I’ve taken a similar approach with different gear, and have had great results. I have a Suhr Reactive Load. I run my amps into the Reactive Load, then into the Axe Fx III, which I use for effects. Works great, and you get to enjoy turning up your tube amps without blowing out your ear drums.
 
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