Real amps vs modelling and plugin amps

[Uncle E]

I have had my eye on an Orange Super Crush for a while now, they released a series of new solid state amps in the same price range though, and now I'm thinking of getting a Gain Baby instead.

Orange made a little battery-powered micro amp that was awful on its own but sounded great miked up. The best part is it was so low-powered that I could put it in the next room without bothering anyone, and listen to the great miked up sound on my monitors.

[CapnLockheed]

I have had my eye on an Orange Super Crush for a while now, they released a series of new solid state amps in the same price range though, and now I'm thinking of getting a Gain Baby instead.

Orange made a little battery-powered micro amp that was awful on its own but sounded great miked up. The best part is it was so low-powered that I could put it in the next room without bothering anyone, and listen to the great miked up sound on my monitors.

Heh.....I used to do that with a Pignose and a Lectrosonics Maxi-Mouse. I used to work in
NYC in the 80's and used the Mouse for busking duties as well. Some subway platforms had pretty
nice acoustics.

[Uncle E]

Do you guys wanna list your top 5 amp sims ?

Tonex
AmpliTube (but only for loading Tonex Captures, never using its own amps)
Woodrow
Lion
Ruby

Every IR loader I've tried has been a disappointment compared to Ox or Ox Stomp.

[Uncle E]

Regardless of the gear I play I still sound like me.

For many years, my goal was to get all the different sounds into a portable and easily recordable package. I was getting great sounds out of many different rigs but never had a single rig that could do them all, and they were unwieldy more often than not. So while I understand and can relate to Howe's point, it only addresses a small part of the problem, at least for me.

[kevinsparks]

I've had two transistor amps, a Marshall and an Ampeg. Both had great sound. I knew the Valvestate wasn't tube, but I honestly didn't realize the Ampeg was transistor based until I got home. I was just shopping by sound and it was the one I think sounded the best. It beat out a whole bunch of tube amps.

I still have a Valvestate 100V amphead. There's a 12AX7 tube in the preamp, it's basically a solid state amp though. It's broken and I can't recall what it sounded like, in use it was quickly replaced with a Rocktron Chameleon solid state preamp and a Marshall Dual Monoblock power amp. I'll have it looked at at some point and see if it's worth repairing. There are some solid state amps which sounds really good though. I have had my eye on an Orange Super Crush for a while now, they released a series of new solid state amps in the same price range though, and now I'm thinking of getting a Gain Baby instead. I just need to try it or at least do some research on the internet to decide

I've had a Valvestate and a Super Crush. If you're not doing chug a chug, the Super Crush is probably better than the Valvestate, but the SC gets pretty gainy. Cleans are nice, and the reverb is useful. My two complaints are the speaker emulated out is terrible, and the head should have been lunchbox sized.

I'd say the Super Crush or Amp1 Iridium are the best analog solid state amps currently available, but people also really love Quilter. Just to add more options, since you know, you are probably already looking at a dozen things.

[Naillerz78]

I'm sorry my response wasn't clear enough for you. As I stated:

Personally, I'm overjoyed to have so many choices at my disposal.

If I didn't like ampsims then I'd hardly be overjoyed to have them. My point is that they are viable tools....more colors on the palette. Pros use them onstage and in the studio. Do I think they're better than "real" amps. That depends on the amp in question. Some cheap solid state amps sound like dog doo IMHO and I would gladly use a profiler like Tonex instead. That being said....would I rather be playing a 100watt Orange or Marshall full stack turned up so loud that it moves enough air to make my pants flap in the breeze? HELL YES!! Personally this NOT an apples vs. oranges question to me. Amps and sims both have a place in my studio. Sometimes different situations require different tools. That's my opinion and I'm sticking to it.

Ah ok, yes I did not read it clearly as pointing to sims just an options/range/affordability of gear these days statement.
Well can we leave solid state aside for the moment as 99% of sims are supposedly modelled on nice classic tube amps often the best examples of /boutique expensive models. It’s not asserting to be modelled on crappy solid state amps ,that’s muddying the water tbh.

So re the tube amps how does it stack up for you sound wise after recording with both ? (I don’t have a studio btw I’m a complete amateur using a DAW /recording. Do sims need more “polishing” / “fattening” up or additions and EQing to give those tracks the same level of depth (or whatever ).

*What are your go-to Sims in the studio also pls*

In reddits I read of “my sim sounds bad” topics .. users give the advice “it’s the IR’s -get better IRs and a great IR loader etc . Is that where the progress has been made the last 5 years? re speaker modelling? .. I can’t hear it personally re the amp modelling has progressed.

I’m going to play with NAM today and check out the profiles. See if that’s better than the older sims I have.

[stoopicus]

IR quality actually does make a big difference in that bad IRs (or bad convolvers) can really muddy things up.

If you want to try a free older one that actually does a decent job, check out STL’s NadIR.

I keep meaning to play around with seeing if I can get cool interesting things going with Kilohearts Convolver in Multipass. Using different IR for the lows, mids and highs is interesting to me, kind of modeling a crossover by hand

[Naillerz78]

DP

[zerocrossing]

One thing to bear in mind with sims is levels. Many of them model the originals at 0dBu = -18dBFS, so if you try and send it a track that isn’t properly gain staged you’re going to have a bad time. Apologies if you already knew that but if you did not - try gain staging down to between -18 and -12dBFS before the sim and see if it sounds better and less overdriven.

Good point. Something which poses a bit of a headache if you're testing out different presets on Amplitube (less so with other amp sims I've tried) is the inconsistency in required input gain per preset.

This is why I encourage people to forget the presets. Think of Amplitube as an analog to real life. No one walks up to a Fender Twin and looks for the preset button. You turn it on, let it warm up. Start messing with the controls. Maybe put a boost pedal in front of it. Maybe buy a few to see what one works best. Maybe you want a wah? Some sort of diode drive? All those can have settings as well. Then you want to record, so now you're setting up a mic. Maybe two. Nudge, test, nudge, test. How does it sound in the mix? Maybe it needs some compression and EQ.

So we do all these things to get "our sound," and yet we're underwhelmed by a preset that was created by someone else with a totally different guitar in a different listening environment. That's ridiculous. Start with the default. Choose an amp that you think is in the neighborhood of what you're after. Pretend you just brought it home from a shop, and work with it. Get acquainted with all the amp models. I made myself go though each one and work with it until I got something I liked out of each one and saved it as a "default." Sometimes on multi-channel amps, that means multiple defaults. From there, many more specific presets are made. Now I have my favorites, plus some Tonex captures of things that aren't modeled that catch my attention, though I mostly use Tonex captures for drive boxes.

[YnJ]

Orange made a little battery-powered micro amp that was awful on its own but sounded great miked up. The best part is it was so low-powered that I could put it in the next room without bothering anyone, and listen to the great miked up sound on my monitors.

Despite it's name, Gain Baby is no micro amp. It's smaller in size than the Super Crush, it has the same output though

[stoopicus]

This is why I encourage people to forget the presets.

Me too, and that is in fact the first advice I give people that buy multieffects pedals too. Ditch the presets and just use them as virtual pedalboards you arrange yourself. 75% of the factory presets on those things suck anyway.

[Naillerz78]

Well I loaded up NAM today and had a good play through. Sadly now have to wipe some egg from my face ..and take back some of the hurtful things I said about amp sims.
I can’t believe this is free. The big names musta been worried when it hit the market hey…
ooo yeah, very nice! Well done NAM.
To the OP, YnJ have you tried this ??

[YnJ]

To the OP, YnJ have you tried this ??

Yeah, I've tried it a few times. It didn't do anything for me, I rather use proper amp plugins

[zerocrossing]

To the OP, YnJ have you tried this ??

Yeah, I've tried it a few times. It didn't do anything for me, I rather use proper amp plugins

I was somewhat impressed with NAM, but there was aliasing that I couldn’t get passed. I’m told this has been addressed since. I also found its IR loader to be hit or miss. Not sure if this has been fixed. It’s probably a fantastic solution for people who want a simple but great sounding amp sim. I don’t know what the user library is like now, but for me, the “hit rate” was pretty low at the time.

Tonex makes much more sense for me. There is a free version, but you can get the “Max” version for $99 on sale. It loads all my IRs without complaints, and has a good cab modeler and other effects. More importantly for me, is that it comes with a fantastic library of captures, including the user library. Not every one works for me, but enough are great that it’s still a ton. Way more than I could ever use.

Also, I’m a one-stop-shopping-experience kind of guy. Some of my favorite sounds involve three amps, with various different stomp boxes, and post cabinet studio effects. I could set that up with Bitwig, but what a pain in the ass. I’ll also assert that I think a lot of the amp and cabinet models in Amplitube are every bit as good as what’s available in Tonex, and I really appreciate how they tweak like a real amp, not like someone just stuck an EQ in there. Maybe this is just nostalgic for me. I’ve not owned a huge number of amps in my life, but I’ve worked in many shops and I’ve had the pleasure of spending a lot of time with a lot of them.

[CapnLockheed]

My five favorites?

1) Two Notes Genome - It's own amps are pretty good. It can load NAM and Aida-X captures as well.
Combined with Two Note's DynIR, (dynamic irs), it's become a go to.

2) Tonex

3) ReValver Suite & ACT combo. (Personal bias tho as I was one of the original beta testers).

4) Scuffham S-Gear

5) Magix Vandal - tho perhaps not the best sounding of the bunch, it's uncomplicated GUI
and "feel factor" make it a go to for quick jams or as a sketchpad.