Patch doesn't cut through live?

strat714 said:
Too much gain, not enough 800, 1k = not cutting. Cut gain and add mids and see what you've got then.
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This.

Also... Has it occurred to you and your bandmates that your Bugera guitarist has twice as much cone space? He's moving more air. The only way to combat that, in my experience, is to raise the cab off the ground and point it at you head.

Another tip... Don't adjust your tone (even at full volume) with ear protection devices in your ears.

Respectfully...

Cojo
 
cojoguitar said:
...Has it occurred to you and your bandmates that your Bugera guitarist has twice as much cone space? He's moving more air.
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From the designer of the CLR cabs:
Jay Mitchell said:
...this is a myth. The volume velocity capacity of a well-designed 12" woofer is more than four times that capacity for typical guitar 12" speakers. So it is altogether possible - likely, in fact - that a well-designed two-way system with a single woofer can "move" more air than a 4x12 guitar cab.
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Rex said:
From the designer of the CLR cabs:
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Originally Posted by Jay Mitchell
...this is a myth. The volume velocity capacity of a well-designed 12" woofer is more than four times that capacity for typical guitar 12" speakers. So it is altogether possible - likely, in fact - that a well-designed two-way system with a single woofer can "move" more air than a 4x12 guitar cab.
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Umm... Yeah... Right then. My comment was meant as a suggestion. Not gospel. While I think Jay's comments are related to HIS cabs... He's selling a product. A VERY good product. Were we even talking about Atomic cabs? It's a good quote but I didn't know Avatar cabs were designed by Jay nor did I know Jay (Atomic) used V-30s in his (what I would call) AMAZING cabs. An Avatar cab loaded with V-30s does not an an Atomic make. Apples and oranges (the fruit, not the amps) IMO. But thanks for the quote.... I'll certainly keep this in mind moving forward. :)
 
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It's not positioning as they are always telling me to turn up, even though if you stand in different places it sounds like him and I are the same volume, relatively.

I'll try boosting somewhere between 400Hz - 1kHz and see if that helps, cheers.

Also, I must say I'm getting annoyed at the amount of advice that I've already addressed... "less gain", "more mids", "turn up the volume"... I've already said there is VERY little gain being used here, especially for a metal sound, I'm almost maxing out a 150 watt power amp, and there is a LOT of mids here. I think messing with WHERE I'm putting the mids might help, but it's surely not a lack of mids, both my ears and a frequency analyzer confirm that.

Thanks again for the help guys, I will try out these methods at our next practice. :D
 
cojoguitar said:
Umm... Yeah... Right then. My comment was meant as a suggestion. Not gospel.
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Understood.


cojoguitar said:
Were we even talking about Atomic cabs?
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Nope. We were talking about the theory that a guitar cab would push more air than a FRFR cab. At least that's what I thought we were talking about. Then I reread the thread and realized that I'd misunderstood. My bad. :eek:ops


cojoguitar said:
It's a good quote but I didn't know Avatar cabs were designed by Jay nor did I know Jay (Atomic) used V-30s in his (what I would call) AMAZING cabs. An Avatar cab loaded with V-30s does not an an Atomic make. Apples and oranges (the fruit, not the amps) IMO. But thanks for the quote.... I'll certainly keep this in mind moving forward. :)
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All valid points. Peace.
 
One important thing. Your power amp is at 150 Watts solid state and his tube power amp is at 100 Watts. I was talking to Matrix amps the other day and was told that to be able to equal my 100 Watt tube head I needed around 400 watt solid state head.

I myself have an active monitor with 150 solid state watts and play in a rather low volume band and will buy something around 500 watts because there is simply not enough headroom with 150 solid statewatts compared to my old mesa mark v 90 watts head.

Now, and these are the conclusions I have came to.
When amps watts are measured they measure how many watts a specific amp can put out before a certain percentage of distortion is put out, that is no difference between solid state and tubes.(More depending on the correctness and knowledge of the manufacturer) The difference is that depending of what tube head you have you could easily put out much more than 100 watts and you still think that your sound is clean. And this is because of the clipping charachteristics of tube power amps. On the other hand when solid state power amps go into clipping mode they go from ultra clean to bees fest. Not desirable.

Take a look at the specs of the newest matrix power amp of 1600 WATTS which is 480 watts per channel at 8 ohms . Insane? But according to some users on this board this is what it takes to fully compete with a Mesa Boogie stereo 100/100 head.
Since you say you have tried everything else!
Good luck!
 
That's close. Watts are watts, that's for sure. And amps are rated, more or less, by what they can actually deliver. But a 100-watt tube amp can sound louder than a 100-watt solid-state amp, because the tube power amp can be overdriven into significant distortion before it becomes objectionable. That added distortion makes the tube amp's percieved volume sound louder, even though it might not sound distorted. It's still only putting out 100 watts, but the added distortion products make it sound beefier to our ears.
 
another thing you might try is to use your other guitarists' sound as a reference. you say he cuts through fine, so why not tweak your patch to sound a bit more like his. you can do a direct A/B comparison when you're both in the room, so it should be relatively easy to spot where the weak points in your tone are and tweak them.
 
Yes watts are watts and amps are rated by what they can deliver BEFORE a certain amount of THD-total harmonic distortion occurs. The "problem" and wonderfulness is that tube amplifiers can continue to produce more power and THD after this point. Solid state amps on the other hand SOUND horrible after that point more or less.
 
Just for fun. Try antoher amp/sound to see if it`s "louder" in the mix. Try the Two Stone. It`s not suited for your music, but it would be interesting if you could share the result with us.

Hope it works out for you. :)
 
simeon said:
another thing you might try is to use your other guitarists' sound as a reference. you say he cuts through fine, so why not tweak your patch to sound a bit more like his. you can do a direct A/B comparison when you're both in the room, so it should be relatively easy to spot where the weak points in your tone are and tweak them.
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Thanks man, I think that's what I'm going to do in order to find "that" frequency that he's using to cut through so much, and then go from there and try to work around that framework.

Also, I've heard the "tube watts vs. solid state watts" argument way too many times. I've heard opinions from at least 50 people from hobbyists to "experts" and still have no definitive answer either way, so I'm going to go ahead and say let's take that out of the entire equation in this scenario.
 
A 150W SS amp with a single 12" isn't going to compete with a 100W tube amp into multiple 12" speakers. First of all the tube amp will sound much louder since it's 100W at say, 1% distortion and, I dunno, 400W at 10% distortion. Your SS amp is 1% distortion at 150W and 80% distortion at 160W.

Secondly, although the volume velocity of 12" PA speaker may equal multiple 12" guitar speakers, the directivity is much less. Multiple speakers have a narrower beam pattern since they form an array. The beam angle is inversely proportional to the array length (lambda/d) so if you double the length (which is effectively what you are doing) you halve the beamwidth. This focuses the sound into a narrower beam and gives the impression of louder and more cutting since that same power is focused in half the area and therefore the flux intensity is twice as high (power/area). A 4x12 has twice the intensity yet again since the vertical beamwidth is halved. This is all approximate since it isn't a uniform, continuous array but the general principles hold.

People think that 4x12 speakers are louder because they have more speakers. But they really aren't any "louder" watt-for-watt. They sound louder because the sound is concentrated in a narrower beam.
 
FractalAudio said:
People think that 4x12 speakers are louder because they have more speakers. But they really aren't any "louder" watt-for-watt. They sound louder because the sound is concentrated in a narrower beam.
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This is why I've never agreed with the 'just turn up' mentality. Learn with the band how to work within each others sonic territory. If you're all in the same place, turning it up won't matter, it will just get messier (and louder). I've played in bands where the guy with the 4x12 kept cranking it further and further because he 'couldn't hear himself'. It was because he was scooped to death, and the bassist was in the same EQ area as the bottom end....it came out screechy for him. I made suggestions, but we'd get it sounding right in practice, then he'd go home and turn knobs for another week, and we'd start all over again.

Turn down, figure it out, THEN turn up when motivated.
 
have you tried standing facing your cab about 7 or 8 feet away from it?

i reckon its probably more to do with where you are standing if its in a practice space.

not that a lot of the other suggestions here arent valid - particularly less gain, try to operate in different frequencies from the other guitar player.
 
simeon said:
another thing you might try is to use your other guitarists' sound as a reference. you say he cuts through fine, so why not tweak your patch to sound a bit more like his. you can do a direct A/B comparison when you're both in the room, so it should be relatively easy to spot where the weak points in your tone are and tweak them.
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^This - Sometimes it's the only way to 'make/tweak' your adjustments. I end up tweaking a lot with no one around in the studio. But, until my other guitarist plays his tube amp, it is very difficult to distinguish what frequency you cut through in unless you are both playing. In fact, I am still trying to mess with cutting through ;)
 
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