Anybody else not having much success with factory presets?

Hi all,
I bought the FM3 about a year ago. I've owned a lot of pedals and several tube amps, but I basically haven't played through a pedal or amp since I got the FM3. I do think you can achieve almost any tone with Fractal's modeling. I also think it's better than all the alternatives I've tried (I have played Neural DSP plugins but have not personally tried the Quad Cortex).
My own presets are not overly complex, and not very effect heavy. I like a good low gain dirt or high gain shred tone. I have a pretty standard preferred tone (Petrucci, Andy Timmons, Vai, Govan, etc.). I admittedly am going more for amp-in-the-room (I know, it's oddly controversial), but even the FM3 can achieve pretty convincing amp-in-the-room tones through studio monitors or good headphones. However, I almost uniformly don't like the factory presets, ones I've tried on Axe Change, and a Fremen pack I bought. With some tweaking (and not even a crazy deep dive into the nuanced settings) I seem to get much better tones out of my own presets even when they are fairly simple. Anybody else feel that way?
it's common for presets designed by others to not sound the way you prefer. it also highly depends on your entire setup and how your ears perceive things vs how others do.

so this is pretty common, yes.
 
I couldn t use ANY default presets on the FM 3. Basicly, I use AustinBuddys Cygnus Live Gold, because He Pro tweaks for Live playing. And I am as far from a Modeller tweaker as you can get. lol I tweak VERY little if at all, and just play. ;p
 
Hi all,
I bought the FM3 about a year ago. I've owned a lot of pedals and several tube amps, but I basically haven't played through a pedal or amp since I got the FM3. I do think you can achieve almost any tone with Fractal's modeling. I also think it's better than all the alternatives I've tried (I have played Neural DSP plugins but have not personally tried the Quad Cortex).
My own presets are not overly complex, and not very effect heavy. I like a good low gain dirt or high gain shred tone. I have a pretty standard preferred tone (Petrucci, Andy Timmons, Vai, Govan, etc.). I admittedly am going more for amp-in-the-room (I know, it's oddly controversial), but even the FM3 can achieve pretty convincing amp-in-the-room tones through studio monitors or good headphones. However, I almost uniformly don't like the factory presets, ones I've tried on Axe Change, and a Fremen pack I bought. With some tweaking (and not even a crazy deep dive into the nuanced settings) I seem to get much better tones out of my own presets even when they are fairly simple. Anybody else feel that way?
I know how you feel. I've had ok success with my fm3 so I decided to sell it and go back to tube amps.
 
Presets should be viewed as a starting point. In all of the years I have been dealing with digital gear (about three decades), I have never encountered a factory preset that was "exactly" what I was looking for, save for maybe one or two stereo detuning effects in the Eventide H9.
 
Same here.
I grabbed a lot of useful hints from factory or other's presets (just saving some delays, compressors and reverbs here and there)..
but I'm always ending with my presets.

I suppose it's also related to guitar / style / references / etc etc.. it should be common
 
Yea everybody talks about pedals in the context of their "rig" and I get that. But the "rig" for a modeler is a guitar (of which I own many but still have the same issue of the factory presets not sounding great) and either a speaker (of which I've tried several, and have pretty neutral studio monitors that I use most of the time) and headphones (also which I have several nice neutral pairs, all with same results). There are some decent youtube videos getting great tones (like johnnathancordy) but most of the demos sound fairly mediocre to my ears compared to the potential of the unit. To each his own I guess
yup. and all of those still affect the resulting tone the same way.
 
Totally agree, but I’m talking 100% of the factory presets were completely unusable to me
sure, this can happen. they weren't 100% unusable to me, and others too. so it's a range of some people enjoying them, and some not, like most things in life.

it's impossible to make a preset that works for every single user, let alone 300+ presets. it really depends on the guitar, how someone plays, their speaker setup, their knowledge and expectation, and more.
 
Hi all,
I bought the FM3 about a year ago. I've owned a lot of pedals and several tube amps, but I basically haven't played through a pedal or amp since I got the FM3. I do think you can achieve almost any tone with Fractal's modeling. I also think it's better than all the alternatives I've tried (I have played Neural DSP plugins but have not personally tried the Quad Cortex).
My own presets are not overly complex, and not very effect heavy. I like a good low gain dirt or high gain shred tone. I have a pretty standard preferred tone (Petrucci, Andy Timmons, Vai, Govan, etc.). I admittedly am going more for amp-in-the-room (I know, it's oddly controversial), but even the FM3 can achieve pretty convincing amp-in-the-room tones through studio monitors or good headphones. However, I almost uniformly don't like the factory presets, ones I've tried on Axe Change, and a Fremen pack I bought. With some tweaking (and not even a crazy deep dive into the nuanced settings) I seem to get much better tones out of my own presets even when they are fairly simple. Anybody else feel that way?
I think some of the factory presets are great, some sound great with a tweak, some are OK, and some do nothing for me because I’m not a fan of the style. I copied a few directly into my favorites and barely touched them, and a couple others got major overhauls to everything but the amp and cab. That’s what the factory presets are there for.

Guitar pickups have a big effect on the sound. Some presets need single coils and others need humbuckers, so I try to be sure to use both.

Fractal EQ’d the presets to sound good loud, like at stage volume, not at bedroom volume. They probably used FRFR speakers, and small monitors and headphones are not going to sound the same even if turned up because they don’t move as much air, which then can’t couple acoustically with the guitar and results in lower gain and lowered midrange response through the modeler. So turn up the volume, don’t adjust the gain or the EQ.

Everyone has an expectation of how a system should sound live. We listen to it long enough and we’re going to think anything that doesn’t sound like it is weird because our brain expects that sort of tonal range. Your own presets are predicated on your own taste in sound, but it might not be EQ’d for a guitar in the full band mix at volume; we don’t know and can’t tell because you didn’t give us anything to compare or listen to. Consider sharing some of your presets asking for a critique of the overall sound, specify which factory presets sound off to you, and tell us what speakers and headphones you use to monitor the sound.

Something to consider is, if you don’t like the sound of the factory presets or those on Axechange, or Fremen’s pack, and only like your presets, that maybe you have conditioned your brain to a sound that is skewed from what others are hearing. Ear fatigue can lead to that, as can hearing damage, as can poorly EQ’d headphones and monitors. I have EQ blocks to flatten my headphones that I use when setting the EQ of my presets, and I don’t touch the EQ otherwise, trusting my system to send a good sound to my FRFR and FOH. I’m also aware of the tone curve of my headphones so when I use them without the EQ blocks to compensate I can remind myself the heavy bass is from their construction, not the preset.

Auditioning factory presets is useful reading.
 
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I'm just the opposite. I find the factory presets more than usable. Some of them are amazing. In my case, I've used several factory presets as the basis for my main tones and just had to do some minor tweaking. Of course as has been mentioned much of it depends on the guitar, how you play, speaker setup, etc.
 
I don't use any stock presets. None of them have nearly enough gain for me. Fun to play around with occasionally. But for main sounds I always build from the ground up.
 
So the main reason I made this thread was to take the pulse of other users. It seems it’s mixed responses so far, but some people are in the same boat as me. I personally think the default presets are the main reason that nearly 100% of the comparisons online currently favor Quad Cortex over Fractal (that and maybe some paid endorsement at play hah) - basically the ease of getting a good tone from first use. Unless the Quad Cortex is dramatically better than all the Neural plugins (which I haven’t heard anybody claim), the Fractal modeling is capable of superior “best tones” to Neural to my ears. But the factory presets sound much better from scratch for Neural in my opinion. And yes I’ve tried with multiple guitars with multiple pickup manufacturers, single coil, humbucker, soap bar, passive/active, different speakers, FRFR, studio monitors, headphones. I am capable of making a preset work well with many different pickups, etc. Maybe the Neural presets are just tweaked to a more amp in the room sound, which a lot of us prefer (but I know Cliff has posted that he doesn’t really aim for it). I highly doubt I’m the only customer who isn’t selling out stadiums every night and just wants good tone at home at reasonable sound levels. Just my unsolicited 2 cents

I think that one major hurdle for many people is lack of experience with different kinds of gear, which makes it considerably more difficult to "diagnose" a sound or factory preset and understand what is needed to quickly and easily tweak it into what you're after. For example, say someone hears a recording and really likes the guitar sound, but they don't have even a ballpark idea of what was used to get it. Somebody with more experience would listen to the track, and instantly recognize a Marshall boosted with a Tube Screamer and a medium length delay, and they are able to quickly get that sound without much effort at all.

Or, from the other direction, suppose somebody tries a Plexi preset and thinks it's close, but isn't sure what is needed to get it the rest of the way there. Another person would audition that preset and know that the Tube Screamer in front of it is the missing piece of the puzzle and they nail it quickly.
 
I find that in particular the presets lack sustain/compression for a lot of lead work. But like everybody will respond, just my opinion and others may have different preferences
I think it's because they're designed for live use, which lots of high SPL gain reinforcement.
 
I am not saying that I do not have success with them , because I have used some of them, but I enjoy them for a while, I select a bunch that I keep at the Axe-FX, and I forget about them as I create my presets. The same with the hundreds of commercial presets that I've bought.

There is nothing wrong with them. It is just a development of personal taste, tweaking skills, the choice of IR, and the joy of DIY
 
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Presets should be viewed as a starting point. In all of the years I have been dealing with digital gear (about three decades), I have never encountered a factory preset that was "exactly" what I was looking for, save for maybe one or two stereo detuning effects in the Eventide H9.
And different strokes for different folks. Been here a long time and this subject or, shall I say discussion comes up quite a bit.
I always find it "amazing" that none are usable, workable, etc, etc, etc.
But this is why I said what I said in my first sentence.

I also will say "almost ALWAYS" in these discussions high gain (in varying degrees), are the preferred sounds looked for in presets and not found.
I have always found "some" factory prese5s" that I can use or at least tweak a bit to my liking. I mean since the Standard days going forward.
what I do find are heavy FX in most presets. But that is to be expected since they (whomever made the modeler) are trying to showcase all the device can do.
 
complete success here - I look for one that is kinda like the sound I'm after, and tweak it to my taste since it would be a total fluke that any preset from anywhere that I have not tweaked myself is gonna sound good with my unique hands / guitar. I happen to believe this effect is pretty universal after reading many 100s of similar "can't get the tone in the vid" / "that preset that's supposed to be awesome ain't working for me" threads.
 
I don’t know guys ..... I see guys like Cooper Carter, Mark Day, Leon Todd, Larry Mitchell etc sound pretty awesome without fail going through a bunch of stock presets.....

Those guys are all super talented guitar players of course. I’m not saying anyone else isn’t talented, but I think when the only difference is the person playing it’s hard to blame the gear or preset, no ?
 
Challenge: could you have tweaked by yourself a preset as good, or better than factory preset Limelight M@, for that specific tone? :p
 
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I don’t know guys ..... I see guys like Cooper Carter, Mark Day, Leon Todd, Larry Mitchell etc sound pretty awesome without fail going through a bunch of stock presets.....

Those guys are all super talented guitar players of course. I’m not saying anyone else isn’t talented, but I think when the only difference is the person playing it’s hard to blame the gear or preset, no ?
Ya, my stock answer (nauseatingly repetitive but I'm relentless) - get the DI track for one of those players' awesome sounding to you performances through your studio monitors with a given stock preset with no PP - reamp that DI through the same stock preset on your own Axefx rig, and listen, on the same studio monitors, to the exact same awesome sound being produced by your rig thru that stock preset as you heard from their rig - then lastly, and most importantly, accept, because there is no alternative, that the answer to why the stock preset sounds different when you play through it, can only lie within your own hands/pick/guitar/pickups/strings/guitar setup/tuning - nothing else - you can stop wishing for someone to come and say - "oh just adjust your global xyz parameter setting to abc and all those presets will dial right in for you". Also, despite HiRezReverb, AFAIK Axefx does not model AITR through FRFR - totally different things as Axefx includes mic'ing in the IRs that AITR does not - this used to be a modelling 101 mantra regularly restated here (almost pasted on our foreheads upon entry) - I don't see what's changed - Axefx with Cab modelling turned on is not designed for AITR - it's designed for a mic'd cab in another room which sounds different - possibly disappointing in comparison to some - better to others like me who prefer mic'd cab to AITR.
 
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