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Post by donr on Nov 7, 2019 13:00:57 GMT -6
I received an Iridium this week. First impression is favorable. It feels great under the fingers and the pick attack in particular sounds like a really good amp. The Vox and Marshall emulations are the stars. I'm going to try it live this weekend and compare it to the JCM 900 in my fly rig. If it's as good as I think it might be, I won't need the 900 anymore. Pretty high praise. So what did you not like about the Fender as much as the other two? Or are you just not a Fender guy? The Fender Deluxe emulation didn't sound bad, but the drive breakup wasn't as useful to me as say a Super Reverb's would. It might be great with pedals in front, I haven't gotten that far with it yet. The Marshall breakup was really good, perhaps better than any Marshall I've actually owned. The Vox is a little trickier, you balance the treble knob with the midrange treble cut knob, sorta like a Pultec, then the drive setting starts to make sense.
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Post by bigfurry on Nov 7, 2019 13:16:33 GMT -6
I just gave Iridium a quick workout and was pleased overall, which a few caveats. I think it sounds really good but very smooth and a bit less dynamic than “real life”. However, once a sound is dialed in i feel it will sit really well in a mix. The surprise bonus for me was how the IRs really make it seem like you’ve got 9 different amps, not 3 with variations. They made a big difference in the sound; almost as much as flipping between models.
I think the overall sound goes from very warm to moderately bright- in a dense mix, I think additional boost eq in upper mids might be needed. Nothing a minute of playing with plugins couldn’t fix.
The biggest compliment I can pay the Iridium is I got lost playing it- before I knew it, 20 minutes had flown by, and I had written a riff that I liked. That’s what it’s all about!
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Post by bigfurry on Nov 7, 2019 13:24:40 GMT -6
Tele w/ Humbuckers > Iridium (all amps / cabs) > Zod ID DI (tube DI) > Coil CA70S's proved inspirational. PS - the Negative feedback and LF controls on the CA70's are magic on Elec Guitars. And they no doubt put some meat on the Iridium too.... Oh doc, my wallet did not need that last push to get a Coil... Hmmmm
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Post by drbill on Nov 7, 2019 14:31:40 GMT -6
Tele w/ Humbuckers > Iridium (all amps / cabs) > Zod ID DI (tube DI) > Coil CA70S's proved inspirational. PS - the Negative feedback and LF controls on the CA70's are magic on Elec Guitars. And they no doubt put some meat on the Iridium too.... Oh doc, my wallet did not need that last push to get a Coil... Hmmmm haha!! Sorry about that....
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Post by drbill on Nov 7, 2019 14:34:26 GMT -6
The Vox and Marshall emulations are the stars. i'd agree with that Don. Of course, I am not even a guitarist, and your impressions would be worth 10,000X's mine, but I probably would still prefer my mid-60's blackface to the Iridium. But the Vox and Marshall emu's are really a LOT of fun for me fooling around.
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Post by drbill on Nov 7, 2019 14:40:06 GMT -6
Pretty high praise. So what did you not like about the Fender as much as the other two? Or are you just not a Fender guy? The Fender Deluxe emulation didn't sound bad, but the drive breakup wasn't as useful to me as say a Super Reverb's would. It might be great with pedals in front, I haven't gotten that far with it yet. The Marshall breakup was really good, perhaps better than any Marshall I've actually owned. The Vox is a little trickier, you balance the treble knob with the midrange treble cut knob, sorta like a Pultec, then the drive setting starts to make sense. Tomorrow I've got some ambient styled guitar stuff to record. We've been going pedal board into my black face deluxe's clean channel set to fairly low levels (2-3)(mine was modded by paul rivera decades ago as per the amps carlton, graydon, and ritenour were using in the mid 80's and the main channel is wildly different to stock.) Will sub out the Deluxe in favor of Iridium into the chain mentioned above. We'll see if I switch back to the deluxe mid-session. haha I doubt I'll be switching with the deluxe model not needing to drive into breakup. The benefit will be getting true stereo out of the guitarists pedalboard.
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Post by sirthought on Nov 7, 2019 15:29:33 GMT -6
That’s what it’s all about! So, the Iridium and the Hokey Pokey...good to know.
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Post by wiz on Nov 7, 2019 15:40:04 GMT -6
donr does it do that just breaking up when you dig in a little... thing.... on the Marshall? Say neck pickup on Les Paul, tone rolled off.....slow blues held vibrato note kinda thing... Cheers Wiz
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Post by geoff738 on Nov 7, 2019 16:17:16 GMT -6
Are people finding the hall settings useful?
Cheers, Geoff
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Post by drbill on Nov 7, 2019 17:04:43 GMT -6
Are people finding the hall settings useful? Cheers, Geoff I'd call them "room" settings. Far from hall IMO. They are useful for a little "air" around the sound. Like you have one close mic, and another (87/67) back a bit in the room. For that kind of thing, yeah, very useful. If you want it dry and sterile, turn it off. For big ambient halls / FX, you'll need to add some plugins or another strymon pedal....
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Post by donr on Nov 7, 2019 17:06:15 GMT -6
Wiz, my guitar sound lives right where crunch meets overdrive, and the Iridium Marshall does that really well. Plus the three cabs chosen are all different and useful.
Geoff, the ambience is rooms, not halls and it's useful to hear enough that you get a sense of an amp in a space, you'd likely use less recording if you knew you were going to place the guitar into another space, or record it that way.
I'll know more about using it in the world after this weekend.
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Post by geoff738 on Nov 7, 2019 17:41:44 GMT -6
Oops, thought they had called it halls, but rooms it is.
From the clips it doesn’t sound overdone or splashy. Which is nice.
Cheers, Geoff
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Post by kcatthedog on Nov 8, 2019 14:24:24 GMT -6
Played it for half hour in store. Vox and Marshall sounds surprisingly good, fender a little anemic. Everything works as advertised, drive , 3 eq pots (b,m,t) and 12 cabs and reverb sounds.
I was pleasantly surprised but wasn’t certain I was ready for the no real amp thing.
You can certainly dial in your tone and set drive, master and your guitar volume to taste and feel: it didn’t have that spongey disconnected from guitar feel that some boxes have, so a good user experience.
I didn’t buy as salesman was a bit of a jerk and I am undecided about this or am amp.
I was disappointed in the Marshall origin 20, likely the small speaker as had been mentioned. I had thought the amp would be new, but faceplate was pretty scratched, eventually salesman admitted it was a floor model and nothing he could do. I thought right it’s likely had the shit played out of it in the floor. It too sounded good but small.
Thought salesman should wise up with US Black Friday coming up. Sweets water has a new b stock: full warranty and it would be $200 less than Cdn, goes a long way towards buying a better speaker. I think I would want a 12 alnico blue, so thought I’ll just think about this and demo some other amps.
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Post by wiz on Nov 8, 2019 18:28:28 GMT -6
Played it for half hour in store. Vox and Marshall sounds surprisingly good, fender a little anemic. Everything works as advertised, drive , 3 eq pots (b,m,t) and 12 cabs and reverb sounds. I was pleasantly surprised but wasn’t certain I was ready for the no real amp thing. You can certainly dial in your tone and set drive, master and your guitar volume to taste and feel: it didn’t have that spongey disconnected from guitar feel that some boxes have, so a good user experience. I didn’t buy as salesman was a bit of a jerk and I am undecided about this or am amp. I was disappointed in the Marshall origin 20, likely the small speaker as had been mentioned. I had thought the amp would be new, but faceplate was pretty scratched, eventually salesman admitted it was a floor model and nothing he could do. I thought right it’s likely had the shit played out of it in the floor. It too sounded good but small. Thought salesman should wise up with US Black Friday coming up. Sweets water has a new b stock: full warranty and it would be $200 less than Cdn, goes a long way towards buying a better speaker. I think I would want a 12 alnico blue, so thought I’ll just think about this and demo some other amps. I bought a JTM-1 by Marshall when they first came out.... if you can get one of those, it records really well.... Cheers Wiz
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Post by drbill on Nov 8, 2019 21:00:38 GMT -6
Used the Iridium with my above mentioned chain for a session today - several hours. It took pedals and "real" playing very well. Took about 5 minutes, and the guitarist picked it up and held it over his crowded pedalboard and began wondering out loud how he was going to be able to fit one on his board. The Blackface was outstanding, and although we were doing cleans, it sounded like my mid 60's black face deluxe. The marshall was killer. Again, clean, but just a tad of breakup on harder picked notes. Very convincing. The Vox didn't get used much today, but the guitarist has a nice well kept AC30, and said it was reacting similar, although the gain positions needed to be set different in comparison to his actual amp. Overall, I never missed not having an amp on all session. It's not like standing in front of a loud amp, but it sounds incredibly like a loud amp, mic'd well, coming thru studio speakers. And that's all I need. <<thumbsup>>
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Post by indiehouse on Nov 8, 2019 22:07:06 GMT -6
Used the Iridium with my above mentioned chain for a session today - several hours. It took pedals and "real" playing very well. Took about 5 minutes, and the guitarist picked it up and held it over his crowded pedalboard and began wondering out loud how he was going to be able to fit one on his board. The Blackface was outstanding, and although we were doing cleans, it sounded like my mid 60's black face deluxe. The marshall was killer. Again, clean, but just a tad of breakup on harder picked notes. Very convincing. The Vox didn't get used much today, but the guitarist has a nice well kept AC30, and said it was reacting similar, although the gain positions needed to be set different in comparison to his actual amp. Overall, I never missed not having an amp on all session. It's not like standing in front of a loud amp, but it sounds incredibly like a loud amp, mic'd well, coming thru studio speakers. And that's all I need. <<thumbsup>> Curious to know if you’ve used a Kemper? I want this. Question is, do I want it because it’s shiny and new, or do I want it because it’s a step-up from what I already have?
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Post by drbill on Nov 8, 2019 22:19:39 GMT -6
Used the Iridium with my above mentioned chain for a session today - several hours. It took pedals and "real" playing very well. Took about 5 minutes, and the guitarist picked it up and held it over his crowded pedalboard and began wondering out loud how he was going to be able to fit one on his board. The Blackface was outstanding, and although we were doing cleans, it sounded like my mid 60's black face deluxe. The marshall was killer. Again, clean, but just a tad of breakup on harder picked notes. Very convincing. The Vox didn't get used much today, but the guitarist has a nice well kept AC30, and said it was reacting similar, although the gain positions needed to be set different in comparison to his actual amp. Overall, I never missed not having an amp on all session. It's not like standing in front of a loud amp, but it sounds incredibly like a loud amp, mic'd well, coming thru studio speakers. And that's all I need. <<thumbsup>> Curious to know if you’ve used a Kemper? I want this. Question is, do I want it because it’s shiny and new, or do I want it because it’s a step-up from what I already have? Nope. Never used a Kemper. From what I've heard, some are preferring the sonics of the iridium. But I have no idea. I just know I like it.
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Post by indiehouse on Nov 9, 2019 5:47:58 GMT -6
Curious to know if you’ve used a Kemper? I want this. Question is, do I want it because it’s shiny and new, or do I want it because it’s a step-up from what I already have? Nope. Never used a Kemper. From what I've heard, some are preferring the sonics of the iridium. But I have no idea. I just know I like it. Right on. I've heard it both ways. Some like the Kemper better. Some say the Iridium hangs right up there. I think the main idea of the Kemper being more tweakable. I'm not really a tweaker, though.
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Post by kcatthedog on Nov 9, 2019 7:35:58 GMT -6
You can dial in the iridium very quickly, found myself playing quickly not bogged down in tweaking: nice!
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Post by Quint on Nov 9, 2019 8:11:39 GMT -6
You can dial in the iridium very quickly, found myself playing quickly not bogged down in tweaking: nice! This and the cost are what interests me about the Iridium and conversely is what has kept me from ever considering a Kemper.
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Post by kcatthedog on Nov 9, 2019 9:18:34 GMT -6
Ditto.
I only didn’t buy it as I wasn’t certain I wouldn’t prefer an amp and as the fender sound was certainly a usable sound, didn’t seem fendery to me.
If you have a fender amp and you run this on the fx loop or on your board. I think you’d be pleased.
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Post by drbill on Nov 9, 2019 9:49:13 GMT -6
The big talk around these parts was "yeah, OK....but how is it going to take pedals." It didn't take long yesterday for the guitarist I was recording (with a huge pedalboard) to start wondering how he was going to fit one on his pedalboard. LOL Personally, I'm a "let the amp rip and do it's thing" kinda guy, but I get the pedal board thing. This box seems to work either way.
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Post by mike on Nov 9, 2019 10:21:48 GMT -6
How quiet or not is the noise floor on this ?
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Post by kcatthedog on Nov 9, 2019 11:20:48 GMT -6
I’d say quiet but depends on condition of your guitar etc.?
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Post by drbill on Nov 9, 2019 14:05:13 GMT -6
How quiet or not is the noise floor on this ? Quieter than my amps.
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