Your Opinion On Amp Sims

What's your opinion?

  • I use amp sims all the time, whether its serious or not

    Votes: 39 54.9%

  • Amp sims sound really fake, gotta mic a real amp

    Votes: 13 18.3%

  • I use amp sims just for fun or messing around, but not for anything serious

    Votes: 14 19.7%

  • I use V-amp/Pocket POD kinda things

    Votes: 5 7.0%
  • Total voters
    71
kcearl said:
i I like the sound of (modelers)...if it sounds good to your ears then fine
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and ultimately that's all that matters.
Amps .... modelers ...... types of guitars ...... none of it matters without the music and they all serve the music.
Artists use many different things to achieve what they want ....... if it works then it's great.
 
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fuzzsniffvoyage said:
I've messed with amp sims. The ones I've used sounded like shit. But it might be operator error.
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yup. i had a really hard time with them at first, and still rarely use them except when i'm in a bind. but, they can sound really good if you work with them. i just find them to be like EZDrummer...it takes less time to record the real thing than to mess with the fakes...but if the fakes are all you have they can sound great.

you ask for opinions...you get opinions.
 
99% of the time i normally capture an amp with a mic and a DI before the amp, purely so i have a safety net if i mess up. probably 90% of the time the mic is absolutely fine, but on those occasions where is wasn't (and those are normally the sessions where you're so rushed you don't spend the time properly setting up the amp/mic :face palm: ) then i've got the DI to either reamp with a real amp or bung it through a modeller. 10 years ago when i first tried one of the line 6 kidney pods i hated it with a passion. now, modelling has got so good that, as people have said, in the right hands you can get some awesome tones out of modelled amps. as software Amplitube free is super comprehensive and even logic 9's new amp sim thing is more than usable, and as rack gear we have the Line 6 pod xt's at work in the rehearsal rooms and, although people grumble the very first time they see them, no one complains after actually using them.

oh, and i take the same approach with bass, although i do use the DI signal quite often. it does seem though that a lot of the guys i work with have great basses but shoddy amps.
 
"Man, i hate the Eagles". "Get out of my cab!"-The Big Lebowski.

Joe Walsh was Joe Walsh way before he joined The Eagles, so yes, the hippie salesman was a moron. And you are a moron if you don't respect who Joe is, and how influential his sound has been to rock over the years. You can't reinvent the wheel, no matter how young you are. How many songs on the radio do You have?

Reminds me now why I never was a music store salesman. You'd think I'd be good, I know guitars, I know drums, I know P.A.'s. "Over here, This is what you need". Of course it wasn't, it was what I could make a decent commission from.
Every time I went into a shop, I had to find a manager to actually haggle with. But I went enough, and spent enough, that the manager would be happy to see me. I could just browse and teach the sales staff a thing or two about gear. That was always fun.
 
walt8 said:
"Man, i hate the Eagles". "Get out of my cab!"-The Big Lebowski.

Joe Walsh was Joe Walsh way before he joined The Eagles, so yes, the hippie salesman was a moron. And you are a moron if you don't respect who Joe is, and how influential his sound has been to rock over the years. You can't reinvent the wheel, no matter how young you are. How many songs on the radio do You have?
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I suspect you're talking to me?

I don't respect Joe Walsh at all. Why should I? I don't listen to anything he's done. His music is boring classic rock pap to me. If that makes me a moron, so be it. I'll be a moron that doesn't listen to cheesy shit 70's radio crap.

How many songs on the radio do I have? None. How many do you have? I'm gonna bet none as well. That's a horribly weak point to make anyway. I can't have an opinion without being on the radio? Then neither can you. Besides, radio is shit. Justin Bieber gets played all over the radio. So does Miley Cyrus. Since when does radio play = good?
 
Don't go getting all philosophical, mky?

I use an amp sim, and I find that it is a highly personal
choice; they ain't for everybody.
 
Hey OP: I have heard some pretty convincing amp simulators (so I'm told they were) through my shitty computer monitors when listening to online compressed computer files. I think it has been said already while skimming through here and I'll reiterate: your playing and song and music is generally what your target audience is going to hear the most. Only audiophiles with setups way better than my little analog chain are going to dispute you if you get it sounding good. But personally, I like the analog way because it works and feels best to me. But I could rock some guitar for you through a Pod and make it sound good just as easily as through my amps.
 
Why not just get a Vox AD15 and have it both ways.......it's basically an amp sim box with a small single-tube amp and speaker built in. How many PODs come with their own amp and speaker? And it's probably cheaper than a lot of those PODs too.

On the other hand, it's fun messing aroudn with a Zoom G2.
 
I think it comes down to how people use an amp sim verses anything else. What I like about using them is I can tweak a guitar sound to my heart's content in the mix. Although it's tricky in a home studio without a control room to position a mic on an amp just right, sometimes just going thru a boat load of amp sim presets can be a bit of a drag too.
 
If it hasn't been mentioned, I think the Young bros. of AC/DC recorded some tracks using AxeFX (I think this was the one alleged) on the last album. Also, everyone seems to be raving about the Kemper modeling amp, but having an amp kind of defeats the purpose of plugin sims, I guess.
 
[kindly skipping the thread]

My personal experience with amp sims are on my Digitech RP150. I use it quite a bit, since it's extremely easy for PC recording. I've been using it for years and I've never had a single issue with sound quality, driver/software support, recording and the like. So, I love this thing.

With that said, the RP150 (and many other RP models) include a bunch of amp/cab sims. I actually have never assembled a tone with a certain desired amp in mind... every tone I've made was simply the result of tons of tweaking to make a tone that sounds good to me. What I mean is that I develop a tone using the Rectifier amp sim with a Bassman 4x12 cab sim (just an example). I did that because it had a tone range that sounded like what I was targeting; I didn't say to myself "I think I want a Rectifier tone".

So what I'm saying is that as far as going for accurate replications of these amps using the sims, I don't really have an opinion, since I don't really use it in that fashion. I just develop specific tones for what I need in parts of my music, regardless of which amp/cab sim it takes.

(hope this makes sense, lol)

EDIT: I used the Digitech RP150 entirely on my Algarothsyum album (see my signature below). I recorded all guitars and bass tracks with it. I also used it on the Algarothsyum 5-track demo as well... I even recorded V-drums through the Digitech. So with the results and service I've gotten with my processor, I'm VERY satisfied. For the new material I'm recording now, I still use the Digitech, although I'm using it purely as a recording interface. I record with my Line 6 Spider II, direct output now. So the Digitech still serves me well, especially for other effects.
 
The convenience, utility and versatility of sims (hardware and software) is just unmatchable. The learning curves for getting them there can be a nightmare. To me, the real advantage of an amp is that it's universally repairable hardware---unlike a hardware/software sim/model which will be, after a time, left unsupported by the manufacturer or unrepairable because of proprietary or Surface-Mount electronics. This forces you back into the learning-curve and tweaking cycle.

BTW, I use a POD for every gig.

Paj
8^)
 
Paj said:
The convenience, utility and versatility of sims (hardware and software) is just unmatchable. The learning curves for getting them there can be a nightmare. To me, the real advantage of an amp is that it's universally repairable hardware---unlike a hardware/software sim/model which will be, after a time, left unsupported by the manufacturer or unrepairable because of proprietary or Surface-Mount electronics. This forces you back into the learning-curve and tweaking cycle.

BTW, I use a POD for every gig.

Paj
8^)
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I have a POD ....... use it sometimes but it's really horrible sounding ..... I actually much prefer the Behringer VAmp2.
But the POD , regardless of your feelings about it, doesn't even approach the quality of sound the current crop of modelers produce.

No comparison at all between a POD and say, a Fractal unit.
 
Lt. Bob said:
I have a POD ....... use it sometimes but it's really horrible sounding ..... I actually much prefer the Behringer VAmp2.
But the POD , regardless of your feelings about it, doesn't even approach the quality of sound the current crop of modelers produce.

No comparison at all between a POD and say, a Fractal unit.
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I'm fond of my POD, maybe because it's so much better than my Digitech pedal.
 
The newest pod HD is actually pretty decent. Miles better than the old podfarm stuff to my ears.

The problem I have with it is that I still find a lot of software to mop the floor with it, and the cab emulation is still sub par.
 
Guitargodgt said:
The newest pod HD is actually pretty decent. Miles better than the old podfarm stuff to my ears.

The problem I have with it is that I still find a lot of software to mop the floor with it, and the cab emulation is still sub par.
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Yeah, this modeling software is really developing fast now. Even a year from now everything will be better than what's out there right now.
 
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