Sonicake NAM Captures?

[Doug B]

Like they actually show up to a gig with it? I mean for a bedroom player sure I can see it as their main modeller, but I wouldn't gig with it.

Yes, for gigs. This is for a singer songwriter-type situation, not a full band.

 

[Doug B]

This also has no footswitches. And just one single encoder.

It has two footswitches and a rotary encoder.

 

[Sascha Franck]

It has two footswitches and a rotary encoder.

I'd likely rather step on a raw egg...

 

[BenIfin]

Okay, it's a scam



This guy says "it doesn't sound exactly the same" but that's an oxymoron, it sounds line nam played thru a fuckin' 0.5" speaker

Comments on the video:View attachment 37449View attachment 37450

The same guy posted on the NAM group on FB:

View attachment 37451View attachment 37452

I could well be wrong but upon listening to the comparison it sounds like the SonicCake was very strongly filtered.

A possible cause.

See the image below - the IR block was still engaged (?) - so either it seems (?) to be running into another IR - which is what it sounds like to me - or it was being filtered by the Active IR Block in some way (?)

I wouldn't have thought the 48 / 44 issue would make such a huge difference (?)

Maybe the S/Cake does actually sound like total sh*t when playing NAM Captures (?) but something in this comparison just feels "not done quite right" (?)

Still-shot from the 3 min 25 sec mark of the video:-

 

[PamStarmaker]

I could well be wrong but upon listening to the comparison it sounds like the SonicCake was very strongly filtered.

A possible cause.

See the image below - the IR block was still engaged (?) - so either it seems (?) to be running into another IR - which is what it sounds like to me - or it was being filtered by the Active IR Block in some way (?)

I wouldn't have thought the 48 / 44 issue would make such a huge difference (?)

Maybe the S/Cake does actually sound like total sh*t when playing NAM Captures (?) but something in this comparison just feels "not done quite right" (?)

Still-shot from the 3 min 25 sec mark of the video:-
View attachment 37464

... it makes no difference in sound if IR is on or off when playing in clone mode with a NAM profile. It ist automatically disabled although you can tweak there but without any result.

And btw, it sounds great and not only for the bucks. If it sounds the same or not doesn't matter for me.

 

[Dave Lewis]

 

[Doctor Blue]

This guy does justice to the PM:

 

[norminal]

It has two footswitches and a rotary encoder.

Woah. I just realized that THE Doug B is back. Welcome back homie!

 

[Doug B]

I'd likely rather step on a raw egg...

Your dime, your dance

 

[Sascha Franck]

This guy does justice to the PM:

There's actually some pretty decent sounds in that video.

 

[DLC86]

 

[Mike Oliphant]

So it nulls at around -27dB, which is... not great.

For reference, NAM is around -41dB and Kemper is around -31dB. Ampero is around -34dB.

So you aren't yet getting Kemper level quality for $65 - but it is getting close.

 

[Doug B]

Woah. I just realized that THE Doug B is back. Welcome back homie!

Thanks!

 

[Doug B]

So it nulls at around -27dB, which is... not great.

For reference, NAM is around -41dB and Kemper is around -31dB. Ampero is around -34dB.

So you aren't yet getting Kemper level quality for $65 - but it is getting close.

And like Leo said, if Sonicake can add NAM functionality in a $65 unit, what's holding the bigger companies back? I thought that Fractal would've been the first to add it to the Axe-FX III back in 2023.

 

[Sascha Franck]

And like Leo said, if Sonicake can add NAM functionality in a $65 unit, what's holding the bigger companies back? I thought that Fractal would've been the first to add it to the Axe-FX III back in 2023.

It's possibly holding them back that input levels still aren't sorted and that you may need to develop a NAM loader interpreting the (more or less newly added, IIRC) meta data correctly.

 

[StratsoundFan]

And like Leo said, if Sonicake can add NAM functionality in a $65 unit, what's holding the bigger companies back? I thought that Fractal would've been the first to add it to the Axe-FX III back in 2023.

But it's not NAM functionality. There is format conversion going on, and the sample rate is changed, and null test reflects that. Dimehead Player perfomed much better in comparison, precisely because it actually runs NAM captures, unlike Pocketmaster.

 

[DLC86]

But it's not NAM functionality. There is format conversion going on, and the sample rate is changed, and null test reflects that. Dimehead Player perfomed much better in comparison, precisely because it actually runs NAM captures, unlike Pocketmaster.

Until someone verifies if what Jason Zdora suggested is correct, we have no way to tell if there's format conversion or not cuz the comparison is fucked up by the wrong sample rate.

As I wrote in the comments under Leo's video, a simple way to verify it could be to load a 44.1 kHz profile (can be easily done via tonezone3000 and I think there are some on tonehunt too) and see if it sounds closer to the plugin/dimehead in that case.

EDIT: for example this one: https://tonehunt.org/moshimothi/3a4de063-1abc-4bd4-aa27-545a5f3a2903

 

[Mike Oliphant]

Until someone verifies if what Jason Zdora suggested is correct, we have no way to tell if there's format conversion or not cuz the comparison is fucked up by the wrong sample rate.

They should be able to fix this pretty easily by adding resampling to their NAM capture process.

If they are using the same tone matching tech as in the Ampero, this sample rate error (and the resulting EQ shift) is probably accounting for most the difference between the -27dB null test and the -34dB of the Ampero.

My guess is fixing the sampling issue would put this little unit ahead of the Kemper in terms of capture accuracy.

 

[PamStarmaker]

If I remember correctly, Kemper also works at 44.1 kHz. If, for example, Mr. Kemper were to come up with the idea of including NAM profiles in his portfolio, a deterioration in quality would be expected, as can be seen with Leo. On the subject of latency, I would say the pocket master is still completely okay. Nobody expects to use it for professional use. It's really fun with this part and the on-board sound options are really good. And being able to capture a few ideas on the fly when you use it as an interface is really great.

 

[BenIfin]

I'm out of my depth here ..... but if the unit is hardware designed and built at, say, 44k / 16 bit ..... how can a firmware update "fix" this 44-to-48 NAM issue ?