Red Wirez system as a purchasable Axe-Fx firmware upgrade?

smilefan

Experienced
I bought the BigBox collection, and have spent 2 weeks auditioning the countless options Red Wirez IR's and mixer program provides. I am in love. IR for IR I rate the Red Wirez overall as slightly better individually than stock Axe-Fx, but with the mixer ability, IMHO, the Red Wirez offerings are a clear step better than what's in the Axe now. Dimensional, vibrant, and alive. As others have noted, they dont seem to need any EQ'ing, but sound very balanced as is.

The problem I have is that I bought this massively comprehensive bundle from which I must choose only ten of the
thousands of options it provides to implement at any one time in the Axe. This isn't good enough. As a cover band
player I might use 5-6 different Fender patches, 6-7 Marshall patches, a couple Vox patches, and a few modern metal and crazy FX patches in a gig. That's minimum. I want to be able to create speaker/cab/mic mixes to optimize each patch.
The Red Wirez system lets me do this, but the Axe doesn't. I'm not going to purchase the Speaker Box series because I'm
already out of user slots for my mixes.

Cliff, is there any way to adapt the Red Wirez IR/mixer bundles as a purchasable upgrade for permanent download into the Axe, in lieu of the cab/speaker IR's & mic EQ's which are currently stock? Considering that the cab/spkr/mic component is only second in importance to the amp models themselves in shaping the overall sound quality of the Axe, I hope you consider offering this option, or some variant thereof.
 
Did you notice that the firmware file is about 500 kB? I don't own the redwirez bundle but I think it's size is severel MB. So I''m quite sure it's not possible.
 
I'm sure that once the editor is full public, you will be able to drag and drop the Redwirez into a slot and audition to your heart's content. However, you will still be restricted to 10 user spots. I've had the big box bundle for a month or so and can say that while they are awesome, the stock ir's are excellent too (at least the one's that I use).
 
just a question. Why cant IRs be stored on solid state flash memory inside the AxeFX and be moved into the IR cabs on patch changes? Is the load time that slow? or is it the Axe architecture? or the complexity is too much for the DSP chips. Could a 3rd or 4th DSP chip added to the design make the ability to store say 100 user IRs?
 
smilefan said:
As a cover band
player I might use 5-6 different Fender patches, 6-7 Marshall patches, a couple Vox patches, and a few modern metal and crazy FX patches in a gig. That's minimum. I want to be able to create speaker/cab/mic mixes to optimize each patch.

I can't imagine someone in the audience go "wait a minute, it's supposed to be an 1960A with V30's through a SM57. I'm CLEARLY hearing a G12T75, and the SM57 isn't even off-axis. This blows." ;)

Seriously, though, for live shows (yes, even for a cover band), as long as your tone is in the ballpark, you're doing just fine. Majority of the audience couldn't even tell a Marshall from a Boogie, and they couldn't care less as long as it sounded good. Put out a killer show, and folks will keep coming back.

Just my two cents.
 
Fat Albert said:
smilefan said:
As a cover band
player I might use 5-6 different Fender patches, 6-7 Marshall patches, a couple Vox patches, and a few modern metal and crazy FX patches in a gig. That's minimum. I want to be able to create speaker/cab/mic mixes to optimize each patch.

I can't imagine someone in the audience go "wait a minute, it's supposed to be an 1960A with V30's through a SM57. I'm CLEARLY hearing a G12T75, and the SM57 isn't even off-axis. This blows." ;)

Seriously, though, for live shows (yes, even for a cover band), as long as your tone is in the ballpark, you're doing just fine. Majority of the audience couldn't even tell a Marshall from a Boogie, and they couldn't care less as long as it sounded good. Put out a killer show, and folks will keep coming back.

Just my two cents.

Yup, in reality we can all do our live gigs with a Strat, a drive pedal, and a standard Fender amp. But that's not the
point. I paid for this elaborate Red Wirez package and I want to be able to get the most out of it. Just like the Axe
itself. I want to take advantage of the vast options now available thru digital technology. That's why we choose the Axe isn't it?
 
smilefan said:
Fat Albert said:
smilefan said:
As a cover band
player I might use 5-6 different Fender patches, 6-7 Marshall patches, a couple Vox patches, and a few modern metal and crazy FX patches in a gig. That's minimum. I want to be able to create speaker/cab/mic mixes to optimize each patch.

I can't imagine someone in the audience go "wait a minute, it's supposed to be an 1960A with V30's through a SM57. I'm CLEARLY hearing a G12T75, and the SM57 isn't even off-axis. This blows." ;)

Seriously, though, for live shows (yes, even for a cover band), as long as your tone is in the ballpark, you're doing just fine. Majority of the audience couldn't even tell a Marshall from a Boogie, and they couldn't care less as long as it sounded good. Put out a killer show, and folks will keep coming back.

Just my two cents.

Yup, in reality we can all do our live gigs with a Strat, a drive pedal, and a standard Fender amp. But that's not the
point. I paid for this elaborate Red Wirez package and I want to be able to get the most out of it. Just like the Axe
itself. I want to take advantage of the vast options now available thru digital technology. That's why we choose the Axe isn't it?

I can understand the sentiment, but what other solution, outside of the Torpedo box (that's +$2K) what else offers you 10 User slots for IR's?

With the IR Mixer, you can create extremely diverse and complicated IR's if you so desire. And have 10 cabs on 'standby' BEYOND the stock cab IR's. You cannot roll up 10+ cabs to any gig I've been to unless your name is Joe Perry or EVH. :D

Just sayin'. (Don't get mad at me, just pointing out facts). It's an embarrassment of riches, the Red Wirez stuff, for sure. But the "I want it all... right now!" thing when you know the technology and hardware simply cannot, AFAIK, support it seems greedy.
 
Thought it might be worth mentioning -- whenever Liquid Control's Liquid Tracks comes out, it would be able to hold all of you pre-made cabs and I imagine it could drop them in almost at will (not sure if this will be more difficult now wth the newer method of loading cabs to the Axe-Fx -- the old way where the cab slot was pre-designated in the cab file may have worked better for this application.)
 
smilefan said:
Yup, in reality we can all do our live gigs with a Strat, a drive pedal, and a standard Fender amp. But that's not the
point. I paid for this elaborate Red Wirez package and I want to be able to get the most out of it. Just like the Axe
itself. I want to take advantage of the vast options now available thru digital technology. That's why we choose the Axe isn't it?

It's all about diminished returns. Going from a one or two amp setup to Axe-Fx is a giant step forward, and very much an improvement. Learning and optimizing the equipment is even better. But is it REALLY necessary to have it down to the exact mic, cab, speaker, and placement for every song based on the recordings? Well, I suppose if it's easily done, sure, why the heck not. But considering that it's not an easy feature to implement, I'd argue it's just not worth losing sleep over.

Also, consider that even the original artists being covered tend to use different equipments onstage vs. studio, and often sound very different when on the road. :)
 
smilefan said:
Yup, in reality we can all do our live gigs with a Strat, a drive pedal, and a standard Fender amp. But that's not the
point. I paid for this elaborate Red Wirez package and I want to be able to get the most out of it. Just like the Axe
itself. I want to take advantage of the vast options now available thru digital technology. That's why we choose the Axe isn't it?


Yeah, I can definitely understand that. But hey - having "only" ten user slots is still a pretty good problem to have, yes?
 
godprobe said:
Thought it might be worth mentioning -- whenever Liquid Control's Liquid Tracks comes out, it would be able to hold all of you pre-made cabs and I imagine it could drop them in almost at will (not sure if this will be more difficult now wth the newer method of loading cabs to the Axe-Fx -- the old way where the cab slot was pre-designated in the cab file may have worked better for this application.)
That sounds interesting idea if I understood it correctly. Some device (maybe a feature for Liquid Tracks) that could store tens of IRs in banks of 10. Then with some midi command it would push the selected bank to axe's user IR section over midi. Of course that would take some time and you probably couldn't do it while playing but between songs you could swap user IR bank.
 
knoll said:
godprobe said:
Thought it might be worth mentioning -- whenever Liquid Control's Liquid Tracks comes out, it would be able to hold all of you pre-made cabs and I imagine it could drop them in almost at will (not sure if this will be more difficult now wth the newer method of loading cabs to the Axe-Fx -- the old way where the cab slot was pre-designated in the cab file may have worked better for this application.)
That sounds interesting idea if I understood it correctly. Some device (maybe a feature for Liquid Tracks) that could store tens of IRs in banks of 10. Then with some midi command it would push the selected bank to axe's user IR section over midi. Of course that would take some time and you probably couldn't do it while playing but between songs you could swap user IR bank.

I think it might be a couple of seconds. 10 IRs at axe-FX 1024 is about 80kB. A bank file is 256kB and takes 1 1/2 minutes on my setup. That would make it around half a minute...
 
GuitarDojo said:
The only clear solution is to purchase a second AXE-FX. :p

Then you would have 20 IR slots. :D

And what's better than two Axe-FX and 20 IR slots? Why, THREE Axe-FX and 30 IR slots of course!

Oh, where does it end? Would someone PLEASE think of the children!?
 
Scott Peterson said:
You cannot roll up 10+ cabs to any gig I've been to unless your name is Joe Perry or EVH. :D

That's a great point but even those two performers aren't rolling in with 10+ different cabs and all the electronics it would take to switch them all in and out, and all the miking it would take to properly mike each cab.
 
mitch236 said:
Scott Peterson said:
You cannot roll up 10+ cabs to any gig I've been to unless your name is Joe Perry or EVH. :D

That's a great point but even those two performers aren't rolling in with 10+ different cabs and all the electronics it would take to switch them all in and out, and all the miking it would take to properly mike each cab.


Check out the pre-AxeFx setup of Dweezil Zappa on the ZPZ DVD. Maybe not 10 but close enough. Now he's touring with 20+ (2 Ultras) cab setups. I'm sure everyone involved is thrilled, except for his ex rig tech. Hope the dude was also his guitar tech.
 
Scott Peterson said:
I can understand the sentiment, but what other solution, outside of the Torpedo box (that's +$2K) what else offers you 10 User slots for IR's?

For 2K I would pair up the AXE-FX with a Muse Receptor, It can do all the IR's plus a bunch of other stuff:
http://www.museresearch.com/

This question was put to Cliff and he said it's beyond the capability of the current hardware.
And now I'm going to put 2 more quaters in my AXE-FX2 piggy bank.

;)
 
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