My observation of before & after installing Firmware 4 (Cygnus)

Eman7422 said:
Dumb question, but I think the preset uses a factory cab in the new preset pack, but when you download the artist presets, you get IRs from Steve. Did you change back to the Stevens IRs.

also can’t remember if the atomic playboy one was stereo but some of the Stevens presets used a left and right IR and some were mono, but they all used Steve’s custom/personal IRs.

just a thought.
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YES I am using Steve Stevens IR's and yes it is stereo and uses 2 cab IR's. I still love it the new way. it is thick and meaty and sounds very real like I have a mic on a cabinet. . I am also using the HI Rez Cabinets . I hear a bit of a difference but I don't think in a rock band mix loud in a sound system you could tell. But it isn't on overload so I am using the HI REZ IR's in stereo
 
Randalljax said:
Stupid Question
the original preset you used came from the artist pack that Steve Released last year ?
Have you tried the Stevens new factory prests
and are you using his same IRs
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I did not know he put out a new Artist Pack for Fractal. Last time I looked Fractal site still has the original ones. Where can I get the new ones? Are you sure he updated them? I was told by a moderator that he did not update his own presets on the Fractal site. Yes I am using his same IR's
 
Royalty said:
YES I am using Steve Stevens IR's and yes it is stereo and uses 2 cab IR's. I still love it the new way. it is thick and meaty and sounds very real like I have a mic on a cabinet. . I am also using the HI Rez Cabinets . I hear a bit of a difference but I don't think in a rock band mix loud in a sound system you could tell. But it isn't on overload so I am using the HI REZ IR's in stereo
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Just read this in another thread
check the amp input eq hi cut
should be 20000 or off but someone posted it was defaulted to 20.00 on all their presets
the complaint was darker and muddy
 
Royalty said:
I did not know he put out a new Artist Pack for Fractal. Last time I looked Fractal site still has the original ones. Where can I get the new ones? Are you sure he updated them? I was told by a moderator that he did not update his own presets on the Fractal site. Yes I am using his same IR's
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I am talking the New Factory presets in the updated Cygnus banks could those have slightly different defaults now than his original ones that we not included in the Factory presets
 
Royalty said:
But it is definitely darker.
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This is my experience as well. I had to raise the presence and lower the depth a little on all my main presets and that was it.

With every major new firmware update I’ve done since I started using Fractal back in 2016 I always had make a few minor tweaks to my presets after a major firmware update.
 
So last night was my first live gig with Firmware 4 (Cygnus). I was hoping to go out in soundcheck & hear what the new Cygnus Firmware 4 sounded like, but we started setting up later than usual & people were arriving and it was not a good time to soundcheck and soundcheck did not happen. In my in ears it sounded great. It sounded very real like I was using an amp. I know it was loud concert volume and sometimes I took my ears out completely and could tell that the guitar sounded huge, but I loved it before Cygnus.

One really good sign was that a guy was sitting with some people near the sound system and he told me my guitar was not loud enough when I was doing power chords & soloing so I told the sound man turn me up. After he turned me up I could see that there was a huge difference with the audience looking at me trying to tell me it was even better now.

We play 90 percent Hard Rock and It still pisses me of when sound men don't put the guitar level where it should be. I tell all of them that argue with me, listen to an AC/DC, GUNS N ROSES, Van Halen RECORD. THIS IS THE LEVEL I WANT. Some guys do it without asking. Some tell me if I turn you up the vocal is not loud enough. so I tell them turn up the vocal after you get the guitar level where it should be.

I got a gig tonight, a wedding actually. We play a mixture of R&B & rock at weddings but we do still play Guns n Roses, Steve Nicks, Heart and AC/DC at weddings. So tonight I will go out in front of the house and hear some. I can probably get a soundcheck tonight being it is in a Hotel ballroom in a hotel in Fort Lauderdale.

Oh I forgot. The one thing that happened last night that was not a good thing was my FM3 Froze 2 times during the night. Had to turn it off and start it again. I kind of freaked out because it was in the middle of songs where I am playing big power chords. It was in "Summer of 69" Brian Adams and "Pour Some Sugar on Me" Def leopard . After turning on & off 2nd time I had no problems the rest of the night. This never happened to me with Firmware 3.02 or whatever was before Cygnus. Kind of worries me. Hope it doesn't happen tonight.

When I got home after the gig I took a shower then wanted to hear the difference if Cygnus & Ares in my headphones in my house. I used Audio Technica. ATH 50 headphones. So I first went to my saved untouched Ares "Atomic Playboy' sound and then went to the Cygnus "Atomic Playboy" sound.

There was a difference for sure to me. The Cygnus sounded more real. How much more real I can't say but there was something I liked better about it, like it felt and sounded more natural. The original Ares way I still loved it but I felt there was I guess more natural sustain & an openness to the Cygnus sound.

Anyway I am still playing with it and getting used to the Cygnus way. I probably had some ear fatigue last night from playing loud concert volume rock so maybe not the perfect night to put the headphones on at home. I will do it again Tomorrow or Tuesday and hear it again.
 
Royalty said:
So last night was my first live gig with Firmware 4 (Cygnus). I was hoping to go out in soundcheck & hear what the new Cygnus Firmware 4 sounded like, but we started setting up later than usual & people were arriving and it was not a good time to soundcheck and soundcheck did not happen. In my in ears it sounded great. It sounded very real like I was using an amp. I know it was loud concert volume and sometimes I took my ears out completely and could tell that the guitar sounded huge, but I loved it before Cygnus.

One really good sign was that a guy was sitting with some people near the sound system and he told me my guitar was not loud enough when I was doing power chords & soloing so I told the sound man turn me up. After he turned me up I could see that there was a huge difference with the audience looking at me trying to tell me it was even better now.

We play 90 percent Hard Rock and It still pisses me of when sound men don't put the guitar level where it should be. I tell all of them that argue with me, listen to an AC/DC, GUNS N ROSES, Van Halen RECORD. THIS IS THE LEVEL I WANT. Some guys do it without asking. Some tell me if I turn you up the vocal is not loud enough. so I tell them turn up the vocal after you get the guitar level where it should be.

I got a gig tonight, a wedding actually. We play a mixture of R&B & rock at weddings but we do still play Guns n Roses, Steve Nicks, Heart and AC/DC at weddings. So tonight I will go out in front of the house and hear some. I can probably get a soundcheck tonight being it is in a Hotel ballroom in a hotel in Fort Lauderdale.

Oh I forgot. The one thing that happened last night that was not a good thing was my FM3 Froze 2 times during the night. Had to turn it off and start it again. I kind of freaked out because it was in the middle of songs where I am playing big power chords. It was in "Summer of 69" Brian Adams and "Pour Some Sugar on Me" Def leopard . After turning on & off 2nd time I had no problems the rest of the night. This never happened to me with Firmware 3.02 or whatever was before Cygnus. Kind of worries me. Hope it doesn't happen tonight.

When I got home after the gig I took a shower then wanted to hear the difference if Cygnus & Ares in my headphones in my house. I used Audio Technica. ATH 50 headphones. So I first went to my saved untouched Ares "Atomic Playboy' sound and then went to the Cygnus "Atomic Playboy" sound.

There was a difference for sure to me. The Cygnus sounded more real. How much more real I can't say but there was something I liked better about it, like it felt and sounded more natural. The original Ares way I still loved it but I felt there was I guess more natural sustain & an openness to the Cygnus sound.

Anyway I am still playing with it and getting used to the Cygnus way. I probably had some ear fatigue last night from playing loud concert volume rock so maybe not the perfect night to put the headphones on at home. I will do it again Tomorrow or Tuesday and hear it again.
Click to expand...

When it froze, did you happen to have an FC layout where one of the footswitches was a tap tempo with a tuner hold function? I have had it freeze on me a few times with that setup but never after moving the tuner to another to its own footswitch and letting the tap tempo have its own dedicated footswitch. I know this was supposed to be fixed in the official firmware 4 (not the betas if I understood correctly). If it was firmware 4 you will likely want to post something in the bugs session.

Regarding the rest, great post.
 
So I just got home from the wedding I played tonight. It is 2:26 AM and I am lying in bed as I am writing this. We did a soundcheck before the wedding party and I was standing in front of the Sound system. I first put the Cygnus preset for the Steve Stevens "Atomic Playboy" on Then I put the original Ares " Atomic Playboy" on that was not a soft reset and is the original one.
Here is what me and my band all heard: The difference to everyone in my band including me was the original Atomic Playboy preset without the Soft reset had more GIRTH & MEAT to it. We had the system up loud also with my channel flat on the board.

The soft reset Cygnus Atomic Playboy preset was thinner without the Girth & Meat.
So I hate to say it but in the sound system doing a soundcheck I liked the original better. Am I loosing it or is there something I did wrong? I had absolutely no EQ on the console and I was running in Stereo. Flat for both sounds . The volumes were the exact same . When I played the original Non Cygnus Non soft reset Preset it was completely different. I used the old preset the whole night in our rock songs.

What is really interesting is that I liked the Cygnus preset better in my KRK E8 studio monitors than hearing it in a big loud PA system . I loved the Cygnus preset in my Audio Technica ATH 50 headphones , but my D----ck didn't get hard hearing the Cygnus version in the loud soundcheck tonight. I have to say that all the EQ, bass, treble, mid, presence , etc....... is exactly the same as before. So why is it not at least as GIRTHY & Meaty.

As I previously said yesterdays gig we did not have a sound check and I only heard my guitar in my in ear monitors all night. I also at yesterday gig took my ears out for one song and I could hear the guitar coming out of the mains pretty loud. Also yesterdays Sound system was 2 times larger than tonights Sound System. But again tonight I had it flat no EQ and I and my whole band voted the older atomic playboy sounded better, more exciting, girth, meaty, thick, ballzy with all of us standing in front of the house sound system. Shit, I really hope Steve Stevens can tweak his Fractal presets with the Cygnus Firmware.

Am I doing something wrong? After my crew voted I put some EQ on the Cygnus preset. I put +3.5 DB @250Hz and everyone still liked the old preset sound better. When I think about it I can explain it like this. The Original Atomic Playboy preset that Steve Stevens made before Cygnus came into this was like it was going thru a Pultec EQP1A tube Eq and you could feel that thick meaty Girth in the sound.
The Cygnus sound was like you took off the Pultec EQ from the sound and the Girth and meat went away. That is about how I can explain it.

When you think about it Steve Stevens made that sound before Cygnus was here and he obviously spent time getting it where he loved it or he wouldn't of released it yet. So I will still use the older version with No Reset done
with the Cygnus firmware.
I know some of you guys are gonna say I'm nuts but I am being 100 percent honest. I liked he Cygnus sound better in my studio monitors than in a loud Sound system ready to play a rock show.
 
Royalty said:
So I just got home from the wedding I played tonight. It is 2:26 AM and I am lying in bed as I am writing this. We did a soundcheck before the wedding party and I was standing in front of the Sound system. I first put the Cygnus preset for the Steve Stevens "Atomic Playboy" on Then I put the original Ares " Atomic Playboy" on that was not a soft reset and is the original one.
Here is what me and my band all heard: The difference to everyone in my band including me was the original Atomic Playboy preset without the Soft reset had more GIRTH & MEAT to it. We had the system up loud also with my channel flat on the board.

The soft reset Cygnus Atomic Playboy preset was thinner without the Girth & Meat.
So I hate to say it but in the sound system doing a soundcheck I liked the original better. Am I loosing it or is there something I did wrong? I had absolutely no EQ on the console and I was running in Stereo. Flat for both sounds . The volumes were the exact same . When I played the original Non Cygnus Non soft reset Preset it was completely different. I used the old preset the whole night in our rock songs.

What is really interesting is that I liked the Cygnus preset better in my KRK E8 studio monitors than hearing it in a big loud PA system . I loved the Cygnus preset in my Audio Technica ATH 50 headphones , but my D----ck didn't get hard hearing the Cygnus version in the loud soundcheck tonight. I have to say that all the EQ, bass, treble, mid, presence , etc....... is exactly the same as before. So why is it not at least as GIRTHY & Meaty.

As I previously said yesterdays gig we did not have a sound check and I only heard my guitar in my in ear monitors all night. I also at yesterday gig took my ears out for one song and I could hear the guitar coming out of the mains pretty loud. Also yesterdays Sound system was 2 times larger than tonights Sound System. But again tonight I had it flat no EQ and I and my whole band voted the older atomic playboy sounded better, more exciting, girth, meaty, thick, ballzy with all of us standing in front of the house sound system. Shit, I really hope Steve Stevens can tweak his Fractal presets with the Cygnus Firmware.

Am I doing something wrong? After my crew voted I put some EQ on the Cygnus preset. I put +3.5 DB @250Hz and everyone still liked the old preset sound better. When I think about it I can explain it like this. The Original Atomic Playboy preset that Steve Stevens made before Cygnus came into this was like it was going thru a Pultec EQP1A tube Eq and you could feel that thick meaty Girth in the sound.
The Cygnus sound was like you took off the Pultec EQ from the sound and the Girth and meat went away. That is about how I can explain it.

When you think about it Steve Stevens made that sound before Cygnus was here and he obviously spent time getting it where he loved it or he wouldn't of released it yet. So I will still use the older version with No Reset done
with the Cygnus firmware.
I know some of you guys are gonna say I'm nuts but I am being 100 percent honest. I liked he Cygnus sound better in my studio monitors than in a loud Sound system ready to play a rock show.
Click to expand...
My final suggestion
and make sure you have a backup or 3
for some unknown reason i tried this on my old pre Cygnus presets
and it changed them for the better

go into edit tools —manage presets - click on you SS atomic preset so it highlights—-right click while highlighted
select the bottom Reset AMP

https://forum.fractalaudio.com/threads/reset-amp-block-after-firmware-update-cygnus.173565/
 
Royalty said:
So I will still use the older version with No Reset done
with the Cygnus firmware.
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If it sounds better then of course use it .... why would you not? The alternative would be to go through every parameter on every block and recreate it exactly on a new 'Cygnus' preset slot which seems like a lot of trouble for no reason. Just copy it as it is to a new slot and rename it slightly if you want to remind you never to reset it.

As for hearing things differently when comparing the outdoor PA with 16 subs and flown tops compared to a different smaller PA system in a hotel ballroom .... I'd expect maybe insurmountable differences even with corrective EQ intervention to make those 2 venues sound similar. The room takes it's toll.

I heard Toto play a theatre size gig (1500 mixed floor standing/seated balcony) some years ago they brought in their own PA equipment and I'm assuming their FOH engineer knew his business .... but the sound was actually quite poor .... and that was from a centre position about 2 metres above the FOH soundman's head. My friend who is a Toto fanatic followed the tour a bit and saw them again this time in an Arena sized venue a week later and the sound was very good ...... some places are maybe just sound killers for certain frequencies/types of music?

Sounds like your Rock band and the one I play in probably share the same set ... personally I just make sure what I hear on stage is good to me and the FOH can be whatever the sound engineer wants to make it. Even if I do go out front during a soundcheck in the larger gigs and think it sounds good by the time a crowd turns up and sucks up all the mids and highs the sound engineer will have compensated for them - so it's always down to them to sculpt the EQ .... we just smile and look pretty.
 
To understand the differences between two presets that sound different running under the same firmware version, compare the actual parameter values, one-by-one. The easiest way to do this is perhaps to make screen captures in Axe-Edit.
I'm guessing you missed something after the soft reset, and that you'll find it though a little work.
 
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Admin M@ said:
To understand the differences between two presets that sound different running under the same firmware version, compare the actual parameter values, one-by-one. The easiest way to do this is perhaps to make screen captures in Axe-Edit.
I'm guessing you missed something after the soft reset, and that you'll find it though a little work.
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After the soft reset I saw that all the EQ settings went to 12 O clock Flat. So I did make a photo of every page to have it in case. So I put back all the EQ back to where Steve Stevens had them. Bass, mid, treble, High treble , presence, Depth, Master Volume. I made sure to put all of these back where they were. Also put output Eq back where it was. Then I did compare other parameters. I did notice some things did change going to Cygnus. Maybe about 4 things were different. I left them on the Cygnus values. I did a reset like this video below shows today. I listened in headphones and I like it but I really won't know until my next gig to compare the Pre Cygnus sound to the Cygnus sound. I got a gig Friday night in a big ballroom again for a Corporate Party. We will be doing all rock so I can go in front of house again and try again. I first did a soft reset and now I guess I did a full reset like in this video. so we will see if the full reset sounds better to me.
https://forum.fractalaudio.com/threads/reset-amp-block-after-firmware-update-cygnus.173565/
 
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Staaahhhp. You had me at 'thick, meaty girth.'

:sweatsmile:

FWIW, I don't do the whole soft reset thing because it has never once made my preset sound better. It always ruins whatever it was that was special about the preset and then I fight to get it back but never quite achieve it, so I just leave them be.
 
Ugly Bunny said:
Staaahhhp. You had me at 'thick, meaty girth.'

:sweatsmile:

FWIW, I don't do the whole soft reset thing because it has never once made my preset sound better. It always ruins whatever it was that was special about the preset and then I fight to get it back but never quite achieve it, so I just leave them be.
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Ok I understand your point. So what would you do in my case? If you know that you loved the preset before and you changed firmware how would you get the Cygnus version as good as the Ares version better than before? Would you do a full reset and not a soft reset? I still have the version I love so I am ok just incase
 
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Royalty said:
Ok I understand your point. So what would you do in my case? If you know that you loved the preset before and you changed firmware how would you get the Cygnus version as good as the Ares version tor better than before? Would you do a full reset and not a soft reset? I still have the version I love so I am ok just incase
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I don't touch my presets unless they need it. For instance, my primary preset (has clean, dirt, gain, etc.) from Ares sounded even better on Cygnus. It's more or less the same preset I've used since I got my Axe III 3 years ago. Of course I've tweaked it a little here and there over the years, but I've never once reset it. My rule of thumb is that if it doesn't sound right, then yeah, reset and/or tweak. I haven't needed to. With the updates, it keeps sounding better and better and better. I'm not suggesting this is the correct way, but the tones speak for themselves. For reference, I use the JP 2C+ Green and Yellow amps (and whatever was close to them before the JP2C+ came out). I'm not sure if they were greatly affected by whatever parameters would benefit from a reset. The amp(s) that you use may be an entirely different story and might sound horrible when crossing over from Ares to Cygnus.
yek said:
When the firmware release notes advise a reset, do a reset and adjust if necessary. It's as simple as that. Otherwise quite critical parameters may not get updated to their optimal values.
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I wonder if FAS might just release exactly what parameters should be reset? It seems overkill to reset the whole thing if only a couple values should be adjusted. Like I said above, doing the reset has never made my presets sound better. It has only every made the preset sound weak and thin, and then I would have to go back and tweak a bunch of parameters that I spent months tweaking and never really getting back to where I was. That said, I might come up with something BETTER, but with as little time as I have to tweak as many presets as I have, it's just not practical. I think maybe a guide for each update as to what specific parameters should be reset to what specific values.
 
Ugly Bunny said:
I think maybe a guide for each update as to what specific parameters should be reset to what specific values.
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Not possible. A single parameter can't be reset. Also, the reset might be needed to recall correct values for negative feedback. Each model with negative feedback has its own specific value.
 
Ah. I see, so it'd be far more labor intensive than a short section in the release notes of a list of parameter to set to specific values. Makes sense. I just wish there was a way to reset the amp block that didn't make me have to essentially retweak the whole block to get it sounding anywhere close to what I had because, often, I don't know what parameters I tweaked to get my specific tone. I definitely understand the importance for certain amp models, but at this point, I'm weighing the benefits and risks of a reset vs the chance that there's a parameter that should be reset that isn't happening because I don't want to ruin my preset :tonguewink:
 
@yek the one thing I do find interesting is what Frank for G66
posted , that technique I have not seen done before and it did seem to make a noticeable audible change for the better
i have been using the tool reset block but Franks seems to work differently, is there a reason ?
 
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