Expression pedal to control gain?

Update #2: Did the same experiment with a couple of Plexi's and the Solo100 Lead (same preset, just changed amps). Same result. There's no visible impact going by the CPU meter at all. I get the exact same range of fluctuation when the controller is set to None as I do when I'm moving it as fast as I can. Edited to add: The Plexi's sounded horrible when doing this. Those models don't like this at all but the CPU meter was not spiking.

Can anyone with a III actually see a spike that isn't there without the controller assigned? If so, what amp model is doing it?

On the models I like the most it seems to have zero impact so I feel safe doing this unless someone from Fractal chimes in. Maybe there's something going on there that happens so quickly it isn't revealed by the meter? To me this seems like running the AC in a four cylinder car versus a V8. The III is a V8. It cares not about your climate control habits. :p

I do get a kick out of trying to break things though. I might even load a preset up to about 80% CPU and see what it does then... I mean we can't physically damage it by loading the hell out of the CPU, right? Is there any harm in maxing it out just to see where its limits are?

Edited to add this from the other thread so I can find it easier. I want to try some of these models and see what's up.

59 Bassguy
1959SLP Jump
1959SLP Treble
1987X Jump
1987X Treble
Bludojai Clean
Bludojai LD 2
Bludojai LD Pab
Bogfish Strato
Brit 800 #34
Brit 800 Mod
Brit 800
Brit JM45
Brit Super
CA OD-2
CA3+ Rhy
Cameron CCV 1A
Cameron CCV 1B
Capt Hook 2A
Capt Hook 2B
Capt Hook 3A
Capt Hook 3B
JS410 Crunch Or
JS410 Crunch Rd
JS410 Lead Or
JS410 Lead Rd
ODS-100 Clean
ODS-100 Ford 1
ODS-100 Ford 2
ODS-100 Ford Md
ODS-100 HRM Mid
ODS-100 HRM
Plexi 50W 6550
Plexi 50W Hi 1
Plexi 50W Hi 2
Plexi 50W Jump
Plexi 100W 1970
Plexi 100W High
Plexi 100W Jump
Solo 88 Rhythm
Solo 100 Rhy
Two Stone J35 1
Two Stone J35 2
 
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Doug Notter said:
Can anyone with a III actually see a spike that isn't there without the controller assigned? If so, what amp model is doing it?
Click to expand...
If you're watching the meter in Axe-Edit, I suspect it could happen that it gets missed. I would use the front panel meter.

Aside from watching are you listening for any artifacts? Crackling, popping, etc?

Anyway, nice to hear that you're getting good results. Thanks for testing.

Also, it is quite possible that due to the massive increase in CPU power on the Axe Fx III vs the II, you would almost never be able to trigger it. That's a good thing! :)
 
unix-guy said:
If you're watching the meter in Axe-Edit, I suspect it could happen that it gets missed. I would use the front panel meter.

Aside from watching are you listening for any artifacts? Crackling, popping, etc?

Anyway, nice to hear that you're getting good results. Thanks for testing.

Also, it is quite possible that due to the massive increase in CPU power on the Axe Fx III vs the II, you would almost never be able to trigger it. That's a good thing! :)
Click to expand...

Good point about about watching the meter on the front panel. I never even look over at the actual unit. I'll keep that in mind next time. I have been listening for artifacts also. Nothing that I can hear. I'll throw on the headphones during the next round just to be sure. One of these days I'll make a quick video to show you all why I like doing this so much. It's awesome on the Mesa and Friedman. On my main preset I have that controller assigned to increase the gain but at the same time decrease the Phaser in the mix. Then I have some extra reverb and delay that gets thrown in via the pitch follower. The whole thing just feels so "alive" when setup this way. Loving the hell out of it.

I did some more testing this morning. I swore I was only going to play for a few minutes... 90 minutes later. lol.

Update #3: This time I made a new preset with just an amp and cab in it. I have some other things going on in the previous preset so I wanted to be sure it wasn't getting lost in the noise so to speak. Same results though. From idle to full use, the fluctuation is the same whether the pedal is assigned or not. Seems to have no visible effect at least watching the meter in Axe Edit. This time I was playing around with some of the amps on that list. Capt Hook, Solo, Brit 800, all same result.

I'm going to do a little more testing before I stick a fork in this issue just because I'm having fun with it. So far so good though.
 
lqdsnddist said:
So how about just changing the amp channel to duplicate settings save for the input drive parameter ?
Click to expand...
If you use channels:
There is a slight drop out when changing channels.
You cant hold gain level of your amp independent of scene changes.
You are limited to 4 channels.
Using a controller allows you to smoothly morph from one gain setting to another.
The list goes on...
 
lwknives said:
If you use channels:
There is a slight drop out when changing channels.
You cant hold gain level of your amp independent of scene changes.
You are limited to 4 channels.
Using a controller allows you to smoothly morph from one gain setting to another.
The list goes on...
Click to expand...

Plus I don't have a FC yet. Just two expression pedals and one is a full time Wah.

Using this setup combined with my volume knob and pickup selections I can go from a pretty serviceable clean tone to full shred without changing scenes or turning a drive pedal on or off. I don't usually go all the way to completely clean but I can if I feel like it (with my Strat anyway). It changes some FX parameters at the same time and then add the pitch follower in... crazy variety with nothing but one pedal and the options on the guitar itself.

One of my favorite things to do since I got my Axe FX III is load up a random playlist of backing tracks on YouTube and just improvise for sometimes a couple hours straight. Being able to vary my tone/gain in real time, completely seamlessly, even in the middle of a run, is something I've been wanting to be able to do for many years and being able to finally do it makes this type of playing incredibly addicting for me. I can't get enough of it. My old Tri-Axis could technically do it but it was through midi and the way it stepped up/down was annoying and there was only so far you could go with it. This does exactly what I was trying to do back in the 90's and couldn't pull off.

If you do any long form, improvisation type soloing on a regular basis, this is just awesome and I recommend playing with it (if you have the Axe FX III... at this point it seems like it has no issues with it at least on the models I like the most). I'll get a FC eventually but I'll still be doing this on some presets for sure. I think I'll eventually want three expression pedals connected. A dedicated Wah, one for misc uses that would change per preset and this one which I call the Gas pedal. :p
 
I been doing this since the II XL Plus, never heard any artifacts. For the most part Boggie amps. I'm sure the presets I use it with aren't very CPU hungry tho, and the sweep is generally pretty fast. Just a thing that I always wanted to control with other systems that wasn't available. Love rocking an expression rather than hitting a switch. Never saw the old thread where it was frowned upon.
 
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