Another Axefx vs Amps thread

sprint said:
my guess is one was broken
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Nah. Analog variances are a legitimate thing. Another guitarist had the opposite conclusion. He hated the one I loved and vice versa.

The point is that the AxeFX is easily as close to an analog amp as one analog amp is to another.

Does that mean everybody can find their sound with the AxeFX? Idunno, maybe not. But I'd say most can.

Cliff's not going to stop making these products better, but this whole "is it as good as the Real Thing" clown show is just so much wasted time.

Yes. It's as good. Full stop.
 
rossipedia said:
Nah. Analog variances are a legitimate thing. Another guitarist had the opposite conclusion. He hated the one I loved and vice versa.

The point is that the AxeFX is easily as close to an analog amp as one analog amp is to another.

Does that mean everybody can find their sound with the AxeFX? Idunno, maybe not. But I'd say most can.

Cliff's not going to stop making these products better, but this whole "is it as good as the Real Thing" clown show is just so much wasted time.

Yes. It's as good. Full stop.
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This. I've played across tube amps that I thought sucked. I've played across solid state amps that sounded great. I've played modelers I loved and modelers I hated. There are just too many variables to nail it down to a formula.

On top of that, there are effects that will sound like crap across a great amp. There are effects that will sound decent across a crappy amp.

And, personal taste and preference come into play. I have yet to hear a RAT or Tube Screamer I could stand, yet many people swear by them. I love the early line 6 Modern Hi-Gain tone, yet apparently so few people did that Line 6 discontinued it.

It's a big world out there.
 
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rossipedia said:
Nah. Analog variances are a legitimate thing. Another guitarist had the opposite conclusion. He hated the one I loved and vice versa.

The point is that the AxeFX is easily as close to an analog amp as one analog amp is to another.

Does that mean everybody can find their sound with the AxeFX? Idunno, maybe not. But I'd say most can.

Cliff's not going to stop making these products better, but this whole "is it as good as the Real Thing" clown show is just so much wasted time.

Yes. It's as good. Full stop.
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I was poking fun, but more seriously, I cannot quite reconcile the legitimate analogue differences you refer to, against the relentless pursuit of precision to the "original" that is one of the main reasons so many come to own Fractal. There are countless threads here each with many posts praising (rightly so), the accuracy of Axefx models to the original real amp. It can't be both ways can it?
 
sprint said:
I was poking fun, but more seriously, I cannot quite reconcile the legitimate analogue differences you refer to, against the relentless pursuit of precision to the "original" that is one of the main reasons so many come to own Fractal. There are countless threads here each with many posts praising (rightly so), the accuracy of Axefx models to the original real amp. It can't be both ways can it?
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Fair enough. I probably came across as a bit more prickly than I felt. All good!

I think really the end goal is: "Does this produce the same quality and caliber of tone, response, feel, etc as the analog amp that is being modelled?" Or more concisely: "Does sound and feel like a [AMP]?"

For all intents and purposes, I know my answer is "yes". But there's still going to be variances when comparing it against physical amps, because there's variances between physical amps in general.

But even though I'm satisfied, I know Cliff never will be and will always be striving to make his products better. And I know there are others like him, so even though I might get annoyed at people constantly doing the "AxeFX vs physical amps" comparison... I guess I do recognize that it has value.
 
Back in the early days of electric guitar amps were ‘primitive’ and choices were few.

But, many bands/artists made great music with them. While there were those that searched for a unique sound (their sound) most spent more time making and playing music... using what they had.

Their individual sound, technique and style is what you got... and still do. < Read that again.

As decades past, more became available to choose from.

Nobody tried to copy someone else’s sound. Most anyway. Sounds like an identity crises.

Enter modeling.. it been around for decades now. And... it’s gotten real good. Also... option paralysis.
Confession... I love tube amps... and I don’t have any anymore. The Fractal just kicks ass. Wish this wonder box was around when I started playing.

My observation over the last number of years is that... Now, we’ve become so obsessed with tone and feel comparisons to the point of being ridiculous.
That’s Cliff and FAS’s job. 😄😄 Hey... they’re awesome!

Whatever you use... tube amp / modeler... there’s something for every budget to get something that can give you a legit sound. WAY better than years ago. I’ve been playing since ‘78.

Comparing real amp vs modeler is seriously a waste of time anymore. It would benefit much more (as a guitar player) to PRACTICE, instead of getting old making ‘Presets from Hell’ or trying to dial in some magical tone which will somehow make you 5x a better player than you already are.

Kinda nitpicking silly to me.

Yeah... I’ve spent time making some presets (and I’m very happy with them)... but for me, now I rather spend more time playing using what I got... like it always was.

Excellent tones are available in either case. The rest is YOU... because (I’ll say it again)... In the end, you’ll still sound like you... whether you suck or you’re a badass.

Confession... I rather be a badass because I practiced a LOT ...
than suck, because I kept playing BS all the time while jerking off to parameters and comparing apples and oranges... followed by 2 hours spent on the gear page reading opinions.

Hey... whatever rocks your speaker cabinet.
 
rossipedia said:
Fair enough. I probably came across as a bit more prickly than I felt. All good!

I think really the end goal is: "Does this produce the same quality and caliber of tone, response, feel, etc as the analog amp that is being modelled?" Or more concisely: "Does sound and feel like a [AMP]?"

For all intents and purposes, I know my answer is "yes". But there's still going to be variances when comparing it against physical amps, because there's variances between physical amps in general.

But even though I'm satisfied, I know Cliff never will be and will always be striving to make his products better. And I know there are others like him, so even though I might get annoyed at people constantly doing the "AxeFX vs physical amps" comparison... I guess I do recognize that it has value.
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yes, I can understand how the endless comparing can get annoying, but understandable imo since guitarists are exacting, so if I own / owned an instance of real amp X that I dialed in to my perfection, upon acquiring Axefx my natural tendency will be to dial in the model to match my amp instance as exactly as possible. Though there will be differences between my instance of real amp X and Cliff's instance of real amp X (on which the model is based), Axefx provides such deep editing that I can dial the model in to compensate for many common differences in 2 instances of the same real amp (pots, bias...).

I tend to follow the comparison threads with interest. My impression (particularly from those comparison threads where the slide rulers are out in full exacto geek mode), is that Axefx easily nails preamp sections of any given instance of the same real mic'd amp, but preamp+poweramp+Cab is a harder nut to crack to get to 100% though Axefx comes closer than any other and still inching forward.

The difference between 98% (or whereever it is that we are at) and 100% seemed silly to me for some time, but my own tone tweaking has changed my thinking somewhat as I experience Axefx tones I don't like, and have those tranformed into tones I totally like with what I'd consider very small adjustments. Having said that, I feel there are some parameters in Axefx that I'm frustrated with becase I cannot hear any differences in the values (in the case of "tube type" changes, I can barely even see a difference in various analysers never mind hear one with my admittedly flawed ears - but this seems correct to real life equivilents - sorry guys, I'm with Glenn Fricker on this one - imo so far, most power tube swaps make no material difference in tone).

We like to think / say we are 99% there, but the continuous flow of applauded improvements here over many years
suggests we've had more than 1% ground to cover, and / or that we're really not so sure about our math on this.
 
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sprint said:
[…] I feel there are some parameters in Axefx that I'm frustrated with becase I cannot hear any differences in the values (in the case of "tube type" changes, I can barely even see a difference in various analysers never mind hear one with my admittedly flawed ears - but this seems correct to real life equivilents - sorry guys, I'm with Glenn Fricker on this one - imo so far, most power tube swaps make no material difference in tone).
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Tubes are just a part of the sound, something Cliff said a while ago:

https://forum.fractalaudio.com/threads/why-power-tubes-sound-different.79962/

FractalAudio said:
There's also different operating voltages and bias points but I'm trying to keep this simple.

You can simulate changing power tubes in the Axe-Fx by simply increasing or decreasing the LF and HF resonance values.
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Maybe @FractalAudio could add more to his post based on the current state of the modeling eight years down the road. He’s definitely made a lot of progress.
 
sprint said:
I feel there are some parameters in Axefx that I'm frustrated with because I cannot hear any differences in the values
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I too have noticed that. But with certain ones, I figure it's some other parameter that I need to adjust, or engage, first, before the other one will do anything.

However, just the other day I was trying to add some Presence, and I swear the knob wasn't changing the sound at all. But I can't recall which amp it was, and I just moved onto another one.

Overall though, I'm in the camp of, I just don't get the obsession with tone tweaking to the nth degree, because there are so many great tones to be had. I personally switch to a different tone, not because I don't like it, but because I just want to play around with something different. But I guess if it's a very specific tone you're after, maybe a really tight, high-gain tone, that allows you to play super-crisp palm-mutes, for example, I get it.

But I do find myself thinking, I wonder if they spend this much time on their actual playing skills as they do chasing tone? And that's not a dig directed to anyone in particular, because Lord knows, I'm still nowhere near the player I'd like to be. But when I find myself spending too much time with a preset, I stop, and remind myself that the majority of the audience would rather hear a well-played song with a decent sound, than a poorly-played one with a "killer" tone. Imo.
 
TSJMajesty said:
However, just the other day I was trying to add some Presence, and I swear the knob wasn't changing the sound at all. But I can't recall which amp it was, and I just moved onto another one.
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If I remember right, there are some models that don’t actually have a presence control so turning it does nothing.
 
Only thing I can say is that I had a Friedman BE 100 Deluxe and I did compare it to my Axe FX III.
The Axe was spot on in 4CM when I did compare the Friedman and the Friedman in the Axe Fx.
But yeah but sometimes I thought that there would maybe a difference in some frequency’s and feel.
And then… I did a blind comparison and someone else switched between the amp an the Axe.
And at this point it was not possible for me to say what’s the amp and what’s the axe was.

To me, sometimes our brain tells us that there must be a difference in sound and or feel,
but in this case there was not.

This does not count for every amp etc. in the Axe III this is just my personal experience with that specific Amp and the Axe.
As many already stated, there are sometimes or often differences between two of the same amps.
Back in the 90‘s I did tours and gigs with two JCM800 in a stereo setup.
These two amps did sound very different on the same setting (the Serial Numbers were close to each other)
For a stereo setup this was not a problem for me but I had a clear preference for one of that amps.
 
Rasmus Toftlund said:
First - Besides being a sound engineer, producer, studio owner and guitarist, I am and always will be a tube guy! I own many different tube amps and cabs, mostly high-gain, as that is where my interest lies (Metal).

When that is said, I am absolutely sold on the AXE3. Like OP I am interested in how close the AXE3 gets to my real amps, but I approached this quite the other way around;

Now I physically own the amps and cabs I consider the ultimate setup for my band needs:

Engl Savage 120 + Mesa Boogie Mrk V 90watt
into
Engl Pro Cab 4x12" + Mesa Rectifier XL Cab

But it's not practical for me to bring these out on gigs, as they sit in my Studio-setup, so my aim was to recreate my dialled in sound on the respective amps and cabs in the AXE3.

Also I knew I would always want to play thru cabs for monitor needs live, either bringing along my own, or borrow/rental my way on fly in gigs and the like.

Therefore I knew I would also have to bring a power-amp always. For more "local" gigs and rehearsal I use my Marshall 9200 Tube Power Amp, with 5881 tubes - insanely heavy, but I care more for the sound, less for the practicality. (For others I will most likely use the Palmer Macht 402, have not come up yet.)

I started out with matching the AXE3 amp blocks of the respectable amps (Angle Severe 2 + USA Lead Mid Gain Bright) to my physical amps, one by one - using the 4CM described in the Fractal Wiki - flipping between the physical pre-amp and the Amp Block from within the AXE3 . Using the physical amps actual power-amp, I obviously turned off Power Amp Modeling in Global.

The results was mildly speaking flabbergasting...

With almost the same settings in both amps, staying on the Tone page, I came incredibly close real fast. Did they sound the same 1:1? No, just like 2 identical amps never sound the same, due to electronic component tolerance, tube-bias and wear and tear. But no doubt it was the same amps, behaving exactly the same way - and they felt and responded exactly the same when playing them thru their respectable cabs. Amazing! And you couldn't really say one sounded better than the other, just slightly different.

Remember, I was using the physical amps power section for this!


Next step:

Now the AXE3 out of Output3, before any Cab Block, into the Marshall 9200 Power Amp into first the Engl Pro 4x12" Cab, Switching speaker cable back and forth between the Engl Savage 120 output and The AXE/9200 to compare. And then into the Mesa Rectifier XL 4x12", switching between the AXE3/9200 and the Mesa Mrk V.

This was more tricky - I found that the Marshall 9200 was letting thru way more high frequencies than when going into the physical amps Power section, thru Effect Return. I slammed a Filter Block before Output3 and found I had to do Lowpass all the way down to between 4K to 5K, to match the 9200 to the Engl Savage. Almost same thing with the Mesa Mrk V. That helped big time! Again - not 1:1, but obviously the same amps and very close. And when I started to play around with Speaker Impedance Curves, different Tubes, Speaker Compression and a little deep tweaking, the result was INCREDIBLE!

I ended up with a result sounding SUPERIOR to my physical amps!! Even though I love those 2 amps, nothing isn't so good, you can't wish for it to be a little better, haha! - Well, on the AXE3 versions I had SO MANY MORE parameters to play with, and then of course I now was free to build the perfect true stereo setup, when combining the AXE3 various effects.

I was, and still am, blown away!!


The last step:

I am now in the process of adjusting my IR's and what comes out from Output1 (direct to FOH/IEM) to replicate in the PA what I hear coming thru my cabs. I have no doubt it's doable, and when I listen thru my Genelec 1030A's, it already sounds better than anything I've ever heard - on all volume levels btw. It will probably take a couple of shows on real PA's before it's perfected in that regard, but that's the easy part. :)


For my part, I am now convinced Cliff has cracked it! - To my experience the AXE3 is 100% there.


Good for you FRACTAL, and thank you!!
- And remember, the reason why we all think the AXE sounds so amazing, is because it sounds like tubes! ;)
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I don't suppose I could talk you into posting a preset on https://axechange.fractalaudio.com/, could I? :D
 
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