Dez
Rock Star
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out of a curiosity to learn something, what do you mean?
ian_dissonance
Shredder
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- 1,924
That’s what makes it so convenient. You just find someone with the amp, go over to their house, spend some time dialing it in, then spend and hour sending high volume whale noises through it. Easy. Simple.
paisleywookiee
Rock Star
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paisleywookiee
Rock Star
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Sure, if you're cool with that. Personally I don't like being beholden to someone else, either having to find and buy captures, or find someone with an amp, or whatever. That's why for me I'd prefer to have the amps, and capture them.
ian_dissonance
Shredder
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No I agree. Capturing is cool. But it’s like IRs. If none of them sound like what I want to hear then my options to change that are limited.
Dez
Rock Star
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- 3,467
No I get that I mean what does HE mean lol, I know a Mark’s EQ controls do not behave like most amps, I’ve got one!
paisleywookiee
Rock Star
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I think we'll definitely get to the point where we all have something like NDSP's "Tina" functionality, where the sweep of the knobs and gain are captured and interpolated somehow. But it's just not there yet.
MirrorProfiles
Rock Star
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before owning a kemper I think I had 3 amps. After owning a kemper it grew to like 20-30. I actually like that it made me fall in love with amps all over again but it’s probably not how it’s supposed to go. I have other friends where the same sort of thing happened.
IMO Kemper was best when it was used alongside your own collection of amps, rather than a replacement for them.
IMO Kemper was best when it was used alongside your own collection of amps, rather than a replacement for them.
Dez
Rock Star
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That’s how I use my QC
paisleywookiee
Rock Star
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Yeah, which is why you saw so many pro bands using Kempers (and now QC's), because they had the collections and the means to capture them well. Even younger bands like The Warning use Orange amps in the studio, but tour with a Kemper Stage for simplicity.That’s how I use my QC
ian_dissonance
Shredder
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- 1,924
That’s how it went for my former bassist/guitarist. Got the Kemper to capture his amp he didn’t want to drag out with his other band, ended up with a pile of heads and preamps to capture for playing out, lol.
Dimiguitar
Roadie
- Messages
- 652
Didn't own many more after Kemper, but hauled many, profiled many etc etc.
Eventually thought fractal sims were more accurate to the amps I care about the most, felt better, easier to adjust etc etc. So there wasn't as much reason to bother with Kemper anymore.
But this changed recently if it comes to capturing devices in general and especially with tonex V2. Not going to haul 64738 amps again but there's times where I get a tone that is very difficult to emulate with fractal.
Also it's a good backup that contains many captures of my fractal tones. I'm not sure I would have liked Kemper enough for that, if it meant mosquito mid feel.
Dimiguitar
Roadie
- Messages
- 652
Pretty much how Kemper mid response feels like to me. It's a bit of a mosquito. Maybe profiling V2 fixes that.
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Dimiguitar
Roadie
- Messages
- 652
Destroyer of my perfect mids ..
Jarick
Rock Star
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- 5,044
I think generally the ability or inability to adjust profiles (or captures) is overrated...you can scale the gain up and down and tweak the (post) EQ well within reason. It's like an engineer running a recorded guitar through an EQ - it doesn't ruin the tone at all, it actually makes the tone work better. Now you can't go from say a clean Deluxe up to a fully cranked one hanging on for dear life, or from a super gained out Dual Rec dropped way down to clean properly.
The thing that bugs me most with Kemper profiles is generally the baked in cabinet. You may have a really good amp capture and the feel and dynamics are there but the speaker used is the wrong EQ or the mic placement was bad or what not. Undoing that tends to really mess with the tone. You can kind of fake it dropping a different IR or cab block on it but it's not really the same. That's what I'm really interested to hear about with the Mk2 profiles if they ever come out. The ad copy talked about new cab modeling.
But at this point who even knows if or when these will be released and how relevant they'll be when they do arrive. If everyone's moved on and even the people who were Kemper fans a year ago have soured on the company, just having better profiles in essentially the same boxes won't be enough to move the needle.
The thing that bugs me most with Kemper profiles is generally the baked in cabinet. You may have a really good amp capture and the feel and dynamics are there but the speaker used is the wrong EQ or the mic placement was bad or what not. Undoing that tends to really mess with the tone. You can kind of fake it dropping a different IR or cab block on it but it's not really the same. That's what I'm really interested to hear about with the Mk2 profiles if they ever come out. The ad copy talked about new cab modeling.
But at this point who even knows if or when these will be released and how relevant they'll be when they do arrive. If everyone's moved on and even the people who were Kemper fans a year ago have soured on the company, just having better profiles in essentially the same boxes won't be enough to move the needle.
ChordInversion
Roadie
- Messages
- 657
The great news is that even with this likely Kemper flameout, everyone will have plenty of options from which to choose. IK and Neural continue to improve their captures. Plenty of manufacturers remain primarily focused on modeling. There's nothing for anyone to be upset about, except maybe people who bought Mk2 Kemper hardware thinking it was going to do significantly more or do it significantly better.
paisleywookiee
Rock Star
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That’s true. Tonex v2 sounds better, but is more consistent in captures too.
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The real great news is that there are loads of waaaaaaaaay better options than the Kemper these days, purely from a tone perspective. Let it die guys. It deserves it.
Enchilada Jones
Roadie
- Messages
- 865
It might be a long wait for that funeral because, as you pointed out, the only way those ’loads of better options’ are better is if you only compare the “tone perspective”. Many of those better options are lacking years later with user interface and or effects, midi, etc. etc.
Since buyers also need those things Kemper is still one of upper tier competitors.
Its current tech is at a roadblock and the mkii isn’t likely to change that but Kemper can keep selling product until all those better options up their game to compete with a whole package. That last 5% better accuracy for a capture/ modeled sound isn’t enough to drive a stake in Kempers heart if keeps getting packaged in an incomplete piece of hardware.
Most of the ‘better’ devices are more like a proof of concept than a ready for mass production. ToneX and QC are still struggling even now!
