Orvillain
Power User
So I'm still not a 100% convertee over here; I still like valve amps, and I still have this gut feeling or instinct that they sound better than modelling. But I'm having quite a number of my fundamental assumptions challenged over here! 
So this isn't scientific in the slightest, but here is what I have:
Axe FX II output 1 going into a Marshall Valvestate poweramp.
Output 2 going into a DI box with the ground lift enabled, and then into the front of the Diezel D-Moll. I've level matched it to ensure that the level going into the amp is the same with the Axe as without. In short - matched it to plugging the guitar directly in.
Then I'm running this patch:
So in short - scene 1 is the real amp, scene 2 is the modelled amp. Then I record a loop into the looper and switch between the two scenes to compare the amps. There just is no clear winner, as much as I really really really wanted there to be. I didn't care which was the outright winner... I just wanted there to be one, so that the argument in my head could be settled. I had my wife (who isn't a musician and knows nothing about any of this stuff!) which was giving the best tones, but I didn't tell her which was which. Once she picked the real amp and another time she picked the Axe FX.
The time she picked a real amp, I was using Das Metall. The time she picked the model, I was using Euro Red - which weirdly, sounds way closer to my Diezel D-Moll than any of the Diezel models on the unit.
I am *really* liking the Marshall Valvestate poweramp. It adds this bit of glue to the Axe FX and gives it a bit of extra thump. Compared it with a Matrix poweramp the other week that a friend has (he has a Valvestate too) and I thought the Valvestate blew the Matrix out of the water personally.
Very strange and interesting discoveries at the moment. I expected when I first got my Axe to just like it for recording, and would always prefer a real amp... but I cannot say that this has been the result at all. And the Axe has all this extra flexibility, which is both a good thing and a bad thing... because there is nothing like just plugging into a few pedals and then an amp and turning a few knobs.
The fact that for me there is no clear tonal winner is frustrating as hell!
So this isn't scientific in the slightest, but here is what I have:
Axe FX II output 1 going into a Marshall Valvestate poweramp.
Output 2 going into a DI box with the ground lift enabled, and then into the front of the Diezel D-Moll. I've level matched it to ensure that the level going into the amp is the same with the Axe as without. In short - matched it to plugging the guitar directly in.
Then I'm running this patch:
So in short - scene 1 is the real amp, scene 2 is the modelled amp. Then I record a loop into the looper and switch between the two scenes to compare the amps. There just is no clear winner, as much as I really really really wanted there to be. I didn't care which was the outright winner... I just wanted there to be one, so that the argument in my head could be settled. I had my wife (who isn't a musician and knows nothing about any of this stuff!) which was giving the best tones, but I didn't tell her which was which. Once she picked the real amp and another time she picked the Axe FX.
The time she picked a real amp, I was using Das Metall. The time she picked the model, I was using Euro Red - which weirdly, sounds way closer to my Diezel D-Moll than any of the Diezel models on the unit.
I am *really* liking the Marshall Valvestate poweramp. It adds this bit of glue to the Axe FX and gives it a bit of extra thump. Compared it with a Matrix poweramp the other week that a friend has (he has a Valvestate too) and I thought the Valvestate blew the Matrix out of the water personally.
Very strange and interesting discoveries at the moment. I expected when I first got my Axe to just like it for recording, and would always prefer a real amp... but I cannot say that this has been the result at all. And the Axe has all this extra flexibility, which is both a good thing and a bad thing... because there is nothing like just plugging into a few pedals and then an amp and turning a few knobs.
The fact that for me there is no clear tonal winner is frustrating as hell!
