All profiles lost bottom end, sound a little nasal and brittle *SOLVED*

  • Just recently, my Kemper sounds different. I recently did a gig where I borrowed a friend's Kemper for another guitarist in the band to use. I did a backup on mine and a restore on his to duplicate the two Kempers so all of our tones would match perfectly. Any changes made on one would be backed up and restored on the other.


    All went well through the gig. When I got my Kemper back home, playing it through the same cabinet with the same guitar, all of the profiles sounded a little bit thinner with a bit more edge. Enough so as to make the amp not a pleasure to play through anymore. I've rebooted. I've done a system update from 5.3 to 5.1.0. I've done a restore back to a date before I started copying back and forth with the other Kemper. I've gotten the other Kemper back and A/B'd it with mine and there is definitely a difference. The other one sounds beefy like mine used to. I've even done another backup on the other one and restore to mine.


    I've gone through all the pages in the Output section and compared them both. All settings are identical. I've done the same in the System section and all setting are identical.

  • Please post your findings, if you figure this out. Love my Kemper, but this is probably the most frustrating thing that I struggle with, and I'm not sure why. Just when I think that I have my KPA sounding perfect, it goes and gets thin and weird sounding on me at the next gig.


    One thing that I'm looking into though, is my Behringer FCB1010 midi foot controller. I have found that it has a tendency to send out controller data on occasion, which can change the tone of my KPA. Most of my performances have a wah pedal in one of the slots, and that wah is usually set to (Bypass&stop). I think that's what its called. It's the setting that allows you to activate the wah slot, just by moving the pedal, then it deactivates, when you stop moving the pedal. On a few gigs, I've been playing, and all of the sudden, out of nowhere, the tone gets weird, like the wah engaged. If I physically move the wah pedal a couple times, the tone goes back to normal. Still investigating this one.

  • That was the first thing I thought. Because I've had times when a profile sounded thin and lifeless only to discover I had an expression pedal set up as a Volume before amp stack and it was all the way toe down. So I just disconnected my Floorboard altogether. It's removed from the equation.


    This is a different sound though. It's edgy. It's almost as if I were running a profile with no cab sim into an FRFR. But I'm running the profile out of the powered output into my best sounding 4x12.


    It has to be a hardware thing because I have another Kemper right next to it that has been restored from a backup made by the bad sounding Kemper. It sounds great. The only difference in the two setups when I A/B them is the speaker cable and they are both high quality.

  • @W_Walker do you use any of the cabinet parameters at all , if so, what are the values?


    I ask because I use to use the character knob all the way maxed out and if I was running into a 4x12 cab ,even with monitor cab off, I would still get a similar affect to what @W_Walker is saying. Same thing goes for high shift and low shift.


    Also, check out my recent thread about the helix and kemper in 4cm. It could very well just be a tech anomaly. That being the case it might as they say 'come correct' after a new steady firmware is released?

  • Yep, i could not tell if you had already done that, even Mick from TMS profiles had the same issue, all was cured after a global factory reset (so it was a software problem). I am reading right from the OP that you did not re install the software right??


    Ash

    Have a beer and don't sneer. -CJ. Two non powered Kempers -Two mission stereo FRFR Cabs - Ditto X4 -TC electronic Mimiq.

  • Thanks for all the great suggestions, guys.


    @Monkey_Man, the behavior didn't go away and come back. I've had it since I got the rig home from my last gig.


    @Awesome_Elvis, I'll check out those parameters and let you know what I find. I'll change them if they are maxed. Would love to read your thread but I don't know what "4cm" is. Sorry. I'm a nube.


    @Finally, @ashtweth, @mikeb, thanks for your input. Looks like a global reset is in my near future.


    @Dean_R, Good call. I did open a ticket with Kemper support. My OP is a copy and paste from my email to them. I started this thread assuming that support from them would be slow, like every other company on the planet. Not so with Kemper. Woke up this morning to a reply that pretty much goes through all the suggestions here plus further steps to take if the global reset doesn't work. There are a couple of other trouble shooting steps they want me to take like checking the tone from all outputs, not just the powered out. Here is their email to me:



    Dear Wendell Walker,


    thank you for your email. It is very unlikely that the fact that you created a backup on your Profiler has changed the sound of it. That was probably just a coincidence.
    Are you experiencing the difference in sound through all outputs including the headphones?
    If so please try the following:



    1. First consider to create a backup as this process will delete all user data and reset all settings.
    2. Upgrade to the current Profiler operating system release software.
    3. Press and hold Soft button 1 (next to the TYPE knob above the display) while powering on into Tuner Mode
    4. Keep holding the button until "System Maintenance " appears.
    5. In Maintenance Mode press "Recovery" followed by "Init&Factory Content", "Yes" and "Ok".
    6. Then press the Exit button and reboot or simply restart the Profiler via Chicken-Head knob.
    The Profiler will now start like a brandnew device under current software and will ask for your confirmation of date, time and Owner Name entry.


    If the issue persists after the reset please record a take from the main outs using one of the unaltered factory rigs and also record a track from the direct out at the same time. Send me both recordings and let me know which rig you used. I will then reamp the DI track using the exact same rig for comparison.


    Sincerely,
    Hans-Jörg Scheffler
    Kemper Amps Support Team



    I tell ya, these guys are fast with the response. I love it. Even a bigger Kemper fan now. :)


    I'll post my progress here.

  • Yeah, one's relationship with a Kemper can be like an ideal marriage - one loves one's partner (Kemper) more every day.


    @Monkey_Man, the behavior didn't go away and come back. I've had it since I got the rig home from my last gig.

    Ahh... when you said, "When I got my Kemper back home, playing it through the same cabinet with the same guitar, all of the profiles sounded a little bit thinner with a bit more edge", I got the impression the behaviour had changed.


    Thank you for clarifying, Wendell.

  • Yeah, one's relationship with a Kemper can be like an ideal marriage - one loves one's partner (Kemper) more every day.


    Ahh... when you said, "When I got my Kemper back home, playing it through the same cabinet with the same guitar, all of the profiles sounded a little bit thinner with a bit more edge", I got the impression the behaviour had changed.
    Thank you for clarifying, Wendell.

    It did change, from the way it sounded at the last gig (f'n awesome) to the way it sounded when I got it "home" (my shop where it usually lives). It never wavered on the gig. And I've never gotten it to sound great since setting it back up here.


    As far as my relationship with my Kemper, it actually sounds like lunacy coming out of my own mouth when I say it, but I actually think it's better than traditional amps, and I'm a bit of a tube snob. My other big amp is the Bogner Ecstasy. I'm super serious about tone. My favorite profile is the one that I made of that amp and when I play it through the Kemper, sometimes I sort of forget that I'm not actually playing my Bogner. Times when I'm reminded that I'm not are like when I look back and see a bunch of lights I'm not used to seeing or when I need to add a stomp box effect or something I would traditionally put in the effects loop, and it's so much quicker and easier to do with the Kemper. And no patch cables to fail. The thing is a godsend. So my relationship with it is actually like I'm cheating on my marriage to my Bogner (and tubes in general) and more like I want to get another KPA so I can have an extramarital ménage à Kemp.


    Sick. I know.

  • As far as my relationship with my Kemper, it actually sounds like lunacy coming out of my own mouth when I say it, but I actually think it's better than traditional amps, and I'm a bit of a tube snob. My other big amp is the Bogner Ecstasy. I'm super serious about tone. My favorite profile is the one that I made of that amp and when I play it through the Kemper, sometimes I sort of forget that I'm not actually playing my Bogner. Times when I'm reminded that I'm not are like when I look back and see a bunch of lights I'm not used to seeing or when I need to add a stomp box effect or something I would traditionally put in the effects loop, and it's so much quicker and easier to do with the Kemper. And no patch cables to fail. The thing is a godsend. So my relationship with it is actually like I'm cheating on my marriage to my Bogner (and tubes in general) and more like I want to get another KPA so I can have an extramarital ménage à Kemp.


    Sick. I know.

    Not at all, Wendell!


    Great story man; thank you for sharing it.

  • @Awesome_Elvis, I'll check out those parameters and let you know what I find. I'll change them if they are maxed. Would love to read your thread but I don't know what "4cm" is. Sorry. I'm a nube.

    no worries! 4cm is 4 cable method. It basically means using a multi fx unit that has an effects loop that you would use with your bogner amp or Kemper in a way the makes it so your before preamp effects first , and your time based and modulation effects, after, in the amp or Kempers fx loop post preamp stack.


    Weird thing happening with helix and kpa...

  • no worries! 4cm is 4 cable method. It basically means using a multi fx unit that has an effects loop that you would use with your bogner amp or Kemper in a way the makes it so your before preamp effects first , and your time based and modulation effects, after, in the amp or Kempers fx loop post preamp stack.
    Weird thing happening with helix and kpa...

    Ah. Been doing the 4cm since I think way back to the Roland GP8. Just didn't recognize that shorthand for it. Until recently, I was using an M13 that way with my Ecstasy. Since I got the Kemper, I sold that M13. Still liked it, just figured I might as well get rid of it before it depreciated any further. Now when I run my Bogner, I just use a traditional pedal board with all the basic needs including 4 gain stages. :)


    Good times.