Posts by drumdrum

XLR are the same as TRS cables internally....they both have a hot cold and earth/ground wire, its just the connectors that are different on either end.

TS cables contain a hot and ground cable.

The only real difference is that TRS cables are capable of stereo functionality over the one cable, and it is generally better shielded against interference with mono signals over long distances. This last feature only applies if you are hooking it up to a balanced output.

TS cables on the other hand, carry only a mono signal and are used for connections to unbalanced outputs. They are also generally cheaper on a like-for-like comparison.
Sound quality wise, both are the same for a mono source (like a guitar cable for instance), HOWEVER over long distances, the TS cable may (or may not) pick up some interference hum somewhere along the line. TRS cables are better designed to carry the signal cleanly over the distance.

There is a bit more to it than this, but this is about 95% or it in a nutshell.
Oh and dont be fooled by "cable-philes" who spend rediculous amounts of money on cabling. A $400 cable will sound EXACTLY the same as a $10 cable in most circumstances. People who believe otherwise have more money than sense IMHO!

+1

Hello,

I was wondering, would it be possible to incorporate a recording / loop function into the Kemper?
I dont mean an effects loop, but a Boss loop-station type thing, where we could temporarily record and continuously playback, say 30s of something, and then play over the top of it?

I use this for practicing my solos etc over my songs with my laptop, but when I'm out and about or practicing at night and just want to try something quick I often dont want to turn my laptop on or I will have lost the idea by the time everything is set up!

If memory is an issue with the Kemper, could we use the USB port on the back to use our flash drives as a type of temporary memory bank for our loops (perhaps even save them here)?

It makes sense to me and I would love to hear the reasons why this could or could not be done with Kemper as it currently stands.

Thanks!
-DD

p.s. The Kemper is hands down, THE greatest musical investment I have made in the last few years.... love this thing!

Wow! This sounds more like a problem that a feature request!

+1 man!

Quote from tayholliday

For me, the downside of SPDIF is that I have to slave the interface to the Kemper's clock, which just leaves only one sample rate option. And with some audio interfaces it can be kind of annoying to have to switch those settings around every time you want to use the KPA.

+1

Im still waiting for the spdif output volume control......

Didnt upgrade last time, dont think I'll risk it this time.

Nice to see that Kemper are at least doing something with the thing.....though performance mode is surprisingly still absent afte over a year on the market and it being advertised as a feature on the main website....

+ 1 to what has been said already.

I also recommend recording the direct guitar output from the Kemper in tandem with the main processed signal.
Then, if you decide later that the original sound doesnt suit, you can re-amp the direct signal through various rigs in the Kemper.

Just some quick tips:
1 - Record a direct track from the guitar. Can save you in a pinch if the initial processed recording doesnt fit with the mix.

2 - Try double the guitar tracks and hard pan them opposite to one another. It'll give you a "huge" sound....of course, only do this if you WANT that sound...
(Note - duplicating the original track and panning it opposite to the original is not the same thing.... )

3 - If doubling, the more you layer, the more you reduce the gain per layered. Especially true for high gain sounds. Otherwise you end up with a wall of "fizz" and not enough tone. There is supposed to be a note in there after all!

4 - Watch the brightness. Most beginners have the brightness WAY too high on their recordings.

5 - Keep an eye on your treble and presence settings.....see #3.....

6 - Some people will say "if you need to EQ it afterwards, you need to re-record it!" .IMHO, not necessarily. Dont be afraid to apply some EQ during the mix to help balance the tone with the rest of the instruments.
However, if you find yourself applying a LOT of boosting and cutting, AND doing so over a long time ....AND you are STILL not 100% happy with the result, then you are probably better off re-recording the part.....or using your direct guitar recording (essentially the performance) and re-amping it until you get a tone that you are happy with.

7 - When mixing, USE. A. REFERENCE TRACK!!!!!
I cant count the amount of times a reference track has pulled me back from the brink! your ears and brain will get tired and distracted when mixing. Use a reference to help to guide you. This is not the same as trying to completely duplicate the sound of the reference track. But mixing without one is very hard to do, at least, in the beginning.

8 - When making comparisons, volume match the parts/effects first. Your ear will 99.999% of the time prefer the louder version, even though it could be detrimental to your mix! Balance the volume first between the before and after scenarios and then you can REALLY hear that the change is doing to your tone...

9 - Check the tuning between takes. Nothing worse than nailing that difficult part, then hearing that it sounds flat/sharp in the mix!

Some of these are fairly obvious, but sure never hurts to get a refresher now and again!

If you are going in via spdif then there is 0 difference between any interfaces (sound quality wise).

Both are digital signals that bypass the AD converters so it makes no difference.

If you are going in via an analog signal then it will make a bit of a difference, but probably not a massively noticeable one. Since IIRC the Fasttrack does only has a line and a XLR input, Im guessing you are going in the line in. In this case, an interface upgrade would be a good investment. Just dont hope for it to be some magic bullet and suddenly all your mixes are gravy!

Quote from guitarnet70

There's a group of users here (including myself) that tests the new Beta FW in real life before release. Previous to that you have Alfa and Beta testing runned by the technical team at Kemper. If you stay below 1000 rigs you'll have no problems updating (BTW: the 1.5.2. is now a release version, not a beta)

Cool. Thats good to know!

I have 400 rigs on my KPA at the moment, though I honestly only use about 30, though I do have quite a few snapshots of some depending on what mood Im in! (ie, if I'm feelng the 80s hairy metal sound on a particular day.... )

thanks...

Just posted this in another thread, but I feel it applies to this thread topic also:

from a QA point of view, a fix that has the potential to be easily mis-applied (and hence "brick" the unit) is not a good thing from a users point of view.

Everytime there is an update, this forum tends to have a few "Just upgraded to firmware XXX an it caused an error" type threads. I presume these FW updates are properly tested, yes?

As with the FW updates being released about once a month, and considering that I use my kemper all the time, Im not so sure I want to risk "bricking" my unit in order to update it.
I mean, firmware updates for products shouldn't carry this level of risk....

Is there any assurance someone at Kemper can give us that the stability of the firmware updates are properly tested before going live?

Or is this just the risk we take given the "beta"-ish nature of the product?

from a QA point of view though, a fix that has the potential to be easily mis-applied and hence brick the unit, is not a good thing from a user point of view.

Everytime there is an update, this forum tends to have a few "Just upgraded to firmware XXX an it caused an error" type threads. I presume these FW updates are properly tested, yes?

As with the FW updates being released about once a month, and considering that I use my kemper all the time, Im not so sure I want to risk bricking my unit in order to update it.
I mean, firmware updates for products shouldn't carry this level of risk....

Is there any assurance someone at Kemper can give us that the stability of the firmware updates are properly tested before going live?

Just wanted to say that whatever Chris / Scott / Santa Claus says about the Axe Fx 2 / KPA, I just had a GREAT night of jamming with my KPA!

I never really appreciated the impact of a well tuned stomp pedal before now....(call me an old skool amp-only guy!)

All that matters is the feel from playing....

eh, any chance someone could do a quick copy / paste off of TGP thread of what Chris said that has caused this ruckus?

I dont have an account with TGP and I dont want to get one (and the spam risk that comes with it!) for the sake of 1 post.

All this discussion has piqued my curiosity though.

Case in point about horsepower and technology:
Apple iPhone5 vs Samsung Galaxy S 3.
1.2Ghz Dual Core A6 processor, 1 GB RAM vs Quad core 1.4Ghz Cortex-A9

On paper the GS3 should be able to way outperform the iPhone 5, but in reality and in benchmarks, the iPhone 5 outperforms the GS3.

Generally speaking, properly implemented code on moderate hardware will almost always outperform poorly implemented code running on cutting edge hardware, and at a much better price point too. This is true for most technology products on the market today. But when you couple properly implemented code with cutting edge hardware...hooo boy, you got something nice there!

Hi!

First of all, I do not mean this thread as a bash at the Kemper. I love my Kemper unit and it serves me well everyday! ITs my best buy in ages...

but...

I do wonder sometimes how "finished" the unit really is. I mean, the Performance mode is still "coming soon", the undo and redo buttons still do squat, there are some basic functions missing such as SPDIF output level control, spring reverb, PC/MAC based editing software, there is a USB CAT-5 connector on the Kemper that does nothing, etc etc... There are also firmware updates about once a month to "add" features.

Not that I am complaining, its just I wonder if we are a "beta" crew so to speak and that the Kemper folks are using us as guinea pigs to add features to their device and build it up over time.

Will there ever be a day where I can buy a KPA with everything working in the unit, and not have to rely on future firmware updates? And at this point, would the KPA be more expensive? As in, is the Kemper currently discounted because not all the features are available?

To reiterate: I love my Kemper....but sometimes I wonder how "finished" a product it really is.....

+1

Quote from BRUNO

You guys probably noticed that the KPA now allows WDW (and more).This is a a good timing for a cool announcement that you will see in a few weeks..May be before that ;.Some of you guys are already aware of it
For all who wants to play WDW...Stereo or mono... all possibilities in one box..stay tuned

Ehh....forgive the ignorance, but WDW = ???

Does anyone know if this feature will be added in a future update?

I can't see how it wouldn't be an easy thing to implement... essentially some gain coding on the spdif output stage?
I guess thats one for CK and his fellow magicians to answer properly though!

IME with the Kemper vs my amp (JCM2000 DSL 100W with 1960 Lead cab) with both a sm57 and a e906 propped up against the grill, is that against both mics, the Kemper profile is almost there....

but, to my ears, it tends to miss the target a little in regards to the bass response of the tone coming out of the real amp.

Sometimes, adding about 1db or so to the bass brings it even closer, sometimes I find I need an EQ stomp in front of the profile to get it there.
Dont get me wrong, it is a very useable sound, but its the dead giveaway for me in blind tests, which I nearly always get right.

IMO, this is the only achilles heel of the Kemper profiling process, otherwise its pretty much flawless in terms of sonic quality.

Thanks so much for making this think CK. Its my best buy of the year!!

Quote from 01000100

like I said it sorts by rating. you are looking at number of votes.

Ok I have something wrong in my head at the moment!


What is the difference between rating (the stars, yeah?) and number of votes?
Are the star ratings not set by user votes?

AAaahhhhhh. I think penny just dropped as I type this!

Say each star = 1 point (so 5 star rating = 5 points)

Profile A gets 3 votes of 5 stars each (15 points)
Profile B get 10 votes of 1 star each (10 points)

A is rated higher than B on output due to points score, but B has more votes.

Ok cool.

But could a search by ratings be included also, as I like to discover new amp profiles and new sounds and it would be an easier way to find the better profiles instead of needing to know off hand "oh, I need a profile that sounds like a XYZ amplifier".

Cheers!

Quote from 01000100

actually, if you type in a search term, the results are displayed with the highest ratings on top.

I dont think this is quite correct. I did a search simply for "Rectifier" with all the filter check boxes enabled. As you can see from my screenshot it does not seem to be sorted correctly by ratings. In this example it has gone in star ratings from top to bottom:
11 - 9 - 6 - 3 - 5 - 5 - 5 - 7 - 8 - 4 - etc etc....

Is this an issue with your search forum, or something else I'm missing?

(Relatively poor image quality, because I had to re-save it as a poor quality JPEG to keep within the restricted attachment limit of 80kb)