noob question, i apologize

havoc

havoc

New Member
Hello Everyone, let me start by saying i'm a total noob. I've had my FX II for about 2 weeks, hooked up to my Mac, Ax-Edit and Fractal-Bot installed, skimming manuals, and trying different guitars with different presets. Beyond amazing unit.... albeit overwhelming coming from years of analog amps and pedals and not much recording experience. Which has lead me to what for probably everyone reading this what are a couple of completely inane questions.

So here they are:
  • If i install a patch someone else has developed (via Fractal-Bot i assume) will it overwrite an existing patch, or put in into an empty bay... hell are there even empty bays for this sort of thing or creating new patches?
  • What would the behavior of the installation be it i was to pull the Stevie Ray Vaughan's Voodoo Chile patch from Tyler Grunds site and install it via Fractal-Bot?


Any insight would be appreciated. I've already backed up all three banks and cabs to be safe, just nervous to start installing non-factory stuff i guess, and i don't want to overwrite a patch i'm digging.

Thanks
Rich
 
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Hey Rich!

Welcome to the fold! No need to apologize man. We were all new to the technology at one point and, hell, I'd be lying if I said I wasn't always learning new and amazing things about this box and sound creation and I'm going on some 5 years now as a Fractal user. If you make peace with the fact that you just need to learn the things you need to know now to get the sounds you want now and that the rest will come later it's a whole lot easier on your head IMO!

As for your questions:

If i install a patch someone else has developed (via Fractal-Bot i assume) will it overwrite an existing patch, or put in into an empty bay... hell are there even empty bays for this sort of thing or creating new patches?
Click to expand...

Correct. The unit ships with presets in every single location so in order to make your own or use someone else's presets you have to overwrite something. You can use Fractal-Bot to create a full back up of your system before you start overwriting in case you want to get something back though. And the factory presets are always available for download from the support site here: Fractal Audio Systems - Support

What would the behavior of the installation be it i was to pull the Stevie Ray Vaughan's Voodoo Chile patch from Tyler Grunds site and install it via Fractal-Bot?
Click to expand...

Tyler sometimes uses custom IRs in his patches. When he does he posts the IR and the patch. You'll need to put the IR in to a user cab slot on the unit. You can do this with Fractal-Bot or Axe-Edit. And you'll need to upload the patch. Once uploaded, visit the CAB block in the patch and make sure it's pointed to the correct user IR slot, the slot where you put the user IR. I think is SRV patch uses a custom IR if I'm remembering correctly.

Tyler's patches are awesome. Definitely worth the learning curve here to get to play with one of his patches!

Let us know how it goes and don't fear asking questions here.
 
nb - you can try patches without actually over-writing anything. when you import a patch via axe edit (or fractal bot), it gets loaded into RAM. you won't actually over-write anything until you save it.
 
Welcome to the fold, dude. There's no such thing as a stupid question if you don't know the answer! :)
 
Awww Sweet!! So i can try stuff without saving. That would lead me to believe that i can choose the patch to save over too. Nice!
 
You can edit any patch as much as you want. Nothing will be saved until you press the "Store" button on the front, at which point you can overwrite the current patch or select another patch to overwrite.

Also, just as a suggestion, the first thing I did when Axe Manage came out (it's a part of the Axe Edit software) was completely erase my Bank A so that all those patches were completely blank. I'd highly recommend doing this as while the patches that come with the Axe-Fx can help establish what the Axe can do, they probably won't be all that useful to you by themselves, so you really won't be missing much by erasing them. Erasing them really does a lot to make things feel much less crowded and more flexible.
 
HI havoc and welcome. Exciting times ahead!

You will of course find your own way with this thing, but I thought I'd share my experience. I spent and to an extent wasted a lot of my early days with the ax on the presets exchange. Don't get me wrong, for some things it's invaluable. Like when you haven't got a clue how to get there, or what fx are used to get a sound. I would always hear ppl telling others to use their ears, and after after a lot of hours I agree with them. I spend time dialling in my own sounds now and I'm actually quite enjoying the whole process.
 
Thanks so much for the feedback...

The fascinating thing is just what you point out mogvinda, how the Factory presets are a launch pad for developing and playing with all these amazing possibilities. I was actually thinking that my first foray into creating a sound would be something SRV but when i saw/heard Tyler's Voodoo Chile video and saw that I could pull the patch from his site, i was flabbergasted. Blew my mind that i could pull something like that, see how it was constructed and get such huge jumpstart on understanding how to build a sound like that, just awesome.

Jazzed to get home and start mucking around :)
 
Awesome! I found myself struggling with the same exact question. I was seeing people replacing whole banks of presets and downloading individual patches and it freaked me out that I had to get rid of one of the stock sounds. Granted I won't use some of these at all, but the hoarder mentality was getting the best of me. You never know when you might need that sound....lol. As long as I can undo and start over I am good.

I just received my fx2 last week and it is easily the one of the best purchases I have ever made across all spectrums.

Thanks for all of the responses and OP thanks for asking the question.
 
Welcome, Rich. My way of tackling this was to go through all the stock presets and delete the ones I didn't think I'd need for any reason using AE. Then I moved them into consecutive order at the end. The last preset is blank, BTW, comes in handy sometimes. I have downloaded others' presets and banks and then rearranged. Same thing with IRs. When you audition your sound may or may not please you because your guitar and other setups may not match the originator's. But you can tweak and at least see how they put things together.
Many here have been generous and gracious by sharing, including Yek, Fremen, Simeon, Scott P, many others. Look in the Preset section of the forum.
And have fun.
 
Just save a snapshot of the stock patch in Axe Edit first , then when you overwrite it with your own patch, it's still there on your disk.
 
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