Thanks for replying. The Mustang Fenders do sound good, as well
as the A3 Fenders, although a 1970 Twin Reverb is the only real
Fender amp I owned, far too long ago, to remember anything but
the pilot light.

Amplitube Fender LE SuperSonic, MetalHead, and Twin Reverb are a fine
trio, when used with a clean Mustang patch and A3.
Cheers

Correct. The release order went something like this:

Amplitube, Amplitube 2, Ampex SVX, Jimi Hendrix, Metal, Fender, Amplitube 3. X-Gear was out at some point but I forget when it was released, which allowed you to "cross pollinate" between all the IK guitar plug-ins. AT3 eventually replaced X-Gear entirely.


According to IK they developed new modeling techniques/code to better emulate hardware when Fender came out. Then they revamped their old modules from the other plug-ins and put that tech in AT3. So if you use Ampeg SVX within AT 3 it sounds better, notably in the cabinet sims.

I originally started using IK's amp sims because it tore up the Line 6 POD XT that I had at the time in terms of audio quality. The POD sounded like I was recording with a kids toy and Amplitube 2 sounded much closer to the real deal. Ampeg SVX then allowed me to tell clients to not break their backs hauling their big bass rigs into the studio. And then Fender really blew my mind with its quality.

I honestly thought we were a good 5-8 years away from guitar hardware simulators sounding like the real deal, around the time AT Jimi Hendrix came out. But Fender blew my mind and then when IK said they were upgrading all their old modules I was like a kid on Christmas LOL. I still don't think their Marshall amps sound great and still prefer Amplitube Metal over AT3's high gain sims (save the Soldano and Orange models) but for everything else it offers I am completely satisfied. That Roland JC-120 model is just like butta...Between that, the Orange and the Fender Twin all my clean tones are covered.

I was the same way actually, I used to rock a Pod XT Live, but after trying out AmpliTube Fender I sold it and got a StealthPedal! Haven't looked back since and it just keeps getting better with the new gear in the Custom Shop!

From an inside the IK circle viewpoint, how are the Custom Shop sales doing?

0= a bust
5= as hoped
10= beyond our wildest dreams

Have your hardware sales increased since the Custom Shop release?

When will credits be sold at Guitar Center?

Will credits ever get bundled with hardware products?
Cheers

That explains a lot. I thought Amplitube Fender was a huge step up from the previous Amplitube products (although the Jimi Hendrix had some gems).

Nostalgic. I was so on board with those amp sims (at2/jh/fender)

I find the fender stuff great. I think I'll go back through some of them since I've got dem' all tonight

Not sure if credits will ever be sold at Guitar Center, but we do bundle credits with our StealthPlug and StealthPedal.

Yeah whatever you guys are doing to make your software sound authentic keep it up! In all honesty the sound isn't 100% there it's about 95% but that is close enough to fool the vast majority of listeners. I'm not sure if 100% is even possible. Sometimes I prefer the sound of Amplitube to real amps because the real amps may have some issues and I don't foot the repair bill for client-provided gear.

Let alone could I spend tens of thousands of dollars and take up precious space for that last, miniscule 5%. The Amplitube line are indispensible plug-ins and are used pretty much on every mix.

Whenever I read from someone that they don't like how your plug-ins sound my first questions is always "What is your recording chain?" Because just like real amps if you are using a crappy guitar with old strings and a bad cable, going to a mixer's line input, the plug-in will not overcome that to a great degree.

Plugging in a nice Fender or Gibson with new(ish) strings, choosing the proper pickup setting for the track and a Mogami Platinum cable into a Radial DI box and tweaking the settings gets me there every time. Assuming the musician is good, of course. Plus the tried and true technique of layering guitars needs to happen too for rhythm parts.

Nice dodge on the sales question (totally understandable,
but Oprah was asking )

50 credits with the Plug cable is nice!
Cheers

Yes, it has been a long time since I've thought about this but I recall when AmpliTube 3 came out I was explaining how we basically ended up taking everything we learned with AmpliTube Fender plus some newer techniques and putting it all together for AmpliTube 3. Being a long-time fan, I definitely noticed the difference. I came on board with IK roughly during the beginning of the AmpliTube Fender period which was a real shift in quality. I met the CTO (who is the real brains behind so much of our sound) and key developers face-to-face at my first NAMM at that time and they were really excited about the progress we were making. Another notable encounter was our CTO (who is a bass player and huge Jaco fan) getting very animated and excited while talking about the Acoustic 360 model.

I guess tone is like that - regardless of where you get it, it just "clicks" and excites when you feel like you've nailed it. An example of perspective - We just posted something about two Boss pedals on our Facebook page and there is some (expected) hate for one of them, but really when people can get that sound that allows their fingers to make that guitar really sing you can't argue with their enjoyment of what you may think is crap gear.

I can see that if we're talking about all amps in existence (most of which are not good) but it's only about 60-70% as good as really nice amps. That's still good enough to fool most listeners. Kemper is 100% there, meaning I prefer it over most real amps and put it nearly on the level of the best boutique amps.


Agreed there. Double-tracking cures a lot of evils.

Thanks for the heads up on the Kemper, I've never heard of it before. At $1,800+ it's a little out of my price range at the moment but I'd love to demo one some day.