FWIW, I've been posting some of my experience with the unit over on TSB... here's a quick rundown and where I'm at.
Obsessively spent the last two evenings with this thing, putting it through the initial "demo" phase. I've run it through my little HT5 combo + G12H cab (FX Return), through some modest headphones (Audio Technica M30), and finally through my friend's Atomic 50w (the black edition with the adjustable tweeter). My thoughts...
DAY ONE FIDDLING
Started with HT5 + cab (FX Return)
After a few hours of dialing through presets and tweaking this or that - I was freaking out...
because it just wasn't sounding like the "holy grail" I had anticipated for so long. I faithfully followed all the guidance and tips I could find. My heart literally sank to the floor. What's wrong? I'm a mainstream MFX vet, but this thing is a whole new world... part of me hoped it would be as easy as plug in, turn on, gain up, play... not so much. I've been through this kind of initial phase plenty of times. I think I had the wrong idea on how this would go.
I disabled cab modeling, of course. Been there, done that. I also switched between poweramp modeling on and off. I prefer it ON. Sounded okay, but
not WOW. Wondering about using my Peavey Classic 30 or HT-20 FX Return. Also thought about switching to a 2x12 with custom Celestion Elite-80s. Dunno.
On to Headphones
Cab modeling on. Sounded better overall. Quickly became apparent that I may need to look at getting a portable FRFR rig at some point, which is what some have recommended to me. I figured this would be the case, based on all my other MFX experiences.
Went back to the HT5/cab after watching a few tutorial vids (thanks Scott Peterson and others). Got some better tones.
DAY TWO FIDDLING
A little disillusioned from day one, last night I began tweaking on patch 000. Kept it super simple. Need to patiently learn how to work this beast. Started paying attention to how each parameter on the 59 Bassman amp affected the tone. Fell in love with the FAT switch. Moved to the deep editing pages, but didn't really do much. Bumped the input trim for more bite.
HT5/cab rig still. Sounding better now. Pulled out five different guitars to see how they sounded through this simple preset. The strat (EMG KH20 pups) sounded great! Yay. The last time I played a Fender amp that was this... "juicy", it made my ears bleed from the crazy volume. Nice to get the sweet punch and bloom at modest levels. A few of the guitars didn't sound so great with these settings, but the strat was a perfect match.
Atomic 50w
So my friend came by with his Atomic 50w (version 2? with the tweeter). The thought was that this would be the perfect match. Plugged it in, turned on cab modeling. Dialed up default presets 000-020 and just chorded away. A little noodling to simply listen. Immediately things were incredibly boomy and muffled, even with the tweeter cranked up - I hated it, frankly. I liked my HT5/cab rig better - no contest.
Regardless, my friend liked the Axe2, flat out. He's big into PC-based modeling - and this unit smokes that stuff (IMHO).
I have been told that I could set the low-cut on each amp in each preset to mitigate the boominess. Good to know... but every amp in every preset...
really? I hope there's a global low-cut or high-cut that applies to all amps/presets with the flick of a switch (???). That would be incredibly useful when switching output rigs on the fly. Anyway, the Atomic is mine for a few days... but I'm not sure I want to bother with tweaking for it since it'll be gone soon.
Back to the HT5/cab rig. This time, started on 000 again, but changed the amp to AC30 Top Boost. Fiddled around and got a mean, punch you in the face, medium crunch, jangly tone that stood right up. Maybe I'm getting the hang of this... heh (probably not). Then it got late and I needed to take care of other stuff.
My thoughts after two evenings of demo'ing
Presets... the first 50 are cool and usable. Simple setups. I'd LOVE LOVE LOVE to have a preset for each amp model as the new models roll out. It would give us a great starting point. With 384 presets, we have plenty of room. Or did someone already set something like this up? Somewhere after the first 50 simple amp presets stuff got a little to strange/unusable sounding for me.
It was pretty simple learning the Axe2 hardware UI. Took a bit, but it's easy to deal with once I got used to the paradigms.
No software editor??? I was told "Don't install Axe-Edit right now. It'll mess up your unit." This is unfortunate because I am all about building patches with a computer GUI. I can't take advantage of any of the user-made stuff either without Axe-Edit (presets, IRs, TMs, Scenes), correct? Needless to say, I'm chomping at the bit for the v2 release as well as the v10 firmware update.
Really need to get a footswitch controller. Ergh. Really need to settle on an output rig. Ergh.
After that first evening, when I couldn't get it to really sound amazing, I thought "this isn't nearly worth the price tag." So yesterday, I asked Fractal for an RMA. They sent it. I am torn between "is it
really worth $2200>" and "it is - just get through the noob phase." The 15-day return policy is so short that it kinda forces you to love it or leave it before you really know it. I fully realize I need to learn how to meld it into my configuration. That will take time. At the same time I don't want any regrets about investing $2200 in something I don't like.
Any tips, input, thoughts, and encouragements are most welcome! I wanna love the Axe2. I'm making progress... slowly.
