Can you tell the difference between real valve amps and the same amps profiled

[kimball492]

I've used a Kemper they are great but mine took ages too boot up. I believe they've updated the firmware
now and it's supposedly a lot better. Chappers and the Captain can they tell the difference. The second part is a much more accurate test.
https://youtu.be/ArYxQGBemfA
https://youtu.be/INJ_H5PiuTE

[Dedman]

I thought the Capt was gonna cry in the first one. It's pretty dam impressive.

A couple of months ago I asked a mate who runs 12th and Vine mastering and who's ear I trust, about what valve amp to buy and he responded with "Don't, they aren't worth the expense hassle." I've spit the difference with valves on the pre-amps in both my amps and Solid state after. Even Vox's Tone room software is pretty dam good at re-creating tones, only prob is you can only save a couple to the amp, otherwise you need to connected to the PC

[kimball492]

Hi Dedman, Yeah the Capt couldn't believe the result. Hence him having to do take two. Plus as I think he said Andertons have a Million pounds worth of valve amps to sell so a lot to lose. The Kemper is $2799.00 so not a cheap piece of gear. It's time consuming profiling an amp, and to do it properly and match it takes a while to do, approx an hour with setup. But loads of available Amps to download.The new firmware is so much better now and has made the Kemper very usable in live setting. I personally think that the Positives Bias amp is newer technology and sounds better. but will see as the software / firmware develops.The other bonus is it's about $1000 cheaper than the kemper amp. The Bias Head currently cost's approx Aus $1750.00.

[Simon Barden]

The Bias head is cheaper but it lacks the built-in FX options of the Kemper. So for an all-in-one package, providing you aren't going to be using a lot of effects the Kemper wins over the Bias head, despite the extra cost.

The Kemper is certainly good, but in the Andertons videos they didn't really do a proper A/B test as they failed to get the sound levels the same, and the human ear will always perceive 'louder' as better (up to the pain threshold anyway). You can hear that the Kemper is modelled, but you need to be listening to the right things. It's very close though, and some of my pro friends have them in their studios and like them a lot. Plus, there have been a lot of software updates for the Kemper, so they may have improved the profiling/modelling since those videos were recorded.

I have yet to hear the Bias head in the flesh, but it looks good in theory, and has more software options to play about with.

One thing to keep in mind is that if you have a guitar with very powerful pickups, then there is a danger of overloading the A/D stage of any of the digital modelling amps if they don't provide enough physical signal attenuation (no use attenuating the digital signal level as the clipping has already occurred). The Kemper had just enough input attenuation (I think it was something like -12dB though it's not mentioned in their standard user documentation) to allow my friend Max's Kent Armstrong M-bucker Double Cool pickup equipped Ibanez to play without digital clipping, though it would probably have clipped with the Double Hot version he has on some of his guitars.

So if you have got any of the really hot pickups fitted to your guitar (I'm talking about a lot more than a warm PAF style humbucker), don't assume that they will be OK to use with all digital modellers. If there isn't any visual input overload clip detection (there is on the Kemper), then the best you can do is select a clean patch and see if you get any nasty clipping sounds when playing a loud chord, whilst adjusting any input level setting knob or software parameter. It won't sound nice if it does clip.

[kimball492]

Hi Simon the reason the Bias doesn't have effects. Is it has a connection via Bluetooth to connect you to an Ipad so you can use the Bias effects unit for Editing storing patches and any effects combination you want. Pretty handy

[Simon Barden]

I need to read up on this a bit more it seems. I'm not interested myself in getting one myself, so I think I must have skipped bits when reading the review. Any indication if the remote Bluetooth FXs add noticeable latency?

[gavinturner]

Very impressive comparison.

cheers,
Gav.

[Dedman]

One Youtube reviewer has questioned the legality of actually sampling an amps profile and then selling that sample as people are doing with Kemper profiles. Evidently quite a few top end amp manufacturers in Europe (where any item bought on line can be returned in 30 days) are selling lots of top end amps only to get them back after a few weeks, and the profile going up for sale in forums. It's a whole new bag of worms.

[Simon Barden]

The right to cancel/return remotely purchased goods in Europe starts from the moment the contract/order is made and ends 14 days after those goods are received (which is why anything of value is sent via courier requiring a signature).

It's unlikely anyone can really do anything about it. How would you differentiate the act of recording a guitar amp and putting that on a track, to recording it and running it through a profiler? Unless you ban any form of profiling (which would ruin a lot of recording software developers), it becomes really tricky to differentiate between the two acts.

Samplers and sampling have been with us now since the Fairlight in 1971 (or arguably the Melotron in 1963), so there's an awful lot of precedent for them, and all profiling is doing is capturing impulse responses played through the amp. There's no duplication of amp circuitry, so no copyright or IP infringement there (and I doubt there's any part of a tube guitar amplifier's circuitry that isn't borrowed from other older designs).

The only way that there could be any real comeback would be if the retailer could prove that the purchaser used a particular amp to profile for profit, as (referring to the European distance selling regs) you are still only supposed to have as long to try the goods before returning them as you would have trying them out in a shop. So if a retailer could prove that a particular amp was used for profiling purposes, then they could refuse to return the purchase price. But once the amp and the money had been returned, it would be a much greater legal exercise to reclaim the money and make them purchase the amp.

So, you either stop selling high-end amps over the internet (and I'm sure the internet-only outlets wouldn't do that), or you'd have to build in to the amp's output some kind of audio watermark unique to that amp, that was invisible in normal use but showed up when profiled. Probably a) impossible and b) far too expensive to implement.

[kimball492]

No latency Simon. There's a guy on you tube fx iPad connected via Bluetoothgiving a demo live . You can also control amps front panel from iPad . If I find demo I'll link it.