Comparison of guitar ampsims and effects SW

[Uncle E]

Personally I can't really recommend Tonex for anything (at least when it comes to dynamic playing), least of all for clean stuff.

No, to be honest I didn't even try the Tonex plugin yet...

No, you're right, this is super punk rock behavior. Rock on, Jens.

[jens]

Personally I can't really recommend Tonex for anything (at least when it comes to dynamic playing), least of all for clean stuff.

No, to be honest I didn't even try the Tonex plugin yet...

No, you're right, this is super punk rock behavior. Rock on, Jens.

What's selective quoting like that then, Trash Metal?

Here's the full quote/context:

More recently, I've found adjusting the input gain in the advanced panel as well as the output gain, on the same panel, gives me much more tonal control. I'm wondering if you've tried adjusting there at all?

No, to be honest I didn't even try the Tonex plugin yet...

I only tried a number of models in Amplitube and found them in every way inferior to their algorithmic counterparts.

I'm willing to give Tonex another chance; albeit for trying sims out I usually control the input gain with my fingers and the volume pot, so I'm not expecting radically different results.

(I took the liberty of highlighting some important bits to make it easier for you)

[Kyunghee]

People sleep on TH-U! The rig player is excellent

[Uncle E]

Here's the full quote/context:

More recently, I've found adjusting the input gain in the advanced panel as well as the output gain, on the same panel, gives me much more tonal control. I'm wondering if you've tried adjusting there at all?

No, to be honest I didn't even try the Tonex plugin yet...

I only tried a number of models in Amplitube and found them in every way inferior to their algorithmic counterparts.

I'm willing to give Tonex another chance; albeit for trying sims out I usually control the input gain with my fingers and the volume pot, so I'm not expecting radically different results.

(I took the liberty of highlighting some important bits to make it easier for you)

That doesn't make the case you think it does. The AmpliTube models are a completely different technology from Tonex.

Anyway, my comment was sincere. This is punk rock. I'm the one being a stuffy "trust the science" nerd about it.

[thievedletter]

At the end of the day, we are spoiled for choice at this point.

[jens]

Here's the full quote/context:

More recently, I've found adjusting the input gain in the advanced panel as well as the output gain, on the same panel, gives me much more tonal control. I'm wondering if you've tried adjusting there at all?

No, to be honest I didn't even try the Tonex plugin yet...

I only tried a number of models in Amplitube and found them in every way inferior to their algorithmic counterparts.

I'm willing to give Tonex another chance; albeit for trying sims out I usually control the input gain with my fingers and the volume pot, so I'm not expecting radically different results.

(I took the liberty of highlighting some important bits to make it easier for you)

That doesn't make the case you think it does. The AmpliTube models are a completely different technology from Tonex.

Anyway, my comment was sincere. This is punk rock. I'm the one being a stuffy "trust the science" nerd about it.

I have not the slightest idea what you are trying to say - you could have replied in Suaheli and it would puzzle me less.

Yeah, most obviously it's vastly different technologies - that was right in the centre of my point and the start/trigger of our discussion, wasn't it?

[Uncle E]

It's OK. JerGoertz got what he needs, there's no need for us to discuss further.

[jens]

Yeah, your replies are so far all over the place and straight up off topic that our conversation stopped making sense a while ago anyway...


thievedletter on the other hand was genuinely curious what might be the reason for our dramatically different evaluation of Tonex and made a reasonable inquiry into my useage scenario - and I have a whole lot more respect for that tbh.

[zerocrossing]

The cleans are excellent.

That sounds promising! Cleans is what I want

Personally I can't really recommend Tonex for anything (at least when it comes to dynamic playing), least of all for clean stuff.

My suspicion is that those who swear by it use a compressor in front of their amp-sim - something I personally would never do, so take my reply with that in mind.

Fwiw MGuitarArchitect is amazing for clean tones.

(Until recently I was - for years and years - a complete Melda nay-sayer by the way.)

There’s no accounting for taste. I found MGuitarArchitect to be garbage. A ton of aliasing and CPU usage. I didn’t try it when they added NAM, but NAM is free and I already own MXXX, which I like for multi effects.

[DCrown]

I am fine with Helix Native, rarely NeuralDSP, they have some good amps and Tonex is good, too imo
Audio Assault has some amps I would use for weird sounds sometimes.
Softube have the worst amps for me, they just don't work for me
I prefer hardware Boss pedals.

[DCrown]

The cleans are excellent.

That sounds promising! Cleans is what I want

Neural DSP Cory Wong, if you have a Strat

[zerocrossing]

- Guitar Rig

Good, especially the new models, but I still think there’s a bit of an artificial vibe to it. It’s got an amazing array of great effects and modulation sources, so I mostly go for it when I’m looking for heavily effected, experimental types of sounds.

Best interface.

- Amplitube

My trusty go-to amp sim. Perfect? Far from it, but overall, it’s the best. I too thought that Tonex was “better,” but when I pushed myself to achieve similar results from the algorithmic models, I usually could, but it takes tweaking and familiarity with the models and cabinets.

Pros:

High quality. (Mostly, see below) Amps and gain boxes react like the real thing with varying volumes.

Wide variety of amps and cabinets, especially if you augment it with Tonex.

Good and plentiful effects.

Pretty good interface. Could be better.

Cheap.

Flexible enough for most of my needs. Three full paths can get you to some very interesting places.

Cons:

Uneven. For instance, the Mesa IIC aliases a lot on the lead channel. The III doesn’t and sounds amazing. The lead channel on the TA-30 has weird under tones that sound like someone playing a fuzz tone in another room. Not noticeable at high gains, but for crunch type tones, it’s unusable. The Dr. Z models sound glorious. The cabinets and mics are similar. Some sound amazing but others mediocre. The key is to learn what works for you and how to get the results you want. The presets suck, so if you’re not the tweaking type, move along.

- UH-X

Hate it. I didn’t like the tones and hated the interface.

- Neural

Very good, though not all the models are for me. I tried one high-gain thing that sounded absolutely terrible. Most are great. My reason for not buying them are that they are fairly expensive and each one is a little walled off garden. I wish they would do an Amplitube style plugin so you could mix and match them. Basically, I want a Quad Cortex plugin.

- DiBiQuadro

Meh. It seemed fine, though higher gain stuff showed a noticeable amount of aliasing. Maybe they fixed this, but I’ve never been back back.

- Softube

Good, but not flexible enough for me. They have a certain looseness to the sound that I found good, but not always. I had a hard time getting decent volumes out of it. I ended up selling Amp Room a long time ago. Maybe it’s been improved.

I’ll add that the UAD stuff is excellent. I may pick up the Paradise plugin, but I already have the individual models, and I don’t know if I need the extra ones with everything else that I have.

I also recently tried Bias. It was pretty good. A bit of aliasing on high gain stuff, but not too bad. I didn’t bother with the AI patch via prompt function, as I know how to get the sounds I need. One of the effects was cool, but had some glitches and their AI help department literally told me to set the oversampling higher… which is not an option on their plugin.

[pekbro]

Mostly I like DiBiQuadro stuff these days. Software-wise anyway.

[CapnLockheed]

Two notes Genome is pretty good

+1 It also imports 3rd party NAM captures and it's DynIRS are fantastic!!

Also like Amplitube. I like Guitar Rig but I consider it more of a great guitar multi-fx processor than a great amp sim. Plays very nice with acoustic guitar. And I never saw the need of upgrading beyond v5. I feel pretty much the same about Helix. I must also mention ReValver. It doesn't get the love it deserves. At one time it was light years ahead of the pack and then Peavey let it whither and nearly die for over a decade. It's back under the inMusic/Headrush banner which does not instill a great deal of faith in me. But I have a soft spot for it as I was part of the original team from before the alpha of V1 while it was still just one guy doing the heavy lifting under the Alien Connections banner.

[Uncle E]

Genome sounds great and they keep giving us new stuff for free. The only problem is it takes longer to load than any other plugin I have.