AmpliTube Metal

As a keytarist working in the metal genre, Amplitube metal could well be the first sign of IKM's desire to compete against NI's Guitar Rig and Revalver's MK previously established reign in this niche genre. Those who found AMPT2 to be somewhat too kind with the distortion and grind will definitely find some solace in AMPTM's numerous presets that range from purely barbaric to clean, crystal leads.

Instead of enumerating specifics about the plugin, I mainly asked myself one question: how does AMPTM contribute to the metal musician, who is already accustomed to various other virtual amp boxes?

PRESETS: A huge bank of presets that can cater to nearly any need. Varying degrees of hardness and distortion. Easy layout makes even the laziest musician get the sound he wants. Not much tweaking of controls needed.

SOUND: Everyone uses a different setup; mine is an ASIO. I have to admit that I found AMPT2's sound somewhat dull and distant- I couldn't really feel the sound right at my ears. AMPTM improves somewhat, but I'm still not getting the roaring metal sound that I want. The lower sound clarity and fuzzing/clipping sometimes gets into the way of the sound feel.

Also, sometimes I don't know how to interpret amp boxes that boast a huge number of cabs and fx. While AMPTM's repertoire of cabs and amps is simply stunning, I feel that the sound I get when I start shredding on a keyboard just doesn't live up to the titles.

COMPATIBILITY: Beware, AMPTM's CPU consumption is somewhat high. I've run into excessive clipping even at a high latency setup on a powerful computer, especially when utilizing another synth or ROMpler at the same time.

Final Note: 6.5/10. I felt somewhat disappointed by the sound (the most important factor) after getting excited over the News announcement. Not a bad plugin, but it's definitely does not take the cake as the new virtual amp for metal musicians.

Notice: I found the plugin to be somewhat "crashy". Certain presets, when activated, cause either the DAW/host to crash or the plugin itself to crash. I tried it in FL8, Ableton, VSThost, and energyXT. However, this may be my own problem, as I am not clear as to the cause of its occasional malfunction.Read Review