After a week or so with 10 betas and RC2 into the studio monitors: I thought I’d hook up my actual speaker cabinets: And wow, I’m really impressed. FRFR is great and all, but a real cabinet has its own charm, and I’m getting all of that with v10 without needing EQ adjustments and other efforts of earlier firmware. All I’ve needed do is turn off the cab block and run the AX8 into an SS power amp and to the speaker. The sound and feel is all there: The guitar tone and volume knobs can finesse the proper form just as they do with all tube analog: Plus, the advanced parameters like sag and speaker drive or swapping out preamp tubes translate beautifully.
Since the AX8, I’d downsized to 3 favorite (and versatile) guitar speakers (and 2 seldom used amps): The Celestion Type A which goes well with Fenders or ambient shimmer, a Celestion G12-35XC; which does just about everything well - but particularly with Vox and Marshall type amps, and an Eminence Lynch Super V12 which is not only masterful with high gain material, but aces that Fane muscular clarity with the Carol Ann Tucana Clean, or as you'd expect with a Hiwatt. Each of these speakers match up with various FAS amp models with results much as one would expect with actual amps. Whereas some improvements of v10 over earlier firmware may be subtle: AX8 to SS amp into an actual cabinet is: in sound, feel, and behavior; substantially more authoritative and authentically tube-like than before. Dialed in as a default. I have the Celestion IRs of the G12-35XC and the Type A to actually compare with: and they are as similar as one could expect with the inherent apples and oranges difference between FRFR and a cabinet: IR variances due to mic types and the actual cab being “in the room" without a mic.
I expect players that prefer actual cabinets when circumstances allow, will be really happy with firmware 10. Glad I kept mine.