Looking to buy Axe fx3 BUT!!!!!

[Lkdog]

Hey folks. Inaugural post to the boards. Very new to the world of modeling. I don't lack for real amps or for that matter rackmount power amps. So I feel set to start gigging again, though I'm a little old-fashioned. I'm not likely to use FRFR cabs, but rather 2 4x12's at low volume in stereo thru my vht2150.

I wanted to get rid of my pedal board which has several drives and distortions, plus all the time-based fx one could reasonably be expected to use in a band that does everything from 80's to arena rock to new romantic stuff like Duran Duran.

I guess my fear of plunking down on the fx3/controller is both price and the fear of near-future obsolescence. Does anyone have ANY idea when the 4 is coming out?

I sure wish Fractal would get financing. That would be so nice.

A used FM3 is less than $1000. An FC6 is only $450 used if you need it. Sell some hardware. I am sure you have a shitton of money tied up in pedals cables and amps. And the Fractal stuff will still be usable for years. Easy to flip. When you go to sell them you will get a lot of your money back and you can get some noisy amps and pedals again.

 

[Mark-B]

Buy gear for what it is today, as tomorrow is promised to no-man. The AXE lll is still gonna be pretty-much all a person could need in the way of modeling tech, be it today, tomorrow, or anytime in the future. I bought mine for the amps and the effects and the routing... those things aren’t going away no-matter what the future might hold.

As for obsolescence? ..I still have an AX8. And it’s great! ..at the time, I bought it for the amps and the effects and the routing.. and it still has all those great things.

Buy for what a thing is today. If it fits your needs today, it’ll keep doing that until the wheels fall off it.

 

[Brian Coonan]

Where does this myth keep coming from? It’s a recurring theme among people who are new to the forum.

Seems like YouTube might help keep this out there. I know when I was looking at Fractal, a LOT of the videos are around that kind of stuff and also really heavy stuff which is great it can do that, but any amount of reading - especially on the forum (I read so much out here before I even owned a product) would tell people that literally anything you want to do, you can do.

Last rehearsal for the country band I play in, and the first one with the III, my singer said "That guitar sound is dead on to the song" and it was a Tim McGraw tune, soooooo.

 

[Brian Coonan]

I CAN recommend the FCs, I have an FC 12 and it's easily the best foot controller I've owned (previously owned Ground Control Pro, MFC-101, a few others). It's pricey, but you get what you pay for with Fractal.

+1 for the FC12 - SO many options and ways to do thing. My 9-10 presets are now essentially 2 due to how flexible the FC12 is. Recently, and this was super cool to me - I set up a switch to jump to a whole other preset (for violin) and then set up a button in that preset to jump back by using the hold function - so mid song now I hold down a button, play some violin, hold down another button and am back to my rhythm. The violin patch is too heavy to be included in my main preset...works perfectly and I don't have to try to switch presets by using like the preset layout.

 

[touch33]

+1 for the FC12 - SO many options and ways to do thing. My 9-10 presets are now essentially 2 due to how flexible the FC12 is. Recently, and this was super cool to me - I set up a switch to jump to a whole other preset (for violin) and then set up a button in that preset to jump back by using the hold function - so mid song now I hold down a button, play some violin, hold down another button and am back to my rhythm. The violin patch is too heavy to be included in my main preset...works perfectly and I don't have to try to switch presets by using like the preset layout.

I’m pretty damn sure my AFX3 will always remain better at what it does than I will ever be at what I do…

 

[Sashman]

I guess i see it differently. if i wait some small but known quantity of time I can get all the latest widgets for approximately the same amount of money. I also get plenty of time until the next product comes out so i get my use out of the one i purchased. Like cars for example. The only way i'll buy a car at the end of a model year is if i get a significant discount.

Given Moore's Law is 18 months.. If I get 2 times that out of a product b4 I have to retire it or replace it with something newer...that puts me at having something like this for 3 years until I replace it with axefx4. if I have to replace it sooner with 4 because i dont want to eat into that new timespan with the axe fx4....

While i firmly believe that fractal is the way to go, I just hope i get 3 yeas b4 the new one comes out, which will force the value of what i currently have down for resale.

Of course you can wait, it’s up to you mate!
But... you can waist time and wait, or you can rock the shit out of it!
Cheers and rock on
Sash

 

[Sashman]

Buy gear for what it is today, as tomorrow is promised to no-man. The AXE lll is still gonna be pretty-much all a person could need in the way of modeling tech, be it today, tomorrow, or anytime in the future. I bought mine for the amps and the effects and the routing... those things aren’t going away no-matter what the future might hold.

As for obsolescence? ..I still have an AX8. And it’s great! ..at the time, I bought it for the amps and the effects and the routing.. and it still has all those great things.

Buy for what a thing is today. If it fits your needs today, it’ll keep doing that until the wheels fall off it.

This, I enjoyed every second since I bought my Axe 3.

 

[JCBitB]

It seems as though this is marketed towards prog metal and the Steve Vai's of the world.

There's a lot of interest from that corner because of the flexibility in the routing and amp switching. A 2k digital box is a tougher sell to a guy who runs a tube screamer into a 1k clean platform and is completely happy, let alone slightly religious/dogmatic about the combination he chose. That being said, I think they'd be even happier once they experience the divorce of the tonal impact of a master volume from actual volume. To experience a cranked master volume at a level that doesnt make your head hurt and fry glass? Cmon! I bought my SF bandmaster for $400 and I lug around my AxeFX III instead on a bandmaster channel for most of what I gig.

Biggest concern is living in a GUI. Are you going to be able to commit to the menu diving experience for tone? Because the possibilities are endless, and the process is so much different than a tube amp. Frankly the modellers have options that end up being more than enough rope to hang yourself with, and you're only going to sound as good as your programming skills will allow. If you're running 4x12's and leaving IR's behind, you're going to have an easier time I think, but the learning curve is not insignificant regardless.

 

[TSJMajesty]

..., and you're only going to sound as good as your programming skills will allow.

I don't think that's a fair statement (might scare away potential people looking to make the jump to a product as complex as the Axe Fx.)

There are plenty of factory presets that sound amazing, right out of the box. And if deep-diving into parameters you've never heard of isn't your thing, but you still want to go deeper than what's in the box, there's Axe Change where you can download presets others have created, for free. And there's artist presets on FAS web site. Many ways to get great tones, without deep tweaking. And you don't need "programming skills" to take Cooper Carter's class, just 120 bucks.

 

[touch33]

I don't think that's a fair statement (might scare away potential people looking to make the jump to a product as complex as the Axe Fx.)

There are plenty of factory presets that sound amazing, right out of the box. And if deep-diving into parameters you've never heard of isn't your thing, but you still want to go deeper than what's in the box, there's Axe Change where you can download presets others have created, for free. And there's artist presets on FAS web site. Many ways to get great tones, without deep tweaking. And you don't need "programming skills" to take Cooper Carter's class, just 120 bucks.

I have to agree with Majesty!
I’m a pro audio professional with extreme audio/music/MIDI programming skilz — but that’s the last thing I want to do around my guitar/keys “enjoyment” playing. I understand most of the AFX “deep dive” parameters, but I still purchase/download presets created by others to get the amps/tones I seek. I do still create my own FX “pedal” configs/settings (just like I would do with any pedalboard) but I choose to let the “tones pros” do my heavy lifting for me so I can spend my time PLAYING.

 

[JCBitB]

No disrespect to the preset designers because they do a great job, but I'd never considered the idea that someone would find enough value in them to purchase an axefxIII and live on them forever. Also, I don't mean to make "programming" an axefx sound like some dark art, and cooper carters course is a great place to learn how to do it as well. It's also not hard to learn it for free if you don't mind spending time on it. It's just that there are folks who find out they just don't like to work on a screen pressing buttons. The difficulty isn't extreme as long as the motivation is there, thats all I meant.

 

[TSJMajesty]

I don't know how to dial in a killer-sounding stereo delay, or how to get the best tone from all these different amp models, let alone use all the parameters when it comes to the cab block, so I'm very happy the Axe comes with so many great presets. Yes, I'll change things, but until I learn more, the way I'll do it is take some particular effect that I like, and place that into a new preset with an amp tone I like. For me, it's great there's so many examples, because I don't want to spend time creating presets, but instead on becoming a better player. This box allows me to have killer effects, already set up, and enough of them that all I have to do is choose which ones I want. I'm not a tweaker; hell I barely know what a low pass filter does. But even though the Axe Fx is hella deep, you really don't need to go there to get great sounds out of it. But if you want to go deep, well there's that too.