Some interesting news from Kemper (Profiler Player)

[PorcinePicker]

A couple days ago, I noticed that the Kemper forum was unreachable. I figured it was a temporary problem, but I checked back today and found same. Then I checked their main web page and found “The KEMPER Amps website is currently offline for security reasons.”

Anybody know the rest of the story? Are they in serious trouble?

 

[laxu]

A couple days ago, I noticed that the Kemper forum was unreachable. I figured it was a temporary problem, but I checked back today and found same. Then I checked their main web page and found “The KEMPER Amps website is currently offline for security reasons.”

Anybody know the rest of the story? Are they in serious trouble?

I'm guessing they have some security related reason why they need to upgrade their servers or infrastucture stack. Which can take some time. It's always possible someone has exploited a security hole somewhere and gained access to e.g forum user information or something like that.

 

[texhex]

In the flesh

 

[JCW308]

Revisiting the Kemper Player this week. I'm having better luck after a several month break.

 

[Jarick]

I'm going to bump my thoughts on the Kemper Player into this thread. I received a Kemper Player last weekend after the announcement of the Mk2 devices. I've been thinking of trying one out to revisit the Kemper stuff and as a small set and forget unit. Basically something I can plug into and dial up one of a few sounds without needing or wanting to mess with tones.

I like having the five rig buttons and some knobs to make quick adjustments. It would be nice to have a small screen on the unit but I think I can get around that if I keep it simple. I do think the knobs are kind of finnicky with the responsiveness and acceleration. Also, the switches have kind of a cool smoke grey color which I never noticed in pictures.

For the profiles, I tried a bunch and decided to use five different profiles from Michael Britt's "Crank N Go" pack. I picked five different profiles from the Friedman BE-50 Deluxe - clean channel, clean with a boost pedal, BE channel, HBE channel, and HBE with a boost. That seems similar to how I'd run the actual amp, and these profiles have less of that MBritt mid focused tone.

Now I've settled on the profiles I'll mess around more with the included effects.

 

[JCW308]

I'm going to bump my thoughts on the Kemper Player into this thread. I received a Kemper Player last weekend after the announcement of the Mk2 devices. I've been thinking of trying one out to revisit the Kemper stuff and as a small set and forget unit. Basically something I can plug into and dial up one of a few sounds without needing or wanting to mess with tones.

I like having the five rig buttons and some knobs to make quick adjustments. It would be nice to have a small screen on the unit but I think I can get around that if I keep it simple. I do think the knobs are kind of finnicky with the responsiveness and acceleration. Also, the switches have kind of a cool smoke grey color which I never noticed in pictures.

For the profiles, I tried a bunch and decided to use five different profiles from Michael Britt's "Crank N Go" pack. I picked five different profiles from the Friedman BE-50 Deluxe - clean channel, clean with a boost pedal, BE channel, HBE channel, and HBE with a boost. That seems similar to how I'd run the actual amp, and these profiles have less of that MBritt mid focused tone.

Now I've settled on the profiles I'll mess around more with the included effects.

Same experience here. I have each bank set for one guitar. Then I have it set so I can get to six different sounds, tune and tap tempo without any extra hardware except an expression pedal inside each bank. Great portable rig and it sounds absolutely incredible with acoustic, bass and any electric.

 

[Enchilada Jones]

The Player is, to me, easier to cope with than the Nano Cortex or other non-screen-but-have-presets options. The banks of 5 is a good way to make each bank collection of rigs you would want to use in the same song, or type of amp or degree of gain etc

If they implemented the ability to limit the number of banks that you cycle through with foot switches it would be great. I can’t recall if it has that.
You could have like four neighboring banks for your sets in a rock band. Five other banks for a group of favorite amp types, etc then just set the cycling limits for the show or jam session you are playing that day and it relatively easy to know how to find the sound you want.

 

[AFKAEjay(retired)]

If they implemented the ability to limit the number of banks that you cycle through with foot switches it would be great. I can’t recall if it has that.

99% sure they put that in

 

[Ed DeGenaro]

99% sure they put that in

It is

 

[Jarick]

They have max banks; do they have max rigs? It would be nice if you wanted say three tones to cycle through. Although I suppose you could just bank up and down over the first three right?

 

[Jarick]

Same experience here. I have each bank set for one guitar. Then I have it set so I can get to six different sounds, tune and tap tempo without any extra hardware except an expression pedal inside each bank. Great portable rig and it sounds absolutely incredible with acoustic, bass and any electric.

Did you end up sticking with the Player?

 

[JCW308]

Did you end up sticking with the Player?

Yeah, I'm using two now (one as a backup) and I noticed that I'm playing a lot more and tinkering a lot less (which is good). I use it as an all-in-one rig for all gigs now. I have one full bank set for each guitar. Working beautifully!

 

[AFKAEjay(retired)]

They have max banks; do they have max rigs? It would be nice if you wanted say three tones to cycle through. Although I suppose you could just bank up and down over the first three right?

What I did:
Switch 3 goes one preset up, switch 1 always goes to 1. (2 is a stomp)
Downside: if you want to go from preset 5 to 4, you need 4 clicks.
upside: you can put your “sometimes I need this sound fast” sound, on 1, which then is always 1 click. (Like a lead sound)

Did you find the “combi switch “ functionality yet?


3 switches is never gonna be ideal offcourse. An easy and cheap way to add some switches: you can get a M vave midi chocolate including BT midi reciever to plug into the player for 30,-.4 switches, battery powered, wireless.

 

[OneEng]

The Player is, to me, easier to cope with than the Nano Cortex or other non-screen-but-have-presets options. The banks of 5 is a good way to make each bank collection of rigs you would want to use in the same song, or type of amp or degree of gain etc

I have banks of 5 on my Rack. I don't go so far as to have a bank for each song, but rather banks for different types of songs. I have a few banks for very "special" songs that require something that isn't common (Like U2 stuff, Money for Nothin, etc). It does make it quite gig friendly I agree.

My "general purpose" banks always go from low gain/clean on 1 and higher gain on 5.

I have setlists that also include my guitar settings and performance/slot to use for each song. I have been contemplating using a setlist program that would make the changes to my Kemper via MIDI to make my life easier at a gig when their is often no time at all between songs.

 

[Enchilada Jones]

My "general purpose" banks always go from low gain/clean on 1 and higher gain on 5.

Same here. I usually do a bank of five all the same amp type (or even same profile with different drive pedals in front) with the 5 buttons ranging from clean to gain. Sometimes button 5 is same as 4 but adding more delay and or reverb mix.

I have setlists that also include my guitar settings and performance/slot to use for each song. I have been contemplating using a setlist program that would make the changes to my Kemper via MIDI to make my life easier at a gig when there is often no time at all between songs.

That’s brilliant.

 

[AFKAEjay(retired)]

God…we need functionality to keep dicks out of threads who have nothing to share but personal attacks…I’m tired and bored by it…ignore list helps though

 

[Dom Mcsweeney]

we need functionality to keep dicks out of threads

that is indeed ''what she said''

 

[Jarick]

Gonna try and see what this "feel" business is all about.

 

[Jarick]

Alright an hour of pretty close comparisons and the Fractal is just much, much closer to the real thing. Granted I can't profile my amp directly but all the similar amps with the same IR are a fair bit different.

I'd say Fractal is 95% of the way there with subtle EQ, in terms of overall sound, gain, dynamics, and feel. The Kemper is like 85%. A good profile probably would be a lot closer, but not sure I'll end up keeping the Player long enough for the new OS.

 

[Mongillo19]

Alright an hour of pretty close comparisons and the Fractal is just much, much closer to the real thing. Granted I can't profile my amp directly but all the similar amps with the same IR are a fair bit different.

I'd say Fractal is 95% of the way there with subtle EQ, in terms of overall sound, gain, dynamics, and feel. The Kemper is like 85%. A good profile probably would be a lot closer, but not sure I'll end up keeping the Player long enough for the new OS.

Add on top the fractal also doesn't have a JJ jr/JJ model. Although I imagine the HBE would be close