What doesn't the Axe Fx do effect wise

M

motorhead9999

Member
So as someone who's not necessarily as knowledgeable about the wonderful world of guitar pedals and effects, I started thinking: Are there any effect pedals (or types of effects, which is probably the better way of putting it) that the Axe can't/doesn't do?

Besides the fart pedal. I know that the Axe doesn't have a "Classic Gas" effect block yet.
 
I cant think of anything it wont come close to. There is a lot of talk about the Eventide stuff. You can match most of it using multiple blocks and a lot of time. Effect wise, not much it cant or wont do. Utility wise, none of the FAS stuff sends midi clock. That is a big drawback for some.
 
I think the effects are mostly covered, maybe not 100% but close enough with enough tweaking. Distortion/OD/fuzz pedals there are obviously 1000s in the real world and the Axe has a limiited selection. But you can tweak them more than a standard drive pedal so you're likely to get reasonably close to most.
 
Rogerthat said:
A Strymon Deco style doubler would be posh.
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Strymon Deco is a great example of something the Axe-Fx can do, but not in a simple manner.

Basically to replicate a Deco, you need all of these:
  • Drive with Tape Distortion model.
  • Chorus.
  • Flanger.
  • Delay with tape delay.
  • LFO set to random modulation.
Even then I don't think there is anything that replicates the Cassette saturation of the Deco V2.

But even if you can plug all this in, it's just miles away from the simplicity of turning one knob on the Deco to go between flanging, chorus, slapback delay and longer one repeat delay.

The Fractal system is just not designed for this type of multi-fx orchestration that some pedals can do. Eventide H9/90 is another good example - you can build its "algorithms" (combination of fx) but you can't save it as a group you can drop into any preset or control as one thing.
 
Digitech Freqout
TC Mimiq (Doubler algorithm in the enhancer block)

None of the delay/pitch setups I've come across on the wiki or in the forums come close to the width and natural sound of the Mimiq or even the Enhancer on classic mode.

Here's a comparison I did awhile back. The clips in order are:
  1. Stereo amps stereo wet effects, (1 take)
  2. Same as 1, with the enhancer block, I think on classic mode (1 take)
  3. Same as 1 with the TC Mimiq on 1 dub mode, (1 take)
  4. Actual double tracking (2 takes, one left one right)
As you can hear the width increases significantly from 1-4, very valuable for live playing with IEMs, or even just practicing at home with headphones. Admittedly 2 and 3 are close but 3 is still wider.
 
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Zvex fuzz factory -
I am close to the “main tone” but yeah the whole pedal is another thing . You can create 100 fuzz just with the 5 knobs.
But globally the axe cover everything .

Ah! And some ehx fx ( small clone, polychorus) too, and I still use the real whammy
 
laxu said:
But even if you can plug all this in, it's just miles away from the simplicity of turning one knob on the Deco to go between flanging, chorus, slapback delay and longer one repeat delay.

The Fractal system is just not designed for this type of multi-fx orchestration that some pedals can do. Eventide H9/90 is another good example - you can build its "algorithms" (combination of fx) but you can't save it as a group you can drop into any preset or control as one thing.
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Yeah, that’s the advantage that pedal designers have when creating a pedal that has a very focused use. A single knob can affect multiple things.

We can kinda do the same with modifiers and control switches, but we’re having to act as the pedal designer, instead of taking advantage of spending the bucks for their work.

In a thread from several years ago I mentioned wanting to be able to group together blocks and treat them as a a single unit, similar to object-oriented visual languages I used to play with back when.
 
Greg Ferguson said:
In a thread from several years ago I mentioned wanting to be able to group together blocks and treat them as a a single unit, similar to object-oriented visual languages I used to play with back when.
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That would be cool as I often have multi-block implementations of things that would be nice to group. Could perhaps be just Axe-Edit functionality, to save/load a group of blocks and modifiers.
 
There's a whole range of pedals out there that combine several effects in really specific ways that are definitely reproducible in the Axe, but it might take a while to get it right. Any of the crazy eventide stuff, or maybe the king of the category- the Hologram Microcosm. I keep mine on my big axe rig because it'd be cumbersome to try and reproduce everything it can do- but could the Axe do it if you chucked enough time into it? Sure!

As others have said, the Mimiq and Freqout, although there are reasonable work arounds for both out there.
 
mimiq
freqout
dedicated stutter/glitch block

Fun fact! We used to add "usable" virtual capo to this list, but that has been solved, IMO. I'm an FM3 user and can't waste the blocks to do the multiblock setups that can get close to the above. I know there is a frequout technique that sorta gets you there and Simeon has put in the time to get pretty OK results for glitchy'ness.... but really at some point I would love all 3 of these to be polished up and done professionally by fractal.
 
Tonedeaf said:
Is the Enhancer considered a BBE Sonic Maximizer copy?
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No, it's a stereo widener. TC Mimiq is a faux double tracker. When used in stereo they have a similar effect of widening the sound but Mimiq's faux double tracking is wider than the Haas effect (Enhancer block classic mode) as you can hear in my short demo above.
 
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As has already been said: mimiq and freqout are probably the most obvious.

On a more esoteric front, the only pedal I keep in my chain is a Dwarfcraft Great Destroyer, and there may be some way to combine assorted things to approximate that, but, if there is, it's beyond me.
 
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