• Hey all- I've been a long time lurker. I'm finally making the jump to Kemper and I have a question.


    I'll be using the unit in the studio and live. Live, I'll be using the remote along with a Strymon Big Sky, Timeline in the FX Loop and probably the mission pedal for volume. Does anyone have any pedal board recommendations to lay this all out on that isn't too big? Currently I have the old Pedaltrain classic (32)? It's huge.


    Any help would be awesome!

  • I don't know if this is a specific solution but perhaps the concept that might be of use...


    In the days leading up to the Kemper I had a Vox combo and because the Vette has very limited storage space, my full sized Pedaltrain wouldn't fit with guitars and everything else added. (I now have a toaster and DXR-10 so that cat is sufficiently skinned).


    What I ended up doing was getting two Pedaltrain Nano + boards. In the soft case, it's not much bigger than a loaf of bread. I put my Voodoo Labs power, wireless and a pedal or two on one. The second was all pedals. I left the power cables plugged into the Voodo. To set up, I just laid them out one in front of the other, plugged the power cables into the pedals, and had a very small and concise pedal board that took little load space and could even be stuffed into two smaller spaces.


    I love the Pedaltrain stuff. If none of their standard options fit the bill for you, maybe this modular approach would work. It's an extra step or two during setup but really only adds one or two minutes.


    Of course, you might also want to try the new reverb beta and see if you still feel the need for the Big Sky and Timeline. That's another way to skin the cat.

    Kemper remote -> Powered toaster -> Yamaha DXR-10

  • Thanks for the feedback- I'd like to get everything on one board if possible, but with that said- maybe a board that will fit the remote and expression pedal, and then a nano with just the two Strymon units and their power would be the way to go. The addition of these two pedals will let me have full parameter adjustment on the fly etc and make it more immerse than just switching amps/patches.

  • The Pedaltrain Metro 20 is probably the smallest you could get away with. Most people don't like to put the expression pedal on the board, it makes it taller and adds a weird angle. To each their own. Here's some pics of a Metro 20, with the KPA and Mission, for your reference:


    [Blocked Image: https://i.imgur.com/iJfENZj.jpg?1]


    [Blocked Image: https://i.imgur.com/Pv9y9Bl.jpg?1]


    [Blocked Image: https://i.imgur.com/Yv5XsBH.jpg]


    [Blocked Image: https://i.imgur.com/h5LcjWT.jpg]

    Kemper Powerhead w/remote & Kabinet
    Focusrite 18i8 (2nd Gen) - Windows 10 - Ableton Live - Yamaha HS-8's - DT770 80 ohms

  • Thank you!

  • All I can add to this is that you might not even need the pedal board. I have a Stymon Mobius and a Timeline as well as Cali76 compressor, Digitech Whammy DT etc all controlled through an RJM Mastermind PBC. Since I got the KPA I haven't felt the need to even opend the lid on my pedal board let alone plug it in. Now the new reverbs are out (at least in Beta) the BikSky might also become unnecessary for most people.


    As for the Expression pedal I would advise against the Mission for volume. This limited travel makes it brilliant for use as a Wah but also makes it VERY tricky to use accurately for Volume or many Morphing applications.

  • It try to never sell gear unless I REALLY need to (i.e. the wife finds out). You never know when it might come in handy again somewhere down the road.

    I lived by that philosophy for most of my life. As there's currently no wife, I don't have to get things approved by the purchasing department, which of course leads to even more gear. Buying the Kemper really just set off a chain of events I'd been thinking about for quite some time.


    Lots of amps lying around, many of which rarely got used (one of the things I sold was a Lab Series L5 that I bought in 80 and probably haven't played since 83). Some of the stuff that did get used, a Marshall and a Fender in particular, were 20 years old, had been in the shop a time or two and hadn't been quite right for many years. Probably leaky caps or whatever other indignities come with age. There was also studio gear of a similar nature, like a pair of NS-10s that had been on a shelf for over a decade (life's too short to subject yourself to mixing on NS-10s).


    So, I used the Kemper as an excuse to clean house. I now no longer have to worry about old tube amps getting sketchy or taking up lots of storage space with gear that I simply don't want to use anymore. No more bad pedal board cables, scratchy stomp box inputs, power / ground adventures, bad tubes or the rest of it.


    The pack rat in me (a loud and persistent voice) said, "Yeah, but you never know when it might come in handy!" It was shouted down by the OCD part of me that starts to twitch when the clutter factor gets too high, which replied, "Screw that. Buy it if you ever need it again. [Expletive deleted] unlikely." And so, off to the garage sale it all went.


    I thought I'd feel regret over not having it around, just in case. I find that I don't miss it even a little. In fact it's incredibly liberating. With a toaster and DXR, I have a rig so small that I'm still amazed by the size of it. And yet, I have a thousand times more good tone options than I did with all that stuff I'd collected over the years. I can walk into a room with the toaster & remote slung over my shoulder, the DXR in one hand and a guitar in the other. Life is good. Of course, that's not without it's problems.


    Now what the heck do I spend my gear money on? :)

    Kemper remote -> Powered toaster -> Yamaha DXR-10