Hello & welcome.....
There are NO limitations to the AX8 unless you've already owned & used the Axe Fx II for years & years.....& took full advantage of ALL it has to offer w/ it's dual amps & loaded up your presets w/ everything but the kitchen sink.
The AX8 is just fantastic & I miss nothing at all from the big brother unit.
The goal in creating the AX8 was to give us the "Fractal Audio" quality & sound at a more affordable price range. The only way to do that was to remove the USB recording & dual amp models for the most part. That's what it took to bring the price down & for 90% of us, this was a great & needed thing.
Never listen to any one persons opinion on-line, do your own research , listen to clips, watch videos & then make your best educated guess. The only way to know for sure is to get (& learn) the unit in question in your hands & play it through your guitars & gear.
If you, me or anyone can't sound just stellar through the AX8.....well.....then....um....maybe a tube amp or refrigerator sized rack is needed in the end. Lol
Understand that the only limitations on the AX8 come from the users understanding of the unit itself.
The amount of blocks you can load into one preset is incredible & what do you really need to sound good? You may need to run multiple presets & skip the scene thing, but that's not a big deal in my eyes at all. Using the lower CPU intensive reverbs fixes any maxing out of the unit & ALL units have a cap on how big a preset can get too. Don't be scared away by all the "limitation" talk.
I've had it for 2-months & I'm still learning new things & ways to make it work for me. It's a totally pro level unit on all levels & like all new products, it's being revised & made better w/ firmware updates & that will continue for years to come. We've already seen major updates that included all kinds of fixes, new amp models & better funtionality.
Good luck on your tone quest & get one of these killer Fractal units in your hands ASAP & test it out.
If money's NOT an issue & you have any concerns at all about the AX8, get the Axe Fx II XL+ & you'll never need to purchase another amp modeling device in your lifetime.
I try to look at guitar gear as follows. I'm NOT a single coil Strat guy at all, they just don't work for me at all. But, I know that some of the best players love them & some of my favorite guitar tones come from them. Modeling gear is no different & what one guy just loves & praises, another guy can dislike or even hate. I'm a mid-grade player who knows what works only when I try it out. Fractal works for me....& I've never been a deep tweaker in the past either. Fractal's amp selection & high quality FX make want to learn more & make me want to play more too.
Again, good luck & results may vary.
Peace! X
The Friedman ASM-12's sound HUGE & are just Rock Solid & you can play low rhough them if needed. I do this, but prefer to play that at a semi to very loud level. They are heavy as hell & weigh-in at 51lbs. They are built at the same quality as a Mesa Boogie cabinet & look fantastic. These are not guitar cabinets though & definitely an FRFR system. The drivers have been changed & Dave license this design from another company, but does also build a new cabinet. While I strongly recommend them, I've owned no other FRFR system.....So.....Please take that into consideration. I bought them for the looks & price point 1st & lucked out that they work so well for me live. Then I bought a 2nd one & I'm in total stereo heaven!
