Kemper Player - 1st [ Paid for ? ] Update coming very soon ?

[ian_dissonance]

 

[[Nathan]]

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Now thats got some lols to it, well played

 

[Jarick]

How did "I'm rubber you're glue" turn into "reverse Uno" in the modern lexicon?

My kids are obsessed with Uno. I think it's made a huge comeback.

This is a fallacious argument. No one moans that a DD8 is lacking features that a DD500 would have, because they're not the same thing.

Maybe if Kemper were on profiler 4 right now, their profiling wouldn't suck balls and they would've kept up with the times in terms of workflow and feature set.

We do however complain that features on the DD-500 didn't cascade up to the GT-1000. Or that amps on the IR-2 are somehow different from amps on the IR-200 and different from the GT-1000.

Boss is a whole other animal.

 

[Orvillain]

We do however complain that features on the DD-500 didn't cascade up to the GT-1000.

Not because of any concerns about deliberately limiting the hardware though. They pitch the GT1000 as the flagship, but it is anything but.

 

[Vic Winters]

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Missed opportunity to do a single and double foot switch option as Level 4 and Level 5.

 

[OneEng]

Ok, wow. Just wow.

You guys really do have some issues with Kemper.

 

[OneEng]

It is CRUCIAL to also point out, this player pedal doesn't and will NEVER perform any kind of profiling for you. So you're really losing the main reason to buy a Kemper in the first place. I know, I know... y'all think nobody profiles anyway (despite rig exchange numbers disproving that!) but I am serious - there is literally no reason to buy a Kemper if you don't want to profile amps.

I don't profile, and I know several others that own one that don't either. I hardly think it is the "main reason" people buy a Kemper. I always considered it a niche feature that a few percentage of people would use.

Now .... for the rest of the noise in here .....

Instead of looking at this as a business model affront to the human race, I would rather look at it from a competitive perspective as that is how I see most people who are making a buying decision doing it.

Full Kemper user backup solution:

In this model, nothing else on the market can do it IN THIS FORM FACTOR. You could lug another complete rack+FC to a gig, but this is much more friendly a form factor.

Stand alone 3 button gig solution:

First, I think you would have to be OK with using a phone app on your mic stand. I do this for my IEM mix already, so this might not be that big a deal .... but it is different than what people are used to. Personally, I would have put a screen on it.

Second, while I think that it is better sounding than a Helix, and more powerful (by quite a bit) than the FM3, it is more expensive than even the HX Stomp XL which has a much better gig setup (more buttons and a screen). The FM3 has a much better editor and routing capabilities, and is slightly less expensive, but has less capability (Kemper sports a rig compressor, output eq, 4 pre efx, 1 amp, 1 cab, and 4 post efx). Starting from scratch, I might very well opt for the HX Stomp at $650 (small) or the XL version for $700.

So in this market .... it's not TOTALLY out of the world expensive.

Overall, I think the really big miss here for Kemper is that, at a lower price point, they would have had a killer product release IMO.

Player base: $600 (player with L2 upgrade having all efx and morphing)
Player Pro Upgrade: $800 (player with full functionality minus profiling)

I think they wouldn't have been able to keep them on the shelves with this model. Personally, as a product manager, I would have ensured they had a different chassis with the same guts to keep people from feeling ripped off and being offended.

Anyway. I may buy one on the used market in the future if it has L2 and L3 upgrades (as a backup and throw-and-go pedal for trips). It would be worth $600 to me for such a convince.

Oh, and for the few people that insist that a Kemper sounds bad .... seriously, you are kidding yourself.

 

[JCW308]

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Only problem I can see is that you can't use an expression pedal when using this add-on. Otherwise, it's awesome!

 

[Whizzinby]

Yeah we can all point to several examples of companies doing the same stuff. I’m circling the drain on keyboards and one model I’m looking at, the mid tier vs premium tier offering comes down largely to a software lock and a memory expansion that probably costs them $2. So yeah it’s not new, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t suck. If you’re arguing for this type of stuff you’re either trying to be a contrarian or you have some sort of brand loyalty that prevents you from saying it sucks. The reason this matters more then say IK Tiered Pricing Ponzi Scheme Innovator Multimedia is because people hold Kemper in high regard and hate to see them going down this stupid route.

This is probably inevitable for everything in the digital space.

This reminds me in some ways of Madden. You buy the game, then get your ass handed to you by some dude who bought $500 worth of Ultimate Team player packs. I can’t wait for someone to start selling Ultimate Amp packs for us to collect. “Yay, I landed an ultra rare Peavey Rage combo!!!”.

 

[Sascha Franck]

Oh, and for the few people that insist that a Kemper sounds bad

Fwiw, I think very few people think the Kemper sounds bad. They're just saying that quite some profiles aren't accurate, which is likely correct.
Personally, I have absolutely no horse in that race because I defenitely couldn't care less whether my guitar sound is authentic or not.

 

[Orvillain]

Oh, and for the few people that insist that a Kemper sounds bad .... seriously, you are kidding yourself.

Usually when I post this video, people disappear and never really respond to it in any meaningful way:


You are free to break the mould!

Fwiw, I think very few people think the Kemper sounds bad. They're just saying that quite some profiles aren't accurate, which is likely correct.

Yeah this. All sarcasm and piss-taking aside. I don't think it sounds bad - but not accurate, and I think the other options these days sound better. So I'm viewing Kemper Player through that lens. Having access to the last 12+ years of profiles out there is not something that gives me the aspiration to buy one of these units. On top of that the paid tier system also adds marks to the 'no' column.

Kemper should've overhauled their profiling tech years ago. Because while it might be true that most users don't profile, it is the users who DO profile that give the Kemper its value. Without all of those people out there capturing their amps and coming up with better tones than what you get stock in the box, the Kemper loses even more appeal.

 

[Orvillain]

And you don’t remember Kemper charging for USB audio or a half dozen other things they could have charged for because those things didn’t pose a problem devaluing the product….or they are evil and forgot they were in those instances…you get to decide how to interpret their motive.

I think it is no more complicated than back then, they were riding the peak of the wave and didn't need to charge. These days, they're clearly playing 3rd and 4th fiddle.

 

[Enchilada Jones]

I think it is no more complicated than back then, they were riding the peak of the wave and didn't need to charge. These days, they're clearly playing 3rd and 4th fiddle.

So you think there is no chance their tiered pricing was a solution to the question they posed to themselves- ‘How much of the full capability can we put into the Player and still have value in the other product?’

In your mind It must have been ‘simply’ ‘Hey’ we need more profit, we need to price the Player this way’ ?

I think your bias against the Kemper sound overall has forced you to adopt a ‘simple’ perception that leaves no room for anything more complex. You don’t like the cost of their new product so you reject anything that doesn’t support your indictment of their character.

If tier II was $50 and tier II+ III was $100 would that be ok? What’s your price? Or do they no longer deserve to sell the Kemper product because they have slipped in your ranking to 3 or 4?

 

[[Nathan]]

So you think there is no chance their tiered pricing was a solution to the question they posed to themselves- ‘How much of the full capability can we put into the Player and still have value in the other product?’

In your mind It must have been ‘simply’ ‘Hey’ we need more profit, we need to price the Player this way’ ?

I think your bias against the Kemper sound overall has forced you to adopt a ‘simple’ perception that leaves no room for anything more complex. You don’t like the cost of their new product so you reject anything that doesn’t support your indictment of their character.

If tier II was $50 and tier II+ III was $100 would that be ok? What’s your price? Or do they no longer deserve to sell the Kemper product because they have slipped in your ranking to 3 or 4?

As someone who has no allegiance to kemper or NDSP.. a NC is $550 and can profile…. For a fully unlocked KPP that can’t profile it would barely be interesting to me at $550, I’d still probably lean to the NC.

If it could profile and had all the stuff the stage has then I guess you just charge stage prices for a smaller version with less buttons and no screen, each has their appeal.

 

[Enchilada Jones]

As someone who has no allegiance to kemper or NDSP.. a NC is $550 and can profile…. For a fully unlocked KPP that can’t profile it would barely be interesting to me at $550, I’d still probably lean to the NC.

If it could profile and had all the stuff the stage has then I guess you just charge stage prices for a smaller version with less buttons and no screen, each has their appeal.

And that makes perfect sense to me…that a person puts more value in a different feature set than I do.
For me I’ve owned three different Kempers that can profile and made a grand total of 4 profiles in those years. So a small profile player has been my wish for a long time.

The effects unlock, flexibility and Morphing feature make the signal chain infinitely more versatile than the NC for me. The way the banks and 10 rigs per bank are laid out and accessed are something that ‘works’ for my brain so the NC seems like a downgrade. But that’s just me and my brain.
I certainly don’t think my opinion of which device is better should sway anyone to think NDSP is an evil greedy company that is trying to gaslight the consumers selling old tech etc. It is that kind of ridiculous narrative I feel compelled to comment on. Not a subjective preference for a price level or a feature set.

 

[BenIfin]

I would guess that > %95 of KPA users who record and gig with them have *never* made a profile of anything .... they just use high quality profiles from reputable "makers".

For me, if I were in the market for a N.C or Player - which I never will be - the ability to make my own Captures / Profiles would have precisely zero impact or effect on my decision making.

It would be driven purely by the features / connections / fullness of the midi spec / block numbers / flexibility of the block chain / no. of efx etc.....

 

[Orvillain]

So you think there is no chance their tiered pricing was a solution to the question they posed to themselves- ‘How much of the full capability can we put into the Player and still have value in the other product?’

In your mind It must have been ‘simply’ ‘Hey’ we need more profit, we need to price the Player this way’ ?

I think your bias against the Kemper sound overall has forced you to adopt a ‘simple’ perception that leaves no room for anything more complex. You don’t like the cost of their new product so you reject anything that doesn’t support your indictment of their character.

If tier II was $50 and tier II+ III was $100 would that be ok? What’s your price? Or do they no longer deserve to sell the Kemper product because they have slipped in your ranking to 3 or 4?

I think you've made a lot of assumptions that are incorrect and you are mixing up the areas of concern in order to paint a pretty pessimistic view of my position. If you want to talk about bias, aren't you - as a user and owner of Kemper products - equally open to bias against people like me who don't think that we're being offered a good deal?

My position is not based on bias. It is based on experience, both as a user and also as someone working in music tech for almost 18 years now. I posted my video above that shows objectively that the Kemper isn't accurate. That isn't bias. It is objectively true. You don't have to value accuracy, but you don't get to tell me that I shouldn't find it important.

As I said previously, it is people "like" me (not me exactly, but other professional engineers and people with large amp collections!) that give Kemper a huge amount of value, by providing content for the platform. The people who don't profile simply don't offer as much value to the eco-system.

Now I would say that the value in the other Kemper SKU's can easily be justified by the form factor and the I/O, and the hardware details like the screen and footswitch count. The value is not solely defined by the firmware or features. They didn't need to limit and redact software functionality in order to create USP's for the Player. It already had them by virtue of the fact that it could fit easily on a pedalboard full of Strymon and Boss pedals!

The way the tiers are split up seem pretty cynical to me. All of the base functionality like morphing, rig x-fade time, spillover tweaks, parallel path, loop, more banks, beat scanner, stuff that isn't necessarily DSP related, but rather forms a chunk of the user experience... those things should be level 1 and level 2 .... level 3 should be solely effects, and the extended number of effect blocks.

That would be the consumer-friendly implementation of all of this. But no. Kemper have put you in a position where you have to spend an extra $300 on a $600 product, in order to get baseline functionality that arguably should've been there in the first place.

For these reasons, I would posit that the person who has a pedalboard full of effects they already love, are much more likely to look at the Nano Cortex than the Kemper Player.

I think the pricing was deliberately done to extract as much money from the user as possible, in a rather cynical fashion. That is fully their right. But it is also fully our right to be able to analyse it and judge whether we think it is worth it. All told - it isn't the way I would choose to do business, if I had that choice.

 

[JCW308]

I would guess that > %95 of KPA users who record and gig with them have *never* made a profile of anything .... they just use high quality profiles from reputable "makers".

For me, if I were in the market for a N.C or Player - which I never will be - the ability to make my own Captures / Profiles would have precisely zero impact or effect on my decision making.

It would be driven purely by the features / connections / fullness of the midi spec / block numbers / flexibility of the block chain / no. of efx etc.....

I'm in the same boat. Kemper Player level 3 absolutely kills the Nano Cortex (the way it is right now at least).

 

[Orvillain]

I see they've updated their comparison chart. If you take effects out of it, level 2 gets you everything there.... then this is what you get for level 3:

That does not seem worth £126 to me, and given that there are far superior effects out there, having all of the Kemper effects for £155 also doesn't really come across as good value either.

Also the REQUIREMENT that you already own level 2 in order to use level 3.... that stinks.

 

[Orvillain]

Suffice to say, my perspective is this:

If you're a hardcore Kemper loyalist, and it does everything you need and you don't mind the nickel and diming. Buy it. No skin off my nose.

If you want better effects, better capture technology (leading to better and more trustworthy captures even if you don't capture your own), and if you want to continue to use your own effects options without having to spaff a bunch of money up the wall in order to get baseline functionality, then I'd say get a Nano Cortex or a Dimehead NAM pedal, and build your rig around those.

If you're someone who isn't that fussed about having captures of amplifiers, then I'd recommend neither of these approaches. I'd recommend a HX Stomp or an FM3, budget permitting.