Testing profiles...(my 2 cents...)

This is my approach to getting "great" sounds.

I used to roam around all the 5150/recto/marshall/... profiles on RM, listening to them om my KRK studio speakers. Like many of you i don't like a most of them.
I bought some commercial packs wich sounded a lot better.
Then i used only the commercial cab profile with the free amp profiles............sounded good to me.

Then it hit me...... Like in real life, cabs sound very different and miking a cab is a real magical and difficult proces with various end results.

I now see a total profile as two separate profiles, the amp profile and the cab/mike profile.

I deleted every profile (900+) on the Kemper.
Started Rig Manager.
Made seperate folders for every amp I wanted to explore.
In RM, for exampIe I saved the newest 5150 profiles from different users and put them in the 5150 folder. Did the same with other amps.

Here it comes.... I wanted to test the amp part of those profiles, not the cab/mike part!!
So I killed the studio speakers and connected my power amp & Mesa Rectocab.
Then, in RM, I went thru all the downloaded profiles keeping only my most favorite. Without the cab/mike part of the profile, the amp profiles really are very similar. I saved some profiles wich sounded great thru the real cab but sounded horrible thru the studio speakers. Adding my favorite cab profile (commercial pack) made the same amp profile sound great again!

It took me a whole day going thru the hundreds of profiles but i'm now back to about 90 profiles (total of 20 different amps) wich are on the laptop on RM, not the Kemper.

Tomorrow I will take the Kemper + laptop to the rehearsal room for more testing/deleting of the current 90 profiles at high volume. I hope to be ending up with only 10 amps and 3 profiles per amp.

I hope more Kemper users will test the free profiles on RE this way cause there are a lot of really great amp profiles wich are covered up by bad cab/mike profiles.
So the idea is to test only the amp profile, not the cab profile. And add an excellent and separate cab profile later.

Cheers,
Tom

Quote from PETERFR

Good idea!
Edit: you know you can lock the cabinet?

Really?
That would save a lot of time if I wanna have another as my go-to-cabprofile.

Quote from warlus1

And what is your favorite cab(s)?

It's Till's Cablab 017.
Cablab has loads of cabs with each a different flavor.
(If you don't wanna spend a lot of money on profiles, then buy Cablab and enjoy the amp-part of the free profiles)

When I start testing the amp profiles (on power amp ) I eq because there are frequencies that bury the essential tones of an amp/cab. I hipass at around 100 hrz, this clears up a lot. Lowpass at 6000 hrz to get rid of some fizz without muffling the sound. Than it will sound boxy and nasal. Take around 300 hrz, normal q-factor and dip this lowmid by 7 or 8 db, after this it will sound heavy but still open, more expensive. And you will have lots more space for other instruments in the overal sound, guitars and other instruments will be easy mixing in.

I now have the Monitor Out EQ neutral, and the EQ on the Main Out Bass -2.3, Middle +0.5, Treble - 0.6, Presence -1.3 (reverse smiley). But my monitors are KRK RP8 with don't have a lot of Mid. Later today I will try it on a small PA system, see how the EQ on the Main Out will change.

But all this are my 2 cents, this works for me as e metal guy .

Ps.
I went to see the Poodles in Osnabruck last weekend (one of my wife's favorite).
Guitarist playing a Gibby and Marshall JVM410H on Marshall 4x12. He had problems with the miked speaker, so during the show they flipped the mike over to another speaker. Although the show was great, the guitar sound stayed very muffled and the low-end palmmute peaks were pushing other instruments away at some point. If only more people were into the Kemper thingy.

Quote from hal2000

Good idea. But i will wait for your experience with the PA. I own the Kemper since some month
and i'm still fiddling around with the sound results between real amp and real cab and Kemper
with earphones, with studio speakers, PA-speakers and FRFR's. It is a never ending story which i still have not
understand in detail...

Yesterday and today I went to the rehearsal room.
Connected the Monitor Out (EQ neutral) to the Return of a 5150 (+Marshall V30 4x12).
Connected the Main Out (EQ neutral) to a mix desk (EQ neutral) > PA amp > EV TX1152 speaker.

Yesterday I spend most of the time going thru all the profiles with Till's Cablab 017 as my main cab profile.
Today was going back and forth between 5150 and PA. And both on high and low volume.

At higher volume I found the PA better sounding, more clear and more tone. If I decreased the bass on the Kemper the PA was still a full tone while the 5150 stack lacked body, specially on high volume.
I spend a lot of time trying different eq settings on the Kemper (keeping the eq of Main/Monitor Out neutral). Adjusting the EQ had the most effect on the PA, but that's because the Marshall cabinet not being frequency neutral. I kept on eq-ing and got irritated sometimes that some eq-adjustments (on the Kemper) that were brilliant on the PA, did almost nothing or didn't have the same effect on the 5150 stack. I tried the EQ on the Monitor Out, adding mids to get a better tone. Didn't work.

I spend the last hour only on the PA because it just sounded so good.
Tried the other cabs in Till's Cablab. There are all kinds of flavors , I still have 017 as my main cab. It has all the frequencies very well balanced, so it's very easy to eq on the mix desk. I also like 031 a lot, it's much brighter but the high frequencies are also balanced.

Pure Cabinet.
I liked the sounds with Pure Cabinet (5.0), but also without. With PC the sound gets a bit more direct, so I see PC more like a Direct on/off button.

Back at home I wondered if my PA settings would sound the same on my KRK RP8 studio speakers. I had to adjust the bass (on the Main Out EQ) minus 3 (!!) to get the same sound. Reasons may be; the PA speakers need more bass, the KRK's are bass heavy, my room needs bass traps/ bad acoustics.

@ hal2000.
For me, if I had to buy some amplification for the Kemper and I could only choose between a real poweramp+cabs and a PA system, I would defenitely go the PA way. Two days earlier I would have said " go tubes", today I say " go the non-tubes way".

Amps still in the Kemper after testing/deleting:

Bogner Uberschal from Chris O
Engl Savage from Sinmix
Engl Savage from JEVO
Fryette Pittbull from RiffEm
Marshall JVM from Sinmix
Mesa MK2C+ from Djemass
Mesa MK3 from Thumas
Mesa Recto from R U Sirius (2x)
Mesa Recto from Sinmix (absolute favorite!!!)
5150 from Sinmix
Randall V2 from Sinmix.

I deleted a lot of other amps that were not different enough to take up space.
So this is my to-go list. Keep in mind I'm a narrow-minded metalhead with own preferences, but I do like a thick, fat but clear tone.

Cheers, Tom

Quote from hal2000

i'm still fiddling around with the sound results between real amp and real cab and Kemper
with earphones, with studio speakers, PA-speakers and FRFR's. It is a never ending story which i still have not
understand in detail...

I'm also confused about the differences between PA and FRFR.