St. Rock AMPERIUM LIVE

Some fair points raised, but keep in mind the Amperium Live is pretty compact and as noted by @st.Rock, deeper switching is available - just done with MIDI.

There are trade-offs with everything in life, and with this box, the size, quality of modeling, Bluetooth connection to edit on a bigger screen outweigh some of the perceived negatives. IMO, of course.

.
 
Electric I said:
and with this box, the size, quality of modeling, Bluetooth connection to edit on a bigger screen outweigh some of the perceived negatives.
Click to expand...

Sure. And of course, each to their own. Yet, why not implement some things more elegantly? I don't think there's much of a reason for some things (for instance the lack of any on-device switching of individual FX).
And as far as the size goes, this thing is larger than an HX Stomp - which offers tons more of functionality (of course minus wireless and mobile editing - but that's another thing). Yeah, you may prefer the Amperiums modeling (I guess I'd do, even if I'm fine with the HX series), but then, being a live player mainly, there's quite some more aspects to enjoying whatever units.
And seriously, just because there's MIDI doesn't mean anything. What's the procedure to switch individual FX via MIDI? There's zero about it in the manual. Also, MIDI doesn't magically add a wha effect to the board.

I know, I'm coming across pretty negatively, but then, be it so. Especially regarding live usage, this is bringing an extremely underwhelming feature set to the table (it actually makes you wonder why it's called Amperium "Live"), even my 28 year old GT-5 is better suited regarding that kinda stuff.
I also know that this won't change anymore with this very hardware incarnation, but I actually happen to think that St. Rock has a huge potential soundwise, so maybe they will one day come up with a new hardware revision adressing some points.
 
Sascha Franck said:
Sure. And of course, each to their own. Yet, why not implement some things more elegantly? I don't think there's much of a reason for some things (for instance the lack of any on-device switching of individual FX).
And as far as the size goes, this thing is larger than an HX Stomp - which offers tons more of functionality (of course minus wireless and mobile editing - but that's another thing). Yeah, you may prefer the Amperiums modeling (I guess I'd do, even if I'm fine with the HX series), but then, being a live player mainly, there's quite some more aspects to enjoying whatever units.
And seriously, just because there's MIDI doesn't mean anything. What's the procedure to switch individual FX via MIDI? There's zero about it in the manual. Also, MIDI doesn't magically add a wha effect to the board.

I know, I'm coming across pretty negatively, but then, be it so. Especially regarding live usage, this is bringing an extremely underwhelming feature set to the table (it actually makes you wonder why it's called Amperium "Live"), even my 28 year old GT-5 is better suited regarding that kinda stuff.
I also know that this won't change anymore with this very hardware incarnation, but I actually happen to think that St. Rock has a huge potential soundwise, so maybe they will one day come up with a new hardware revision adressing some points.
Click to expand...
What do the 4 onboard footswitches do? Switch between presets?
 
JiveTurkey said:
What do the 4 onboard footswitches do? Switch between presets?
Click to expand...
@st.Rock can correct me if needed, but my understanding there are two primary uses of the foot switches:
  • Switch between scenes in a bank (scenes in this context are simply completely different presets in the same bank of four presets)
  • Switch between four favorite'd presets, which is essentially the same function as the first but not bound to a specific bank
Then there are hold functions like switching between bank and favorite mode, activating the tuner, and opening the tap tempo interface.

In the end--yes, the foot switches just switch between presets--whether by bank or by favorites.
 
Sascha Franck said:
Fwiw, after taking a closer look and reading through the "manual" (which is really just a selection of screenshots with some descriptions), I gotta say that apart from the great sound, this unit isn't ready for prime time especially when playing live.

Pretty much each and every modeler on earth allows you to connect external pedals, so you can perform additional switching and control functions. None of this on the Amperium. So, should I want to add a volume pedal a a proper position, the only way would be to use a physical volume pedal and insert it in the loop. Also there's no way to add a wah at all, again you'd need a physical wah pedal.

Then, there's also no way to switch anything within a patch - something plenty of folks are doing all the time. So, even if your needs are rather modest and you only wanted to, say, switch a delay on/off within a patch (something so typical it's possible with pretty much any modeler for over 2 decades already), that's not possible. As a result, even such an extremely trivial thing requires you to save two patches already, which isn't too great as there's always only 4 patches exposed at once before you have to switch banks. Add an additional drive that you might want to switch and all possible combinations (4) will eat up your entire bank already.
And it's only getting worse should you want to change, say, the amp gain on the main patch the 4 patches are based on, because you will now have to do that 4 times instead of just once. Perhaps on an onboard UI offering pretty much no assistance in quick editing, to put it carefully.

Yeah, I hear you folks already, "booh, the local contrarian yet again" and what not. But take a moment and think about the things above. I'm sure you'll see how these (IMO massive) oversights could impact sales, at least as soon as it comes to live playing. See, as is, if I only had the choice between this and the rusty GT-10 to attend a gig, I'd rather use the GT-10, pretty much without wasting any thoughts even.
This might be a kickass unit for sound nerds, but it's likely the worst "all-in-one-modeler" recently released when it comes to live playing.
So, no, I'm not just the "local contarian", I'm simply pointing out some things - and in case the St. Rock folks consider coming up with further hardware modelers in the future, they may consider some of these things.
Click to expand...
You have already clearly stated it’s not the device for you ?

This feels like after telling a girl it not going to work out then naming off all her flaws , if the end result is you are not going to see each other again why bother
 
eggpl@nt said:
@st.Rock can correct me if needed, but my understanding there are two primary uses of the foot switches:
  • Switch between scenes in a bank (scenes in this context are simply completely different presets in the same bank of four presets)
  • Switch between four favorite'd presets, which is essentially the same function as the first but not bound to a specific bank
Then there are hold functions like switching between bank and favorite mode, activating the tuner, and opening the tap tempo interface.

In the end--yes, the foot switches just switch between presets--whether by bank or by favorites.
Click to expand...

Single tap - switching scene in a bank.

Long A - tuner
Long B - access to favorite scenes which can be programed - you can select an any scene from any bank.
Long B release and again Long B again - song list mode.
Long C - bank selecting mode. A - up, B- down, C - confirm, D- cancel. When press C to confirm then you can select a scene per A/B/C/D.
D - Tempo

I don't see reasons to make another functionality of switches because
copy\paste scenes - two clicks. And the speed of toggling preset is the same as bypassing any block. It Makes no sense to bypass one block if we can toggle the whole chain. It's a more powerful method imho. But it possible by MIDI.

Idea was to have 4 independent setups. Like 4 channels of amp.

What can we do more with these 4 foot switches?
Why 4 footswitches? Bcs we have wanted to make it smaller as possible. If we look at the rear panel - we will see that it is fully filled.
The rear panel gives a width of the device. We made a stereo return jack instead of two mono returns to have a smaller size etc. To be honest the current width is not enough for 4 foot switches, it would be better to have 2cm more.

There are many reasons why it has such a form factor as it has.
Firstly it was planned as tube amp emulation only.
Our goal was quality amp emulation. Later it has grown to something bigger.

Yes, the Amperium has limitations and many compromises. And we have reasons for it. We want to give a maximum from current design. And we understand "more is more" (c). More is better than less -) But as I wrote early - in real life all have price and a lot of compromises.

We are reading all the comments and collecting them.

@Sascha Franck. We understand that we must look to Donner Arena 2000.
Repeat their functionality and price politics. And maybe then we will be a little bit closer to you. We promise to think about that. And appreciate you for your care about our future developments.

sorry for the many letters.
 
Last edited:
st.Rock said:
Single tap - switching scene in a bank.

Long A - tuner
Long B - access to favorite scenes which can be programed - you can select an any scene from any bank.
Long B release and again Long B again - song list mode.
Long C - bank selecting mode. A - up, B- down, C - confirm, D- cancel. When press C to confirm then you can select a scene per A/B/C/D.
D - Tempo

I don't see reasons to make another functionality of switches because
copy\paste scenes - two clicks. And the speed of toggling preset is the same as bypassing any block. It Makes no sense to bypass one block if we can toggle the whole chain. It's a more powerful method imho.

Idea was to have 4 independent setups. Like 4 channels of amp.

What can we do more with these 4 foot switches?
Why 4 footswitches? Bcs we have wanted to make it smaller as possible. If we look at the rear panel - we will see that it is fully filled.
The rear panel gives a width of the device. We made a stereo return jack instead of two mono returns to have a smaller size etc. To be honest the current width is not enough for 4 foot switches, it would be better to have 2cm more.

There are many reasons why it has such a form factor as it has.
Firstly it was planned as tube amp emulation only.
Our goal was quality amp emulation. Later it has grown to something bigger.

Yes, the Amperium has limitations and many compromises. And we have reasons for it. We want to give a maximum from current design. And we understand "more is more" (c). More is better than less -) But as I wrote early - in real life all have price and a lot of compromises.

We are reading all the comments and collecting them.

@Sascha Franck. We understand that we must look to Donner Arena 2000.
Repeat their functionality and price politics. And maybe then we will be a little bit closer to you. We promise to think about that. And appreciate you for your care about our future developments.

sorry for the many letters.
Click to expand...
To be clear—I have no issue with the footswitching, and I’m thoroughly enjoying the Amperium.

I did mention in another post it would be nice to be able to toggle effects, but to your point—you can effectively do this by copying/pasting scenes with your core amp tone to ABCD, then sprinkle ABCD with specific effects as needed.
 
eggpl@nt said:
To be clear—I have no issue with the footswitching, and I’m thoroughly enjoying the Amperium.

I did mention in another post it would be nice to be able to toggle effects, but to your point—you can effectively do this by copying/pasting scenes with your core amp tone to ABCD, then sprinkle ABCD with specific effects as needed.
Click to expand...
You can setup your preset of dream in scene A. Bypass all blocks what have plan to bypass.
Then copy this scene to scene B / C / D and there switch on desired blocks.
It's fast enough. No need to setup the same thing on each scene.
Yes if you change gain (for example) and you need to change the gain in all scenes - you must to do it manually or repeat as described in begining.
IMHO it's normal behavior. Maybe I am wrong...
 
Also want to specify.
Copy \ Paste working in hardware variant.
You need to enter to chain screen - just click by encoder in the main screen.
And there long tap on encoder yet. You will se menu on screen
1699283690094.png


Selecting by footswitch where you want paste. Ok -save, or Back - cancel operation
 
First, thank you to accept me on the forum.
I've been owning the Amperium Live for weeks / 1 month+ now.
I think tones are great and the unit has such an amount of features I could not believe it.
I love the 2 sides PRE / POST and the insert.
Effects are great. They don't sound thousands dollars lexicon but I think they allow you to sound like yourself.
I use it everyday home, every week @ rehearsal. At end of this month, first time gigging with it.
In band situation this works nicely. But it certainly helps that we go direct and monitor with in-ear...
The XLR output is very convenient and offers a very tidy solution (again, if you go direct).
I'm sure you can record serious stuff with it. I can imagine to perform some reamping and take advantage of onboard effects during mixing without having to rely on plugins.
But I feel that it is well suited for band playing. We can easily have presets available and 4 presets on the row is often enough for many players.
I've read that a lot of features are accessible by midi. I think it can solve the lack of switches problem.
Concerning the setup tool, I've seen many configuration software from major companies that look better but don't work so well.
Well you may notice I'm very fond of the Amperium but my comments are not honeymoon feelings ;-)
 
Phil110567 said:
First, thank you to accept me on the forum.
I've been owning the Amperium Live for weeks / 1 month+ now.
I think tones are great and the unit has such an amount of features I could not believe it.
I love the 2 sides PRE / POST and the insert.
Effects are great. They don't sound thousands dollars lexicon but I think they allow you to sound like yourself.
I use it everyday home, every week @ rehearsal. At end of this month, first time gigging with it.
In band situation this works nicely. But it certainly helps that we go direct and monitor with in-ear...
The XLR output is very convenient and offers a very tidy solution (again, if you go direct).
I'm sure you can record serious stuff with it. I can imagine to perform some reamping and take advantage of onboard effects during mixing without having to rely on plugins.
But I feel that it is well suited for band playing. We can easily have presets available and 4 presets on the row is often enough for many players.
I've read that a lot of features are accessible by midi. I think it can solve the lack of switches problem.
Concerning the setup tool, I've seen many configuration software from major companies that look better but don't work so well.
Well you may notice I'm very fond of the Amperium but my comments are not honeymoon feelings ;-)
Click to expand...
Welcome!

Do you like pickles?
 
st.Rock said:
I don't see reasons to make another functionality of switches because
copy\paste scenes - two clicks. And the speed of toggling preset is the same as bypassing any block. It Makes no sense to bypass one block if we can toggle the whole chain. It's a more powerful method imho.
Click to expand...

Could it be that you're not playing live a lot? Or at all?

Because otherwise you would instantly understand how much of a value it is to quickly switch an effect that you just rarely use within a patch. And even if you use it often, it's usually making more sense to switch an effect within one patch. Because, if you want to save your overdriven amp patch 1) plain, 2) /w some boost, 3) /w delay 4) /w modulation, 5) /w boost and delay (I'll leave it to you to imagine 6, 7, 8, etc...), you'll already be clogging up an entire bank worth of patches. So just switching to, say, a clean patch, would already require to flip banks.

In addition, if you wanted to create just those 5 patches mentioned above, you'd have to save the patch 5 times. And in case you're finding out there's too much treble on your amp's tone control, you'd have to alter and re-save 5 patches instead of just one. Etc.

Seriously, the fact that you're even asking what further control options would be good for, clearly demonstrates that you haven't been thinking live usage through carefully.
 
Sascha Franck said:
Could it be that you're not playing live a lot? Or at all?

Because otherwise you would instantly understand how much of a value it is to quickly switch an effect that you just rarely use within a patch. And even if you use it often, it's usually making more sense to switch an effect within one patch. Because, if you want to save your overdriven amp patch 1) plain, 2) /w some boost, 3) /w delay 4) /w modulation, 5) /w boost and delay (I'll leave it to you to imagine 6, 7, 8, etc...), you'll already be clogging up an entire bank worth of patches. So just switching to, say, a clean patch, would already require to flip banks.

In addition, if you wanted to create just those 5 patches mentioned above, you'd have to save the patch 5 times. And in case you're finding out there's too much treble on your amp's tone control, you'd have to alter and re-save 5 patches instead of just one. Etc.

Seriously, the fact that you're even asking what further control options would be good for, clearly demonstrates that you haven't been thinking live usage through carefully.
Click to expand...

I believe you are great gitarero and better know who and how playing. I will ask you every time when I would want to make something yet.
In my opinion, you are simply thinking in terms of one preset.
If you want additional switches - you need to use external midi footswitch. IMHO that is the best solution.

Or if you so like to teach - you can -)
Describe all functionality of device with 4 footswitches. If it will be better than current and other users agreed with this - I will realize this in device.
Main things like bank and 4 scenes must be a constant. Don't forget about tuner, tap etc. Please do it in private messages. When it will be ready we show it on public. Thx

By the way.... The device have a SONG LIST mode.
How it works : need to setup songs. Each songs have 16 parts. Each part is scene from any bank.
So for each song available 16 sounds.
From songs are made playlists. Total 4 playlists.
If you play a show - you can make a playlist from your songs. And control sound with two footswitches:
B - Backward - previous sound.
C - Continue - forward.
In this mode you no need to dance on footswitches and remember what where and how was setup.
A - is tuner, D - tap. Minimum mistakes , but setup is difficult.
 
Sascha Franck said:
Seriously, the fact that you're even asking what further control options would be good for, clearly demonstrates that you haven't been thinking live usage through carefully.
Click to expand...
I think you've reached an impasse. Your concern has been expressed, st Rock has heard it, and that's all that can happen at this point. This device doesn't appear to be for you and that's fine.
 
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