Presenting... The Axe-Fx III

Routing amps in parallel works, but is of limited use because there are only two amp blocks. So you can have seamless switching from clean to rhythm to lead but then get a gap switching from lead to clean. And that could be a hanging note where a gap could sound quite ugly.

As for importance - that’s relative and subjective. No, the gap, even as it exists in the II, doesn’t destroy the experience completely, and hardly anyone in the audience notices. It’s just annoying as hell to some people. Like some others cannot play without a cabinet or cannot tolerate latency which I would be perfectly fine with. I don’t know why that happens. As I previously mentioned, it’s not as noticeable when I switch amps myself, and more annoying when using automation.

The gap as was demonstrated in the clip recorded by Cliff with the III is a huge improvement over the II. Granted, there was reverb and/or delay which hides part of the gap, but it obviously is something that’s much easier to live with. Being able to run more amp instances in parallel would be a better solution for me though, even with less oversampling.

I’m not sure why this issue was resurrected though and all of a sudden people got the urge to bash those who worry about the gap. If you don’t care about it - perfect, good for you. In any case, there are recorded samples now and everyone can listen and make their own opinion. Which is good.
 
vangrieg said:
Routing amps in parallel works, but is of limited use because there are only two amp blocks. So you can have seamless switching from clean to rhythm to lead but then get a gap switching from lead to clean. And that could be a hanging note where a gap could sound quite ugly.
Click to expand...
You can ladder things so it's seamless:

Quick fade from Amp 1 --> Amp 2
Change channel on Amp 1
Quick fade from Amp 2 --> Amp 1
Change channel on Amp 2

...and so on. You can, on the III, transition totally and truly seamlessly, between 8 amp models using the 2 AMP blocks and 4 channels.

You can do this on the II now too, but with fewer amp models -- only 4.
 
Currently, I have Amp1 with clean and lead, Amp2 with rhythm. Clean, rhythm and lead are three scenes. This allows seamless switching between, say, clean, rhythm and then lead. But not from clean and lead. I could build scene progressions to have more combinations, but that would require a workflow much different from what I’m using, and would be awkward for other reasons.
 
vangrieg said:
Currently, I have Amp1 with clean and lead, Amp2 with rhythm. Clean, rhythm and lead are three scenes. This allows seamless switching between, say, clean, rhythm and then lead. But not from clean and lead. I could build scene progressions to have more combinations, but that would require a workflow much different from what I’m using, and would be awkward for other reasons.
Click to expand...
On AMP1: clean and lead. On AMP2: rhythm and lead. One button to switch between AMP1 and AMP2, one button to change the X/Y state of AMP1, one button to change the X/Y state of AMP2.

All channels to all channels are now instantly accessible.
 
iaresee said:
On AMP1: clean and lead. On AMP2: rhythm and lead. One button to switch between AMP1 and AMP2, one button to change the X/Y state of AMP1, one button to change the X/Y state of AMP2.

All channels to all channels are now instantly accessible.
Click to expand...

Yes, that would work, but I need to switch other things, not just amps, therefore I need scenes, not X/Y switches.
 
GreatGreen said:
If it's really so important to your music that you absolutely for the sake of the song cannot stop your guitar from ringing out between and/or during all of your tone changes, you can setup your patches so that transitions between amp tones are handled by routing amps in parallel, then sweep between them either with damped scene controllers on the level knobs of each amp block, or a foot pedal to turn up the level of one amp block while turning down the level of the other amp block for smooth transitions. You can setup these sweeping transitions with up to four pairs of amps per patch. If you need to do this multiple times during a song, then after the first sweep, change scenes at some point between notes to get the next sweep cocked and ready to go.

Unless you're playing music with an ebow or Fernandez sustainer guitar that requires a constant drone for 100% of the performance, you should probably be able to find at least one 35 millisecond gap somewhere that you should be able to do this with minimal song interference.
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It doesn't have to do with the note ringing out. It had to do with stepping on the button and hitting a note, but that note is cut off which (at least in my case) throws my timing off a little. It's not that big of a deal, but the reduction on the III makes me happy.
 
vangrieg said:
I’m not sure why this issue was resurrected though and all of a sudden people got the urge to bash those who worry about the gap. If you don’t care about it - perfect, good for you. In any case, there are recorded samples now and everyone can listen and make their own opinion. Which is good.
Click to expand...

I guess because it was just honestly funny to me. Comparing the 40-100ms audio gap to blinking your eyes (100-400ms) gave me a good chuckle. I guess the humor doesn't translate through text. If you were my best friend in real life I would joke about it with you also. But I get you have a problem and I won't joke about it anymore. 100ms audio gap is serious business. ;)
 
bdrepko said:
It doesn't have to do with the note ringing out. It had to do with stepping on the button and hitting a note, but that note is cut off which (at least in my case) throws my timing off a little. It's not that big of a deal, but the reduction on the III makes me happy.
Click to expand...

I think it comes down to a skill players need to develop. Just as you learn to handle your guitar such that the notes come out at the right times, you have to learn to handle your other gear so it makes the right sounds at the right times, too. 35 ms is technically about as short of a time span as it's possible to perceive as a human. That should give any guitar player enough slack to change scenes with an imperceptible gap if the guitar player has control over his playing. Learning to step on pedals at the right instant and phrase your playing to accommodate that switch is something a musician just has to get good at. Same with actual tube amps, same with changing pickup positions, which incidentally takes the fastest guitar players around at least 20-30 times longer than the 35 ms scene change gap.

And I don't mean to come off as a Fractal apologist, btw. If the company does anything I consider a misstep, I'll say something. However, complaining about a gap that's almost literally imperceptible unless you go out of your way to magnify it, and is as short as it can realistically be without making additional huge compromises in other aspects of a product, is just something that there's not a whole lot of value in.
 
searching said:
I guess because it was just honestly funny to me. Comparing the 40-100ms audio gap to blinking your eyes (100-400ms) gave me a good chuckle. I guess the humor doesn't translate through text. If you were my best friend in real life I would joke about it with you also. But I get you have a problem and I won't joke about it anymore. 100ms audio gap is serious business. ;)
Click to expand...

It’s not like talking about audio gaps hurts my feelings, so don’t worry about that part. :)
 
GreatGreen said:
I think it comes down to a skill players need to develop. Just as you learn to handle your guitar such that the notes come out at the right times, you have to learn to handle your other gear so it makes the right sounds at the right times, too. 35 ms is technically about as short of a time span as it's possible to perceive as a human. That should give any guitar player enough slack to change scenes with an imperceptible gap if the guitar player has control over his playing. Learning to step on pedals at the right instant and phrase your playing to accommodate that switch is something a musician just has to get good at. Same with actual tube amps, same with changing pickup positions, which incidentally takes the fastest guitar players around at least 20-30 times longer than the 35 ms scene change gap.

And I don't mean to come off as a Fractal apologist, btw. If the company does anything I consider a misstep, I'll say something. However, complaining about a gap that's almost literally imperceptible unless you go out of your way to magnify it, and is as short as it can realistically be without making additional huge compromises in other aspects of a product, is just something that there's not a whole lot of value in.
Click to expand...
I wish it was only 35ms. At least it will be in the III
 
GreatGreen said:
However, complaining about a gap that's almost literally imperceptible unless you deliberately go out of your way to magnify it,
Click to expand...

Well here we go again. :(

Instead of making assumptions about what other people perceive or not, can you just accept that different people are sensitive to different kinds of glitches in audio? I know people who can’t tolerate latency I find perfectly acceptable.

And none of the samples, including the one from the III, has a gap that’s “literally imperceptible”.

And yes, there are ways to deal with it, no, it’s not the end of the world, yes, real amps have gaps, too, and the III seems to have a really small one. All true.

Nobody requires any “huge compromises” either. Currently in the II if you use two amp blocks sampling rate decreases. Is it a huge compromise? Well, I frankly don’t notice any difference at all.
 
GreatGreen said:
If it's really so important to your music that you absolutely for the sake of the song cannot stop your guitar from ringing out between and/or during all of your tone changes, you can setup your patches so that transitions between amp tones are handled by routing amps in parallel, then sweep between them either with damped scene controllers on the level knobs of each amp block, or a foot pedal to turn up the level of one amp block while turning down the level of the other amp block for smooth transitions. You can setup these sweeping transitions with up to four pairs of amps per patch. If you need to do this multiple times during a song, then after the first sweep, change scenes at some point between notes to get the next sweep cocked and ready to go.

Unless you're playing music with an ebow or Fernandez sustainer guitar that requires a constant drone for 100% of the performance, you should probably be able to find at least one 35 millisecond gap somewhere that you should be able to do this with minimal song interference.
Click to expand...
Any time you change Amp block X/Y state, even for an amp that is bypassed, there is a gap in the audio. If you truly need 4 amps in a preset, there are going to be cases where there is a gap... Because you have to change X/Y to get to all of them.

And the gap is longer than 35ms.

Anyway, no need to further debate the issue. I've already mentioned that I found an approach that works for me.
 
iaresee said:
You can do this on the II now too, but with fewer amp models -- only 4.
Click to expand...
No, you can't. Because at some point you have to change X/Y which will cause a gap even if the amp being changed is bypassed.

Edit: reading your later post I see how... I need scenes to do the changes, so that doesn't work for me. :)
 
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