Call to arms: Where are all the Ultra/Std users?

V

Vaelthunder

Member
I know this can be a little bit pointless, but the Ultra/Std community is pretty much dead and I wonder:
Where are all the users that have these units? Are they explored to their fullest by now that you don't need to change ideas/patches/*stuff*?
Even if you moved on to II, someone must be using your old Ultra/Std, right? Where are they?!

I've jumped onto the Axewagon a little too late, and started with an Ultra, and I feel that it's not that easy to change ideas and improve my tweaking. Lot's of old threads are dead [broken links, caused by forum change (?) / axe change moving to new servers (?)] and somehow people don't post anything new anymore.

Should I think about moving on to another unit? I've heard some awesome things coming out from an Ultra but I'm still far to achieve the "perfect" tone. Is there still hope to discuss here and improve? Is there a place where people still talk on a daily basis about their tweaking?

Ultra/Std users, are you still there? Is your unit new to you? For how long have you been tweaking? :roll

Cheers (and sorry if I sound too grumpy, not my intention!).
 
Last edited:
I have an Ultra and a II and the Ultra is still a completely awesome tool. Good tone is good tone and someone could honestly make great music in any genre with the ultra from now to the end of time. So it'll always be a cutting edge unit in my eyes no matter where the technology goes.

That said, for most of the old hands, the Gen 1 units are well understood and quite stable, so they don't frequent the forum or talk about user level tips for the Gen 1 units like the old days. Most of the frequent posters are big Fractal fans so they own both units or moved from the 1s to the 2s so they could follow the evolution of Fractal's technology. Thus, the II has ongoing updates, continues to evolve at a wild pace, and it gets all the attention and generates all the chatter.

But that doesn't make the Gen 1 boxes any less capable and as you're discovering they are VERY "deep" units which unfortunately do not get as much attention here as they used to. In fact, I'm kind of amazed at how dead this forum is too, since all those Gen 1 boxes must still be out there rocking somewhere. FWIW, the tones ARE in there, so it is worth working with. The original Gen 1 wiki is still available. That is an incredible resource. A lot of major Fractal experts are around but many of themprobably just don't have time to surf both sets of forums and are focused on the newer boxes.

Anyway, FWIW, as a II owner, I still consider the Gen 1s to be amazing and can definitely say they are worth the effort to dial in, in every respect.

Maybe post a new thread asking some questions and some of the experts will see it and chime in.
 
I have an Ultra. Love it. Definitely wish there were more users participating here. I get jealous of all the cool info and patches the II users keep throwing around.
 
Exactly my thoughts... Maybe this should be a call to arms for new users that, like me, are starting to understand/discover the power of this unit.
I feel that a big part of the new Ultra/Std users don't comment/post new threads because they feel that this forum is dead. So far I came here to lurk amongst old threads, but maybe it's time for a new cycle and start asking/creating new topics/discussing, even if we repeat ourselves, because many of the old threads have dead links and that is sometimes discouraging. Many old Ultras/Std are finding new owners and we need to relearn...

"What is your approach when it comes to building patches?
How do you try to match someone's tone?
How do you reamp with the Ultra/Std and how can you play with effects and record a clean DI at the same time?"

These and many other questions might have been asked and replied before, but with the firmware updates / axe edit updates / new interfaces / etc. some of this info is clearly outdated. Let's see if this helps to get the Ultra/Std back on track... Cheers!
 
This is a false impression the original poster has. There are a large number of users of Std and Ultra... they're just not very vocal on this forum, because we have been displaced by "the new". It's unfortunate and it does not bode well for the Axe-FX II (which will also, one day, be discontinued - it's just inevitable).

The lifetime of these units could be greatly enhanced if the forum was kept alive. I realize there are STD and Ultra sections on the forum, but they're pretty much stagnant.

I'm an Ultra user, and find that my Ultra still has three times more power than I need. I have hit the CPU limit (many times), but learned how to optimize. The things that bother me most about the Ultra (i.e. those dreaded modifier curves) are mostly the same on the II, so there is little reason for me to switch.

It's just sad the the "first generation" dialog has essentially died off since the introduction of the II.

As an aside, it makes me chuckle to see some of the dialog on the II... the average age range has gone radically down, and you can tell. Also, the ratio of experienced to inexperienced users has also gone down (a natural thing to happen when the user base grows). In my view, the forum is nowhere near as fascinating as it was in the early days... but I digress.
 
I love my ultra. I mean LOVE it. I recently picked up a used HD500 for hotels and while it has a few decently modelled amps, the effects are no where near the ultra. It's almost painful now and have been spoiled by the quality of the ultra to the point that something as simple as reverbs are just so musical in the ultra that other modellers can't compare.

One thing I do is search for old posts in the ultra forums when I start feeling envious of the II. It's kind of ironic the threads in there.... Do some reading and you'll find what I mean. Plus you'll find some invaluable tidbits of information and inspiration. There are a few amps I become hooked on only because I read some of the old threads. The gen1 is an amazing machine and one I hope keeps going strong for years to come.
 
Ok, while we have a few Ultra/Std owners paying attention... has any of you Gen 1 users tried the new Ownhammer IRs? I'm tempted, but all the raving reviews have come from Gen 2 users.

I know, I know... a good IR is a good IR... but I'm wondering if the benefits are *that* obvious with a gen 1.
 
I haven't tried them yet but I've heard a lot about them so I'm curious too... Anyone?

Quick subject change: When going through old threads, how do you browse the forum? Do you search for something in specific or do you read thread by thread? If you take the thread by thread approach, where (as a noob) should I begin (besides reading the Axe Wiki)? I'm asking this because honestly I don't know where to (re)start.

For example: Right now I'm struggling to get a good high gain tone that has a lot of sustain. I've tried the most obvious workarounds to increase the sustain (mess with the noise gate, using compression, etc) but nothing seems to work. So I decided to search by "sustain" and, as expected, a lot of unrelated results appeared and I can't seem to find an answer to my problem. How do you deal with this kind of situations? Do you "ask for help" or you do keep on browsing in the hopes of finding something that might help, even if you don't know where the root of your problem is? (PS: I'm using TS808 OD/Energyball/4x12RECTO2 and PEQ + GEQ. Everything about this tone is right for me, but the lack of sustain is really killing it - specially when it comes to pinch harmonics).
 
Ultra user here, still love it everytime I play it through a PA or through a tube power amp and cab. It is sad that the Fractal first born is set aside as it were for the new baby, but that's life with tech stuff. Still a great source of info here and in the WIKI site. And as you've seen with your post, us Gen1ers are still lurking here to help.

@Vael, what is your input 1 level set at? (knob on front panel) If that was set too low, that can limit your sustain. I usually keep mine around 1-2 oclock. Just tickles the red when hitting the strings hard.

@Dpoirier, I have the Ownhammer Modern speaker collection to add to my on going collection of IR's, and I highly recommend them. Very detailed and helps bring out the character of the amps which makes for easy tweaks to dial in a great tone. I currently filled my 10 user slots with them. With all the Redwirez and the Fractal cab packs that I have, that's saying something.
 
Ultra Gen 1 user here, I post occasionally when I can be of assistance. I dont understand all the crazy things it can do well, but if I have insight or a question I post. I dont post patches, but I'm interested in sharing...I'm just starting to be 100% happy with my patches...so maybe I'll get ballsy one day and share, lol.

I use a few different approaches live for my expression controllers and also have customer IR's from underground studios...so i think a lot of times that my stuff wont translate well to others rigs, lol
 
I use my ultra all the time, but since I've pretty much found a setup for everything I need I don't spend so much time exploring the options, I just use it on gigs and in rehearsals, I also just spend 2 days in the studio recording the next Træben cd with it last week.

I guess the best way to get a discussion going is to post a recording of the tone you have made and what you are trying to achieve? A high gain tone with a lot of sustain could describe both Gary Moore and Metallica to me so that's not very specific (to me anyway).

Edit: you already did I see, and in the right subforum too! Sorry :)

Jens
 
@Axisman5150, yeap, that's where I keep my input 1 level too. Around 2 o'clock, occasionally hitting red when I strum the strings TOO hard.

@Smilzo I'm playing through my Yamaha HS80M monitors.

The setup I'm using is: Axe-FX Ultra > M-Audio Fire Solo > DAW (Studio One) > Yamaha HS80M (plugged into M-Audio Fire Solo) / occasionally some cheap Sennheiser HD201 Headphones (not the case when trying to find new tones).

I'm sure the guitars aren't the problem (Schecter C-1 Blackjack with SD JB and 59 & Ibanez Apex 2 w/ BKP Painkiller and Dimarzio EVO) since I play them on my rehearsal space with my Maxon OD808 + Peavey 6505 + ENGL E212VH Pro and the sustain is massive.

I'll try to post the patch at its current state sometime later when I'm at home, maybe it will help.

@Jens Yeap! No problem, thanks for the help anyways :)

On the subject, anyone care to share their best patches for high gain tones? Mainly I'm looking for 2 different approaches: one modern death metal patch, in the likes of The Black Dahlia Murder, and one "oh no, another kid looking for a" djent tone, in the likes of Modern Day Babylon, as I posted in the Preset Change section of the forum.

Cheers!
 
larsmars said:
Hi,

Have you tried to turn of the noise gate and use a gate Block after the amp?

Lars
Click to expand...


I did, even without the gate Block after the amp. Didn't seem to work. I'll post the patch and an example of what's happening later :)

Don't want to turn this into a "tone chasing" thread, so sorry for the offtopic, but thanks for the help!
 
Dpoirier said:
Ok, while we have a few Ultra/Std owners paying attention... has any of you Gen 1 users tried the new Ownhammer IRs? I'm tempted, but all the raving reviews have come from Gen 2 users.

I know, I know... a good IR is a good IR... but I'm wondering if the benefits are *that* obvious with a gen 1.
Click to expand...

I am a long time Standard user. It is all I need. I play in a regular gigging cover band and I dialed in my core tones long ago. Because I am so happy with my tones, I am not a chaser any more. Sometimes I tweak because I am looking for new effects to spice things up or fit a new song. With regard to IR's, I have been using the same IR for the majority of my core presets. I have purchased some Redwire IR's a while back as well as have downloaded countless ones from this forum. I trust my ears and ultimately, I have a hard time finding an improvement over what I was using... nothing ever knocked my socks off. That was UNTIL I purchased the new Ownhammer Modern pack last week. The first IR I tried from that pack (Scumback), I loaded into User Slot 10. BAM! It was a dramatic improvement over my "go to" Cab I had been using for a couple years now. That's it. I didn't even bother trying another from that pack yet. I had a gig that night and sounded better than I ever have. More girth & balls to my tone, some highs were tamed. Cut through the mix well. I can't wait to dig into these IR's a bit more. If the first one I tried so far sounds THAT good, I can only imagine that there are at least a bunch of killer additional speakers in that pack that are as good or better. I can tell you that that 1st IR alone was easily worth the $20 I spent on the pack.

So as it applies to the original post, I can only assume that there are plenty of Gen 1 users out there who are quite happy with their Axe-Fx and are not feeling the need to have the latest and greatest. I too wish the Gen 1 community here was a bit more active, but there is a massive amount of information, creative ideas in the vaults of this forum that are just a search away.
 
Vaelthunder said:
@Smilzo I'm playing through my Yamaha HS80M monitors.

The setup I'm using is: Axe-FX Ultra > M-Audio Fire Solo > DAW (Studio One) > Yamaha HS80M (plugged into M-Audio Fire Solo) / occasionally some cheap Sennheiser HD201 Headphones (not the case when trying to find new tones).

I'm sure the guitars aren't the problem (Schecter C-1 Blackjack with SD JB and 59 & Ibanez Apex 2 w/ BKP Painkiller and Dimarzio EVO) since I play them on my rehearsal space with my Maxon OD808 + Peavey 6505 + ENGL E212VH Pro and the sustain is massive.
Click to expand...
Immagine you rise studio level up to rehearsal... probably you have to cut bass, high, and adjust gain (less). Different volume and eq that interact with your guitar (on the other side, your live setup at studio level will have less sustain!). Try adjust eq and level until guitar feedback and sustain feel right to you. You may want to use separate output and eq from axefx for monitor & recording.
 
Dpoirier said:
Ok, while we have a few Ultra/Std owners paying attention... has any of you Gen 1 users tried the new Ownhammer IRs? I'm tempted, but all the raving reviews have come from Gen 2 users.

I know, I know... a good IR is a good IR... but I'm wondering if the benefits are *that* obvious with a gen 1.
Click to expand...

I have all Ownhammers IRs are amazing with Gen1.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom