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Post by lcr on Dec 11, 2016 6:10:43 GMT -6
No amp sims sound as good as the Axe FX Ultra I had years ago, and most people feel the Kemper is better than the Axe FX, or at least as good if not better. A few questions for anyone who's owned/used the Kemper :
1) Im not interested in the powered one, should I go with the toaster looking one or the rackmount? Doesnt the toaster have a few more faceplate control knobs? Thats the only difference?
2) I assume the footswitch is super cool? It gives you the looper?
3) does the Kemper cover bass also? I assume it does, but while Im asking...
4) any rumors of a new version being released soon?
5) spidif or analog?
6) will it magically make my playing better? Less sloppy, better song writing? Will my mixes always have that super duper polished radio ready sound?
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Post by Johnkenn on Dec 11, 2016 8:20:53 GMT -6
No amp sims sound as good as the Axe FX Ultra I had years ago, and most people feel the Kemper is better than the Axe FX, or at least as good if not better. A few questions for anyone who's owned/used the Kemper : 1) Im not interested in the powered one, should I go with the toaster looking one or the rackmount? Doesnt the toaster have a few more faceplate control knobs? Thats the only difference? 2) I assume the footswitch is super cool? It gives you the looper? 3) does the Kemper cover bass also? I assume it does, but while Im asking... 4) any rumors of a new version being released soon? 5) spidif or analog? 6) will it magically make my playing better? Less sloppy, better song writing? Will my mixes always have that super duper polished radio ready sound? 1) Yes, the toaster has more knobs...but the rack also has the USB on the front which I find really convenient...I've had both. I like that the toaster is easily movable. 2) don't know much about the foot switch 3) yes, tons of bass profiles. It was depressing when I could get as good if not better a sound through the Kemper as going direct into my Neve and sta. 4) They don't really have any need of updating the hardware. 5) Analog sounds better to me 6) I'll tell you this. I was building tracks in the last few few days. Was struggling with eg's. Just nothing sounded good. Broke down and bought the Kemper again and immediately nailed 4 EG parts. I used to say that one of my complaints with the Kemper is that it can be paralysis by analysis...but now I think that's a positive. You can literally nail ANY sound you can dream of. |
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Post by lcr on Dec 11, 2016 8:30:15 GMT -6
No amp sims sound as good as the Axe FX Ultra I had years ago, and most people feel the Kemper is better than the Axe FX, or at least as good if not better. A few questions for anyone who's owned/used the Kemper : 1) Im not interested in the powered one, should I go with the toaster looking one or the rackmount? Doesnt the toaster have a few more faceplate control knobs? Thats the only difference? 2) I assume the footswitch is super cool? It gives you the looper? 3) does the Kemper cover bass also? I assume it does, but while Im asking... 4) any rumors of a new version being released soon? 5) spidif or analog? 6) will it magically make my playing better? Less sloppy, better song writing? Will my mixes always have that super duper polished radio ready sound? 1) Yes, the toaster has more knobs...but the rack also has the USB on the front which I find really convenient...I've had both. I like that the toaster is easily movable. 2) don't know much about the foot switch 3) yes, tons of bass profiles. It was depressing when I could get as good if not better a sound through the Kemper as going direct into my Neve and sta. 4) They don't really have any need of updating the hardware. 5) Analog sounds better to me 6) I'll tell you this. I was building tracks in the last few few days. Was struggling with eg's. Just nothing sounded good. Broke down and bought the Kemper again and immediately nailed 4 EG parts. I used to say that one of my complaints with the Kemper is that it can be paralysis by analysis...but now I think that's a positive. You can literally nail ANY sound you can dream of. Thanks for the feedback. So, which would you go with the toaster or the rack? It has its own GUI controller right? Do you use the GUI? The faceplate controls? Both? |
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Post by mikec on Dec 11, 2016 8:30:24 GMT -6
The foot switch is great for live applications but I never use it when I am recording. The looper works well for practice but it only has about 30 seconds if I remember correctly. I always use the analog connection for recording.
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Post by Johnkenn on Dec 11, 2016 9:26:39 GMT -6
1) Yes, the toaster has more knobs...but the rack also has the USB on the front which I find really convenient...I've had both. I like that the toaster is easily movable. 2) don't know much about the foot switch 3) yes, tons of bass profiles. It was depressing when I could get as good if not better a sound through the Kemper as going direct into my Neve and sta. 4) They don't really have any need of updating the hardware. 5) Analog sounds better to me 6) I'll tell you this. I was building tracks in the last few few days. Was struggling with eg's. Just nothing sounded good. Broke down and bought the Kemper again and immediately nailed 4 EG parts. I used to say that one of my complaints with the Kemper is that it can be paralysis by analysis...but now I think that's a positive. You can literally nail ANY sound you can dream of. Thanks for the feedback. So, which would you go with the toaster or the rack? It has its own GUI controller right? Do you use the GUI? The faceplate controls? Both? Man, that's a hard one. I would really consider ergonomics. If you put it in the rack, will it be easily accessible? Because you will more than likely spend many hours staring at that LCD. Do you have enough deskspace for the toaster? If you do, I'd go with that. The Rig Manager (at least the last time I looked) just allows you to scroll through different presets. It doesn't control all parameters (why hasn't someone done this?) |
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Post by category5 on Dec 13, 2016 12:12:56 GMT -6
If you do get the Kemper, I strongly recommend getting some profiles from Michael Britt or one of the other well known profile makers (Wagener has a pack of all his amps too). He cut me a deal on a pack of all his profiles (MBritt) and up until that time I wasn't feeling the Kemper. The profiles make all the difference.
The profile exchange is cool, but it's mostly educational. What I mean by that, is you'll learn ver quickly that most people who are profiling their amps can't get them set up to sound good in the first place, which is absolutely necessary.
@johnkenn, YES! What's up with there being no GUI editor? If it's all gotta be on the LCD they need to put a bigger and better looking screen on the thing. That is a major sore spot for me.
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Post by Johnkenn on Dec 13, 2016 14:29:33 GMT -6
Yeah the Michael Britt profiles are just fantastic. It's all about the profile. If you just had what comes with the Kemper you would be disappointed
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Post by BenjaminAshlin on Dec 13, 2016 15:34:38 GMT -6
How do you find the kemper compared to the axefx?
(I know this is asked everywhere but on most forums its had to know who to trust.)
The reason I ask is that i have an Axefx 1 which I seldom use, but when it did i always hated messing around with the setting. I am much more of a "set and for get" amp guy.
I have a kid on the way and I don't think I will be cranking a valve amp around the house in the near future. So I have been contemplating selling an amp or two to fund a kemper.
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Post by category5 on Dec 13, 2016 21:29:11 GMT -6
How do you find the kemper compared to the axefx? (I know this is asked everywhere but on most forums its had to know who to trust.) The reason I ask is that i have an Axefx 1 which I seldom use, but when it did i always hated messing around with the setting. I am much more of a "set and for get" amp guy. I have a kid on the way and I don't think I will be cranking a valve amp around the house in the near future. So I have been contemplating selling an amp or two to fund a kemper. I obsessed about what to do in situations where we can't use amps, and listened to countless samples and demos. The AxeFX stuff seems to do high gain stuff pretty well, but so far the closest thing to closing my eyes and thinking there's an amp there has been the Kemper. I do think Amplitube has some great sounds within, and some of the newer UAD sims are pretty good (FriedMAN, Fender) but since getting the MBritt profiles the Kemper really is a different animal. I'm with Johnkenn. It's absurd that there's no computer based editor/control software, but going strictly on sound I really doin't think there's a worthy challenger to a Kemper with good profiles. If it's high gain stuff though I think the AxeFX will probably deliver. I heard plenty of "peel your face off" samples that sounded pretty huge. What I didn't hear were clean tones that sounded like tubes playing through a real moving speaker in air. |
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Post by Johnkenn on Dec 14, 2016 1:02:45 GMT -6
THIS^^^
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Post by Johnkenn on Dec 14, 2016 1:04:11 GMT -6
I have never been in the same room with an Axe FX. From the samples that I've heard, it's a high gain box. The Kemper excels in the crunch gain stuff in my opinion.
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Post by lcr on Dec 14, 2016 17:46:56 GMT -6
Not that Kemper needs a commercial..but remember in the Brady Bunch movie when Mike answers the phone "yes, yes, hmm.. let me get this straight.. your telling me you can run a single cable into my home and I get 13 channels of crystal clear television? Mike Brady wasnt born yesterday..".
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Post by indiehouse on Aug 24, 2018 9:00:44 GMT -6
I asked this on another thread, but I'll ask here as well. Are you guys generally tracking with the Kemper using stereo out or mono out?
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Post by indiehouse on Aug 24, 2018 9:13:13 GMT -6
I guess you'd only want to record the stereo out if you wanted the Kemper's stereo verb or delay effects. But I'd think you'd want to use those kinds of things in the DAW so that you could pan the mono guitar while still sending to a stereo effect.
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Post by Johnkenn on Aug 24, 2018 9:27:48 GMT -6
Yeah - I would usually record my left and right egs mono and if I wanted some effect eg, I’d record it stereo.
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Post by sozocaps on Aug 24, 2018 9:43:49 GMT -6
Seriously... I have made profiles of my very best amps and my very personal SoZo custom 5153 with it with speakers and also with the (still not available to the public) Kemper load box removing the cabinet. It is very good on a recording BUT it is not the amp in the room adds its own texture and tone to every profile. I like solid state power amps for the speed and power so I like it but it is NOT exactly the amp nor is it better in any way.
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Post by drbill on Aug 24, 2018 10:19:06 GMT -6
You guys are KILLIN me....  Question : how does the kemper sound coming out analog into the clean input of one of your amps at moderate volume to get the speaker sound and the air in the room? Or is that even necessary? |
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Post by Deleted on Aug 24, 2018 12:08:38 GMT -6
I don't like Kempers, they sound like a weaker, phasier, aliased version of the amp I've profiled.. I have tried all the best amp profiles, literally didn't move the mic between the DI / profile / recording from mic and that's why my recent one ended up on E-bay so quickly.. Swamp it under effects and you can't really tell the difference, then again you could save yourself a lot of money and get a Boss Multi-FX unit. Personally I think any confusion stems from it's best traits, I don't think I've used a sim with such "natural" sounding overtones and cab thud. It was easy to get it chugging with resonance and dynamics, which is how a real amp works and that's mighty cool..
Although again it's the quality of the sound being delivered which is again IMO where the Kemper has issues.
The AXE-FX suffers or delivers (dependant on opinion) with the same issues all amp sims do, the cab emulations which are too clean / in your face and a little fake sounding.. Although in terms of "sonic quality" amp simps today sound pretty good, it's just whether or not you want the "larger than life" sound. I'd go either AMP - IR / Helix / AXE - FX or just mic a real cab.. Sure, I do have a tendancy to "rag" on some equipment but I'll be honest 95% of the time I'm nit picking.. The Kemper? A bit of a gimmick for me. |
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Post by drbill on Aug 24, 2018 12:13:28 GMT -6
The AXE-FX suffers or delivers (dependant on opinion) with the same issues all amp sims do, the cab emulations which are too clean / in your face and a little fake sounding.. Thanks. But that brings me back to my original thought / question.... Does the Kemper sound good/better with it's IR into a clean amp / speaker combo that's mic'd? |
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Post by mikec on Aug 24, 2018 12:20:34 GMT -6
I would consider myself a tube amp snob having owned high end tube amps from Two Rock, Mesa Boogie, Swart, Tone King, Fender, Longhorn Amps, Echopark, Carr, Dr. Z, Jackson Ampworks, and probably some I am forgetting. I still have some of my tube amps but I mostly use my powered Kemper for recording and playing live. Even when recording I have it running into a Mission full frequency cabinet so I can have as much in room sound as I want for feel while still getting the recording I want. I find for myself, I can spend a significant amount of time getting an amp mic'ed up to get a nice recording or I can just select the input that my Kemper is always hooked up to, dial up a Michael Britt profile and get a great recorded guitar sound in minutes. I find the Kemper almost always sits in the mix with a minimal amount of fuss. Others may have different results but I know myself and a lot of others out there get great results with the Kemper. I've also owned several versions of the AXE FX. It is also a great box, but the Kemper for me just works more like a real amp head.
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Post by Deleted on Aug 24, 2018 12:28:16 GMT -6
The AXE-FX suffers or delivers (dependant on opinion) with the same issues all amp sims do, the cab emulations which are too clean / in your face and a little fake sounding.. Thanks. But that brings me back to my original thought / question.... Does the Kemper sound good/better with it's IR into a clean amp / speaker combo that's mic'd?
If I understand you correctly you'd get the powered version, bypass the cab section and plug directly into a cab.. It'll sound really odd if you tried to put the cab section through another amp into a cab, I did try it for giggles though..
It does sound better if you go down the powered version / cab route but at that point you might as well just mic the actual amp in all it's glory. You could try FRFR speakers with the kemper (like I used for a live rig (before the powered version) but TBH it won't sound any better even if you mic'd it.
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