Let's talk load boxes!

[jellodog]

No love for the Two Notes stuff? Cheaper and the Captor X has attenuation

The speaker impedance curves aren't quite right, especially in the low end. There are graphs of the Captor X impedance curve in comparison with other reactive loads kicking around, if you look for them.

Mind you, that's also true of the UA OX Box and plenty of people like that

 

[Desertdweller]

To all those trumpeting the Suhr reactive load, I bought one last week, it arrived last night, I messed around with it for 3-4 hours trying to get it to sound good, and its getting returned today. Everything sounds harsh with it. It has a character to the high end that is absolutely unappealing. My Captor X, FM9, Mesa CabClone IR in the Badlander, all sound fantastic. The Suhr just isn’t my cup of tea and I don’t understand why it’s so highly regarded. It honestly sounds awful to my ears.

Their stock IRs sound ok, but any that I added to it, whether my own or from other creators do not sound good in it. I have good faith I know what I’m doing too. All IRs used were 48KHz / 24 bit, and I even tried self-truncating a few of them down to 20ms myself since I know the Suhr does this anyway. It’s also 2x the size of the Captor X, has only 1 output, and doesn’t have an XLR output. I tried 1/4” out to my mic pre, 1/4” out to my interface, I turned all other effects off, I used my Badlander and was able to quickly go CabClone, CaptorX, Suhr, and back quickly to hear the differences too. I tried multiple amps. I tried everything to get it to sound good, and I wasn’t trying to get it to sound like my other load boxes, I was trying to get it to sound the least bit passable. The box just doesnt sound right for high gain to my ears, or anything like the other load boxes or cab sims I have played. YMMV I guess.

 

[Alex Kenivel]

So if I want the low end right, get a Suhr RL. If I want to get the high end right, get a Captor X.

Kidding of course, but the differences in perspectives is what I like.

 

[jellodog]

@Desertdweller I believe that the Suhr Reactive load impedance curve is modelled on a vintage Marshall 4x12 loaded with greenbacks. Don't know if that was wildly different to what your amp was expecting?

Having said that, I've managed to get okay results with an amp that is used to a 1x12 8 ohm load. I would not have characterized the resulting tone as noticeably harsh though.

Is it possible that you had a dud from the start?

 

[Desertdweller]

So if I want the low end right, get a Suhr RL. If I want to get the high end right, get a Captor X.

Kidding of course, but the differences in perspectives is what I like.

The Suhr RL IR is somewhat highly regarded, so don’t just take my word on it. I did a quick google search for this last night and saw a few threads over at TGP of guys with similar experiences to me though, although one of them was able to correct it by using the proper cabling, I did not have his luck with that solution.

So yeah for me, I’d say the FM9 cab block is the best sounding, but it’s not a load box. The CabClone IR in the Badlander is just about perfect, and the Captor X works well but I had to EQ a bit to get it to sound as good as the Mesa, though I assume Mesa probably had Two Notes tweak it a bit for their amps because I was able to use the onboard EQ and enhancer in the Two Notes app to get the Captor X nearly identical to the Badlander Cab Clone IR with minimal tweaking.

I do not want to talk badly about good gear and I do hope my experience is an anomaly, but I will not be buying another Suhr load box.

 

[Desertdweller]

@Desertdweller I believe that the Suhr Reactive load impedance curve is modelled on a vintage Marshall 4x12 loaded with greenbacks. Don't know if that was wildly different to what your amp was expecting?

Yes that is probably the issue. I definitely could hear the greenback type of response from it and it colored everything, even when I ran it with the IR off and just used it as a load box and loaded IRs in a VST in my DAW, it colored the sound very harshly.

 

[Blix]

Weird, never found my Suhr harsh in any way. I have the non-IR version.

 

[Desertdweller]

Is it possible that you had a dud from the start?

It is very possible, but it was brand new, so who knows.

Weird, never found my Suhr harsh in any way. I have the non-IR version.

It may be I had a dud or it may be I am just not a fan of the impedance curve it uses. YMMV for sure.

 

[Blix]

Just for fun as the Axe has the Two-Notes impedance curve as an option:
First Two-Notes, then a Greenback curve at 9 seconds.

 

[Desertdweller]

Just for fun as the Axe has the Two-Notes impedance curve as an option:
First Two-Notes, then a Greenback curve at 9 seconds.

Both of those sound really good

 

[Blix]

Both of those sound really good

Agreed, very small difference really.

 

[Desertdweller]

To all those trumpeting the Suhr reactive load, I bought one last week, it arrived last night, I messed around with it for 3-4 hours trying to get it to sound good, and its getting returned today. Everything sounds harsh with it. It has a character to the high end that is absolutely unappealing. My Captor X, FM9, Mesa CabClone IR in the Badlander, all sound fantastic. The Suhr just isn’t my cup of tea and I don’t understand why it’s so highly regarded. It honestly sounds awful to my ears.

Their stock IRs sound ok, but any that I added to it, whether my own or from other creators do not sound good in it. I have good faith I know what I’m doing too. All IRs used were 48KHz / 24 bit, and I even tried self-truncating a few of them down to 20ms myself since I know the Suhr does this anyway. It’s also 2x the size of the Captor X, has only 1 output, and doesn’t have an XLR output. I tried 1/4” out to my mic pre, 1/4” out to my interface, I turned all other effects off, I used my Badlander and was able to quickly go CabClone, CaptorX, Suhr, and back quickly to hear the differences too. I tried multiple amps. I tried everything to get it to sound good, and I wasn’t trying to get it to sound like my other load boxes, I was trying to get it to sound the least bit passable. The box just doesnt sound right for high gain to my ears, or anything like the other load boxes or cab sims I have played. YMMV I guess.

I am clearly on a personal journey with these load boxes

Ok so here's where I stand, I used the Torpedo Captor for years until I had the Captor X. I've used it for years now and have two Mesa amps that both have a similar unit built in. As I said in this earlier post, I did not have a good time with the Suhr Reactive Load IR, as I found it really made the IRs I use sound pretty bad.

buuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuut...

The OG Suhr reactive load, without an IR loader in it, is absolutely the best sounding load box I've tried yet. I probably need to snag an X-load or a Fryette just to be sure what I'm hearing, but using the older Suhr RL and then loading IRs in my DAW is a night and day better sound than what I experienced with the newer Suhr RL IR. Maybe I got a bunk one, IDK, but the older one sounds amazing IMO.

 

[jellodog]

The OG Suhr reactive load, without an IR loader in it, is absolutely the best sounding load box I've tried yet. I probably need to snag an X-load or a Fryette just to be sure what I'm hearing, but using the older Suhr RL and then loading IRs in my DAW is a night and day better sound than what I experienced with the newer Suhr RL IR. Maybe I got a bunk one, IDK, but the older one sounds amazing IMO.

The OG Suhr Reactive Load has a quite different direct out impedence than the RLIR does. Perhaps it was something to do with that and what you were running it into?

10KΩ vs 600Ω (v1, v2)

 

[paisleywookiee]

The OG Suhr reactive load, without an IR loader in it, is absolutely the best sounding load box I've tried yet. I probably need to snag an X-load or a Fryette just to be sure what I'm hearing, but using the older Suhr RL and then loading IRs in my DAW is a night and day better sound than what I experienced with the newer Suhr RL IR. Maybe I got a bunk one, IDK, but the older one sounds amazing IMO.

I mean…….told ya so.

 

[Desertdweller]

The OG Suhr Reactive Load has a quite different direct out impedence than the RLIR does. Perhaps it was something to do with that and what you were running it into?

10KΩ vs 600Ω (v1, v2)

Any idea why they changed it so much? A lot of guys seem to really like the Suhr RL IR, so I feel like I'm missing something or doing something wrong with the one I had. But it was mushing up every third party IR I threw at it and it didn't even sound good with the stock ones. Those same stock ones sound fantastic with the OG Suhr RL. Once again, odd.

 

[MirrorProfiles]

IR loader in the Suhr truncates IR’s quite a lot, could have been that? Or yeah maybe some weird impedance interaction….

 

[jellodog]

Any idea why they changed it so much? A lot of guys seem to really like the Suhr RL IR, so I feel like I'm missing something or doing something wrong with the one I had. But it was mushing up every third party IR I threw at it and it didn't even sound good with the stock ones. Those same stock ones sound fantastic with the OG Suhr RL. Once again, odd.

I don't know all the ins and outs (I think some people maybe complained about the output impedance), but there was a discussion about it here with John Suhr:

Re-Amping, your best tones yet?

Excellent rundown! You've got the gears turning in my head for a PS2/Friedman Small box 50/4x12 setup. Would you say the PS2 is neutral sounding or does it color the amp's tone a tiny bit/significantly? It’s very neutral sounding to me. There are some depth and presence controls on knobs as...

www.thegearpage.net

... which funnily enough caused me to avoid the OG version and get the later RLIR version because I didn't want any issues. Funny I know, given that you had issues the one I bought and love the one I avoided!

I don't have the RLIR anymore. After playing with it for a few days, I realised that I didn't need it.

 

[jellodog]

I’ve had most of the load boxes, UA, Two Notes, Suhr but no Boss or Fractal… I prefer the Tone King Ironman Mini or the II.

That's a great point. There's a line out on the Ironman II (and Mini II).

The point being that one doesn't have to load down to zero. You don't have to use a 100% loadbox like the Suhr. A reactive attenuator will do and then you're also taking a tap off a signal from a power amp that's interacting with a real speaker too.

 

[laxu]

All loadboxes are a compromise and most of the best devices work well enough. I have only tried the Suhr RL IR briefly at a tradeshow and with headphones but didn't notice anything odd with it.

I currently own two: Fryette PS-100 and a Bluetone Loadbox. The PS-100's poweramp is busted and since insurance paid for it I haven't wanted to spend any more money on trying to get it fixed. I'll get it done eventually.

Anyway, when the PS-100 was working I compared the two loads thru the PS-100 poweramp. I felt that the Bluetone sounded/felt a bit closer to how going direct from tube amp -> my Bluetone 4x10 cab w/ 10" Greenbacks sounds, so I'm guessing maybe they modeled the loadbox after that cab. On Fractal the closest impedance curve is the "Brit JM45 4x10" btw.

But the difference to the Fryette load was pretty marginal, so it wouldn't really matter as long as you dial it to your liking. The adjustability of the Fryette load is valuable though.

For other features, the Bluetone also acts as an attenuator with -12, -15 and -20 dB attenuation, which works well enough for home use as long as you don't have an amp more powerful than 50W. You can also turn the speaker signal off for just line-out signal. Line-out works together with attenuation too. The headphone and analog cab sim on the unit are terrible, but Bluetone makes a versions of it without those as well as offers customization if you want e.g less attenuation for those 3 steps.

 

[EOengineer]

IMO there is some increasingly prominent “internet wisdom” that the Suhr RL is the “most accurate” reactive load out there. In reality, that may be true if you are aiming to reproduce the impedance curve of a 4x12 greenback cab (which is what the Suhr produces) - but that’s not everyone’s reality.

I actually recommend having a couple reactive load boxes so you have options. Use the Suhr to get your vintage Marshall kicks. Use the Captor with it’s more generalized curve that gets you a little closer to a 1x12 or 2x12 response, etc.

In reality I tend to find I usually just use amp modeling, as I’ve not found HUGE differences in using a good modeling platform over my amps and reactive loads. Sometimes I think I can identify a difference, sometimes not.