An Interesting Finding While A/B'ing the AFII and KPA

I had them both for a while about a year ago. After buying some professional profiles from the Amp Factory I preferred the KPA. But then I figured out that I could tone match the KPA or put a EQ in line on the Axe2 and get them to sound almost exactly the same. From that point on the tone advantage of the KPA disappeared for me and I eventually sold it.

Try tone matching the KPA. The results are kind of fun and interesting.


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AZG said:
I had them both for a while about a year ago. After buying some professional profiles from the Amp Factory I preferred the KPA. But then I figured out that I could tone match the KPA or put a EQ in line on the Axe2 and get them to sound almost exactly the same. From that point on the tone advantage of the KPA disappeared for me and I eventually sold it. Try tone matching the KPA. The results are kind of fun and interesting. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
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It's amazing how a little bit of EQ can de-mystify such a strong controversy.
 
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It seems like when it is all said and done, the end result lies in knowing how to EQ a preset or tone. It really is amazing how much the addition or subtraction of certain bands can alter the final tones. I have to agree with some of the statements in this thread about the end result. If I can get the same tones with both, but one allows me to take that said tone into unknown areas of extreme tweaking with almost limitless possibilities .... I know which one I would go with! Axe Fx 2 for me. Joero
 
I think it is good that more people are trying the KPA and Axe-FX II head-to-head in person.

As Hoth notes, the meme (from KPA owners?) on forums for years has been that the KPA has better amps and the Axe-FX has better effects. That implies tacitly that the KPA as bad effects and the Axe-FX bad amp tones. Neither of those are true.

As first hand experience and some knowledge of how to work with the Axe-FX II I found the KPA held no advantage whatsoever personally; and posted it years ago. That was dismissed out of hand by most everyone that likes to pigeon hole Axe-FX owners as obvious fan boys, shills or whatever else can be used to minimize any impact on their own preferences. Still holds true today. The KPA exhibits a character to everything you either like or do not. I hear it. It's readily apparent to me head-to-head; the KPA has a very nice GUI and is set up nicely to be far less intensive in terms of what you can do with signal flow. It never held any superior ground in terms of raw amp tones IMHO, depending on how familiar you were and knowledgeable about how to work with the Fractal.

That upset some people, which is understandable I guess.

The KPA is a very impressive box that works very well at what it does. The almost hands off automatic way it 'profiles' is great; quite an achievement. The KPA offered another choice in the gear market and that is never a bad thing.

That people want to use forums to turn them into turf wars full of territorial pissings is too bad. I have even fallen into it from time to time; but in the end it is really about the gear. Not what people say about the gear on the Internet.

When you actually take the time to try them out head to head in person; you find what works better for you. Use that and be happy making and performing music.
 
The thing that truly sold me on the Axe 2 was reading the manual. The way the grid works is just logical and makes total sense. Reading the documentation on how all the blocks worked let me see how the device would fit in my band situation. I'm still delighted every time I plug in.
 
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I like my Wii.
 
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I owned a Kemper for a few days last year. I didn't have any of the bonus amp profiles out there, it was all stock. I thought it was okay... not bad, but it felt like an amp sim, and didn't really feel like an amp mic'd up in another room and me monitoring from a control room. I didn't get that.

I gassed for an Axe for years, but never stumped up the cash until recently. The first time I played it, I had that instant feeling of "this feels like an amp mic'd up in another room and I'm monitoring it from my control room" so to speak. It did not feel like an amp sim.

I was very surprised, because I took the bait for ages that the Kemper had better amps, so I wasn't expecting to like the Axe's amps much. I bought it for fx-only use initially, but I'm so impressed with the amps that I'm going to be recording all my guitars with it for the foreseeable future. I still haven't figured out the best way to get my live rig together. I have a pretty decent live rig right now anyway, and once I get the MFC, I can start to replace my effects live and see if I need to keep using my Diezel D-Moll, or if I can get away with just the Axe FX and a valve power amp.

Interesting times.

Not an anti-Kemper post at all. Use what you want. But for me, the Axe is better.
 
Looks like Pete Thorn might have taken delivery of a KPA ? It'll be interesting to hear his thoughts ....
 
FWIW, I love Pete Thorn as a player, but since he's given these products to review from the companies directly, you will never see him say anything negative.

R.D. said:
Looks like Pete Thorn might have taken delivery of a KPA ? It'll be interesting to hear his thoughts ....
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Gamedojo said:
FWIW, I love Pete Thorn as a player, but since he's given these products to review from the companies directly, you will never see him say anything negative.
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You've not really followed Pete then .... He has always stated that he will not review a product that he would not use, and if he can't make it sound good to himself, he simply sends it back to the Mfg.

So, expecting him to 'slag' something is unrealistic ( whatever he reviews ), if he doesn't like it we might never know he even had it !

That said ..., I'm sure this is one he won't be sending back .... I have no doubt that he'll be able to come up with something very cool.

But, you'll also be able to read between the lines in comparison to what he's already stated ( time after time ) about the Axe-Fx II ....

Whatever he says, it won't influence my veiws on my Axe-Fx II XL ..., but I do welcome hearing his thoughts whatever they are.
 
R.D. said:
You've not really followed Pete then .... He has always stated that he will not review a product that he would not use, and if he can't make it sound good to himself, he simply sends it back to the Mfg.

So, expecting him to 'slag' something is unrealistic ( whatever he reviews ), if he doesn't like it we might never know he even had it !

That said ..., I'm sure this is one he won't be sending back .... I have no doubt that he'll be able to come up with something very cool.

But, you'll also be able to read between the lines in comparison to what he's already stated ( time after time ) about the Axe-Fx II ....

Whatever he says, it won't influence my veiws on my Axe-Fx II XL ..., but I do welcome hearing his thoughts whatever they are.
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I agree, I follow Pete also. He puts it out there takes whatever he is reviewing and featuring it in some song he wrote and I never got the impression his reviews are forced. And the songs always sound great!
As for the Kemper and Pete he will take it (if he has one), have a favorable review and have a tune with some cool riffs going on, so basically looking forward. Pete’s 5-10 min reviews are way more informative than other people’s 15-30 min reviews. With attention paid to audio quality.
Why will it be a favorable review, because it’s a good unit!
A friend of mine has a Kemper, one of the rack mounts with the power amp, and he runs it through a Mesa 4X12, sound really good to me.; Not that I was A/B-ing it or something like that but some of those profiles sounded pretty spot on.
Would I trade up for a Kemper?? Nope! Ok- one profiles an amp the other models the circuit of that given amp. Personally I will take the modeled amp. There is just more you can do with it. Ever tinker with your real amp? I have and to a large degree you can do it with the modeled amp also. The profiler sounds good and you can tweak, but only to a degree.
Effects wise the Kemper has great effects, but so does Fractal and you can get way more detailed. Routing of the effects? Not even a contest Fractal, done!
The Kemper is kind of meat & potatoes compared to the Fractal, but still sounds great and still much more than what most people would demand out of their rig. The Kemper can get you there fast when dialing in something.
As for me do I need all the power of the Fractal? Probably not, but there is also a certain reassurance knowing I don’t have limitations
 
I just do not understand these comparisons beyond the very pure, tonal and work flow aspects.
AFXII does it for you, awesome. KPA is more your bag, also awesome. Each clearly has their own strengths and weaknesses, not necessarily when compared head to head, but when just taking each unit for what it is.

I've briefly played but never owned a KPA, and of course I'm a AFX owner. Tonally, neither one made me look at the other like it was a hunk of junk. Both can hold their own irrespective of the other IMO. My choice came down to whether or not I wanted to brave the FAS learning curve in order to take full advantage of what it can bring to the table... as I saw it, from an outsider looking in perspective at the time, the AFXII was limited primarily by the user's knowledge, whereas the KPA was limited by the user's resources. If I had a room full of boutique amps that I wanted to put in one box, maybe I would've made a different choice... actually, that's bullshit, I DID have a room full of killer boutique amps that I sold once I got the AFX, but still, I could see that logic.

I think maybe people just want the psychological reinforcement of having everyone else believe they own/play the "best" gear out there, that having these tools makes your tone superior by default, and thus validates your musicality. As a new user, I can say you can DEFINITELY make either unit sound bad if you try... at the end of the day, whatever gets the job done for you is the right gear.
 
KPA is a nice piece of gear, I demonstrated it live and thought the tones were cool. I used some TAF profiles that sounded very nice. Effect wise I think the KPA is not as strong as the Axe. KPA is much more restricted and the grid of the Axe is very powerful compared to it. This also makes the Axe the more complex unit with less instant gratification. Amp wise, dialing in tones has improved majorly. Effect wise I still think it could be made easier and improved. More help to dial in great sounding effects with samples/videos, presets to learn from etc.
The hardware UI of the KPA is easier then the Axe but with Axe Edit 3 the control is great as well.

Not sure how Pete will demo this: with him owning a multitude of amps the KPA is ideal to create profiles making his recording workflow easier. That's one of the main reasons to get a KPA over the AF IMO.
 
It has to be a really slow day for me to read these threads nowadays. I can just get any monster tone I want with my current rig. That's all I ever wanted.

Like a Ferrari owner reading a review of a new Lamborghini: "Sounds like it's cool I guess. I'm a little too busy to bother test driving any new cars these days, though... I have a tuned, well-oiled, Ferrari in the garage dontchaknow."
 
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