Favorite amp sim and why

[beats are us]

amplitube 3

just a great sound overall, tons of control and customization, and a lot of models to choose from.

however, i wished there were more effects for crazy sounding stuff that guitar rig does have. guitar rig has so much stuff to great crazy sounding effects that you can run on synthesizers and guitars.

[zerocrossing]

I frankly can't understand all the AT3 hype.

Same here to be honest ^^ .

Hi Peeps,

Well, First of all I'm impressed as hell with this piece of software, Just got my copy (as a birthday present!) installed and authorized, everything is great, JCM 800 is beyond imagination IMHO, very tight and gluey, beefy and tasty, Also that Orange Amp + Ambass'dor are working great together, Well I think IK applied the Fender's Advanced Algorithms to all the previous models in AT2 and while it works almost great on everything (Tighter and Beefier sound) but I think it changed something as well, For example I used to have a very Rounded Sound on both "American Tube Clean 1&2" in AT2 which is lost now, And if I remember right when Fender released Someone else also mentioned the same thing about the Fender amps that are tighter and the reason people and I think someone from IK (probably Squids) brought up was that IK modeled all the models in AT Fender from the current Fender Production line, they said the reason is that the current actual fender amps which IK modeled them sounds more tight and aggressive, In that time I could use the amps from both AT2 which were obviously more rounded and from AT Fender which are more Tight and aggressive, But now I have lost the Rounded sounds from Fender amps in AT2 which is not good IMHO.. Well I think they did a great job and maybe I'm wrong, But to my ears the Fender amps in AT2 does not have that Rounded sounds anymore.

Btw Sorry for my bad English

Did you get hit on the head at some point and forget?

[Silenceborn]

Well after all those responses and answers to your nonsense Fanboiness, and after describing everything Gazillion times to every1, you are still digging my posts to find something ?

Ok here again just for you AT advocate I paste something which I repeated million times before, but it seems your reading problem is getting even worse (as you obviously could not write my name properly , SlientBurp ??) :

----

"don't get me wrong though, I'm using them (I mean all amp sims and I still believe that AT, GR, and all the others are very good and useful in different situations) all the time myself for many of my projects, even sometime I use amp sims instead of real amps for their fun factor and ease of use"

Also as Hink very well said, after tweaking like hell AT or IMHO even GR or any other amp sim can give you some very nice sounds, and in different situations people use different tools, not all people really all Fanboi of only one tool;) . Moreover when I said that(though I still believe AT is wonderful) it was before the discovery of Vandal. Also as you can read into my post about AT3, I clearly mention that AT3 lost that rounded sound for some parts because I believe (or maybe I'm wrong) that they just applied the same Fender's algorithms to all the AT3 package which makes some old rounded sound and presets to become lost forever and I still have that problem with AT3 yet. But I do not care anymore, because I can easily get my favorite sound with Vandal now.
---

Well ZC, I suggest you go and read ALL my posts bro, at least you could learn how to join a healthy discussion m8. or well there is a reason KVR has a button called : MUTE. It seems very useful in some situations like this when some1 with this mentality can not comprehend an even simple matter. Well dig deeper next time.

And after Sascha himself answered 2 times clearly that there is no conspiracy, that there is no1 behind the scene and you did not even respond!. And now you have found something else to fight for?? I honestly feel some serious mental problem here tbh...


You said :

Oh, I'm sure of it. The thread started by SlientBurp was one of his few posts and prior to that he said exactly the same thing about Amplitube. It's a way to keep Vandal in the "Latest Posts" column.

And I answered to my dear kvr AT Fanboi/Advocate ZC :

"But I doubt you ever had a healthy discussion experience with people around you before, as your FANBOI symptom is getting worse each and everyday, and I'm sure the AT or whatever is not the only thing you are FANBOI for,
your mentality is based on that symptom unfortunately..

I'm really done with you ZC, feel free to ramble here and dig people's posts though, as I said before you are free to waste people's time.


Good luck !

[redshift factor]

I really like AT3, but would you please show me the natural feedback button?

Just crank one of the high gain amp models. Throwing any of the distortion boxes in front will be sure to send it screaming with feedback. So will the DCOMP or compressor. You could even just boost the signal by turning up the volume slider on one of the graphic EQ stomps. Any of these techniques are sure to send your guitar into feedback, though none of it is necessary. All you need is high gain and to TURN IT UP. The old trick of putting the guitar in front of the speaker will work too. You'll probably need something more substantial than desktop Logitechs, though.

If you want to fine tune and amplify the feedback range, try experimenting with the ENV FILTER stomp. You can get some really wild feedback effects with that.

I disagree that amp sims are only meant to replicate the sound of a recorded amp.

Then why do they all have mics incorporated into the cab sims?
You can only hear the sound of the cab through a microphone, not the sound of the live cab directly. You're listening to it through a recorded media playback environment. That's like saying Jimmy Page's guitar on Led Zeppelin III was weak compared to a live amp. Blame the limitations of the recording and playback systems for that.

My point is when someone like Silenceborn says that ampsims can't take the place of real amps, it's because he's comparing a cranked cab to his desktop Logitech's output. I'm sure if he plugged an amp head directly into those, it wouldn't fare any better.

Just pushing a sound through a 4x12 does not a guitar amp make.

Not by itself, no, but it will give the sheer power and volume to make a good ampsim suitable for delivering a complete live experience. You'll probably want to bypass the cab section, though.

[Hink]

I really like AT3, but would you please show me the natural feedback button?

Just crank one of the high gain amp models. Throwing any of the distortion boxes in front will be sure to send it screaming with feedback. So will the DCOMP or compressor. You could even just boost the signal by turning up the volume slider on one of the graphic EQ stomps. Any of these techniques are sure to send your guitar into feedback, though none of it is necessary. All you need is high gain and to TURN IT UP. The old trick of putting the guitar in front of the speaker will work too. You'll probably need something more substantial than desktop Logitechs, though.

If you want to fine tune and amplify the feedback range, try experimenting with the ENV FILTER stomp. You can get some really wild feedback effects with that.

I disagree that amp sims are only meant to replicate the sound of a recorded amp.

Then why do they all have mics incorporated into the cab sims?
My point is when someone like Silenceborn says that ampsims can't take the place of real amps, it's because he's comparing a cranked cab to his desktop Logitech's output. I'm sure if he plugged an amp head directly into those, it wouldn't fare any better.

Just pushing a sound through a 4x12 does not a guitar amp make.

Not by itself, no, but it will give the sheer power and volume to make a good ampsim suitable for delivering a complete live experience. You'll probably want to disable the cab sim, though.

point one, not really the feedback tone I'm going to get from my 1/2 stack at all. Probably partially because the tubes help by being microphonic but more importantly cab size/speaker size/frequency range all play a major role in the character of the feedback. You ellude to this issue simply by stating "Throwing any of the distortion boxes in front will be sure to send it screaming with feedback."

I don't want my guitar screaming with feedback, I want a contolled feedback and not synthetic either. The best part of using feedback is playing on the edge and being on the verge of over the top. If you take a small speaker and loop a mic in front of it for feedback then try a larger speaker in a larger cab you will see the small speaker wont be as subtle, the breakpoints will be shorther and there will be a lower threshold. Basically you have taken your control zone and decreased it considerably, coupled with the frequency range smaller speakers like nearfield monitors have and it's no where near the same as on stage with an amp (unless you're using a tiny amp).

Point 2, yes the mics on every sim, but they also can be defeated. But I agree with rest of it.

Point 3, it will be loud, but this is just me...it wont be the same but of course that depends on how you're driving the cab. In fact the only way I really know to deliver the same tone would be to use a radial re-amper http://www.radialeng.com/di-xamp.htm but again that's just me. I've run my laptop into my cs 400>4x12 celestions and it lacks character, stereo would be better but when my 4x12 was wired for years down to 4 ohms and stereo so as to use my Marshall tube pre (stereo) through the cs into the 4x12 I tried my PODs. The PODs plugged into the power amp didn't really float my boat. The sound was there, but not "where" I wanted it. Of course a sim into another power amp and speaker is going to do this and of course the frequency range of a 4x12 and a monitor are quite different.

When I put my boogie on top of my 4x12 my guitar is happy, my boogie is happy and my 4x12 is happy that it's getting what it likes to reproduce. All three thank me by sounding awesome

[redshift factor]

The mics cannot be defeated without bypassing the entire cab.
It doesn't make sense to emulate a "direct" cab sound through speakers designed for playback anyways. They are two totally different animals.

More to the point, though, you can't capture or otherwise scientifically measure the response of a cab without some sort of microphone, which of course introduces the Heisenberg principle. That's why no one does it.

And the end user's speakers are a wildcard. They cannot be anticipated or zeroed out. Since speakers vary so greatly in character and quality, there is no way to make a guitar cab simulator that is going to universally make every speaker sound like that guitar cab. You can only emulate the sound of a recorded guitar cab as heard through that particular speaker.

As for the feedback, I get very realistic feedback from the Rectifiers, Peavey, and JMP, to be sure. And I can also push those, along with the Vox models and MKIII right up to the edge of feedback that you talk about. Boosting the signal into a crunch amp with an EQ stomp gain, or the compressor stomp output works quite well.

The authentic feedback is one of the main things that sold me on AmpliTube early on.

[Hink]

please reread what I said "a sim is designed to allow the artist to record their guitar without the limitations of a live amp." That is it's not designed to sound like a recorded guitar, it's suppose to sound good for recording. I'm sure that is semantics to you but to me it's huge. Old school again, that's more like recording a recording which is was you said. "They are only meant to replicate the sound of a recorded amp."

I disagree entirely, I think a sim is to replicate a signal suitable for recording.

As for the feedback we'll have to agree to disagree because the feedback I'm talking about is not happening any way but all the way for me. It's not like I haven't been at this a while and I think it's safe to say the I often come up with atypical methods of doing things. If there was a way I would of found it, but a monitor wont do it. If you're multi-tracking and using a sim that monitor is carrying more than just the guitar which walks on frequencies making it harder. Part of it also is what isn't there as well, a full range monitor even alone is going to bring out more of the tone aspects I don't want. I can do okay splitting to my amp and turning my Ted Weber Attenuator low but not off, but I still am concerned about it bothering others.

[redshift factor]

Feedback in AmpliTube does require a bit of finessing to get it dialed just right. The main areas to concentrate on is making sure to feed the preamp section with enough input level, and dial in just the right amount of gain. The sweet spot where it's just teetering on the edge of feedback may only be 0.1 to 0.2 dB. Don't make the mistake of cranking the gain and volume too high. If it's too loud for a real amp, then it's probably going to be too loud for AmpliTube, too.

But you have to admit, AmpliTube is the only ampsim that can even do feedback at all. You can get a nasty aliased shriek out of Guitar Rig if you push the signal too hard, but nothing like amp feedback, or anything you would ever want on purpose.

[Hink]

I'm sorry but I can't agree because I do not think it can give me the same tone from the feedback I want. You're kind of arguing a moot point, no matter what there are going differences that cannot be simulated between live and a sim situation. This is one, just like you can have all the best drum samples and even recorded drums but none of them even cranked up can give you that kick in the gut you get when you're playing in front of the drums live.

When I'm at liberty to crank things up those are things I do, the things I cant here. Gently coercing the back of the neck by rattling and tapping my fingers while slowly rolling up the volume can seemingly create a note out of no where that feedback latches onto then manipulating that sound with the whammy into a song is a fun trick. I can roll in the sound and get an interesting albeit quite different sound with a sim, but the break isn't there, the latch can only be accomplished by the use of a compressor and that destroys the fragility of that live and loud feedback that makes it not only fun but effective.

[P.T.]

It's been said before in this thread, but I'll say it again.

None of these sims will sound like a real amp because you are listening through your studio monitors.

AC/DC doesn't sound like a cranked amp on their recordings either.
Those cranked amps sound like recordings of cranked amps.

If the sim sounds like a recording of a cranked amp it has done it's job.

[Silenceborn]

My point is when someone like Silenceborn says that ampsims can't take the place of real amps, it's because he's comparing a cranked cab to his desktop Logitech's output. I'm sure if he plugged an amp head directly into those, it wouldn't fare any better.

EDIT : Well, amp sims can not take the place of real amps for sure, but I believe amp sims are GREAT for recording and for their great tone palette and etc. the thing I'm here discussing is FEEDBACK of an amp, not amp sims generally.

Well I'm not sure if the "Genelec 8250A" set and also 2 sets of lovely "JBL LSR 2300 with room correction" monitoring system in the studio I record are cheap tbh.

BTW, I did not know you are the only one who can get feedback from amp sims . So just FYI, I was getting feedback far back from even GR1, or even simulanalog suite or even some of those free amp plugins like 5 or 6 years ago even.

Its not rocket science m8, and yes it is possible to get feedback in that way, BUT the SOUND, the FEEL, the DYNAMICS, the ALIVENESS and so many other
critical factors(as just a musician and not a pro sound engineer, I don't know how to describe them with better terms) is not there, so before starting prejudgment about my (cheap? ) monitoring system , please ask some pro audios in studios or go grab some REAL amps and cabs, throw them on the stage, crank em, stand in front of them, and feel the heavenly feedback. So I repeat it again here :

"Get real Fender and Marshal or just your favorite REAL amp and cabs (ATM my favorite is my newly purchased "Orange Dual Terror" which I'm in love with, especially it's Fat channel!! ) , crank them, find the right spot, try to be creative with your guitar volume and tone, and then you can FEEL and realize the REAL difference between an amp sim feedback and a real alive, dynamic and truly magical feedback of a real amp. You will be amazed redshift factor, trust me.



Cheers !

[shogger]

Vandal sounds interesting. Anyone know the demo limitations?

It times out after 5 days. There is a link you can click that promises to extend that demo period...

Shogger

[Amberience]

I don't use any other amp sims than AT3 now. AT2 was always a bit shrill, but usable. At that time, I prefered Podfarm and Revalver. But AT3 has completely fulfilled my needs. The honeymoon period is over, and I still feel like it is the best amp sim out there; just in terms of raw sound, and usability.

I've not even bothered trying to use Recabinet, as the built-in cabs are just really good.

Other than that; Laney VH100R, Orange Dual Terror, and a big fat Zilla cab with Celestion Vintage Centurys!!

[zerocrossing]

If you take a small speaker and loop a mic in front of it for feedback then try a larger speaker in a larger cab you will see the small speaker wont be as subtle, the breakpoints will be shorther and there will be a lower threshold. Basically you have taken your control zone and decreased it considerably, coupled with the frequency range smaller speakers like nearfield monitors have and it's no where near the same as on stage with an amp (unless you're using a tiny amp).

The reason we're not getting that guitar cab kind of feedback is partially due to the fact that the smaller the sound source the more directional the sound is. Add to the fact that we're using near field monitors and that means even more directional than a basic home stereo speaker. Is someone in this conversation really using Logitecs? If they are they should smack themselves and go home in shame.

None of this really has much to do with an amp or amp simulation. Put an amp in one of those amp isolation boxes and monitor it in another room wearing headphones and your amazing feedback machine has it's testicles removed. You mention "artificial feedback" but I'm not sure what you mean Hink. Acoustic (kenitic) feedback is just that. If you're talking about Sustainiac systems (I have one) I highly recommend them. Really good and very controllable. You can dial them so that you're just getting a tiny bit of life, or crank it so you feel like you're standing next to a full stack cranked up.

[zerocrossing]

Vandal sounds interesting. Anyone know the demo limitations?

You get the full version for a couple of weeks I think. I'm not sure how long but my demo is expired and won't make a sound so that's that. Not sure why devs to that. I like the way Admiral Quality does it where after the demo period expires you get bursts of silence ever few seconds. That way at least you can continue evaluating it. I admit I only got to spend a night demoing Vandal and I didn't like the sound at all, but then I was out of the country for a few weeks and now there's no going back.