Tonex Pedal....It's REAL

[Sascha Franck]

You mean Boss' with a spectacular 0.5 ms, at least according to quick googling?

I was absolutely wondering about that when watching that comparison video of Leo Gibson. Usually, a lot of commonly used ADDA converters add around 1ms already (ok, sometimes a little less), and in this case at least one round of passing the dry signal through needs to be covered, too, something even the fastest computers using the best audio interfaces and what not still need around 1.5-2ms for. That's really quite incredible of Boss as they must be able to run everything at pretty low buffersizes (regardless whether the internal sample rate is 96khz). What I'm actually wondering is whether certain blocks add to the overall latency (in plugin land, some do, some don't, managing to do their job within the set buffersizes).

 

[pipelineaudio]

I'm still hoping for a micro sized Tonex profile player with 3.5mm MIDI and SPDIF

 

[Sascha Franck]

If there's documented evidence of someone on a forum mapping out how something should be, and then the manufacturer responding Hey yeah, thanks we'll do that ... I haven't read it.

It happens all the time. Maybe not as directly, though. Usually goes like this: Manufacturer is looking for some betatesters, usually folks with a good connectiont to the real world. Hence betatesters will pickup ideas "off the street" and then maybe discuss some ideas in internal forums, with the actual programmers then telling them whether something would be doable or not. And a lot of times, things are doable. I have been betatesting for several audio software companies during the last decades, so I do in fact know what I'm talking about. Some programmers are extremely open to external input, others a lot less.

 

[laxu]

As a software developer, you often become blind to your own work and when users suggest something it can sometimes be a very obvious thing that makes you go "yeah, that makes perfect sense, why didn't we just do that?" Sometimes you also have to try one way before you realize that hey, this has issues A, B and C. It might not always be something that gets sorted in the design and prototyping phase either.

Sometimes the way users actually prefer to use your software is also totally opposite to how you thought they would want to use it. Or they don't understand the idea the way you implemented it.

Of course there are some user ideas that are just batshit crazy and not worth doing. Or some niche ones that make sense but are so down the "todo list" that they will never get prioritized over something else. Or some that are just not possible because of a technical reason, or hard to do without reworking a lot of other stuff.

I really hated the 1.0 version of Tonex but I feel the 1.1 they released is a big step in the right direction as it removes some of the "that made no sense" parts and clarifies some of the functionality. There's still a lot of crappy bits but if they keep that momentum maybe by summer they will have a pretty decent, maybe even good user experience.

 

[Sascha Franck]

It isn’t how most great things that I use in my film and music work happened.

Well, what I described above is true for almost all software worth its salt. They're all listening to their users and to the "word on the street". Sometimes more, sometimes less.
And fwiw, as you've mentioned Emagic, I've been a betatester for them until the buyout (had to get out because at that time I couldn't justify paying that amount of money for what was a really bad computer - they only got back on track with the switch from PPC to Intel) - and even if they're working in complete secrecy ever since, as the core team is still largely the same persons, I can assure you they're just the same. They love people loving what they come up with.

 

[Orvillain]

Not convinced. At all.

The greatest products emerge from renegade visions .. Amplitube has been on a path for decades, since I'm guessing it was someone in a bedroom coding, like the rest of these folks. Line 6 .. defining a public possibility that any of this was even viable .. Fractal .. the sheer force of one man's compulsion .. Kemper, another original fighting a perception that a great idea was zany .. these were not innovations resultant of committee. Definitely not open source culture.

If someone identifies a novel bug, and can send firmware and examples, that's helpful to software-based manufacturers .. but no .. what I read as inaccurate assessments of certain products and glaringly obvious suggestions for other ones—and lord the business advice for manufacturers of wildly successful products—my guess is that all the criticisms are rarely integral to a product's improvement. Maybe there are exceptions. If there's documented evidence of someone on a forum mapping out how something should be, and then the manufacturer responding Hey yeah, thanks we'll do that ... I haven't read it.

ToneX is on a path and my guess is they're at least a year ahead, probably more, of all the brilliant advice they're receiving here.

I'm looking forward to more clips of the thing being used the way it is, and video of ToneX being gigged in the wild .. that should be cool ..

Speaking as a software guy.... you're not wrong.

Also, most manufacturers are not going to respond to a few hundred customers making demands. Generally I would say you need to be in the thousands before they'll be willing to adjust all of their plans. Typically a company knows very well where their mistakes are, where the pain points are, and it really comes down to time and resources in order to address them. There are a lot of stakeholders behind the scenes who we often need to convince before we are allowed to sanction a particular feature or improvement.

Also, most users don't have the perspective required to know if something truly is an improvement; they can only see their little slice of the world, and so that would be another reason that you may never see the thing you want - because it's the wrong thing for the product, but you're too spoonfaced to see it.

FWIW, I'm the product owner for BFD Drums, and have many years of being told our stuff sucks balls. And a lot of the criticisms are correct, but a lot of them are just misguided nonsense posted by competitor fanbois (this happens more often than you'd think!). But the correct ones are in the melting pot for future products. We definitely do listen, but it's more of a sonar system. One fish aint gonna move the needle, especially when the needle is already being moved by someone with a vision of what they want to build.

 

[the-trooper]

Typically a company knows very well where their mistakes are,

In @IK Multimedia that may not be the case? I remember once upon a time I wanted to try something, don't even remember what, had to be some version of Amlitube, and the download page, or installs, or install managers, or what ever it was back then was such a complete and utter clusterf*uck that I just decided I wont even bother with it. There was so many versions, so many packs, so many variants and subvariants... Completely unclear what you have to download first, what to install, what to skip. Excel spreadsheet would honestly be better than what was on their site.
And it's not that I'm not computer savvy, I am (says he modestly), but I just didn't want to even spend my time on it.
Browsing over these threads in past couple of days, looks like things didn't get better, (if not worse).

I know this looks ridiculous to IK people, but installation is the very first step and the very first time you "touch" a piece of software. It has to be idiot proof with clear path all the way.

 

[Sascha Franck]

That's absolutely what my experiences are as well, @Orvillain (ok, as a mere betatester, but still).
Yet, there's also things happening on a certain smaller scale (which I'm sure you're aware of just as well) - such as some software functionality gone wrong. Like absurdly wrong.

Here's a real life example (I won't come up with any names because I actually happen to like the main guy involved): I was involved in testing a "keyboard instrument" plugin (no details, see above...). Thing didn't throw out enough volume, cranking the faders didn't help, you had to insert an additional boost pretty much all the time. Guy said "well, it's to avoid clipping" (uhm, yeah, well man, that's what faders are for, but hey...). Just that you couldn't make the thing clip. Had 64 voice max. polyphony so I took the loudest patch and slammed 64 notes at velocity 127 in. No clipping (channel fader at 0dB). It was only after this that the guy took care of it and added an output volume control with some extra dB on tap. Took him a mere 2 minutes, if at all (I mean, that's just the easiest thing ever).

Another one (again without names...): We had a neat little programmers meet testers event at some Musikmesse (back when it was still relevant). Some of us testing guys while chatting with one of the programmers: "Man, how long do we have to keep nagging you to adress XYZ?" He was all astonished, went to his laptop, spent some 5 minutes or so, called us to come over and said "You mean like that?" - and it was absolutely excellent (apart from a lacking UI solution, but apparently it didn't take much longer for the UI guy).

I've seen things like that soo often, it's almost beyond belief. And there's no stakeholders, no extra hardware cost or whatever involved. And often not even any noteworthy amount of development time.

 

[Sascha Franck]

back then was such a complete and utter clusterf*uck that I just decided I wont even bother with it.

That's exactly why I said that IK has a longstanding tradition when it comes to UI horror.
Register at website, download - no wait, downloads are now handled via CS. Uh-Oh, CS not updated, lemme do that. Open CS, where's my download? Oh, I have to redeem registered products. Ooopsie, not registered, need to do that first, by now through the updated registration manager. Wow, it downloads and installs! But it doesn't just install the T-Racks plugin I redeemed but the ENTIRE suite, clogging up my components folder and Logics plugin list (no way to get rid of that than manually taking action).
Or the 2GB worth of slow downloads (for Modo Drums CS or so), just to see the installer telling me my machine wasn't supported (lack of AVS instructions). Sure, couldn't have told me before.
Or the Syntronik event when, again caused by an update of whatever CS/ProductManager, the install of a new library "wiped" the old one as the updated installation tool couldn't remember the sample location (set by me in the previous version) and it wasn't possible to relocate things. Couldn't re-download the previously installed library anymore, either, as IK decided that your rights for library downloads would expire after 180 days.
And don't even get me started on the most intuitive interface ever, namely Sampletank - at least in previous versions it's been pure torture having to deal with it.

Note: The above isn't literally correct because I didn't write the exact order down. But it's largely representing the general user experience.

 

[mbenigni]

There was so many versions, so many packs, so many variants and subvariants... Completely unclear what you have to download first, what to install, what to skip.

I've been trying to select, install, and integrate SAP software packages for about a week now. If there's any silver lining, it's that after this, I could probably navigate IK's downloads - or nearly anything else - in my sleep.

 

[Orvillain]

I know this looks ridiculous to IK people, but installation is the very first step and the very first time you "touch" a piece of software. It has to be idiot proof with clear path all the way.

Agreed.

Ours is terrible too.

We're working on making it better.

 

[Mongillo19]

Mine just arrived hooking up to III effects loop as we speak

Just rolling through the stock presets (yeah I know people say they suck) I'm still happy with the tones you can get. It's very much plug and play which lines up with just about any other profiling/capture device I've owned. I'm planning on taking some used gear to GC and seeing if I can grab a used HX FX or stomp. This will absolutely be my travel rig.

For $300, this thing is hard to beat

 

[pipelineaudio]

Well, what I described above is true for almost all software worth its salt. They're all listening to their users and to the "word on the street". Sometimes more, sometimes less.

In any case where I have a choice, the last thing in the universe I would use is something where the end users have no input. Sounds like someone has been stuck on Steinberg, Universal Audio or Avid stuff or something,

I think those kinds of companies are far rarer than the ones who actually listen. I avoid them like the plague

 

[the-trooper]

Rabea Massaad?
Pete Thorn?
Riffs & Beards?
Paul Davids?
Rhett Shull?

Glenn Fricker is the only one I care about.

 

[FAKA!]

I wouldn't order a whole new system for this. My rig is pretty old (2017 i7 8700K, 32GB DDR4, GTX 1070Ti) and my Advanced capture took just over 20 minutes. One thing I noticed is that my system didn't really break a sweat on this, the GPU was at 5% and the CPU was 10%.

I created it with the IR baked in, I'm going to try some more tonight with just the amp.

I have a pretty unique setup, using an AXE III for the drives in front of the amp and all post effects from the AXE III after the amp. I had to use a separate digital interface to the computer, running in and out of the AXE.

I'm running the pedal into the AXE III.

I can have the real amp/reactive load, Kemper, AXE models and the TONEX Pedal all running though the AXE and switch via MIDI between any of them to compare. It's pretty cool.

The biggest issue I'm facing is EMI from the graphics card and USB ground loops. I have grounded all my USB connectors and it's much better but I need to move the computer farther away from my guitar.

Nah not building a new system for tonex, my rig is feeling old lately. i7 6700k 32g + 1080 gtx from 2015. If I thru a 3090 or 4090 into this system id be bottle necked by the motherboard by almost 50%... I finally ready to upgrade, thinking i9 13000k 64g ddr5 with a rtx 4090 should keep me happy for awhile.

Last I checked it took about 20 min to capture with the current rig, really curious just how fast it could possibly capture at. I know the 4090 is overkill but I plan to use it for local install of dreambooth/stable diffusion, video editing/rendering and gaming

I'm using a GTX 1060 and it is working. Your RTX should be fine @FAKA!

We shall see JT... we shall see... I've been eyeing out 4090s for months... at first I was disgusted at the prices.. but I been staring at them for so long now its starting to seem not too bad Thats how I justified all my amp purchases too btw

 

[FAKA!]

Does anyone know how to delete shared captures from Tone.net? I rushed out a handful of test captures when I first got Tonex, definitely nothing to write home about lol. In fact my butterslax captures was just a test to see if Tonex could capture super high gain (which it did but not really usable high gain) cause my Kemper would always shit the bed if I even thought about cranking the gain up when profiling

So I wouldn't mind taking a serious stab at capturing all my amps but would be great if I could remove my test captures.

 

[texhex]

Nah not building a new system for tonex, my rig is feeling old lately. i7 6700k 32g + 1080 gtx from 2015. If I thru a 3090 or 4090 into this system id be bottle necked by the motherboard by almost 50%... I finally ready to upgrade, thinking i9 13000k 64g ddr5 with a rtx 4090 should keep me happy for awhile.

Last I checked it took about 20 min to capture with the current rig, really curious just how fast it could possibly capture at. I know the 4090 is overkill but I plan to use it for local install of dreambooth/stable diffusion, video editing/rendering and gaming

We shall see JT... we shall see... I've been eyeing out 4090s for months... at first I was disgusted at the prices.. but I been staring at them for so long now its starting to seem not too bad Thats how I justified all my amp purchases too btw

$1600-$2000 for a GPU is rough dude, but it is a crazy nice card. I feel like once they started easily charging above $1000 during the chip shortage and all the crypto mining insanity, it normalized those crazy prices for people over time. No way I would pay that much for a GPU, but it's what they are getting right now.

 

[texhex]

Does anyone know how to delete shared captures from Tone.net? I rushed out a handful of test captures when I first got Tonex, definitely nothing to write home about lol. In fact my butterslax captures was just a test to see if Tonex could capture super high gain (which it did but not really usable high gain) cause my Kemper would always s**t the bed if I even thought about cranking the gain up when profiling

So I wouldn't mind taking a serious stab at capturing all my amps but would be great if I could remove my test captures.

IK Multimedia • Is there any way to REMOVE an uploaded preset from ToneNET?

 

[laxu]

Nah not building a new system for tonex, my rig is feeling old lately. i7 6700k 32g + 1080 gtx from 2015. If I thru a 3090 or 4090 into this system id be bottle necked by the motherboard by almost 50%... I finally ready to upgrade, thinking i9 13000k 64g ddr5 with a rtx 4090 should keep me happy for awhile.

Last I checked it took about 20 min to capture with the current rig, really curious just how fast it could possibly capture at. I know the 4090 is overkill but I plan to use it for local install of dreambooth/stable diffusion, video editing/rendering and gaming

We shall see JT... we shall see... I've been eyeing out 4090s for months... at first I was disgusted at the prices.. but I been staring at them for so long now its starting to seem not too bad Thats how I justified all my amp purchases too btw

I could only find a few posts regarding higher end Nvidia GPUs on TGP, but there seems like the training process might have issues utilizing GPU properly. There were people with high end CPUs/GPUs, one with a 4090 and and one with a 3080 that still received at best something like 16 minutes for advanced training.

One person marked that turning off "Hardware-accelerated GPU scheduling" from Windows Graphics settings sped up the training process. This feature needs to be enabled to utilize e.g DLSS frame generation in games though.

I actually have a 13600K + 4090 + 32 GB DDR5 system I built last year. It's even a small form factor in a Cooler Master NR200P case. It's a freakin' beast for gaming to the point that I'm now thinking that I want a 4K 240 Hz display as it easily maxes out my 4K 144 Hz one...

Unfortunately I don't have anything but the free Tonex version and don't really care to spend money on it at this time so I can't test the capture process. I actually wish @IK Multimedia made it available in the free version but limited to something like 5-10 successful captures so people with real amps and loadboxes could try it out and get at least a few successful results if they need to finagle with levels etc.

 

[Sascha Franck]

Wondering whether elaborated Tonex libraries will become more expensive than those for, say, the KPA. I mean, it'll take a *lot* longer to shoot those captures and you'll either kinda clog up your machine or need a dedicated one.