The first one is a stratocaster in position 4 going through the built in DI of an Mbox 3 Pro. No Pad. Gain all the way down. The second is the same going into a BAE 312a Mic Pre/DI. No pad. Gain all the way down. Then being fed into the "Line In" (rear panel via 1/4' TRS) of an Mbox 3 Pro.
The examples consist of a simple strumming pattern followed by a single note line. This is the raw DI signal. No amp emulation, EQ, or compression. I ran both of these through a Waves L2 to boost the signal a little but that is all.
I tried to play exactly the same on both examples. Either way I'm sure you'll be able to hear the difference between the two. Although I would consider this quite the difference in sound quality, to the ones that don't agree, imagine all your instruments and vocals going through quality hardware before it hits your DAW. Record an entire song with cheap gear and then record the same song with high end gear, everything else equal, you're going to end up with two completely different sounding pieces.
Hope this helps
Now to get some money to upgrade my converters.