IK Multimedia TONEX

[Gearzilla]

@Gearzilla Thoughts on it so far?

I’m going to play with Tonex a bit this morning, and will post some more thoughts or a quick clip of me clicking through a few models. So far I’ve been able to find some tones that were enjoyable.

For $449 U.S.D. between Tonex Max, Amplitude 5 Max, and Axe I/O all included in that price I definitely feel I’ve got my moneys worth and then some.

 

[Sleezy E]

I will let my brothers in axe™ shakedown tonex for a few weeks while I patiently wait for black Friday sales

 

[the-trooper]

I like him but certainly wish he would dial back the running times significantly.

That's why there's Steve Sterlacci

And when he takes commenters with a differing opinion (AKA "That doesn't sound like AC/DC tone to me?") he does himself no favors.

He has some videos that are not Helix specific where he explains general concepts and those are good, "how compressor works" and similar. Drawn out, but OK.
The rest of the videos, vast majority, are "man who read the manual made a 45 minutes video explaining to lazy fucks what's written in two paragraphs". But OK, if one wants to waste time, it's none of my concern.
But when he started with the "someone said something mean, and I feel offended, and I have rights, here's a link so you can all go harass him" videos, that's when I lost respect and interest and unsubed.

 

[JT]

That's why there's Steve Sterlacci


He has some videos that are not Helix specific where he explains general concepts and those are good, "how compressor works" and similar. Drawn out, but OK.
The rest of the videos, vast majority, are "man who read the manual made a 45 minutes video explaining to lazy f***s what's written in two paragraphs". But OK, if one wants to waste time, it's none of my concern.
But when he started with the "someone said something mean, and I feel offended, and I have rights, here's a link so you can all go harass him" videos, that's when I lost respect and interest and unsubed.

Steve Sterlacci is cool. Jason's tone is Line 6 Plastic personified and never any sort of benchmark I would look towards/shoot for. In the same way Alex Hutchins is Boss Plastic personified. Both excellent players, though. Certainly.

 

[Gearzilla]

Played a bit more with Tonex. Overall I’ve got a favorable impression. People should be able to find some tones.

Mezzabarba Trinity Bogner 412 has been pretty interesting this early afternoon.

There’s quite a bit to explore even just sticking within Tonex without using it in Amplitude 5 as an amp block. I’ve been running it with Valhalla Delay and SuperMassive Reverb behind it in the DAW.

There’s basically some nice tones in various ranges that can be found, however like with the Tone Model /Profile /Capture paradigm in general not every tone model is going to be a fit in all cases.

There’s an incredible amount of combinations available by swapping around the cabs just within the Tonex platform—which has a significant impact on the outcome of the tone. Some minor adjustments to the treble or presence have been enough for me with the ones I’ve messed around with so far. There’s also a Post EQ section that I have as yet made any adjustments to along with some Reverbs that are available.

I loaded a YA IR in as a Custom IR, however it didn’t sound right, and the levels were way off. I didn’t really spend time trying to figure out the issue at this point. The built ins have been fine.

Still might get around to recording some short play through evaluations.

I think Tonex has a lot of potential, and the price is great. Another arrow in the quiver.

 

[Elric]

I will let my brothers in axe™ shakedown tonex for a few weeks while I patiently wait for black Friday sales

Good strategy. It works but like any ambitious software release definitely has some flakiness/bugs. A lot of oversights, UI, issues, etc.

The IK High Gainers sound pretty bad, in general, IMHO; like across the board. Some of the community ones that have been posted are solid sounding so that might mean it has something to do with the individual caps or it could mean only some amps capture well or who knows. Clean stuff sounds good generally.

Have not tried to cap anything yet so don't have any real impression on that aspect. Word is it is super slow on capturing but that is a one time cost. Sounds like setup/config is kind of a pain but that is because it is a plugin and needs to work with any old interface. Hopefully having the IK interface will make it easy to get decent results.

Their Capture board has more metadata than Neural's which is good but I've got feeling it is still going to be one of those situations just like any other public presets/captures/etc where you have to slog through and find a few folks who do stuff that resonates with what you are into.

 

[fretworn]

So far in Tonex I've been playing Red Led Drive which is a Tone Model of a Marshall JVM410HJS with a cab based on a Marshall 2551A using an Old Ibanez RG570, and I must say I'm pretty happy with the results so far.

Come on man - lay down some Satriani tracks

 

[James Freeman]

For lack of a better place and not deserving it's own thread, it looks like captures of modelers IS going to be a big problem after all.
NDSP and IK should probably add a 'Modeler' icon to the capture type because it is going to be a thing, probably more widespread than real captures.

#fakecaptures

 

[Foxmeister]

#fakecaptures

Is a capture of an original model (e.g. Litigator) still a fake capture?

I do get your point though...

 

[James Freeman]

Is a capture of an original model (e.g. Litigator) still a fake capture?

It's a capture of an original design but a capture of a modeler nonetheless and that should be noted, maybe even mandatory to note.

 

[the swede]

Is a capture of an original model (e.g. Litigator) still a fake capture?

I do get your point though...

We will probably see that…

But anyway they twist and turn it, no profiling/capturing software will be able to change snapshots and parameters on the Litigator that Helix hardware does, which is very much like having a real amp that you twist the knobs on.

It’s going to be a like a candy store thing… “hey I profiling the great Litigator (at a certain setting) take it it’s for free”
It’s still just a static photo of a sound that I may like or not like.

 

[eggpl@nt]

I'm liking ToneX more as user content flows. The IK content was hit or miss for me--mostly miss. Some of the user content is really good.

 

[Orvillain]

I picked it up earlier. Just doing an advanced capture of my VH4 now. Didn't like the fact you couldn't demo the capture functionality before purchasing.

 

[JT]

It's a capture of an original design but a capture of a modeler nonetheless and that should be noted, maybe even mandatory to note.

I want a ToneX capture of a Claude capture of my Kemper profile of the Badonk.

 

[JT]

I picked it up earlier. Just doing an advanced capture of my VH4 now. Didn't like the fact you couldn't demo the capture functionality before purchasing.

We're going to need a palm muting report.

 

[paisleywookiee]

I can see it now: “I need a better graphics card, for Etherium mining and amp captures”.

 

[Orvillain]

hmmmmmmmm.... so I don't have a proper reamping box right now, which makes a/b'ing difficult. But.... this is promising. Already sounds way fewer shits than the Kemper does.

I'm off to a gig tonight, but will play more tomorrow and post some clips.

 

[paisleywookiee]

Wait, can the Etherium you mine pay for the graphics card AND AmpliTube/ToneX? That’d be the fucking sweet spot, baby.

 

[Elric]

I'm liking ToneX more as user content flows. The IK content was hit or miss for me--mostly miss. Some of the user content is really good.

I dunno man. Still kind of iffy after dicking with it this afternoon...

 

[Deadpan]

I dunno man. Still kind of iffy after dicking with it this afternoon...

IMO it will develop. I've experimented some with good results.