Hello from Middle Georgia

    Hi. My name is Spoonman. My Kemper just arrived by mail! I wanted to say hello, and update this thread with my impressions over the next few days.


    And so my journey continues...


    I've had a Vox ToneLab LE (Virtual Analog floorpedal) since about 2009. Pretty happy with it, especially the interface. Sound is good, but not great. It's still my favorite, though. I've run it through headphones as well as 5" active monitors but nowadays run 2.1 Klipsch / Harmon Kardon and it sounds fine.


    I previously had an Axe Fx (standard) around 2011, but I sold it about a year later. I was running it through the 5" monitors and was really impressed, it definitely beat the ToneLab. But the interface was not my favorite (needed more knobs), and it seemed to need a bunch of EQ. I probably just needed a 12" subwoofer, but I felt the ToneLab sat better with me with less fiddling. The time has come to reinvest that Axe money into an amp that should last the next decade (like the ToneLab has), so here I am. I've spent maybe dozens? of hours listening to Kemper-vs-X samples on YouTube, noting whether they were recording-direct-listening-FRFR or miking a cab. I usually prefer Kemper > Helix > Axe. The Helix is closest but still not my #1. The Axe has a very clean, tight, slightly-dark sound, but as far as I can tell I don't prefer it. I totally understand why some would, though. To me, the Kemper samples seem to carry a liveliness nothing else does.


    I also have a small 5W tube amp. It has great clean sounds, but it's not my favorite. The "tube breakup" is real but IMO not a hill worth dying on. If I had to get a tube amp, I'd try the Marshall Studio 20W Plexi Head, but I am just not as interested going down that route as I am the Kemper. I absolutely love stuff like Johann Segeborn's YouTube channel, where he cranks Marshall Super Leads, but that has about as much to do with my needs as Jay Leno's garage has to do with mine.


    My plan is to run the Kemper through a Samson transistor power amp to a 4x12 closed cabinet, and/or my 5" active monitors, but at first just headphones.


    -- post-unboxing:


    There is one weird glitch on the screen (only on the Stack screen) that I'll post below. I believe a software update may help(?): I noticed the version upon bootup was some weird beta that doesn't look current.


    I am in Great Luck in that this unit came from a benevolent 1st owner. This owner loaded my Head with what looks like a ton of MB & MW profiles, surely the Michaels Britt & Wagener of great fame. I am somewhat concerned an OS update might could trash the profiles, so my first step is to back up whatever rigs are loaded and move them to off-site storage. Thanks to Music123 for not wiping the memory!


    I am still waiting for my power amp, so I've only listened through reference headphones. All I can say is, the MW ADA MP-1 patch(? rig? stack? I need to learn my nouns) really makes an N4 sound good. Slightly wet, not-quite-harsh, and not-rounded-off sound out of a fully-open bridge pickup is really something. Awfully close to Pornograffiti. Sounds nothing like the tube amp I've got. Sounds nothing like the Tonelab, either. I don't know if the Axe had an ADA patch, I can't remember any.


    I've let the Rig Manager settle, after downloading 15,000 Rig Exchange profiles (or just metadata of? not sure, took a while). I connected the Kemper and turned it to Browser, and let it Sync. Nothing was lost. Selected all the rigs, Exported, and I think I've got the backups, so now I'm surely good to upgrade. Rigs are only 6kB ?? That's amazing. That's like straight out of Westworld.


    From what I've read, I'll need an empty USB to upgrade the OS. I'll have to do that some other day, I don't actually have one handy. Back to noodling.


    I will keep you posted with my first few days with it. The sound beats my expectations (especially with the Wagener profiles loaded!). It doesn't sound at all like a modeler. I guess it doesn't sound like a tube amp either. It's like some weird Terminator alien technology that eludes human judgment. This is an amazing application of (I'm guessing) discrete signal theory to what was previously dominated by high-power analog circuitry.


    I'll keep you posted. See weird glitch below

    Welcome, Spoonman!

    Quote from Spoonman

    To me, the Kemper samples seem to carry a liveliness nothing else does.

    Yup, and it's not just the sound.


    I often say it feels alive due to the tactile-feedback characteristics whilst playing, which I also describe as providing a sense of immediacy.

    Welcome to the forum! You can update your OS through Rig Manager, but I like keeping a USB drive with the latest OS and my backups on it too.

    Go for it now. The future is promised to no one. - Wayne Dyer

    Thanks for the warm welcome! It's time I gave an update. I am on the other side of an OS update now, so let me just write out (for myself) how I like to do it..


    Spoonman's OS Upgrade Procedure


    1. Acquire a USB flash drive. 16GB is surely adequate, likely overkill.

    2. On a Windows machine, format it as FAT32. Do not quick format, if you don't mind the wait.

    3. (15m later) Turn on the Kemper, as if you were to play.

    4. Insert the USB.

    5. It should show up in the display as "USB Stick" under the 3rd top button.

    6. Hit that 3rd top button.

    7. Choose Backup/Restore.

    8. Backup the entire contents to USB.

    9. Ok, Backup complete. Exit, exit, exit. Pull the USB stick.

    10. Return to your Windows machine, pull the file out of E:\Backups\ and store it (preferably in 2 different places).

    11. Open up the latest OS.zip from Kemper and drop kaos.bin into E:\OS Updates\.

    12. With Kemper still on, reinsert the USB. Wait for prompt.

    13. Install Operating System? Yes.

    14. (15m later) Eventually it will reboot, and sit on the loading bar for a while, then it's back to normal.

    15. Hit that 3rd top button (USB Stick).

    16. Backup/Restore. Backup the entire contents to USB.

    17. Ok, Backup complete. Exit, exit, exit. Pull the USB stick. Store backup in 2 places.

    18. Done. Free to reuse USB for something else, now.


    I felt the PDF included was kind of light on instructions. It probably works equivalently on OS X, I just wanted to eliminate that variable. I had trouble at first, since I formatted the drive as ExFAT on as OS X machine, which is apparently not the right way of doing it, so the procedure above was actually my Plan B, which works.


    At one point, I got an error screen (which I sent as it asked me to). All good now.


    --


    My impressions with the preamp are still very good. I'm a little surprised how different profiles can sound, how much they can vary. Some are mic'd real close, some real roomy. A lot (MBritt, esp) are noticeably higher gain, even on a low-output Strat.


    For now, I've really liked ToneJunkie's Plexi SL J X3. I find I can pretty much +1 bass -1 treble and leave it there.


    Chorus is really good. Fuzz is really good.


    On a final note, the OS update fixed the glitch with the display, no worries there.

    Quote from Spoonman

    On a Windows machine, format it as FAT32... It probably works equivalently on OS X, I just wanted to eliminate that variable. I had trouble at first, since I formatted the drive as ExFAT on as OS X machine, which is apparently not the right way of doing it, so the procedure above was actually my Plan B, which works.

    Plan A should have been to format it on the Kemper, mate.

    Quote from Spoonman

    I felt the PDF included was kind of light on instructions.

    Did you read it 'though? If you had, surely it would have saved your learning the hard way which format to use 'cause you'd have inserted the stick into the Kemper and been prompted to format it right there.


    Great that you're properly-up-and-running now 'though and still happy with what I'm sure will become your beloved Kemper. ;):thumbup: