Do we really want an Axe FX VST?

Necroing this thread from the perspective of a mostly bedroom musician to say: absolutely. I care about quality guitar tone, and certainly Fractal's technology is as good or better than anything else out there, but Axe FX also isn't the only game in town anymore for increasingly very realistic amp simulations and the expensive hardware is paying for the privilege of unnecessary limitations and additional hassle if you are only using this to digitally record at home or in a studio. The I/Os are redundant or unnecessary for a lot of us. I can get a Neural plugin now and dial it to be blind-test indistinguishable from my real 6505+. Helix Native honestly isn't too far behind anymore either. I'd have to sell it and most of my other possessions to afford Fractal. A lot of things in life aren't cheap and justifiably so, but no matter how much I would like to justify it, I can't justify hardware with lower specs and capabilities than my PC which costs half as much when its workflow in a recording situation is less convenient than plugin competitors. Maybe if I was a touring musician where road-worthy hardware and all the physical routing options are genuine necessities. For someone who is using digital guitar processing for recording only Axe FX 3 doesn't really make sense anymore and neither does FM3.

A plugin though, for purely studio as opposed to road use where the only processing limitation is your PC? I said it before: Fractal's technology is as good or better than anything else out there. Assuming it's not priced identically to the hardware, it would probably be the option that makes the most sense to a lot of us. None of this is to knock Fractal's hardware either, because it has legitimate use cases. I feel like I'm part of a market that doesn't need or want that, Fractal isn't competing in it, and I wish it was.
 
It's continually amusing to me that people think the price would be substantially less if the hardware was omitted.

You're not paying for the hardware, folks. The hardware is readily copied by anyone who wants to do so.

You're paying for the firmware. That's the true intellectual property and the cost of that doesn't change substantial if it's delivered in a rack solution or as a downloaded VST. In fact, you could argue it's MORE expensive to deliver it as a VST because the potential for loss is so much higher.
 
With all due respect, there's a $1000 price difference between the Axe FX 3 and the FM3. Surely the hardware plays some role in this, no? I'm not suggesting Fractal ought to undercut Helix Native or something on price. There's all kinds of approaches to market that Fractal could take with this to maximize profit (Neural for example, which is higher quality than Line 6, sells models individually and in small collections. If Fractal did the same thing I'd certainly be interested!) but I'm just throwing out there that there's a separate market for people who don't need or can't justify the hardware and would even find it inconvenient.
 
All popular software, VST and VSTi has already been cracked, even the ones protected with iLok or with cloud account protection
 
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The FM3 also does less than an Axe-Fx III.

An Eventide H9 is $699. The Eventide H9 plugin bundle is $499.

So you'd shave 20-30% of the hardware using a similar pricing structure.

The value is in the algorithms. Not the hardware.
 
Hasn't stopped other wildly popular plug-in makers from being successful. Who downloads a plug-in and then buys digital hardware anyways? If Fractal was to do a full-on Axe FX VST with no limitations and all the effects and whatnot it would certainly be worth an investment. I'm not trying to denigrate the product or what it's worth and I'm not trying to cause an argument. For someone like me, and who knows, maybe I'm less representative than I thought, the salient point I'm really trying to make is that it's paying that much for hardware that is limiting compared to just working in the box with VSTs that doesn't really make sense even if Fractal is as good or better, and if Fractal were to see any opportunity in that market, I'm sure they'd have waiting customers on the basis of the overall quality.
 
To clarify I was talking about illegal downloads and the people who do that of the sort Piing was alluding to, not people who are honest or are professionals.
 
This topic has been debated ad-nauseam for many, many years now. Cliff had stated years ago that they had a version of the Axe-FX platform up and running on a computer but they didn't want to release it into the wild for fear of piracy. Not only that, Fractal would probably have to increase the amount of support staff and/resources just to field all these questions about issues using the software that are no fault of theirs. Then there's the chance of cannibalizing hardware sales.

It's super competitive in the plug-in space (which I'm sure they learned with FAS-FX Reverb) and if they thought pros outweighed the cons we probably would have seen this product from them many years ago. But with the industry's constant sales, race to the bottom pricing and rampant piracy, I highly doubt we'll ever see this. Maybe another effect or two (not holding my breath), but not the amps.
 
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realmoth said:
Necroing this thread from the perspective of a mostly bedroom musician to say: absolutely. I care about quality guitar tone, and certainly Fractal's technology is as good or better than anything else out there, but Axe FX also isn't the only game in town anymore for increasingly very realistic amp simulations and the expensive hardware is paying for the privilege of unnecessary limitations and additional hassle if you are only using this to digitally record at home or in a studio. The I/Os are redundant or unnecessary for a lot of us. I can get a Neural plugin now and dial it to be blind-test indistinguishable from my real 6505+. Helix Native honestly isn't too far behind anymore either. I'd have to sell it and most of my other possessions to afford Fractal. A lot of things in life aren't cheap and justifiably so, but no matter how much I would like to justify it, I can't justify hardware with lower specs and capabilities than my PC which costs half as much when its workflow in a recording situation is less convenient than plugin competitors. Maybe if I was a touring musician where road-worthy hardware and all the physical routing options are genuine necessities. For someone who is using digital guitar processing for recording only Axe FX 3 doesn't really make sense anymore and neither does FM3.

A plugin though, for purely studio as opposed to road use where the only processing limitation is your PC? I said it before: Fractal's technology is as good or better than anything else out there. Assuming it's not priced identically to the hardware, it would probably be the option that makes the most sense to a lot of us. None of this is to knock Fractal's hardware either, because it has legitimate use cases. I feel like I'm part of a market that doesn't need or want that, Fractal isn't competing in it, and I wish it was.
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One thing to remember: before the pandemic, there was hardly any discussion on this forum of people recording at home. In other words, the target market for the AxeFX has always predominantly been live performers, for whom a plugin version would have little appeal.

Yes, FAS could grow into the (home) recording market by delivering a plugin version, but the entry barriers for that market are notoriously low, so they'd be up against severe competition and they could not expect the kind of success they've enjoyed in the hardware market. That, combined with the lower price dictated by the plugin market (yes, the delivery mechanism of the product has an effect on the price) and cannibalism of hardware sales means that would only make sense if there was no other option for the future of the company.

Line6 is a little different since Helix Native was an essential ingredient of their product plan from the very beginning. NDSP is also different since they're going from plugin to hardware instead of the other way around.

I'm sure Cliff considers a plugin version from time to time, but I suspect the reverb plugin was a trial balloon and that trial balloon deflated pretty quickly when there was an ilok incident shortly after it was released.

The synthesizer market might be a good parallel to observe. For the most part, hardware synth makers have chosen to not repackage their synths as plugins and have ceded that market to others. They have chosen to stick to the higher margins and less competition of the hardware market, and ride that market as long as they can.
 
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I actually prefer a rack unit for home stuff over a VST plugin. That thing might last me a life time. I'm not sure a plugin will.
 
Rex said:
Were we on the same forum? :)
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I'm strictly a home recording AxeFX user, so I've always kept an eye out for threads on that topic. Sure, there have always been recording discussions and topics on the forum, but before last April there were comparatively few threads about recording. Rig picture threads were predominantly people showing their live rig. A forum poll showed about two thirds of forum members are mainly performing guitarists.

Obviously things have changed since the pandemic and the number of threads about recording grew dramatically. Issues with recording that nobody ever commented on before suddenly became hot topics of discussion. The number of wishes relevant to studio usage grew.

My point is this uptick in forum traffic about recording is a relatively new (and probably/hopefully a temporary) phenomenon, so don't be misled by that into thinking the majority of AxeFX users are exclusively using it for recording.
 
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GlennO said:
My point is this amount of traffic about recording is a relatively new (and probably/hopefully a temporary) phenomenon, so don't be misled by that into thinking the majority of AxeFX users are exclusively using it for recording.
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And let's not forget the segment that record in places other than their home. Yes I'm set up to track guitars at home, but I find a lot of value in being able to take my AX8 live rig to studio sessions where we'll be tracking drums, and running direct with all the controls right there vs. having an amp tucked away in an iso room somewhere is fantastic, even just for scratch tracks. Or my bass player has some ideas he wants to play with so I can easily pack up the rig and go to his place, and use the same setup we'll use live.

I have a few of the Neural packs, which I used while waiting for my FM3, and I haven't touched them since. Recording guitar with just a VST has never been a fun or productive experience for me. That one time you need to play guitar somewhere other than your bedroom and the VST setup is crap. (I've seen a guy at a local open mic, where everyone gets 2 songs, try to set up a laptop and interface while wasting everyone else's time)

And re-amping....I've never had a need or want to do that in over 20 years of recording guitar. Having to, and learning to commit to things can be a valuable skill in the recording world.
 
realmoth said:
To clarify I was talking about illegal downloads and the people who do that of the sort Piing was alluding to, not people who are honest or are professionals.
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If you don't want someone in your house, don't open the door to them. In this case, Fractal doesn't want any little pirates in their home, so the option for them to come in isn't made available. Blame it on the pirates, they ruined it for everyone.
 
Muad'zin said:
I actually prefer a rack unit for home stuff over a VST plugin. That thing might last me a life time. I'm not sure a plugin will.
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I agree with you on this, it's nice having an independent and dedicated unit, butttttt;

The last a lifetime part? I learned the hard that isn't true directly from Fractal Audio. Had my old Ultra collecting dust, and decided to donate it to a friend for an upgrade over his POD XT Pro. He was having hardware issues with it, and contacted Fractal Audio about getting it sorted out, and was met with a "we no longer service that model" message.

So that pricey piece of gear was immediately rendered not only obsolete, but useless as well.

At least with an old once expensive television, you can have any of the numerous television repair shops repair it. Fractal Audio gear, you're at the mercy of one location.
 
An Axe-FX VST isn't gonna happen. We stand a better chance of getting a Klon Centaur model in the drive block.
 
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