Axe-Fx II "Quantum" Rev 4.00 Firmware Release

I've had my axe fx 2 years now. Been here since around firmware 9. I have never posted once, but felt compelled to. These updates are awesome and just keep getting better. But when you voluntarily update to the newest firmware and you have to spend a lil bit of time tweaking your presets, i am positive it is only a fraction compared to the amount of time Cliff and the team put into preparing these firmware updates that they let us download for free.
 
qjawz said:
Couldn't you just reinstall the Factory Presets?....According to what should happen is they should automatically update if they're Prior to 3.0?
Click to expand...
Thanks ... that worked. Just having them installed on the machine or importing them from folders as individual presets did not trigger the LATEST revision but when I reinstalled the entire bank, as you suggested, it did. I think if I now export them and bring them back in selectively they should retain the LATEST revision. Appreciate your willingness to actually offer a useful suggestion that did not simply denigrate or brush away the issue as irrelevant.
 
Last edited:
quark said:
Thanks ... that worked. Just having them installed on the machine or importing them from folders as individual presets did not trigger the LATEST revision but when I reinstalled the entire bank, as you suggested, it did. I think if I now export them and bring them back in selectively they should retain the LATEST revision. Appreciate your willingness to actually offer a useful suggestion that did not simply denigrate or brush away the issue as irrelevant.
Click to expand...
Would that work as well for user banks?
Just save the bank and then reload the bank & it'd update to the current FW?
 
Updated without testing and played a gig last night. I concur with the positive comments here - the feel is great, harshness is gone and low end is full and clear, even though I removed hi and lo cut from the cab block. Great work, Cliff!
 
merlin17 said:
Updated without testing and played a gig last night. I concur with the positive comments here - the feel is great, harshness is gone and low end is full and clear, even though I removed hi and lo cut from the cab block. Great work, Cliff!
Click to expand...

Exactly what I heard, felt the instant I upgraded!!!
 
quark said:
As it is now, even though I load the new firmware, I can't hear it unless I go into every one of my presets and change the Model Revision to LATEST.

If I load the new firmware, I think I should be able to hear the new firmware without any preset adjustment. Then if I don't like what I hear, for a particular preset, I can change the Model Revision and/or other parameters to something else for that particular preset.

It just seems that the "burden" of adjusting presets should be on those who load the new firmware and then decide to step back rather than on those who load the new firmware and expect to hear what it sounds like. Don't want changes, don't load the new firmware or load it and then reset your presets to a previous version # or simply reload the old firmware.

If you only have a few presets, then no big deal but if you've been purchasing preset packs or want to hear the changes a revision makes to the factory presets, then you have a lot of work to do in order to hear the effect of the new firmware on a large group of presets.

Default behavior, in my opinion, should be to hear the new firmware and the option should be to step back.
Click to expand...
Yes, but imagine if 20% of the customers are performing musicians who tour throughout the year, who might totally freak out after making the proverbial "its your choice" to update, and then find themselves liking the new firmware 50%/50%, but then 30 minutes later 30%/70%. I think Cliff made a wise choice, forcing a serious listen before guys start panicking and feeling confused, and even accidentally over-writing presets in their ambivalence. This way, a careful case-by-case preset-upgrade choice is made for those guys who depend on stability (even a certain, warm Fractal style of hand-holding), while on the road with a bunch of drunkards.

Better yet, imagine the whole thing I just wrote, but replace the percentages with an assortment of the best tasting pizza slices, and replace the words, "..might totally freak.." with the words, "..might ingest, no wolf, 40 chocolate doughnuts.."

I'm just hungry.

Interesting suggestion though, for more well-fed readers.
 
I just installed this firmware a few seconds ago. My immediate reaction is to blow it out of proportion I'm sure.

Let me explain; I used to handle the "harshness factor" by having different presets for different pickups, with the bridge and mid pickup tone dialed away from the higher frequencies.

My guitar has no tone knob (and so has more bright end), so I always assumed has been why I've noticed this particular issue - and needed to compensate a bit.

But wow, the natural sound of this firmware makes this basically unnecessary. Not only that, the response comes through better because its out from behind any previous harshness. (also, I'm able to get much closer to an authentic strat or VH humbucker sound with my setup, which had evaded me a bit - if I want them, piercing harmonics ala Rory Gallagher are right there now). These pickups and these setup choices smoke now! (If you want to try a guitar with your unit that has no tone control now - or a similar option, I highly recommend it) Thanks for your work Cliff!
 
Last edited:
I like it and the ability to be able to A/B - It really makes hearing the differences with certain models easy. However, please hurry up with 5.0 and make sure the company continues to top itself with each new version. Thanks.
 
quark said:
Thanks ... that worked. Just having them installed on the machine or importing them from folders as individual presets did not trigger the LATEST revision but when I reinstalled the entire bank, as you suggested, it did. I think if I now export them and bring them back in selectively they should retain the LATEST revision. Appreciate your willingness to actually offer a useful suggestion that did not simply denigrate or brush away the issue as irrelevant.
Click to expand...

Excuse my N00b question but how does one go about reinstalling the entire bank of factory presets?

Thank you,
 
VeryBadMan said:
Tone is still awesome as usual but when I tried my Mesa Mark IIC ++ preset it was as if I had pressed the " easy " button. Smoother , faster more articulate feel. It that a result of the " squish ", compression, changes in harmonic structure ? I don't know but it's like the Mesa sweet spot without fussing with knobs for hours and waiting for all the celestial bodies to be in proper alignment for the magic to happen. Cool update.
Click to expand...
I really feel that the harmonics-behavior is much more natural. The "cream" (lack of harshly competing harmonics), and the effect on the tone from compression at different settings may both be a factor. Certainly the former.

Its like Cliff found a way of doing the equivalent of when you turn off the soup when its hot and creamy, just before the oil suddenly, in a span of two minutes, separates and sticks frustratingly up the sides of the pan...

For me one thing is certain - this really mitigates the phenomena where a limited number of IR's were "most useable" without adjusting Hi Freq Cutoff. While with most guitars this had largely been solved, but with this one guitar I have with Freds and no tone knob, there is so much high harmonic content available; The experience of changing and choosing IR's for me is going to be even less like putting on the hazardous waste suit, and a lot more like being a chef and checking seasonings.

I just had a funny picture of some uber furious gain guy throwing hand-fulls of my fresh seasonings everywhere. Wonder if everyone will like this (I would think so) or will some genre find it "too smooth, too creamy"?
 
Last edited:
AtomicBlaze said:
I am trying the latest version with my favorite Fremen Supertweed 5SC patch, and the patch actually sounds quite a bit different when I change to the latest modeling version, like the notes lack definition and don't have the same character they did before. I increased the preamp Definition and that seems to make it close to how it sounded on the previous firmware.
Click to expand...
I found that between this and previous firmware versions there IS a fairly big difference the result of the exact settings of basic amp knobs like drive and master volume. For example, I had an early Marshall model and increased the drive to get back to where I was. It sounded better, but similar with respect to "definition" as you put it.

So I say use intuition and don't be surprised if you don't need to visit the advanced page at all to get where you want to be.

Maybe someone else can correct me if I'm wrong, but when you say definition, if you mean anything that might result from increasing the proximity of fuel rods in the virtual reactor (my analogy, based on your name, for the basic amp knobs that impact gain), your instincts will probably guide you and you can get from the prior firmware to the current one with this simplistic, nebulous, but for me very effective technique.. Its just that some people may assume that such setting-changes would not be necessary this far along in the development of the algorithms. I have found it to be the contrary...
 
jesussaddle said:
I really feel that the harmonics-behavior is much more natural. The "cream" (lack of harshly competing harmonics), and the effect on the tone from compression at different settings may both be a factor. Certainly the former.

Its like Cliff found a way of doing the equivalent of when you turn off the soup when its hot and creamy, just before the oil suddenly, in a span of two minutes, separates and sticks frustratingly up the sides of the pan...

For me one thing is certain - this really mitigates the phenomena where a limited number of IR's were "most useable" without adjusting Hi Freq Cutoff. While with most guitars this had largely been solved, but with this one guitar I have with Freds and no tone knob, there is so much high harmonic content available; The experience of changing and choosing IR's for me is going to be even less like putting on the hazardous waste suit, and a lot more like being a chef and checking seasonings.

I just had a funny picture of some uber furious gain guy throwing hand-fulls of my fresh seasonings everywhere. Wonder if everyone will like this (I would think so) or will some genre find it "too smooth, too creamy"?
Click to expand...
"No soup, (FW Updates) for you...One year!!";)
 
jesussaddle said:
I really feel that the harmonics-behavior is much more natural. The "cream" (lack of harshly competing harmonics), and the effect on the tone from compression at different settings may both be a factor. Certainly the former.

Its like Cliff found a way of doing the equivalent of when you turn off the soup when its hot and creamy, just before the oil suddenly, in a span of two minutes, separates and sticks frustratingly up the sides of the pan...

For me one thing is certain - this really mitigates the phenomena where a limited number of IR's were "most useable" without adjusting Hi Freq Cutoff. While with most guitars this had largely been solved, but with this one guitar I have with Freds and no tone knob, there is so much high harmonic content available; The experience of changing and choosing IR's for me is going to be even less like putting on the hazardous waste suit, and a lot more like being a chef and checking seasonings.

I just had a funny picture of some uber furious gain guy throwing hand-fulls of my fresh seasonings everywhere. Wonder if everyone will like this (I would think so) or will some genre find it "too smooth, too creamy"?
Click to expand...
That's a new one. Never would have thought to compare firmware with soup :)
 
Soup and Votka go way back with me. That, and seeing woman in big coats and imagining them without those big coats.

To make that an on-topic remark, let's see, maybe the big coat is like the Kemper patch you want to adjust, by seeing her legs.
 
Last edited:
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom