Presets MASTER THREAD - AustinBuddy's 1400+ NAKED AMPS TonePack for firmware Cygnus X2

[Jemguy777]

Is anybody having issues loading the bank A presets? I have tried probably 20 times using fractal bot and the farthest I’ve made it is to about 35% before it stops. I’ve got about the first dozen presets loaded and that’s it. Maybe my download was corrupted? Gonna try to download again and see what happens.

 

[bradlake]

Is anybody having issues loading the bank A presets? I have tried probably 20 times using fractal bot and the farthest I’ve made it is to about 35% before it stops. I’ve got about the first dozen presets loaded and that’s it. Maybe my download was corrupted? Gonna try to download again and see what happens.

It is happening because of the bug in the HiWatt(power) impedance curve if you are on the latest beta. Hopefully Cliff will fix this soon, but until then
you should try to install them in smaller increments thru the AxeEdit preset manager and avoid selectiing OR INSTALLING the Hiwatt patch.#038

 

[austinbuddy]

[OT] @austinbuddy, is there anything you can say about how you keep perspective going through all those presets? I sometimes really dig a tone after I've been working on it for a while, but when I come back to it the next day it's super bright, or bassy. I can't imagine staying centered over 1400+ presets, don't know how you do it.

Do you listen to reference tracks in between? Any "tricks of the trade" on that level?

Great question. A few things.

I do them in sections, just like they are organized in the banks. So they are in rough "food groups" (or amp manufacturers) of sounds. I'll usually do half (or less) a food group in a setting, depending on how big the group is.

I always rest my ears after a few hours and walk away for a good bit of time. I don't push through and do lots at once -- your ears get fatigued and you make mistakes. That's why it takes so long to do updates for 1400 sounds - but it is important for me to do this right and take the time for you guys.

On EQ part of your question, there are lots of types of guitar sounds from bright to dark, clean to gain, and I wanted diversity and not all similar. So yes some sounds are bright by designed, some are bassy (like metal amps) by design. I do everything on Atomic NEO CLRs which have a very defined mid-range, best I've heard, but those CLRs do cut lows at 70Hz and below. I'm mixing in my studio which is a big room (23.5 feet by 25 feet with 11.5 foot ceilings) with speakers one-third of the way from a wall, and you need at least 16 feet+ for a full bass wave to form correctly is what I've read to be accurate. If you are in a regular house smaller room you may have room modes that make the bass louder sound than it actually is if you were in a big club or hall.

Will say I've noticed the firmware 11 paired with cabs has kicked up the bass response a good bit to me from when I dialed in on firmware 5/6.... Or maybe I didn't notice as much back then!

So in the firmware 11 update I am often cutting LO CUT in Cab Block around 150Hz. I used to cut lower at 100Hz or 125Hz ( little lower for Fenders sometimes). The guitar tech for Taylor Swift (a great guy!) told me once they cut every electric guitar at at least 150Hz for sitting great in the band mix, and I now find that very persuasive under firmware 11. I'm also using the amp block CUT a lot more and have turned down the bass by a value of as much as 2 on a number of presets in the update.

I also like to say -- if it's too bright, may I humbly suggest that's what a guitar pickup TONE control is for! All those live videos of Jimmy Page, he is constantly manipulating his volume and tone controls to shade the sound to his ears. But feel free to turn down an amp's treble, presence, bright cap value, until you like what you hear -- or switch to a different cab -- because the latter is the quickest way to adjust the sound.

Enjoy!

 

[austinbuddy]

Is anybody having issues loading the bank A presets? I have tried probably 20 times using fractal bot and the farthest I’ve made it is to about 35% before it stops. I’ve got about the first dozen presets loaded and that’s it. Maybe my download was corrupted? Gonna try to download again and see what happens.

Don't use public BETA firmware 11.2 with these. That firmware has a bug, Cliff knows and it will be fixed.

The Naked Amp presets are fine. Roll back to firmware 11.1 and all will be well.

As a rule, unless you want to be a beta-testing kind dude (and take that risk), I would not install any BETA firmwares, only the ones that are final PUBLIC versions. And always back up everything with FractalBot before you switch over, so you can always go backwards.

 

[austinbuddy]

It is happening because of the bug in the HiWatt(power) impedance curve if you are on the latest beta. Hopefully Cliff will fix this soon, but until then
you should try to install them in smaller increments thru the AxeEdit preset manager and avoid selectiing OR INSTALLING the Hiwatt patch.#038

Brad has it right.

 

[Jemguy777]

It is happening because of the bug in the HiWatt(power) impedance curve if you are on the latest beta. Hopefully Cliff will fix this soon, but until then
you should try to install them in smaller increments thru the AxeEdit preset manager and avoid selectiing OR INSTALLING the Hiwatt patch.#038

I’m on 11.01 still. Haven’t done the beta update but I will try your idea. Thanks!

 

[Jemguy777]

It is happening because of the bug in the HiWatt(power) impedance curve if you are on the latest beta. Hopefully Cliff will fix this soon, but until then
you should try to install them in smaller increments thru the AxeEdit preset manager and avoid selectiing OR INSTALLING the Hiwatt patch.#038

Dude you’re awesome! Thanks. Loading the presets in smaller groups and eliminating that one preset has me rockin!

 

[Ericaw]

Hi. I have clicks and pops with a few presets of the Naked Amps collection. Especially with JVM410HJS and Friedman Smallbox.
I'm on 11.02 beta 3.
Is that a known issue? From the firmware? From the preset?
Thank you
Eric

 

[austinbuddy]

Hi. I have clicks and pops with a few presets of the Naked Amps collection. Especially with JVM410HJS and Friedman Smallbox.
I'm on 11.02 beta 3.
Is that a known issue? From the firmware? From the preset?
Thank you
Eric

Roll back to 11.1 and see if there are still issues? The Hiwatt speaker impedance was only issue I has aware of.

Unless you are a doing beta testing yourself and reporting bugs, I do advise you guys NOT to use a public BETA firmware release with the Naked Amps presets; just use once the firmware is a public final...stuff happens with bugs and that is why it is released as a BETA...

 

[austinbuddy]

Another update: I'm tackling the preamps and bass amps in Bank 2 today and tomorrow, so Bank B is almost done. I'll have to go through the bonus presets too but we are on track to have it all done and updated by New Year's Day if not before. One thing that will take time and may slow me down from making the deadline is to update the User manual AND re-create the entire preset/scene list since I've reorganized most preset scenes to be more numerically ordered clean-to-rhythm-to-lead, so they lay out nicer on a FC12.

Cliff just released a new public BETA (it ain't final) firmware that has new flanger block stuff in it, I'm not sure how it reacts to the old flangers so that may have to be adjusted some in January for the few presets (Van Halen) that have a flanger. I'm pretty stoked about this new flanger stuff, it includes an Electric Mistress model.

 

[madmarcus1960]

Bless you AB for taking the time to do this during your holiday season. The sainthood campaign begins!

 

[greiswig]

Agreed. Thank you for making our investments continue to pay off!

 

[Ericaw]

Thank you. It works fine with 11.01.
Cheers.

 

[Digital Man]

Does 11.2 have preamp modeling?

 

[GuitarDojo]

In a nutshell ....
Buddy packs the posh lunches for you. Its up to you to trim the bread if you dont like the edges, eat the chocolate pudding today and then eat the tapioca tomorrow. I personally like the hard to find beer battered veggie rings with Corndogs (w/Spicy ketchup and mustard) with a nearly frozen Coke Zero.

Chaka Kahn Chaka Kahn!!!!

 

[austinbuddy]

In a nutshell ....
Buddy packs the posh lunches for you. Its up to you to trim the bread if you dont like the edges, eat the chocolate pudding today and then eat the tapioca tomorrow. I personally like the hard to find beer battered veggie rings with Corndogs (w/Spicy ketchup and mustard) with a nearly frozen Coke Zero.

Chaka Kahn Chaka Kahn!!!!

Sushi anyone?

 

[Rekster]

Sale is until midnight December 31st Austin TX time (Central US).

Yes, the point of this pack is to have good amp/cab p[airings for every amp model available in the Ax-Fx. I use every single amp channel/model (more than 260+ - see Cooper Carter video for examples, he used this TonePack to make 263 clips from the 1000 tones available at the time) at least once, and usually up to 8 examples (8 scenes in a preset).

Originally started this in late 2016 for myself -- like you I wanted to hear everything available, and I had been talking to Fractal Audio's Matt Picone about how helpful this would be beyond the provided Factory presets (which as you suspected do not cover every single amp model). Plus I wanted to save time dialing in myself/have a good base tone ready to go the sounds like the real amp's iconic DNA - Fender that sounds like a Fender, a Vox like a Vox, a Marshall like a Marshall, a Dumble like a Dumble, Mesa-Boogie Rectifier like a Dual Rectifier, a Bogner like a Bogner, etc... all are amps I've played before and have heard on record, so I know what to go for.

A lot of the art is to pair a pleasing cab with the right amp (and many cabs can go with an amp to give it different flavors). Cabs are half the sound. When you have 2000+ cabs to choose from, it can be daunting to do this for 260 amps models. @yek has an amp and cab guide on the public Fractal Wiki that was tremendously helpful in that regard.

Another huge part of the art is getting a balanced tone, and to level it properly. Can't stress the preset leveling part enough - I have had amps that sounded wimpy then I added 2 db of level (which does not change the tone) and they came alive out of my speakers. Knowing how to gain stage and level presets for your playback system is a key part to creating greats tones/sounds. I've been a beta team tester for 10 years so known my way around the unit pretty well now...

So in a way, what you really pay for is someone who spent hundreds and hundreds of hours doing a lot of the work for you to tee up a nice base preset (200+ presets with up to 8 scenes = 1400 different tones) that you can then tweak to your own playing style, guitars, and playback system for that last mile. Make sense?

It must have made sense, I just sent you some money.

 

[electronpirate]

@austinbuddy I would suggest that if people are on Beta FW, they are not entitled to support.

PLEASE folks, don't roll in experimental FW and expect that AB can solve your problem. I get it. You want to be on the cutting edge, but I think the way these Presets are designed is for Stage and/or recording appetites. The only way that AB can manage this is with FW that is set in stone....not while FAS tinkers with new refinements.

IMO.

 

[Johnkenn]

Hey @austinbuddy - I realize I'm on Beta 3 and it just might not work correctly, but it seems as though the input boost, fat/bright switches and saturation switch are all assigned to different foot switches...and won't let you turn them off if you don't have a foot controller. I can go in and turn them off by right clicking and selecting "none," but I just wondered if these were intended to be "on" in the presets? I found most of these - at least with my guitars - needed the input boost turned off. Did you intend for these to be on? Or is it a glitch? I just noticed in the first several I tried - Tweed Deluxe, Super and Blackface Deluxe Tele presets.
Maybe I should roll back to 11.01 and try...

 

[frankenbeans]

Hey @austinbuddy - I realize I'm on Beta 3 and it just might not work correctly, but it seems as though the input boost, fat/bright switches and saturation switch are all assigned to different foot switches...and won't let you turn them off if you don't have a foot controller. I can go in and turn them off by right clicking and selecting "none," but I just wondered if these were intended to be "on" in the presets? I found most of these - at least with my guitars - needed the input boost turned off. Did you intend for these to be on? Or is it a glitch? I just noticed in the first several I tried - Tweed Deluxe, Super and Blackface Deluxe Tele presets.
Maybe I should roll back to 11.01 and try...

I believe this is just the way the presets are programmed. That was my biggest “gripe” (and I feel that’s too strong of a word) with the last update. It is an inconvenience for those of us without an FC.