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Re: RME Firewire 800 and Guitar Amp Sim



After reading the firewire amp sim thread, I thought I might post a bit of correspondence between Krispen and I that relates to this subject, .scroll down to bottom of page for the first letter. It might have subtitled this exchange “Confessions of a Analog Reactionary”

 

Bill

 


From: William Walker [mailto:billwalker@baymoon.com]
Sent: Monday, August 27, 2007 1:22 PM
To: 'Krispen Hartung'
Subject: RE: LoopFest Santa Cruz

 

Yes , I’ve been really happy with both the  the direct recording and live performance results, and for now, until I can get my tech friend to do the “Andrew Mod’ , a simple three or four resistor and capacitor modification some web techy came up with that de-honks the lead channels,  I overdrive the front end of the formula with either a Duncan twin tube (phenomenal) or a Keeley modified  Boss blues driver (ditto), if I want furrier sounds.

   Yes back in the day I had a groove tubes trio, a boogie 295 later replaced by a 50/50, and a pair of Pacific woodworks EVM loaded cabinets (same as the boogie theils by a guy who built cabinets for them) What a loud rig that was. I know what you mean about the 20/20 power amp, that looks really interesting though  I would probably pair it with a 2x10 stereo cabinet for even more compactness.  Besides which I have grown increasingly fond of 10 inch speakers whereas I’ve been a 12 inch  guy all my life. I like the tighter bass response and the better high end detail. See, a bigger Peepee isn’t always better J My current favorites are Weber 30 watt Alnico blue pups which I just moved from my vox amp into my vibrolux reverb (they were way more efficient and powerful than the little 12 watt vox needed) They are so chimey and lovely sounding, bright without being ice picky like many ceramic speakers are. I have tried the Vtwin and it is a nice pedal though I have never tried its direct out thingy, only in front of an amp. They did make a V-twin rack too though I think the Formula is a bit more realized as a pre-amp.  I briefly tried running a sans amp pedal to warm up my PRS hollow I (that I no longer own unfortunately) through My Dtar acoustic pre-amp at a gig I did that was mostly acoustic, to save myself from having to bring an amp just for the PRS. It was a Bose sponsored gig so of course I was running through a Bose PAS, and I gotta say, the sans amp did nothing for me. I couldn’t dial up a decent clean blackface sound to save my life so the PRS sounded kind of nasaly. This was with a Sans amp original and I really don’t understand why people like those things. I guess for its time…..

   To my knowledge know one makes a half rack preamp. I have  been trying to persuade anyone I can coral at Duncan that they need to build and amp in a stomp box using the high grade Mil spec subminiature tubes the use in their twin tube overdrive. A thing that could actually drive a speaker cabinet, but that also had reactive load style cabinet simulation for going direct. Kind of like what the V-twin  was, but better.  What I’ve found currently available is next to nothing.  Digital music corp is redesigning their  3 channel preamp because their first version wasn’t standing up  to heavy road abuse, so its not available yet, VHT has a really cool two rack space model that is going through a re-design due to lead content issues (no kidding!) but that’s big heavy and expensive. Boogie makes A dual rectifier preamp, also big heavy and expensive, and it seems more geared to hard rock sounds though I may be speculating, haven’t heard it or read the reviews. Groove Tubes still makes the wonderful Trio, but that’s also two racks and has no cabinet simulation. This  is why I gambled on the Formula. Its compact,powerful, and relatively speaking, a bargain. That’s as far as I’ve researched it but I’m sure there are other things out there and certainly some older stuff that still sounds great.  Part of this desire to simplify comes from having watched some live footage on Youtube of Jeff Beck playing. What that guy can do with his hands, an amp and a bit of delay and reverb is astounding, it has inspired me to clean up my sonic palette  and eschew many of the effects I used to consider essential, like chorus, partly because  when I’m building as many as 8 tracks on the Looperlative, modulation tends to muddy up the sound if I’m not careful, particularly when I’m using overdrive as well. Don’t get me wrong I love effects, its just that with too many choices I end up spending more time tweeking and less time playing.

See Ya soon dude

Bill

 


From: Krispen Hartung [mailto:khartung@cableone.net]
Sent: Monday, August 27, 2007 12:27 PM
To: billwalker@baymoon.com
Subject: Re: LoopFest Santa Cruz

 

Hi Bill -

 

Thanks for this.  So you like the Formula? I have heard good things about it too.  Boogies are known, at least in my experience, for their mid range "tubby" tone, so your comments don't surprise me.  During my rack, small stereo system days, I used to covet the Formulate in combination with their 20/20 power amp, and two 1X12 Mesa Thiel cabs...man, that would be a sweeeeeeet combo. Add something like a TC Electronics Guitar processor in the rack and you have a powerful system.

 

Have you played through the Mesa V-Twin pedal?

 

I'm with you though..I just want somethin simple and focused on generating a good guitar tube sound...I'll do everything else with my laptop. But I have to have a HIGH quality sound to begin with.

 

Did you ever try one of the SansAmp pedals?  Does anyone make a botique half-rack tube guitar preamp?

 

Kris

 

----- Original Message -----

Sent: Monday, August 13, 2007 5:43 PM

Subject: RE: LoopFest Santa Cruz

 

 After researching on the web for a few weeks and seeing what the options where, (precious few I might add), I bought a Mesa Boogie Formula preamp off of Ebay for a little under $500 ($479, I believe). The thing that I kept hearing in reviews was that it had a realy good clean direct sound and that the lead channels were a bit mid-rangey. I must admit that I have to keep the graphic eq set to a smile curve to achieve the blackface midrange dip on both clean and lead channels, but this thing sounds fantastic going direct or through a full range PA system. Using it also allow me to integrate stomp box pedals in front of it if I want, and a nice byproduct of the purchase was that I dusted off my old TC model one which allows me to run tap tempo delay and reverb in series or parallel, and sounds better than the similar effects in my two previous modelers, most recently a Vox tonelab se, and before that a line 6 pod pro. In both cases I fell in love with the bells and whistles but ultimately soured on issues of digital distortion (the subtle background kind), lack of headroom, and slight latency and two dimensional quality. Last year at loop fest I tried to integrate my rack loop gear and pedal effects with my ancient fender and vox tube amps, with limited success, mostly due to noise and impedance issues related to the combination of line and instrument levels. With the boogie pre, I won’t have to deal with those issues and the extra cartage issues, because with the exception of my floor effects and midi foot pedal, my entire rig fits in a four space rack now, not lap top portable, but close enough. I think that micing a modeling amp is going to give you better results than going direct with modeling as it adds back that elusive air that the cabinet simulation doesn’t quite capture, but it also brings up some problems associated with live mics and ambient noise build up. I honestly have come to believe that the more analogue devices I can throw in front of my digital gear, the better and more real my sound will be. Highly recommended.

 On a similar thread, I’ve been in contact with Radial Engineering, the company who makes amp and ABY switchers, loop selectors and high end direct boxes, encouraging them to make a stereo loop selector that could accommodate and buffer both line and instrument level effects processors so I could for example, run my looperlative, or a lap top looper in line between  my stomp boxes and my tube amp, without any impedance mismatching, hissing or overloading. They seem like they are interested in doing it, just a matter of when. But it would be a cool device for guys like me who would love to be able to integrate the old school with the new.

I look forward to seeing you in October.

Bill