Input trim vs Input gain - Story of discovery!

MackieFX

MackieFX

Experienced
Ive been trying to dial in a 'dent' tone recently, and everyone says you should have the amp gain low, boost with an OD and pick hard.

No matter what I tried though it never sounded fully clear enough for me. No matter how low the gain was there was still too much of it but at the same time not enough.

Then last night I watched a Misha Mansoor video where he dials in a Rhythm tone and copied his settings exactly. The mystery was suddenly revealed.....
Screenshot 2021-04-12 at 10.49.31.png

Input trim BELOW 1?!?!?!? What in all that is holy is going on?!
All of a sudden the tone is godlike and all of the messiness I was struggling with is gone. What is this sorcery!?

I though turning input trim down would turn my BKP pickups into single coil wussies. I also thought turning down input trim meant you were actively ruining whatever input boost you're running in to your amp. Needless to say, yet another AxeFX trick that is so simple I feel stupid for not finding this sooner.

Heres the video for reference - he changes the amp settings later on and ends up with input trim at 1 and you can really hear how much more dirt it gives.
 
yek said:
Lowering Input Trim means that you're lowering the level of the signal going into the Amp block. IOW: decreasing the output of your pickups. Nothing else.
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Is this equivalent (identical in result) of having a filter block decreasing the volume before the amp block?
 
yek said:
Lowering Input Trim means that you're lowering the level of the signal going into the Amp block. IOW: decreasing the output of your pickups. Nothing else.
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So the OD pedal is still kicking the front of the amp as hard as usual, its just the guitar part of the signal. Idk how cliff does it but thats insane :D
 
MackieFX said:
So the OD pedal is still kicking the front of the amp as hard as usual, its just the guitar part of the signal. Idk how cliff does it but thats insane :D
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I'm not sure I understand you correctly, but lowering Input Trim is similar to lowering the Level knob of an overdrive pedal that's placed right before an amplifier's input.
 
yek said:
I'm not sure I understand you correctly, but lowering Input Trim is similar to lowering the Level knob of an overdrive pedal that's placed right before an amplifier's input.
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I misunderstood, that makes sense. Thanks!
 
Boost pedal would do the input EQ/shaping of the sound. I think you could argue that putting our OD level at 6 instead of 10 would be similar to input trim around 0.58, though exactly what levels correspond would depend on the tapers of both those controls.
 
As EVH himself said, super hot pickups into a super hot amp tends to sound like mush, if you want people to hear your playing you gotta choose where you put the heat.

My #1 guitar has Suhr Aldrich humbuckers in it and I tend to run the gain pretty low on my amps so the nuances come thru. He plays Plexis and 800s, which are mid-gain amps by modern standards, so it makes sense.
 
For the most part, I run PAFs so that is my output metric from which I use input trim to boost (e.g. Dimarzio Injector neck (in bridge)) or even cut (Dimarzio Tone Zone). That was I use the same presets for each guitar but the gain levels are pretty much the same across the board.

Because Dimarzio publishes their pickups voltage specs, I use that as a basic for adjusting the input trim. E.g. the PAF has a 285 mV output vs the Dimarzio Injector neck which is 160. To compensate for just the difference in output level I set the input trim to around 1.78.
 
Input trim is like an input signal multiplier, so a setting of 1 is unity gain. 0.5 would give you half as much input signal (-6dB) , while 2.0 would give you twice as much (+6dB) and so on.
 
He must have just have been messing with that before the stream started. It looks like it was back to 1 pretty quick after he reloaded a new amp. Unless I'm missing something.
 
bikertrash said:
He must have just have been messing with that before the stream started. It looks like it was back to 1 pretty quick after he reloaded a new amp. Unless I'm missing something.
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Here is f.e. a moment when he turns down the trim on purpose and checks it with a riff
 
bikertrash said:
He must have just have been messing with that before the stream started. It looks like it was back to 1 pretty quick after he reloaded a new amp. Unless I'm missing something.
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If I remember correctly, in this video he's got a patch or two with it turned down as well. So, I would assume he just does it if he likes how it sounds.

 
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