Well I've gave mine a bit of a spin and I need to do so in case I do decide to return it as I'll be away for two weeks unfortunately!
It was a bit of a surprise when I saw it had arrived at the local dealer and thankfully the original price.
First thing I want to say is I'm old enough to remember 2 channel amps (3 if you were lucky!) and hauling around 4x12's....
If someone put one of these things in front of me with wifi, amp captures, multi fx etc back in the day my head would have exploded
So while we live in IMO the best current period for music gear (except for the 50's if you are a LP fan :D) its also the worst time for complainers
I really feel for the people building this gear sometimes and the BS they have to put up with online, so two thumbs up for all the awesome manufacturers putting out this brilliant gear!!!
One of the reasons I didn't want the QC is I've found a certain happy medium/compromise with my gear I already have and to just focus more on playing. Being off social media has also been brilliant as far as even though I'm out of the loop of new gear I'm focusing more on what I own and not killing the wallet either.
Anyway back to initial impressions!
1.Some of the higher gain presets do have some nasty high end spikes, some sound a bit muffled (some of the factory profiles on the kemper and fractal I felt were the same) but there are some great ones right off the bat that could be used live. I do believe the fractal to be the best handling any aliasing which gets brought up once in a while.
2.Ease of use, light years ahead of the Axe-Fx...the Kemper while at first was very intimidating with the CRO look, didn't take long to learn at all
I would say QC,Kemper and Fractal in that order (I haven't tried the Helix but they did a damn good job with that one too)
The flip down for inputs and scenes/presets is brilliant.
Not to mention fact you can put on a (free!) sweetwater video and get to know the unit in 30min vs paying some $120 course from a guy whose tone sounds as smooth as legos in some vids
3.Cabs I think its one of the most straight forward approaches ever. Pick a cab/mic and adjust .....the 1000 IRs in the AFX is just a nightmare.
I'm assuming that is the way they are housed in the QC which makes perfect sense.
4.Effects not as bad as I had read...I think its somewhat a tie with the AFX and the Kemper (some effects better than others ...the AFX pitch shift always seemed not good to me) the QC from my limited use is good enough and its early days.
5.Capture
I have not got to this part yet but the last 6-7 mths have had very little free time so maybe I'll even do some QC profiles on the Kemper and share here hahah
6.Footswitches
At first I was a bit worried about how close they are but its not too bad, the angle works great because you can just lay your foot flat to hit the upper ones.
Saying that with the touch screen and the encoders I might go the way of using an RJM mastermind for a controller....idiocracy is very real and I'm not sure its worth the risk at some venues....
Is the Kemper or Fractal going anywhere? Not yet...as much as the Fractal is a PITA with the interface and FW changes that ruin patches I need it for the guitar synth stuff I do due to the routing/outputs.
I think I will use the Kemper for a pure guitar rig (if only the parallel path had more features for piezo guitars but I've found a compromise)
But I may still sell the stage and keep the toaster...there is a high probability I'll share profiles between the units too for consistency!
With the QC I think I will mainly use it for Bass/Acoustic/recording and possibly a live guitar rig depending on if I sell the stage
Anyway just more of the same info, nothing new....I need to dig in deeper yet.