Does anyone else find they have a new favorite amp in different firmware releases

What I've found is that I generally like all the amps more as the firmware versions progress. In earlier firmwares I'd play an amp and clearly dislike it. Now, it's not so clear.

I recall when the Tucana was first released and I didn't like it at all; I felt it was too cocked-wah sounding and had some weird midrange stuff going on. It became my goto model once FW 19 hit, and now with Quantum 1.0, I find it hard to play anything else. Almost any sound I want out of it I can get, typically with just my guitar's volume knob and pickup selector.
 
Depends on how far the parameter changes go. It sounds like the equivalent of selecting specific values for components to me, which is not really deviating from the 'real world' design. Most designers are going to select passive components like resistors and capacitors that can easily vary by as much as 20% in their measured value from the schematic 'design' value.

When you go to buy an amp, in your specific real world amp, all those fuzzy 5,10,20 percent windows all resolve to some specific value for the one you have and it will NOT be the same as the value set printed on the schematic or in the prototypes the manufacturer built. The result is an incredible amount of variation some audible, some not. This is why specific tube amps of the same design all have the same character since schematically they are the same within tolerance but there are the occasional magical mojo specimens where all the stars aligned on a specific set of measured values that sound extra good.

While I am sure FAS tries to procure prime specimens with intrinsic mojo, I have zero problems with them going through and hand selecting specific values which give optimal performance which may vary slightly from their on site specimen and IMHO, this in no way diminishes the claim 'this is a model of amp X'. Now if they were to do something like change the feedback topology of the power amp... Yes, this is a modified amp, it should be named to reflect that so people's expectations are aligned but that doesn't sound like what Cliff is saying.

Pretty much my thoughts; I prefer an optimal sound/tone over an exact dupe of a subpar sound/amp tone.

Now, I'm new to all this and my axefx came with some other presets as a bonus and since day one I've just loved a patch called Brownface (IIRC) and it's got a verb lux amp that is totally "edge of breakup" with split humbuckers on a PRS C22 while full hb pups allow for "more" gain and other benefits.

Now with 1.03-1.04 I've begun to explore a lot of other amp models and couldn't be happier with the "new"!tones via the triode update - just awesome.

Lastly, I think the axefx can surpass tube amps because it's infinitely configurable - perhaps in 10 yrs a new modeling paradigm may come along from all that is learned about tone and modeling?
 
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Yes and no. Sometimes newly added amps sound best in their first appearance, then they go through series of small changes in next firmwares and might lose their specialty. Nuclear tone for example. Diezels have been on a on/off rollercoaster, but Voxes and JCM800 are always steadily awesome. :)
 
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