I think
@Omri Bazelet has some good feedback about the experience that shouldn't be brushed aside here. There's certainly a class of user that wants to get it home, power it on and GO! The manual, well-intended, isn't necessarily where everyone wants to start unfortunately.
In his case, there were some country-specific settings that aren't obvious from first power-on or from a glance at the manual. And, don't discount language barriers -- I'm not certain the manual is available in all languages which can be an impediment for initial success in non-US regions.
Discuss the ideas, people, not the people. Criticizing
@Omri Bazelet specifically is exactly how you turn these feedback discussions to shit. I'm talking at you too
@peteri and
@Repartee41. This, "You must be stupid,
I didn't have a problem with this..." innuendo isn't okay here. Got it?
To clarify I was discussing the idea, not the person. I don't think Omri is stupid, I think Omri is exaggerating to bring a finer point to his other complaints, and the idea that it would take anybody six months, or anything close to that, just to get up and running with the Axe-Fx is nowhere close to reality for basically anyone.
However, I do disagree with a few of those finer points as well personally (and agree with some as well). I don't think the Axe-Fx is difficult to learn and I don't think it's difficult to use, especially when compared to other digital devices in the product space, and when considering the freedom you have to build pretty much any given sound you like. Very complex patches and tones can be built in the Axe-Fx, but the people at Fractal have gone to exceptional lengths to make it as straightforward to use as possible, and I think they've largely succeeded. Almost everything is written in plain language and flows logically, the parameters of each block are always arranged in logical groups and tabs, in a hierarchy of most common parameters which are the most immediately available, to the most advanced, esoteric parameters grouped together at the end of the last tabs, etc.
As for some of Omri's other negative feedback...
1. A tutorial has already been made. It's the manual, and it's written in a very friendly, conversational cadence. It's not a "tough" read at all. Also, all the factory presets are designed to be a tutorial of sorts as well. They start off simply and escalate in their complexity to show you what the Axe-Fx can do. If you want a video, I think there are enough youtube tutorials out there to serve the purpose.
2. I do agree with Omri that it would be nice to be able to maximize Axe Edit to a full 16:9 window, sure. However, I disagree with having one giant Fractal Audio app that does everything. I like that Fractal Bot and Axe-Edit are separate, etc.
3. As for having the "real amp" names, I understand Fractal cannot legally include the names of all modeled amps, but I would also love the ability to "manually rename" amp models myself, along with a "rename back to default" option for misspellings, etc.
4. No bluetooth, please. It strikes me as a fairly unreliable technology, it would also make the device susceptible to wireless interference and add more complexity and cost to the unit.
5. I kind of agree with this one, partly. It could be useful if, for patches that only use one line on the grid, you could "fold" the signal path in the same way the Helix does so you could see and access blocks more easily.
6. Not so sure I agree with this one. Seems like the current method is just as proprietary / intuitive as a wheel double-click.
7. I disagree about the change in marketing strategy. Every dollar spent on marketing is a dollar not spent on R&D. And what happens when you start spending less on research while the company continues to grow and still needs to hit those numbers? Innovation and quality go down so you start
relying on marketing for sales, instead of product quality. So you're forced to cut even more corners while marketing needs an even bigger budget to make up for having to push a lesser product, on and on until one day you wake up and you're Gibson guitars, who now makes larely unreliable, poorly crafted junk but constantly spends fortune after fortune trying to convince the market they're not. Opposite of this, you have Fractal Audio, who makes the Axe-Fx III and FM3, which are so uniquely great that Fractal's user base rave about them to the point that much of Fractal's advertising is done by word of mouth. Ever think about how weird it is that so many guitar players know about the Axe-Fx despite how rarely you see Fractal ads? It's because good products very nearly sell themselves.
