The importance of aesthetics to me.

While I can appreciate your difference in preferences and the reasoning behind them, I personally think the Ampero II Stage is gorgeous. In person it looks like a high end piece of gear to me. It’s part of why I tried it over the Ampero II Stomp. I like how the gray highlights separate the bank/tuner/looper section and the stomp/patch/bypass mode. The line/strip below the gray HOTONE box is a tri-color input level that’s continuous rather than segmented.

They use a similar schema on the back segregating inputs and outputs that I find visually appealing and useful. The feature listing text up top doesn’t really bother me much. It’s not noticeable to me when using standing up/on stage. Here’s a pic of the back to illustrate what I mentioned and it matches the front well (pic included to compare).
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I agree the Ampero stuff looks really clean to me
 
My favorite aesthetic for stompboxes is pretty much the total opposite of elegant.

Not the wiring, but the pedals themselves-

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Blank project boxes.

This exact shot is what turned me into a gear nerd when I was 11. I had no clue what any of this did, it looked like science lab equipment to me. And really, it's just A/B boxes and a couple loop boxes, but the mystery of it all had me so curious as to what it all did and I still love the aesthetic.

.....and that blue Fuzz Face. :chef

The next rig I saw that tripped me out was Vai's '96 rig, but more pedals on the floor that I had zero clue what they did (another loop box and now the CAE RS-10, which for a while I thought was the secret to Vai's playing :ROFLMAO: )
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Aesthetics can be influential in decision making, and can extend to other senses.

I recently sold a nylon string flamenco / classical type guitar. I’d had it for over a decade and used it for some jazz and a little home noodling, but had not played it in years before finally deciding to sell it off.

Why did I keep it so long? It was partly made of cypress and I loved the aroma!
 
The little lines between the footswitches, the "modeling engine" branding up top and those lines between the bank indicators serve no real purpose, and don't give it a better visual identity IMO.

Yeah, they're there just to be busy and fill space, as it's otherwise the Ampero II is a square box with no identifiable features. They do make the device pretty thou.

IMHO Line 6 has the best design flair in the mfx business. Well, maybe excepting the Pod Go, which was designed around a sturdy, but very cheap and plain, folded steel chassis 😄
 
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About the hardware visuals:

HX Stomp, QC, FM3 and FM9 all earn points for non-cluttered looks. Important when on stage, no distractions.

Kemper, Amperio Stage ... terrible. All kinds of superfluous elements.

Ampero Stage? Really? I do have my criticism about the UI, but cluttered is not what I'd call it at all.
 
About aestetic. I hated SG's, until I saw Derek Trucks. Got a few that sounded and played great, now I find them beautiful. If something sounds good, feels good to play and it's fun to mess around with it just starts to look good to me.

Unfortunately my mind does not work like this for women. :bonk:beer:wat
 
I also (gasp!) quite like how NDSP hardware looks. They clearly took a lot of inspiration from Apple... but it works.

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i will have to agree, QC is to me the best overall looking modeler… super clean. But its also only looks. It’s not quite Apple level irl. An Apple product really feels like it looks. QC doesn’t do that quite all the way. I’ve….. touched one…. once… it wasn’t disappointing but just not quite “there” compared to all the release images.
 
i will have to agree, QC is to me the best overall looking modeler… super clean. But its also only looks. It’s not quite Apple level irl. An Apple product really feels like it looks. QC doesn’t do that quite all the way. I’ve….. touched one…. once… it wasn’t disappointing but just not quite “there” compared to all the release images.
I was an Apple/macOS admin before my current role and not just the quality of the hardware and software but the consistency of quality always amazed me in comparison to my Windows team counterparts. I always looked like hot shit in my job because the Mac environment was smooth as silk with happy users. Their new MacBook Pros are also DIEZEL units.
 
I can already tell I’m getting a Nano Cortex. I hope I can hold out for a sale. $100 off would be perfect!

I came very close to buying one recently, as a number of used NCs got listed at reasonable prices, and that 2.0.0 update fixed much of the gripes i had with the device at launch. Had to remind myself that the Nano Cortex can only be controlled via smartphones...
 
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I came very close to buying one recently, as a number of used NCs got listed at reasonable prices, and that 2.0.0 update fixed much of the gripes i had with the device at launch. Had to remind myself that the Nano Cortex can only be controlled via smartphones...
Yes, a touchscreen on it would really be sweet. I guess the basic knobs on front help a bit. I hope they have alt/secondary features.
 
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