Of course .... but why not just buy a device that you don't have to buy more stuff, add more cables, add more setup and tear down complexity, etc?
I am not saying that it can't be overcome, but in a review of what is the "best" device for a situation, (and in my case and others like me, live gigging and properties of the device that are important for live gigging), ergonomics should be a factor in the evaluation.
QC owners will rant and rave about Kemper users making excuses for why the Kemper captures take longer, require more work, and are sometimes still not as accurate as the QC are frequently the SAME people that make excuses for the QC's horrible ergonomics or the QC's less capable FX or the QC's lower reliability.
In both cases, people are just fooling themselves. The QC does capture faster and more accurately than the Kemper. If THAT is what is important to you (and it is for a segment of users), THEN the QC is a better device for the job. The Kemper is more ergonomic and robust than the QC for live performances. If THIS is what is important to you, THEN the Kemper is a better device for the job.
These are the details that reviewers should be calling out in their reviews. I swear, some of these stupid reviews appear to throw a dart blind folded to make their determinations. These reviews are just garbage click bait.
I’m one of the older Kemper users, bought mine in 2013, sold it in 2016, then bought and unpowered one, sold that, bought a powered one, sold that and then bought a powered one, which I finally let go off in 2022.
I really wanted to like the Kemper. Heck, I still do. But the march of progress is incessant and as time went by, I started to see limitations of the device, such as preset FX paths slots, the inability of the device to have a true automatic double tracker, and a floorboard controller that I wish I never bought after my Gordius Little Big Giant mopped the floor with it.
I let go of my Kemper when I got an Axe FXIII. For all practical purposes, I am a tube amp guy, even though I suck at recording them and I can’t take them to gigs and they cost
too much money to maintain. Honestly though, they are so much fun and the best part is the immediacy of the experience: touch a string and feel the sound instantaneously - no lag, just a very tactile interaction between fingers and sound.
The Axe paired much better with the amps because of the routing options, so the Kemper had to go.
There was also one other thing I didn’t like about the Kemper: the inability to craft one’s own tones. If you didn’t have access to fabulous amps and a good studio, you were just stuck with whatever was on the rig exchange. And don’t make me laugh about commercial sellers, that was one hell of a rabbit hole with diminishing returns.
Towards the end of my journey, and I may well be wrong about this, I started to hear what I think is a signature character to all the Kemper high gain profiles. It can be achieved on almost any gainy profile by turning the definition to 10, and that’s when you get the most best heavy tones and also hear the effect the most. Something in the mids.
That said, I really enjoyed my time with the Kemper. I just had different needs
I recently bought a Quad Cortex, just about a month and a half ago, and fwiw, it does not feel like a fragile unit that will fall apart. It is also extremely easy to edit using software or the interface, and I like how easy it is to get a good tone going.
For me, form factor was the sole criteria I bought this, with the knowledge that this was one of top tier modellers on the market.
I also think timing of my purchase played a role in how I perceive the unit. Within a couple of weeks of my purchase, plugin compatibility was rolled out and I am getting what I think are great tones.
They’re not half bad, really, and I think at a gig, no one could tell if I was using this, an Axe FXIII or a Kemper for that matter. And I think that’s great, always important to have options and choice.
Theres always loads of details that you can only know by using the devices extensively and you never hear about them.
Take tap tempo for example, Kemper has a beat scanner that can automatically sync by detecting what you’re playing and adjusting automatically.
QC has a dumb screen that pops up for AGES and prevents you from changing scenes while it’s there.
You never hear about things like that but it’s actually quite important when using one of these devices live. Just one example.
I have done some detailed studies of
the beat scanner on the Kemper, as well as it’s tap tempo function.
Hook it up to a computer and tap out a tempo. You’ll find it is extremely erratic and jumps by small fractions of a bpm in either direction from the tempo that was input.
I had posted about it on the Kemper forums, but did not receive a satisfactory answer. I used to go by nightlight on that forum too.
