Refine or not for Studio/DA/Merged profile?

  • Hi.

    I've just got the new Kemper DI and am about to profile my amps..yet again :)

    I've realized I'm a bit confused and got some questions how to make the best Direct Amp (DA) / merged profile


    1st question, a merged and studio profile should theoretically be 100% identical right (assuming you didn't change anything between taking the DA and Studio profile)? Or are they just about the same (again theoretically)?


    2nd question, I've seen some suggests refining is no longer needed as of later OS's, is that the case? The 7.0 manual still suggests to refine it (I'm on OS 6.0) ?


    3rd: Assuming refining is still advisable, I'd like to get both studio and merged profiles which makes me confused how to go about getting an as accurate DA profile as possible. Should I refine both for the DA profile and then again for the studio profile?


    Doesn't refining introduce a level of "subjectiveness" in lack of better words? Say you do two studio profiles of the same setup without refining both should be identical, but if you were to refine both you will probably end up with two slightly different profiles subject to your attack, choice of chords, length of strumming and so on. My understanding of a merged profile is you're doing a DA profile first , then a studio profile. Then the Kemper takes the studio profile and subtracts the DA and voilá, you've got the cab separated. Then combine the DA and the cab makes a merged profile. To make a perfect merged profile you're not suppose to change anything between making the DA profile and studio profile, which makes me confused wether to refine or not. If you do refine both the DA and the studio profile , couldn't that result in two different outcomes later making the merged profile different from the studio?

    Last time I profiled my amps was with the OS version (3.0?) when they introduced merged profile as a feature but I found the studio and merged profiles didn't sound the same (profiled the DA with countryman 85) with the studio profile much more accurate. Can't remember if I refined or not, possibly did.


    Hope my questions makes sense 8o

  • I've now made a few Direct Amp profiles, Studio Profiles and Merged ones and found the Studio and Merged profile does not sound the same, very similar but still with a noticeable difference. I suspect that could be due to slightly different results when making the DA and Studio profiles and having refined them both.


    Something that also struck me as odd is after I created a Merged profile I found that de-selecting the Cab block in that profile doesn't sound the same as the DA profile it was based on?! Even though the audio sounds like garbage, i.e no cab present, there's a big difference in the sound, both level and saturation.

    Is that a bug?


    Another feature that would be nice is if the merged profiles upon creation were to be tagged by the KAOS so they could be easily identified in Rig Manager as a Merged Profile. That would be far easier than to trust the masses to stick to any logical name convention

    :)

  • "Another feature that would be nice is if the merged profiles upon creation were to be tagged by the KAOS so they could be easily identified in Rig Manager as a Merged Profile. That would be far easier than to trust the masses to stick to any logical name convention"


    Oh yes, please.

    This has been requested countless times, but unfortunately the Kemper staff just doesn't see a need for this - I don't know why. ;(