Real amps vs modelling and plugin amps

[YnJ]

Something older that piqued my interest back in the day was a Digitech RP1000 floorboard. It had options to run analogue drives with its Fx loop or some such. They ought to be cheap now.

You can do that with the Boss GT-6 as well, and probably with some or all of it's predecessors and successors. I got mine for 60 quid just to get the power supply. It didn't impress me much at first, after reading online about "upgrading" it with an analogue drive in the effects loop, I tried it, and it made a huge difference

[guitarzan]

EDIT: I was always under the impression that the Roland GP-8 was sort of the pinnacle of the early analog/digital hybrid ‘Boss’ stuff, but I never tried one. It was still on my watch lists at a lowball price point fairly recently, but I see it’s not anymore and they are going super cheap, so I think I’m going to it put back on the lists again!

The other guitarist in the metal band I was in in the late 80s had a GP-8. I thought it sounded awful, it might have been the way he tweaked it though. I had a GP-16 myself at a later point, which I thought was a lot better. Again, I don't know if there was much difference apart from the processing power, you might want to consider that instead though…

I think it may have been the way that guy tweaked the GP-8 because from what I’ve read the analog front end is basically a bunch of standard Boss pedals (so are the two digital effects I guess). I have read it wasn’t particularly suited to very high gain metal though.

The GP-16 is said to have more advanced digital effects, but no analog front end, it’s all digital (from what I understand from my recent refresher read-up).

One forum post had these guesses for the GP-8 pedal equivalents and there was general agreement:

FT-2 Dynamic Filter
CS-3 Compression / Sustainer
OD-2 Turbo Overdrive
DS-1 Distortion
PH-2 Super Phaser
PQ-4 Parametric Equalizer
DD-3 Digital Delay
CE-3 Chorus (digital)

That would explain why the chorus was mentioned as the weak spot occasionally, everything else seems pretty solid based on that list. I’ve got a Boss Pro NS-50 noise gate that would probably work great with the GP-8 analog front end in its loop.

I have a bunch of rack stuff just laying around, the GP-8 would pull it all together with MIDI … at the prices these are going for I can’t afford not to have a GP-8!

Then I can have organized big but useable 6u rack laying around instead of scattered remnants — progress!

[YnJ]

Yes, you're right. And all these years I thought the GP-8 was just crap. It's a while ago, and I think I only used the GP-16 in the effect loop of the Peavey VTM I used at the time. The Rocktron and a Marshall Dual Block power amp replaced both of them

[guitarzan]

I can’t believe I’m all jazzed up about rack stuff again now, it’s such a PITA, but since I still have all this crap it seems a shame not to organize it into a working rack system again, and it’ll actually take up less space than it does now.

The pièce de résistance is a killer Soho Acoustics QTR-1 tube preamp I have had forever (it’s pretty much a Kitty Hawk Quattro but with improved reliability and doesn’t need the special foot pedal to switch channels). Some say it is based off Dumble and Mesa circuits, and it does sound great.

I’ll never cart all that crap around again, but I might just as well have it all wired up and ready to play at home. It could probably be captured in NAM for a portable version if I want to.

I think I’m up to at least an 8u rack now…

[Uncle E]

EDIT: I was always under the impression that the Roland GP-8 was sort of the pinnacle of the early analog/digital hybrid ‘Boss’ stuff, but I never tried one. It was still on my watch lists at a lowball price point fairly recently, but I see it’s not anymore and they are going super cheap, so I think I’m going to it put back on the lists again!

…Doing some refresher reading…
seems the GP-8 is great for the MIDI controlled analog front end (analog dynamic filter, drives, compressor, and phaser). Seems like the digital delay would probably be good too though, in an 1980’s Boss way, but there seems to be mixed feelings about the digital chorus (probably a bit too ‘hair band’ for some). The best news is the digital section has analog dry through, and the analog front end has its own output send before any a/d conversion, then the digital section has the return — so you can do the four cable method. Pretty cool for 1987 or whatever.

Prince's guitarist sold me his GP-8. It sounded exactly like Prince (you might recall the scene in Purple Rain where he was doing the pedal dance with Boss pedals). You're right about the 80s Boss digital delay, those were 12-bit and cool in their own way.

Still only 1 parameter knob on all of these!

[Uncle E]

You can do that with the Boss GT-6 as well, and probably with some or all of it's predecessors and successors. I got mine for 60 quid just to get the power supply. It didn't impress me much at first, after reading online about "upgrading" it with an analogue drive in the effects loop, I tried it, and it made a huge difference

Where in the signal chain does the effects loop sit in the GX-700? Can you run the analog drives out to an external amp modeler, then back in to the digital effects? Can the internal amp modeler be bypassed?

[Uncle E]

But I think what I really want is a surfybear. Insane since I still have the Peavey Valverb, but rack stuff is kind of a pain to mix and match with pedals, especially just one unit. Maybe if I got a cool tweed covered 1u case for it and put it on top of an amp…

Still, the Valverb is great but it’s not especially Fender outboard sounding, where the SurfyBear really nails it. Topanga into Valverb… I bet that would work. No way to power it from an isolated DC supply or powerbank though, and that’s important when you live with very noisy unshielded house wiring. Unwieldy too.

Hmmm… rack up the H&K Bass Master, the Rockman Stereo Echo, and the Peavey Valverb… a lot of pure analog tone in there for a 2u rack. But then I need extreme power conditioning, always have access to mains power… everything is always such a hassle!

You really are my low watt brother from another mother. I had a Valverb for around 20 years and loved it. Unfortunately, it's probably the source of your noise, that's why I ultimately stopped using it and I never found a solution.

[Uncle E]

The pièce de résistance is a killer Soho Acoustics QTR-1 tube preamp I have had forever (it’s pretty much a Kitty Hawk Quattro but with improved reliability and doesn’t need the special foot pedal to switch channels). Some say it is based off Dumble and Mesa circuits, and it does sound great.

Want

It's funny, I build Dumble's but it would cost me more to build it than to buy one of these. It makes a lot of sense, too, because most of the Dumble sound comes from the preamp section.

[YnJ]

Where in the signal chain does the effects loop sit in the GX-700? Can you run the analog drives out to an external amp modeler, then back in to the digital effects? Can the internal amp modeler be bypassed?

It's after the compressor, drives and preamp (amp modeler), and before the EQ and effects. Everything can be turned of with a button on the front panel, except for the speaker sim which I had to turn off in the global settings. Just as well, I'll never use it anyway. The amp modeller can be turned on and off just pushing the button for it. It's a lot more practical than most of the more recent Boss multieffects in that sense

I have ran the drives on the GX-700 to an external amp modeler, in the form of a plugin on my PC, and back to the effects, using the OMEC Teleporter you recommended to me. It definitely opens up a lot more options, as I have amp plugins which sound a lot better than the amp models on the GX-700, and combined with the analogue drives makes the GX-700 sound a lot better. I don't have any other amp modellers at the moment, I would guess you can use most types in the effect loop though. Digital effects works fine. I've noticed the effect loop doesn't react well to analogue effects, it works, you get a noticable drop in sound quality though

[Uncle E]

GX-700 + Soho QTR-1 may be in my future (but no Valverb, thank you very much)

[YnJ]

The pièce de résistance is a killer Soho Acoustics QTR-1 tube preamp I have had forever (it’s pretty much a Kitty Hawk Quattro but with improved reliability and doesn’t need the special foot pedal to switch channels). Some say it is based off Dumble and Mesa circuits, and it does sound great

I see them as low as $250 on Reverb, it will be more than double as much including shipping VAT and customs fees though. Is it worth $600-800?

I think I’m up to at least an 8u rack now

You are going down the rabbit hole as well I see. For me it started when I took my Chameleon out of the wardrobe to see if it was still working. It was, so I started looking for a power amp. Now I have a 6U and an 8U with three preamps, two effect modules and a power amp, in all taking up room equivalent to 11U, and it all started in early March this year

[guitarzan]

The pièce de résistance is a killer Soho Acoustics QTR-1 tube preamp I have had forever (it’s pretty much a Kitty Hawk Quattro but with improved reliability and doesn’t need the special foot pedal to switch channels). Some say it is based off Dumble and Mesa circuits, and it does sound great

I see them as low as $250 on Reverb, it will be more than double as much including shipping VAT and customs fees though. Is it worth $600-800?

I think I’m up to at least an 8u rack now

You are going down the rabbit hole as well I see. For me it started when I took my Chameleon out of the wardrobe to see if it was still working. It was, so I started looking for a power amp. Now I have a 6U and an 8U with three preamps, two effect modules and a power amp, in all taking up room equivalent to 11U, and it all started in early March this year

I don’t know about $600 - $800, where are you? Maybe you’d be better off with a Kitty Hawk Quattro if those are more available to you locally (I think they were built in Germany). Same circuit-wise, they tended to overheat because of all the tubes in a 1u space but there must be a workaround (enclosure fans or something). They also had a special foot switch, but that shouldn’t be too hard to work out either.

I really like the QTR-1, but I’m not sure I would spend that much to replace it. I really haven’t tried that many other tube preamps, so I don’t feel confident in recommending it that highly, good as it is — there’s a lot available at that price and I haven’t tried most of it. I had a Mesa Studio .22 preamp and I got rid of that and kept the QTR-1, if that’s something to help gauge my opinion of the Soho.

[guitarzan]

GX-700 + Soho QTR-1 may be in my future (but no Valverb, thank you very much)

Here’s an old post from another forum that might interest you if you do get a QTR-1:

SOHO Acoustics QTR-1 Tube Preamp Mods

https://adadepot.com/index.php?topic=230.0
ampguru

#8
March 18, 2015, 02:49:47 PM

Last Edit: March 18, 2015, 02:55:19 PM by ampguru

Hi Quattro Users,

I tuned for a long time my SOHO QTR-1 Quattro Clone, and got the best Results in Hot and Lead with 2 major type of Mod´s
Change the 3 Grid Leak Resistors from 1meg to 470kohm, and changing Values of the coupling Caps.

( while reinstalling the Original use of Lead, without the second Half Use of The Stage , look at the Schematik, it´s easy to realize, on the PCB it was already Prepared )

1meg Grid Leak was way to much, changing takes away the Mud and you get a much more Stabel Tone, without loosing Overtones.

Also there was a 1meg Bass Pot, wich muds anything to Shit, changed it to the desired Value of 250K.

Play it with ADA GCS-2 ( Cab Sim ) with Intellifex Mixed in Wet Only via a Mackie Mixer and i´m in Heaven.

No Problem with differnt PA or Monitor Systems anymore, Now Sounds great over any type of Soundsystem.
Simply Great

V1 Raytheon 12ax7 V2 Siemens ECC83 V3 und V4 Brimar ECC83

The Cathode Bypass Reduce Switching i took out Complete, The Thin Character i took away with clipping out the 220pico Bypass ( see the schematik ) and better Crunch i got this way also.

Put a Choke in, and Good F+T Elektrolytics, etc.....

Dead Silent now, even in Hot Channel via Headphone !!!!!!

Jibbi Du

I have a hard time following some of that, but maybe you will understand. I’m not a high gain guy so I really never used the channel 2 Hot or Lead settings much. The Dumble stuff is in channel 1 (Clean, Crunch), or so it is rumored.

[Uncle E]

It's good, just keep in mind that he's reducing bass in some places and adding bass in others, so you'll want to go all-in if you do this. For example, it's likely that they put in the 220 pico to counteract the bass build-up in the other places, so clipping it out without doing the other things would probably sound bad.

FWIW, from the schematics I found, the Soho is more accurate to a Dumble than the Kitty Hawk is. Any negative review of the lead channel might come from the fact that the Kitty Hawk has a full extra gain stage.

[guitarzan]

Nah, I’m good with it as is. I really don’t use the high gain channel anyway. Plus it seems like that guy was optimizing it to use one of those awful ADA cab emulators direct to a PA, so that would take a major overhaul. I just thought it might be a concern for you or anyone else that might be considering purchasing a QTR-1.

Good to know about the Dumble channel. Are you planning any mods there?

Oh yeah, about the footswitch… it just needs to be one of those two button latch footswitches that have a TRS output (a tip/ring switcher), but the problem is that if it doesn’t have LED indicators you have no idea what channel/mode you are on looking at the pedal.

There are some Marshall amp footswitches (and some cheap Chinese ones on Amazon) that have the LEDs, but they require power from the amp, I can’t find any that take a battery or 9vdc pedalboard power for the lights (like some a/b/y pedals).

Can the QTR-1 supply power for the LEDs or would that be more of a DIY thing on the pedal to add external power? I think something like the Roland GP-8 has the ability to handle channel switching with MIDI control, but a simple foot switch that has the two LEDs would be nice to have.

Anyway, any two button latch tip/ring switch will work, but not really practically. There probably is a pedal like what’s needed around somewhere? I think there was some info on modding one of the Marshall footswitches, but I can’t find it now. That was probably over 25 years ago now that I think about it.