IK Multimedia TONEX

KingsXJJ said:
I’m over ToneX with V2 or not. I want parametric captures that encapsulate the full range of gain, EQ and volume/master volume of the amp.
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I can certainly understand the part about wanting amp-like controls. I've felt this way for ages. Used to do a lot of profiling with other units, but eventually stopped, because using fractal was so much more convenient and usually with better results. Can just lower the master vol on a Jcm 800 sim and get a radically different response, like the real amp, no new captures needed.

All that said, I went into tonex one to use as a backup for fm3. I made captures of all my presents with V1. I did this again with V2 and the results are spectacular, much improved. So now I'm finding myself capturing real amps more so again, when I have access to them. Some times these feel better to play through than fractal sims, at least in my experience.

Thing is, I didn't think I would bother with captures again. Really surprised. In fact, fm3 has not been turned on for a while, for that matter, in part because of its issues recording via USB, and the fact that tonex one can sound and feel so good to play through.

Then there's also cases of amps that imo aren't so easy to replicate with fractal units even in terms of sound nuances. An example for me is the tonex brown sound packs. Nothing in the fractal (that I could dial in) feels and sounds quite like this.

Also, the portability is next level. I don't want to always carry the fm3 with me. Staying some place else and really want guitar with me? One headache less. Wanna use a device as just a boost/overdrive pedal in front of amp? Tonex has me covered. There's several use case scenarios where I'm finding myself going for tonex one instead of the fractal.
 
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laxu said:
What's the best way to find V2 models on Tonex? It seems there is no filter for this and the best you can do is put "V2" in the search, though it seems to put V2 models at the top for any search...

Also are any of IK's own collections V2? I'd imagine IK would have the necessary DI's to make them.
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I have V2 filter options in the lower left filter pane. I might be misunderstanding your question though?
 
KingsXJJ said:
Just a $60 toy. At that price I can afford to play around. Like the Pocket Master.

But I don’t hoard subpar gear and run two at $300. I just check it out and move on. But your concern about what I play with is noted. And curious.
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What is subpar about the tonex one units?

I think the software could improve a lot, as well as some other things, to some level, like the faint high pitched sound I get from non usb power supplies.

But for what these units do they are spectacular imo. At 150 euros, and I can sound pretty much the same to the real amps, with the feel also being very close. And then there's many use cases where the insane portability is great.
 
laxu said:
Nah you are right. I'm just a dumbass and totally ignored the left sidebar. IK's design is...not intuitive.
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Fair. That section of the UI pulls double duty and I think I had a similar hangup in the other direction - I couldn’t find the model info pane, which is the OTHER thing that populates in that box. Not super intuitive but you find it once and you get it.

FWIW, I was lurking around tonenet one night earlier this week and filtering by V2 caps just to see if things have changed in my year plus neglect of random online captures - it took me about 5 mins to hit a dozen VERY solid caps that now live on my device. In particular some GREAT Marshalls.

Either V2 is creating more forgiving/consistent caps, OR I got lucky and got a good batch right away.
 
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laxu said:
IK's design is...not intuitive.
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Defenitely not. But the filters help a great deal for sure.
Also had to get used to the search filters, which help a lot as well when browsing ToneNET.

EOengineer said:
Either V2 is creating more forgiving/consistent caps, OR I got lucky and got a good back right away.
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Could be, but I actually also found some most excellent V1 captures. But then, it possibly helps that I never compare to any originals.
I only wish ToneNET was a bit more responsive. Sometimes loading a capture for previewing takes like 30 seconds, which, given that they're 40kb each, is quite awfully slow. Which is why I sometimes just download a whole bunch without listening first and then delete the duds when listening to them locally.
 
Sascha Franck said:
Could be, but I actually also found some most excellent V1 captures. But then, it possibly helps that I never compare to any originals.
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If I’m comparing during capture there’s def a leg up with V2, but I agree there are tons of great V1 caps, especially if you expand scope to include IKs partner collections. As far as I know the entire Mesa reference pack is V1 and their high gain stuff would directly benefit from a V2 upgrade - likely not possible but I’d love to hear it.
 
Dimiguitar said:
What is subpar about the tonex one units?
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I think they could improve the hardware experience significantly with a couple of changes:

Big Tonex pedal:
  • Change the way the whole parameter menu works. Only Setup should use the "one param at a time, click to open and adjust value" bullshit.
  • Instead add more layers under the knobs:
    1. Amp tone layer - Gain, Bass, Middle, Treble, Volume.
      1. "Feel" layer - Gate threshold, Comp threshold, Comp gain, Presence, Depth
    2. Fx layer - Delay mix, Delay time, Delay feedback, Reverb decay, Reverb mix
      1. Fx layer 2 - Mod type, Mod Rate, Mod depth, Mod level
    3. Cab layer - IR or VIR select, IR/VIR cab select, Low cut, High cut (if they added those params...)
      • If VIR selected:
        1. Cab layer 2 - Mic 1 type, Mic 1 X, Mic 1 Y, VIR blend, VIR resonance
        2. Cab layer 3 - Mic 2 type, Mic 2 X, Mic 2 Y, VIR blend, VIR resonance
  • Change the way you access the layers: Turning Parameter will cycle between base layers - Amp tone / Fx / Cab.
    • Pressing Parameter knob will cycle between e.g Amp/"Feel", Fx 1/2, Cab 1/2/3 based on which "base" layer is selected.
  • When you turn a param knob, it will show a shorthand of the param name + value, e.g "PRES 5.6", "DTIM 500", "RMIX 30" for non-type params.
This gives access to almost every param without having to painstakingly select them one by one and go back and forth, while greatly improving the speed of operation.

Tonex One pedal:
  • Allow mapping the Alt mode knobs from Tone Editor. You could select any params for each preset for the 3 Alt knobs.
  • Allow swapping Gain/Volume. To me base layer = Gain, Treble, Mid, Bass vs Alt = Volume, <3 chosen params> would be more intuitive.
  • Add a "Bypass+Tuner" option. If you use the Tonex as a drive pedal, bypassing it would put it into Tuner mode.
    • With either mute/thru mode based on if you use it as an always on pedal vs tuner, or as toggleable drive + thru tuner.

Dimiguitar said:
But for what these units do they are spectacular imo. At 150 euros, and I can sound pretty much the same to the real amps, with the feel also being very close. And then there's many use cases where the insane portability is great.
Click to expand...
I think the portability is really the huge deal. The Tonex One can go with you anywhere and provide a pretty nice little rig, or augment your other stuff. I'm more "meh" on the big Tonex and feel like a "medium Tonex" somewhat like the upcoming Valeton GP-50 would be a good in-between product - physically smaller, but with a screen.

The Tonex software has gotten better - but is still not great. I wish V2 had added proper knob position metadata for example, so people could just add the common controls, and whatever unique controls the amp has and it could show those settings as nice little knobs on screen. It still relies way too much on the name of the capture and a comment field for real info.
 
laxu said:
I think they could improve the hardware experience significantly with a couple of changes:

Big Tonex pedal:
  • Change the way the whole parameter menu works. Only Setup should use the "one param at a time, click to open and adjust value" bullshit.
  • Instead add more layers under the knobs:
    1. Amp tone layer - Gain, Bass, Middle, Treble, Volume.
      1. "Feel" layer - Gate threshold, Comp threshold, Comp gain, Presence, Depth
    2. Fx layer - Delay mix, Delay time, Delay feedback, Reverb decay, Reverb mix
      1. Fx layer 2 - Mod type, Mod Rate, Mod depth, Mod level
    3. Cab layer - IR or VIR select, IR/VIR cab select, Low cut, High cut (if they added those params...)
      • If VIR selected:
        1. Cab layer 2 - Mic 1 type, Mic 1 X, Mic 1 Y, VIR blend, VIR resonance
        2. Cab layer 3 - Mic 2 type, Mic 2 X, Mic 2 Y, VIR blend, VIR resonance
  • Change the way you access the layers: Turning Parameter will cycle between base layers - Amp tone / Fx / Cab.
    • Pressing Parameter knob will cycle between e.g Amp/"Feel", Fx 1/2, Cab 1/2/3 based on which "base" layer is selected.
  • When you turn a param knob, it will show a shorthand of the param name + value, e.g "PRES 5.6", "DTIM 500", "RMIX 30" for non-type params.
This gives access to almost every param without having to painstakingly select them one by one and go back and forth, while greatly improving the speed of operation.

Tonex One pedal:
  • Allow mapping the Alt mode knobs from Tone Editor. You could select any params for each preset for the 3 Alt knobs.
  • Allow swapping Gain/Volume. To me base layer = Gain, Treble, Mid, Bass vs Alt = Volume, <3 chosen params> would be more intuitive.
  • Add a "Bypass+Tuner" option. If you use the Tonex as a drive pedal, bypassing it would put it into Tuner mode.
    • With either mute/thru mode based on if you use it as an always on pedal vs tuner, or as toggleable drive + thru tuner.


I think the portability is really the huge deal. The Tonex One can go with you anywhere and provide a pretty nice little rig, or augment your other stuff. I'm more "meh" on the big Tonex and feel like a "medium Tonex" somewhat like the upcoming Valeton GP-50 would be a good in-between product - physically smaller, but with a screen.

The Tonex software has gotten better - but is still not great. I wish V2 had added proper knob position metadata for example, so people could just add the common controls, and whatever unique controls the amp has and it could show those settings as nice little knobs on screen. It still relies way too much on the name of the capture and a comment field for real info.
Click to expand...
I’ve always looked at the Tonex pedal as being a possible afterthought to IKs line of (maybe failed?) fx pedals. It absolutely feels wedged in there.

Given the success, I VERY much expect a novel hardware device from them over the next couple years that’s more suited specifically to the kind of thing you’re describing. Will probably expand to support Amplitube and more flexible signal chains too.
 
EOengineer said:
I’ve always looked at the Tonex pedal as being a possible afterthought to IKs line of (maybe failed?) fx pedals. It absolutely feels wedged in there.
Click to expand...
Probably literally the same hardware, which is an understandable way to go. I think they just could have put more thought into its operation. I think they could totally solve it via software updates too, if they bothered to put any effort to it.

EOengineer said:
Given the success, I VERY much expect a novel hardware device from them over the next couple years that’s more suited specifically to the kind of thing you’re describing. Will probably expand to support Amplitube and more flexible signal chains too.
Click to expand...
Yeah I'd expect one too, or maybe offering a bit more upscale version of what the Valeton GP stuff does.
 
laxu said:
To me base layer = Gain, Treble, Mid, Bass vs Alt = Volume, <3 chosen params> would be more intuitive.
Click to expand...

Yeah, that'd be great.

But let's face it, what I really wanted was a Dual Tonex. 2 separate engines, Amplifirebox size, 5 endless encoders (so you could have gain, BMT and level on one page), a small display for encoder readout and further information (a really, really simple one would do), switches configurable so they could have each and every function, MIDI in (wired and BT), separate outs for each engine (but only if needed), 2 EXP ins and a little more CPU juice on top so one could have a drive/boost and delay/verb spillover. Anything else could be exactly as two TXOs in series.
That'd be an incredibly capable little device. I'd instantly pay more for that than the asking price of the big Tonex pedal.
 
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Sascha Franck said:
Yeah, that'd be great.

But let's face it, what I really wanted was a Dual Tonex. 2 separate engines, Amplifirebox size, 5 endless encoders (so you could have gain, BMT and level on one page), a small display for encoder readout and further information (a really, really simple one would do), switches configurable so they could have each and every function, MIDI in (wired and BT), separate outs for each engine (but only if needed), 2 EXP ins and a little more CPU juice on top so one could have a drive/boost and delay/verb spillover. Anything else could be exactly as two TXOs in series.
That'd be an incredible capable little device. I'd instantly pay more for that than the asking price of the big Tonex pedal.
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Do you want the dual Tonex setup for separate drive capture + amp, or for stereo amps?
 
Fwiw, what I really wanted was delay/reverb trail spillover within one patch on the TXO. But as external control via MIDI isn't supported by IK (which would be the only scenario where this would make sense), I doubt this will ever happen.
 
laxu said:
Do you want the dual Tonex setup for separate drive capture + amp, or for stereo amps?
Click to expand...

Anything, really. Just as some examples, you could:
- Use one for amps and post FX, the other one for dirt boxes and pre FX.
- Use both parallely for a wicked stereo setup.
- Treat them just as two separate TXOs.

All of these would immensly profit from freely configurable switches. You could for instance use one switch for amp/patch switching and the other one to boost things and maybe add delay/verb. That way you'd have 2 sounds with a lead variation for each (which would take me through each and every gig as an emergency device, add some external pedals to taste and it'd become a full rig).
The autosave nature of the TXO would add to the comfort when using it on, say, sessions or as an emergency device. Adjusting things with endless enoders and without having to resave would make last minute adjustments a breeze.
 
Sascha Franck said:
Yes. You are dead wrong about a) them being sub par and b) about me "hoarding" them. They instantly became part of my live setup and they're sounding absolutely excellent - which is confirmed by pretty much anyone actually using their stuff. Which obviously doesn't include you.
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You are the one that started BS about hoarding. Yet I I’m an ass when I return the favor? FO.
 
[Nathan] said:
I've gone from having ToneX uninstalled to buying a tonex one pedal to make some videos, the turnaround with v2 is real. I agree its splitting hairs with NAM now and if you want to use it as a pedalboard/rig solution then ToneX is going to be the cheaper way into it.

Sounds like IK are cooking up a helix style unit with no doubt ToneX captures alongside Amplitube effects. They generally have cheaper hardware solutions to others so if the timing is right it will come across like a cheaper Stadium alternative, some good moves for IK if it all happens.

NAM has its own pros that we can have more conversations on, but in the context of "cheapest/best" pedalboard captures then ToneX is solid now.
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I have been lurking this forum for awhile, but had to join because of all the ToneX talk!

I am the same way. Last year I tried the free ToneX just for the heck of it because I was bored. Within a few months I owned Total Studio Max, a ToneX One, and the Axe I/O. I have gotten better digital tones than I ever have, and that is after being a Fractal user for years. There is just something about high gain chug that modelers struggle with that the capture units seem to get right.

I have played with NAM, but it just hasn't clicked with me in the same way, but I do like your 6505+ captures.

I couldn't even model with ToneX before because it would just crash on 50xx GPUs. V2 not only allowed me to capture, but they sound better, and it only takes me 8 minutes to make an extended capture.
 
IMG_2893.jpeg


Yo….so anyone here running direct V2 captures? We’ve got a new puppy in the house so my nice amps are locked up out of the chomp zone for a while. I’m getting HELLA lively presence on the V2 captures, like the blanket was pulled off the speakers. It’s significant. I had tried this on V1 and didn’t love it.

Tonex direct V2 caps into a guitar cab just became a viable live option for me. Some of these recto caps are punishing.
 
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