After all of these years, finally--I've bit the bullet and jumped on board the Fractal train..

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Dr.Strangenote

Member
I'm really excited. I took advantage of the lower cost that I've been seeing over the past month or so, and said to myself, If I'm going to get in, now is the time. I've been thinking of ways to sell pedals/gear for an Axe FX, and it really didn't matter to me which one. Now, I've never even played one of these yet. I know.. Haven't even demo'd one, and I really did ask around for folks to lend one over for a weekend, but that couldn't surface, so I just went all-in. This is my first post here at the Fractal Forums, however, been a lurker since 2012 (I think).

A little history of where I'm coming from. I've been playing digital gear in my hay day and I've been called, 'the effects' monger', the effects unit guy, digital circuits, and many more names that I can't remember, but yeah, my bandmates at the time all gave me crap over it. When I got a bit older, more experienced (I've been playing about 30+ years now), but back in the 80's/90's, I switched from multi effects units, to just straight up tube amps. I took a plug, from my guitar, and plugged it into a tube head, playing directly through that. I've been that tube amp guy without any effects, or processing units, or anything for over a couple of decades. It was the simpleness of it, that I've enjoyed. Lugging a cab/head around was the only thing I had to really worry about. I've since, more recently, been using tube preamps (rack units), preamp pedals, effects pedals, massive pro pedal board, etc at church each week, and with a few band projects. It's the same set up each and every week. Super heavy as hell to carry, in and out of the house and while trying not to damage the walls on the way in and out. So, now that I'm getting older, maybe a bit more wiser, I've decided, jeeze... an Ax8 could really save my ass and my back instead of lugging around heavy gear around. I could get the sounds I need in the studio, live in church, or on a session, or even just a jam, I could just do that.. Well.. here we are now..

I'm totally excited about receiving the Ax8 today. Yes, it's coming today--according to UPS!

I have my same old rig still around, (with the exceptions of selling off other gear in my time) but perhaps I'll start selling more of the pedal board gear and not looking back. I've read all the stories of this same scenario; these guys/gals sold their pedals and haven't looked back since. I guess, that an Axe III would be in the future, but for now, portability of the Ax8 was my choice due to it being brought on the road with ease, and not have to lug more equipment around. Guitar, gig bag, and Ax8. I couldn't beat the price tag either. Anyway, see you all around soon..
 
Welcome aboard! You are going to have the best of both worlds now, loads of effects, and amps with tube like response.

Hope UPS deliver on time......!
 
Sell everything on Reverb.com. Super easy. Remember, this is not a Bruce Jenner sort of thing, if you hate it, sell it and buy the other stuff back. It all holds it's value so well on Reverb.
 
My wife had one job today while I'm at work. Stay home and wait for the delivery. Well, just got notice that the 1st attempt was made and nobody was home. She said that she went out for a few and wouldn't be long... Yeah, so now I have to wait until tomorrow.. THIS HERE, is my luck... LOL!
 
I sat on the fence for a while also. I love the AX8 and I think you will too after you get the hang of it.
 
No diamonds for her!

Dr.Strangenote said:
My wife had one job today while I'm at work. Stay home and wait for the delivery. Well, just got notice that the 1st attempt was made and nobody was home. She said that she went out for a few and wouldn't be long... Yeah, so now I have to wait until tomorrow.. THIS HERE, is my luck... LOL!
Click to expand...
 
Congratulations, you can make your "rigs" as complicated or as bare bones as you like, but in this case you can have a boatload of those rigs at your toes.
 
Congratulations!!
You won't regret it.
That said, I still have a TON of other gear, yet the AX8 is a game changer. SO EASY and quick. Best solution I've come across for traveling, especially fly in gigs. If it's for home use, you can record SUPER easily as well.
Great unit, as is the Axe III...better start saving :D

ENJOY!!!!
 
I took a fair amount of time before diving in on the AX8 and it was the right decision I think. The things that tipped me to make the decision were:
  1. Format of the AX8 - you can spend silly money (Fractal included) on footswitches to control items. The AX8 has got a very flexible solution in its package. It is small but well built. I'm not bothered about fancy displays either. I do all the programming on AX Edit and use a more or less consistent layout of the footswitches.
  2. The range of amps - I'll never need a setting for all the amps, no one will, but the range there is brilliant and I can't really fault it. I personally find the cabs good too having used Wall of Sound that I got with a Two Notes Reload which I find troublesome in a way that the Fractal stuff is not. It doesn't take long to find a few favourite cabs to get what you want.
  3. The presets on the AX8 were not all brilliant but there are enough to get started and to easily alter. Better still were the handful I got off the exchange web site. After a week of fiddling around with these I have no need to buy any IRs or presets done by others.
  4. The ability to save blocks is great because in reality I suspect most users will home in on a range of sounds from a core of amps, cabs and effects making it simple to build new presets.
  5. Controlability - It has plenty. I've got other pedals that I can connect to it so that if I wanted, I would be able to supplement the switches already on there but so far no need to. But those who want to are not restricted.
  6. Software updates - you can't fault the company here.
  7. Tech support - there are some negative comments on the web about issues along these lines. I've opened two calls and both have been dealt with in a first class manner. As good as anything I have seen and much better than most.
  8. Forums - I've seen some aggro about abuse on forums. It's not pleasant and in any case what can the company do about such issues. From what I have seen people are very generous with advice.
Downsides:

  1. It's a pity it does not have a headphone output. It doesn't make any difference to me. I bought a superb headphone mixer on Reverb for £40, rack mounted and quite flexible so I use that.
  2. It's expensive in the UK because of exchange rates. There's little sense in trying to import from the states and as good as the supplier is in Germany (and they too are top notch), I ended up getting a second hand one because the conversion rates with the currencies were crazy.
I've got no issues with lack of CPU for what I want. The amps are musical and respond well. Effects are excellent too.
 
Just remember the reset effect block on the drop down menu on axe edit, tweak until you hearts desired ,don't like ,reset .its fun :) Got mine about 3 weeks ago ,I love it
 
I sold a lot of my stuff to purchase the ax8 about a year or so ago. It turned out to be a great decision. Lugging around tube amp heads, cabs, pedals, etc was starting to get really old. Now I just need my ax8, guitar, and, if I'm going somewhere with no p.a., a powered p.a. speaker. It's much more convienent and the sounds are great. There can be a learning curve so definitely take advance of all the advice on here and elsewhere. I was getting pretty frustrated with the sound I was getting with the ax8 until I did some digging on here and figures out the problem. Turns out it was super simple and now I'm in tone heaven. Cheers!
 
thanks everyone! I appreciate the welcomes and also tips, plus I enjoyed reading your experiences leading up to your path of righteousness.

Ok, so I was able to spend a few hours with it last night a bit, and some more really early this morning. I didn't want to stop! Will continue to dive head-first into it. Can't wait for the weekend as I can really get things moving along gracefully. 1st impressions, Totally killer!! I am really, truly blown away. Simple to use and intuitive designs. Haven't cracked into the manual at all yet. I did upgrade to newest 10.01 firmware, it came with 10.00 pre-installed.

I've gotten really great sounds right away with the stock presets. After going through many of the stock amps, not all, but those that intrigued my interests, I've imported some of Leon Todd's presents (just as a starting point), and I am completely floored (no pun intended) :p. I've seemed to have discovered the saturation switch and saturation parameters really do liven things up to what I'm looking for. I like organic tone, not over gainy or over the top balls to wall gain, but I do love George Lynch's tone.. who doesn't right? I tend to gravitate towards my own sounds and style, which could seem similar to a Malcolm Young, meets Pete Thorn, but with a little more hairy teeth that can bite if you aren't paying attention. When finding amps/tone, I also aim for Andy Timmons-like, cleans/rhythms that are just beautiful.. But I won't go into describing sounds, eventually you'll all be familiar with videos/recordings that I'll contribute to explain things on where I'm coming from with all that.

Gator: I'd like to know what didn't seem to sound so good (at first for you), and what did you do, in a quick summary, to get you to tone heaven? I can pick things up fairly quickly, perhaps even just point me to a link on the boards, or some sort of --try these first-- type thread? The reason that I ask this is because it's really great now--out of the box, and I couldn't imagine what I'm missing if there needs to be some changes to 'this n that' for starters.

My favorite amps (so far) that I've spent most of my time with right now are the more organic type, like the Suhr Badger 18, the Friedman Dirty Shirley 2, and the Brit JCM 800 #34 & Friedman 18 C45. One of Leon Todd's Plexi-ish presets too which I cannot recall the exact name at the moment, but I can include that one that I've found later. I like those amps that when I roll off my volume, I can get to edge of breakup, fully defined. I'm only scraping the surface, but I just seemed to have found a special place with those (for now). I know that there will be endless love all around for what's in there now, especially the undiscovered tweaks. It's a journey that I look forward to being surprised by.

Thanks..
 
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Dr.Strangenote said:
thanks everyone! I appreciate the welcomes and also tips, plus I enjoyed reading your experiences leading up to your path of righteousness.

Ok, so I was able to spend a few hours with it last night a bit, and some more really early this morning. I didn't want to stop! Will continue to dive head-first into it. Can't wait for the weekend as I can really get things moving along gracefully. 1st impressions, Totally killer!! I am really, truly blown away. Simple to use and intuitive designs. Haven't cracked into the manual at all yet. I did upgrade to newest 10.01 firmware, it came with 10.00 pre-installed.

I've gotten really great sounds right away with the stock presets. After going through many of the stock amps, not all, but those that intrigued my interests, I've imported some of Leon Todd's presents (just as a starting point). I've seemed to have discovered the saturation switch and saturation parameters really do liven things up to what I'm looking for. I like organic tone, not over gainy or over the top balls to wall gain, but I do love George Lynch's tone.. who doesn't right? I tend to gravitate towards my own sounds and style, which could seem similar to a Malcolm Young, meets Pete Thorn, but with a little more hairy teeth that can bite if you aren't paying attention. When finding amps/tone, I also aim for Andy Timmons-like, cleans/rhythms that are just beautiful.. But I won't go into describing sounds, eventually you'll all be familiar with videos/recordings that I'll contribute to explain things on where I'm coming from with all that.

Gator: I'd like to know what didn't seem to sound so good (at first for you), and what did you do, in a quick summary, to get you to tone heaven? I can pick things up fairly quickly, perhaps even just point me to a link on the boards, or some sort of --try these first-- type thread? The reason that I ask this is because it's really great now--out of the box, and I couldn't imagine what I'm missing if there needs to be some changes to 'this n that' for starters.

My favorite amps (so far) that I've spent most of my time with right now are the more organic type, like the Suhr Badger 18, the Friedman Dirty Shirley 2, and the Brit JCM 800 #34. One of Leon Todd's Plexi-ish presets too which I cannot recall the exact name at the moment, but I can include that one that I've found later. I like those amps that when I roll off my volume, I can get to edge of breakup, fully defined. I'm only scraping the surface, but I just seemed to have found a special place with those (for now). I know that there will be endless love all around for what's in there now, especially the undiscovered tweaks. It's a journey that I look forward to being surprised by.

Thanks..
Click to expand...


Glad your enjoying it! It really is a remarkable device. My issues with bad tone were my own fault. Some how (not sure if I tweaked a default setting by mistake) everytime I loaded an amp block, the default volume would be incredibly high.....in some cases pegged all the way to full blast. I also didn't fully understand the differences between the master volume and level controls. I figured if the amp blocks loaded at a certain level, well that was what the designers intended.......it was not. I forgot that it is modeling a real amp and you'd never ( at least I wouldn't) turn an amp up to full blast, especially the high gain ones I typically use. I have an engl fireball (somewhat similar to the "energy ball" engl Powerball amp on the ax8) and got to thinking that I'd never turn that thing up that high and usually leave it around the 2 to 4 volume range. I did some digging and read a lot of posts on here about how to properly gain stage, set levels, etc and now I can't stop playing with it. I also learned some good tips on here for the low and high cut on the cab block that have really helped the tone also. So basically, I'm embarrassed to admit, it took me over a year to realize I was doing the equivalent of turning all my amps up to face melt volume....including the clean ones. Once I realized that one simple thing, BAM! Awesome time!
 
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