I just don't get them. It's like something changed between releasing Liquid Profiles and the Player. Management, marketing, product design, etc. - something changed. The innovative designs just fell off a cliff.
I still gig my MK1 Stage and honestly, I'm happy with the tones. But after everything the last year with Kemper, my next move is to QC or Helix or Fractal. Which is sad to invest so much time and money into a platform but what am I supposed to do? Just continue to pay the same money for less usability, less features, less innovation than all the other platforms?
That is how I feel as well. Additionally, they suddenly decided to be aggressive with users on their forums. All really bad IMO.
Sorry, I never really looked at the player at all. So the Player is $700, has lopsided I/O, no loop, starts with 4 effects plus 1 capture unless you pay more, had no display, requires Wi Fi for editing even though it also has Bluetooth (that apparently doesn’t work great at the same time as the Wi Fi), and has no display?
And it can do some other stuff but it costs more?
Who was this made for and who was/is buying it?
I think it was a particularly bad idea in a bunch of ways. It's also more like $1000 all-in to "unlock" full functionality.
The right decision would've been allow us to at least change the stereo TRS 1/4" out to be the "MAIN" out - so that the main volume knob adjusts it.
Really ask yourself - who would run their main mix to FOH mono, and then run it stereo to their monitor(s)?
Strange decision indeed.
The idea for Kemper was an amp-in-the-box solution for your pedalboard. But again, the main out is mono xlr - so how do you run that to your guitar pedals after the unit?
It's basically a crippled HX Stomp with less I/O.
I bought one thinking cool, I'll have a Kemper on my desk to use instead of unpacking my Stage between shows. Then I tried gigging it over and over and it was always painful.
My favorite is Kemper advertised a $100 3rd party display to add to it. Sure, because that's the solution - count on another company to fix your bad product for you.
Before release, I was hoping it would allow me a lower cost backup solution that was small enough to fit in an overnight bag. As it is, it is useless for that. Better off getting a used Stage for that purpose and accepting the larger format backup.
I don't think any of this was planned. Here's my evidence:
None of the MK2 products have physical buttons to control the new Fixed FX Blocks.
I know I am in the minority, but I believe they didn't even turn the main board in this. It is exactly the same as the original(s) for the different models. They will hook the new profiling 2.0 to only the new hardware inside the firmware.
I used to be a pretty good hacker. Wonder if I could find the hook in the assembler code and create a binary that makes MK1 play MK2 2.0 profiles at full resolution? Might be worth an hour of effort to try ...... assuming they ever release the thing.
I still don't classify this as "fraud". It's just shitty for MK1 users ... and yes, an attempt to get existing MK1 users to buy a new unit.
Problem is ..... why would I shell out that kind of money for a NEW Kemper when I could use the SAME money and get a Stadium (non XL) instead?
Don't underestimate a company's desire to keep costs down by reusing existing stuff and leaving updates for later. Those new blocks are mostly more "utility" grade effects so not having dedicated buttons on the hardware is not surprising. Not having a software menu to access them from the front panel however is bollocks, but I wouldn't be surprised if they add that later.
I think that this among other things really shows that there isn't anything different under the hood. In fact, photographs also show this. You don't have to look far.
It's a firmware upgrade tied to a hardware upgrade that doesn't have anything to do with the new features IMO.
