Kemper recording with spdif and focusrite sounds worse than i expected

    hey all - super new to the KPA, apologies ahead of time if this has been discussed previously but i couldn't find a decent answer through general searching.

    so i got the kemper about a couple of weeks ago and i am generally very happy with it, however i can't seem to be getting good quality audio when using it for recording.

    here's a summary i bought some commercial profiles through some well known vendors and when i play these profiles through the kemper connected via xlr to my line 6 powercab plus they sound very good and i am able to tweek them to my liking, it is when i try to record using these profiles where i hit a wall. my setup is as follows:


    *guitar (music man majesty generally) --> kemper

    *Kemper XLR L mono out into line 6 powercab plus 1x12. (for monitoring during recording and general bedroom playing)

    *kemper S/PDIF out into S/PDIF in on a focusrite 8i6 3rd gen

    *a pair of Adam Audio A5V plugged into my focusrite 8i6 as studio monitors using a 1/4 inch cable.

    *DAW of choice is Reaper (i tried tracking in mono spdif and stereo as well)


    Also i am not an expert at recording by any means :D but the sound difference is drastic when recording it sounds harsher and generally bad to my ears. Any tips are appreciated here, is there a global setting i need to make sure is enabled? could the Adam Audios A5V be the issue too i picked them up about a month ago and don't have prior experience with other quality studio monitors , should i consider upgrading them? if so any recommendations ?

    thank you.


    Also forget to mention that my Kemper and Focusrite are properly sycned at 48khz and the Kemper is acting as clock master.

    Have you tried turning the spdif volume down?


    What setting do you have the spdif output set to?


    have you tried monitoring through your monitors to see how that sounds?


    can you share a clip of the sound?


    just a few thoughts hope it helps .

    Why not use your Adam's as monitors for the Kemper while setting up your rigs? That would let you know what your recorded tracks should sound like. You're not recording the Line6 powercab.

    hello, thank you for the tips as far as i can tell the volume of spdif is set to 0db i can try to turn it down. i'll take what y'all said and try them. was just wondering why would the line 6 powercab plus sound that much better i guess my expectation there was what i hear from the powercab plus is what i should hear in recording but i will try to tweek the sounds with the Adams and see what the output settings are set and respond here.

    Hi,


    I´ve just swapped from analog out to SPDIF out. The sound i´ve got from the SPDIF out it´s waaaaaaay more detailed and "clean" than the analog out. I use very good quality cables (Gotham), the interface is a MOTU 896 HD (a bit old, but works excellent !!!) and a pair of ADAM A7 and an ADAM SUB8 out. Everything works at 96 Khz.

    It´s not a bad idea to have different performances for Studio and Live situations. Some Profiles comes with Studio and Live purposes.

    Quote from dinosound

    Hi,


    I´ve just swapped from analog out to SPDIF out. The sound i´ve got from the SPDIF out it´s waaaaaaay more detailed and "clean" than the analog out. I use very good quality cables (Gotham), the interface is a MOTU 896 HD (a bit old, but works excellent !!!) and a pair of ADAM A7 and an ADAM SUB8 out. Everything works at 96 Khz.

    It´s not a bad idea to have different performances for Studio and Live situations. Some Profiles comes with Studio and Live purposes.

    mine is set at 48khz do you recommend me going up to 96khz? i read the focusrite specs for the 8i6 and it supports that sample rate. other than that my global settings for SPDIF are master stereo which seems to be correct.

    How do you get ur device to work on anything else besides 44.1 I've tried and I can't get my Focusrite Scarlett 6i6 to lock :(

    Quote from csasson

    How do you get ur device to work on anything else besides 44.1 I've tried and I can't get my Focusrite Scarlett 6i6 to lock :(

    so with me i had to do a few things. first i opened up focusrite control and selected from the settings 48 khz, then in the kemper itself you click the output button and scroll through the pages till you get sync clock and move it to 48khz or whichever sample rate you want. with me i also had to do something with my DAW (Reaper) where i had to set the sample rate to 48000 (48khz) to get this working. and you'll also need to set the clock source to s/pdif inside of the focurite control

    also after trying some of the tips i finally got a good recording sound, mainly my profiles had to be re-tweeked with my monitors to sound good i also went to 96khz and lowered the spidf volume and that sounds good to me too. thank you all for the tips

    Hi, I’m planning to try spidf input into my kemper and see that you can now record at different sample rates. I record at 48 and 32bit. I also know I have to use the kemper clock for this to work properly but there is no mention I can find about 32bit. Will these settings work or will this affect the sound quality? Also is there any plans for kemper to be able to do all this while still using an audio interfaces clock source?

    Thanks

    Firstly, tracking 32-bit is overkill IMHO; you'll lose nothing by going 24 bit.


    As for the other question, if your DAW is set to 32-bit-default operation, it'll add the extra 8 bits automatically if you track the Kemper's S/PDIF out at its default (and only) setting of 24 bit. As I said 'though, there's nothing to be gained tracking-quality wise.


    It can be argued that mixing to 32 bit has utility where some mastering houses / engineers are concerned, but the dividends, if any, are extremely-negligible IMHO and not anything a consumer's going to hear or be equipped to do so, so I wouldn't worry about it, mate.


    Save the track space. It'll make archiving projects quicker and more-practical disc-space wise.