Posts by ZSchneidi

Quote from lightbox

Ok, so we can rule out monitoring or signal path issues.
Next in line is the guitar(s) you're using. Michael Britt mostly uses a Tom Anderson Hollow T Contour Telecaster style guitar for tweaking and profiling. Waraba mentioned P90 equipped guitar but that's what Michael Britt uses on stage, not so much for profiling. The telecaster is a pretty bright guitar (basicaly all Telecaster style guitars are much brighter than e.g. Les Pauls). This preference leads to slightly "warmer", more mellow results in his profiles. Not exactly perfect for Les Pauls or other "darker" sounding guitars.

Keep in mind that as a gigging artist, Michael Britt might have a tendency to keep the treble "under control". At high volumes, guitars (especially Telecasters) can get pretty harsh in the trebles. So in this regard I do agree with you that his profiles lack a bit of the clarity and brilliance you'll find in profiles specifically made for studio/recording use. That's not necessarily a downside, just depends on your application what's best for you.

Now what can you do about this? Of course there's always the option to try other cabs with the amp profile. But before you start doing this, you might want to try "High Shift" and/or "Character" in the CAB block. I wouldn't recommend to start using lots of EQ trying to compensate for what you miss. It's well possible that Michael Britts profiling style just isn't made for you.

One last remark:
Michael Britt typically has the reverb block engaged with a pretty low mix setting. This adds to the impression that a sound seems to be "thin". Others often use quite a bit more reverb or even delay. Best advise in this regard is to setup a reverb (and delay) that you enjoy with other profiles and then lock these slots so they stay the same whenever you load a Michael Britt profile.

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Hey mate,
thanks for taking the time here.

Ok that is something i haven't considered yet that his profiles might adress a specific purpose more live situation then studio use.
It may come from the fact that i saw so many different guitarists using and praising them for like any situation so far. So
i just assumed they would work in the studio as good as live. For gigging purposes that might still work. But the best thing on the
kemper for me is that i can use it with headphones and it still sound realistically like and amp. Many of my favorite profiles have
a realistic tone and feel to them. And thats why i get so frustrated that especially the praised britt profiles can't match them.

Maybe i should read the profile description first. Maybe his profiles are mainly for live situations. From high class profiles I
assume that they were profiled in a flat characteristic without boosting or cutting to many frequencies so that i have a chance
to modulate them to my needs later. But there is so much missing right out of the box.

I usually tend to take all of the effects out of the equation to really figure out what the amp sounds like. Effects come second.

Maybe you right and Britt just isn't my cup of tea.

Quote from stfuzz

Hi ZSchneidi,

I don´t know if you are aware that your first posting is quite disrespectful!?

Sorry i think this was a bit harsh from me.
I had no intention to criticize Britt personally. I'm sure he is good with what he is doing.
Maybe its just the pure disappointment and frustration that spoke for me.

Quote from Ingolf

This.MBritt's profiles all tend to sound a bit darker because they're tweaked for a live setting and therefore have treble under control.
Also his profiles often make use of his favourite cab and therefore tend to sound more similar than other vendors' profiles that use several cabs and mics.

As you have made an opposite experience than what’s common sense here why not make a recording?

That is the real strange part here.
You might be right and his profiles tend to serve live purposes but his previews on his profiles sound great to me.
But using them myself can't live up to the expectations. Maybe there is a huge difference in just hearing them and
playing them myself. Maybe i always need a reference point.

I could try to record and compare those differences i'm talking about.

Quote from DavidAJack

I LOVE the MBritt Vox pack. It's my go to clean sound. Melts my heart every time and it's super dynamic and responsive.

Also a big fan of the mesa boogie profile.

MBritt does a great job of adding great effect with many of his rigs which act as a great starting point for tweaking.

No complaints here.

I'm using humbuckers.

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I got myself the 65 ACE30 PACK from Britt because i love the AC30 character.
And like the 800 pack just pure disappointment. This doesn't sound any good out of the box.
And i dont run those profiles into guitar cabs i rather monitor them via studio equipment.
Maybe thats just the wrong environment for those profiles.

Quote from Frodebro

I think he was just REALLY frustrated and was venting a bit. We've ALL been there with gear at one point or another.

I use Mike's profiles with both single coils and humbuckers, and they aren't thin or distant sounding at all with my gear (QSC K10s). I'm thinking maybe something is tweaked in the global settings in OP's Kemper that is messing with his sound. We've seen that many, many times around here.

Could you point out what in my global settings could cause these kind of problems.
Because i really want to find a way to get them to work like you all seem to know them.

Quote from Eltzejupp

Riding an old horse.

Month ago I asked also what‘s the magic behind Michaels profiles, because for me they are too dark and I also got no useable sound right out of the box.

The answer from one of the mods was, that I have to buy a tele......Lol

After checking again I must say that Michael has also done some brighter profiles. A big gamechanger for me was the cab. I tried the profiles with a 1960AV from deadlight studios and the profiles where ok for my taste, but i must say I have a bunch of Miachels profiles and i dont use one.

If you are from the JP fraction, you find more gems in other packs. What’s your experience with the Lars Lüttge pack from kemper?

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Maybe trying other combinations of cabs and eq might help but i spend money on those profiles because I want more like
a plug'n'play approach and don't want to put to much time into a single profile in order to see whether it works for me or not.
Other profiles work that way and i i like them i start putting some time into them.

I haven't tried the Luttge packs yet but if you recommend them i sure gonna try them out.

Don't get me wrong guys i'm not here to just bitch about M Britt he must deliver good stuff or else the community wouldn't
praise him like that. I currently more frustrated with myself that i just don't get anything decant from it. Maybe the problem
is me or my settings or just my expectations. I guess i need to record a bit and tell you whats bothering me.

Quote from sercho

Thin and distant are the opposite adjectives I'd use to refer to MBritt's profiles, actually! It seems weird to me that you're getting that 'crappy' sound you describe, and the most surprising is you only get that with his profile but not with freebies or other vendors'.

I've experienced the feeling of buying a pack from a commercial seller (not talking about MBritt here) and being quite dissapointed of the tones I was getting (taking into account everyone seemed to love those profiles), but I could not say the tones were that bad. Out of that around 30 profiles pack I bought, I'd use between 2 and 4.

From MBritt I've his free official pack and a couple of single amps and I like 'em.

To me they sound darker than average but quite beefy, definitely not thin at all! Actually very suitable for a live performance at loud volumes.

What guitar are you using?

Cheers.

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Hi sercho,

thanks for your comment. I was expecting exactly that. This full and direct sound that is suitable for live setups.
When i hear people playing britt profiles they sound very good and even the previews on his site sound way more direct.

Like you i already bought several commercial profile packs. I mainly search for good profiles of specific amps.
I buy a pack and test it and many basically end up in the trash because I'm just not satisfied with them. Other packs may
suit me better.

Maybe its just a thing of personal taste here. And maybe the Britt profiles start to shine in a specific setup maybe played
through an actual cab. But thats basically not the point of the Kemper. So i feel I'm missing something here.

You say your Britt profiles sound dark and beefy. Thats is basically the opposite from what i just got with the 800 pack.
These profiles sound so light and thin there is no punch no repsonse and nothing that sound close to a real amp.
Other free profiles sound so good and beefy i don't get it why the Britt profiles in particular don't deliver that to me.

Im using a Sterling by Music Man JP100D

The Petrucci signature pick ups may not be suited for the britt profiles.

Quote from lightbox

Do you experience the same effect (distant, thin, undefined) when you listen through headphones on the Profiler headphones out?

Yes absolutely currently i'm using headphones mainly and especially when trying new profiles in order to get a better feeling for them.
Btw. I'm monitoring the Kemper with Beyerdynamic DT990 Pro and a Presonus 1824 Interface into M-Audio M3-8 monitors.

Quote from waraba

I'm pretty sure you're using the wrong guitar to test these profiles . M Britt uses a P90 guitar for most of his profiling sessions. They also sound great on my P90 semi hollow. P90 are really different from Hi gain active pickups for instance.

Also : most of M Britt's profile use a single Cab , if you don't like this cab , you won't like the profiles , whatever the amp.

Why did not give a test to the demo profiles from the official rig packs, available in the rig manager , before buying the packs ???

Hey mate,

ok that might be one problem that i'm just using the wrong pickups.
What suprises me is that there are so many different guitarist with very diffent
guitars that said they are good and i heard some demos that convinced me
that the profiles might be good. And i already listened to to demos and previews.

Sure using the demo packs might be a good starting point. Don't get me wrong I'm not
bitching about losing money here thats not what bothers me. It's more the frustration
that others seem to get good results where as i'm just getting nothing from it.

Quote from lightbox

"Garbage", "complete shit", "complete disappointment" aren't the best way to describe what they lack, what you expect, what you hear.
If you just want to vent, ok. Message received.
If you're asking for help … provide better information (or even better demo sound clips).

Well can't argue with that My Bad should have been a bit more specific here.

So what really bothers me with those profiles is that they sound thin and distant.
I would say that these two word describe the best whats wrong with those profiles.

As Wheresthedug said he just use them plug'n'play without any need to dial them in.
But if i go through them every single on of those profiles sound distant like he put a
mic in a corner of the room and hope the mic picks anything from the amp. Thats the main
issue with them. What leads to them sounding thin and undefined. Were other free profiles
or commercial ones sound well defined and present. The Britt profiles just sound totaly
off to me there is no power coming through.

I don't know if you can imagine what i mean. And thats a basic problem with them.
There is so much missing that won't come when i screw around with the EQ or other
settings.

Quote from Wheresthedug

We all obviously have different tastes so what is nirvana to one is utter shit to another. All I can say is I spend most of my time using either my own profiles or Michael Britt profiles. I like some of the Bert Meulendijk stuff too. I pretty much never tweak any profiles ; just plug’n’play and get great results. If the profile doesn’t grab me straight out the box I just select another that does.

What is it about Michaels profiles that you don’t like?

Hi,
thats what i would expect from those profiles the plug'n'play factor.
Look above i hope i could make clear what is the most disappointing part for me.

As is said there are plenty of free to use profiles that sound very direct and defined.
For me the Britt profiles sound like very poorly miced up profiles. They are so thin and
lack so much character and definition.

Hey guys,

many claim that M Britt profiles are among the better profiles out there.
I have already bought a few of his packs and came to the conclusion that these profiles
sound pretty garbage. At least out of the box.

On his site the previews sound pretty good or else i would never have
bought them. But as soon as I start using them oder figure out which profiles suit me the best
is can't find a single one that at least sounds decent enough to spend more time working on it.

Yesterday I got myself the 800 Pack,
Because I want a good JCM800 or 2555X the preview sounded very good and i was all exited and shit.
But i went through all of the profiles and really tried to dial them in but in the conclusion they ALL sound
complete shit.

What am i doing wrong here ? Are M Britt profiles any good ? why do people claim they are good ?
Do I need to dial them in and master them before they start to sound closer to his previews ?

Thats the second pack in a row that was a complete disappointment.
I never played a real JCM800 or 2555X and they just sound crap at least those profiles. The previews
on the other hand sound totaly amazing.

I compared them to the free Friedman Browneye profiles from Thomas Dill from Rig Exchange.

I know its a different amp but the quality of the profiles are like black and white. The Dill profiles

sounds absolutely amazing out of the box without an tweaking. But these Britt profiles I'm just done with

this crap.

Or tell me if I'm just to stupid to use them correctly.

Quote from Nothisworld

This solved my problem: Headphones output is awesome

Still it could be argued that the clarity is a notch better when headphones are plugged to the KPA. But I think this is good enough to go.

Good luck

My current problem with the Interfaces headphone out is exactly that the representation of stereo effects are not the same as on the kemper.
But i already going with two xlr cables and main output set to "master stereo" but still dont get the sound right on the interface.

I guess i have to double check the signal chain and processing maybe somethings still messing up my signal.

Hey guys i recently got myself a Presonus interface. The Studio 1824 to be exact.
Its an awesome interface and sound pretty good so far.

BUT!!

And its a big But(t) the headphone output on the kemper seem to be still the better one.
If i send pure amp sound through they both tend to sound the same so thats a point for
Presonus that the Headphone out sound good and unbiased and can drive my 250 ohm
DT990 Pro very well. But if you drive the Headphone amp to hard it tends to distort so
one have to spend time dialing everything in to get decant levels without distortion.

But as soon as i add various effects on the Kemper rig both units start to sound very different.
The Kemper sound stage is much wider and sound full and vibrant. While the Presonus sounds
still good but is missing some fine details.

So my conclusion here is that its hard to find an interface that is representing the Kemper headphone
out as good as the Kemper does. Don't know what amp they build in there but it sound absolutely amazing.
Even better than everything coming out via Main/Monitor out on the Kemper.

@Wheresthedug

Thanks for this nice Test you put up there. We aren't scientists so this approach was decent enough.

I would like to reproduce your test in the full extend but i only have my Beyerdynamic DT990 Pro 250 ohm.
I have a pair of AKG headphones that i'm not even willing to compare because they have such bad characteristics
,representation and sound stage.
So i have only one pair of headphones.

But i can confirm your results on the second part. I can't compare high and low impedance headphones here but i can
compare the different headphone amps.

Currently i can compare the Focusrite 2i2 which is obviously not made to drive high impedance headphones the Presonus 1824
which at least can drive them at decent levels and the Kemper headphone amp itself.
I my opinion the Focusrite doesn't necessarily sound bad but just hasn't enough power to drive the DT990 Pro so i can't compare them
objectively. The Presonus drives them pretty good even at levels that are painfully loud. But with increasing level they tend to distort.
So with the Presonus i have to find the sweet spot where the level is loud enough without messing up the tone.

The Kemper is in my opinion far ahead of the interfaces. I already tested it with Space disabled on the headphone output. Because this
feature doesn't represent the rig unbiased. But even with Space disabled the Kemper Headphone Output sound so much better.

I just can't point out what it is. The difference is increasing further with added effects as i said. The sound stage is way better on the Kemper.
Its like you can hear a wider spectrum. I don't know what causes the differences.

I'm not a trained sound technician. So i wouldn't claim to hear any loss coming from the converters. but the converted Signal on either XLR or Spdif
doesn't sound the same on the Presonus. It might be the Presonus but i can't imagine studio gear like the 1824 messing with the signal.
I can't even record what is coming out of the Kemper Headphone due to the fact that the said "wider spectrum" is lost once the signal passed the
converters on the Presonus.

Is there a way to send the signal back to the Kemper via Spdif to monitor it via the Kemper Headphone out ?

Quote from Wheresthedug

I’ll go and check in a moment and report back.

I have Kemper, Focusrite Safire (pretty standard headphone amp) and an old Mackie 8 bus mixer which is designed for hi impedence headphones. Although not great cans for moniting i havea couple of pairs of DT100 which are either 250ohm or 600 ohm versions so should at least be able to tell what difference the amp/impedence match makes.

That would be very interesting. Please test the Kempers headphone amp how it drives the different impedance headphones and compare them to the Mackie

Quote from Kempermaniac

Not sure if switching from line to instrument level avoids that mic preamps are engaged when seeing XLR at the input. Keep away your fingers from phantom power, it's only for certain microphones.

All in all I think that it's a setting thing.

Might be possible i have the feeling i don't know shit how to operate the kemper properly

Quote from Kempermaniac

Ok, first: When monitoring/recording via SPDIF make sure that the KPA is master and interface is slave, choose matching sample rate on each unit and set both devices to 24 bit. Try to lower/raise the buffer size of your interface to get rid of artifacts, clicks and whatever noise. Second: Maybe there's no need for splitting channels as most interfaces and DAWs offer stereo channels by grouping two channels.

Regarding XLR: On some interfaces mic preamps are automatically engaged when seeing XLR on the inputs. Your signal can be too hot then.

I'm far from being an expert in this regard so I hope I'm not too wrong with what I've written.

I will take a look at the spdif and the matching of the devices didn't knew that.

On the presonus you can turn on phantom power and switch from instrument to line level.

I guess i would need a referenz amp for the headphones to see were the problem starts to screw up the sound.
Don't get me wrong it sound still good on the interface but there is this last 5% of the sound missing that makes a huge difference for me.

Hi guys thanks for the interest in helping me out here Thumbs up for you folks.

Quote from Michael_dk

What ‘source’ is the spdif out on the kemper set to? Please double check (in output/master menu)

Hi all my output channels are set to Master Stereo. I already triple checked all output parameters.

Quote from Kempermaniac

Regarding the representation of effects: Both, delay and reverb inside the Kemper, are stereo effects. The headphone out of the Kemper is stereo as well. Those stereo effects sound much better and more audible when monitored in stereo. Therefore I could imgane that maybe you're not monitoring in stereo via your interface. Check the settings of your interface as well as the output settings of the Kemper.

Hi I already tried three different ways to monitor the Kemper through the Presonus.
First via Spdif which is giving me pretty nasty performance in the DAW due to the fact that there are periodically apearing artifacts while monitoring or recording.
Second via XLR on Master Output which is giving me a stable signal but with the described representation of the effects chain.
Third and this one might be a bit weired I send the Stereo Headphone output split to to Line Input channels of the presonus.

So I take care to send every output of the Kemper in Stereo and spliting them in the Presonus to discrete channels to i can pan them and monitor left and right channel isolated
and in the mix.

What i found out is that the representation of the Headphone output is different only when I plug in my Headphones directly into the Kemper.

So basically

KEMPER FRONT HEADPHONE OUTPUT -> HEADPHONES (BEYERDYNAMIC 250 ohm) sounds absolutely amazing

KEMPER FRONT HEADPHONE OUTPUT -> STEREO SPLIT TO PRESONUS LINE INPUT 1/2 -> HEADPHONE OUPUT PRESONUS (same headphones) sound way less appealing

Its like there is so much from the reverb / delay effects missing it just sounds wider directly from Kemper to Headphones.

So i guess there is definitely something missing in the signal spectrum but it might be the headphone amp.

Can someone explain from his/her own experience what happens if the headphone amp isn't specifically designed to drive high impedance headphones ?

Maybe thats the reason I'm missing so much from the orignial Signal due to the fact that the Presonus Headphone output just simply can't run the 250 ohm headphones.

From the Presonus specs:

Headphone Outputs

Maximum Power 150 mW/channel (60Ω load)
Frequency Response 20 Hz - 20 kHz (unity gain)
Dynamic Range 103 dB (A-weighted, 1 kHz, unity gain)
THD + N 0.250% (1 kHz, 150 mW, unity gain)
Impedance Working Range 32Ω to 600Ω

So the interface can definitely handle the 250ohm headphones but is there another limiting factor ?

Quote from Wheresthedug

As Michael_dk said, the SPDIF out could well be the problem. It needs to be set to "Master Stereo" on page1/7 of the Output menu.

If that is set correctly, check the settings in the Focusrite interface.Also, check the settings. I'm using an old Saffire which is configured via the Mix Control interface. Make sure that isn't set to mono on the channels that the Kemper is going through and/or the main outs.

Finally, if you are running through a DAW like Logic etc make sure you haven't set something to mono accidentally in the DAW itself.

Hey, as said before i made sure that im running on Master Stereo on every output im sending to the Interface and I ran them in both linked stereo channels
and discrete left/right channels and sent them to an output mix.

I need to figure out whether the problem lies in the stereo splitting or the headphone amp not being capable of driving the headphones properly.
See description above.

Quote from Finally

What kind of S/pdif cables are you using? If you take the main outs from the KPA to your interface are you still getting poor sound?

It doesn't seem to me that the interfaces are the problem. I've had good results with even a budget interface.

Its hard to tell what causes the problem.
If i dial back my effects chain an go with pure amp sounds both units sound very similar thats ok for me.
But if i use the full effects chain the Kemper Headphone out is way better and direct in terms of presenting the effects.
And if i have to much gain in the rig or it goes to loud the Headphone out on the Presonus tends to distort the sound.
Its not clipping cuz the input meter is at half not even close to clipping. Its more the Headphone amp that starts to
distort the sound with is pretty nasty.

So the Presonus has definitely its flaws but the Kemper isn't representing correctly and i can't find the reason the effects
are represented different on the headphone out compared to the spdif out or the main out.

Quote from szykman

maybe space parameter, under output there is an one called "space" can be added to headphones only if you want and it is to give a little reverb feeling that helps indeed to add the "space" over the headphone

i played sometimes in my headphone 250ohms like yours and sounds ok for some profiles and not for others, fact is that over headphones sounds like if monitor cab is off, i think that is because headphones are real FRFR so they can sound more complete and different than regular studio monitors

i personally only enjoy my kemper properly when played over 12 inches speakers (stereo in fact) then it rules

but my recordings and studies over headphones and studio monitors are sounding very good too...

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Ok i kinda have to correct myself.

I just sat down and try to figure out why the headphone out of the Kemper sounded to much more appealing then the one
on the interface. the space parameter you mentioned is indeed a factor but not the actual problem here.

If i turn off any modulation or Reverb/delay in my rig they both sound the same so not the problem with the interface.
Its more the Problem that the Kemper sending you whole effects chain way more direct and louder on the headphone out
than on the spdif out...

Why is that ? how can i correct the level of intensity of reverb and delay on the outputs of the kemper ?

Quote from 808illest

You could always grab yourself a cheap little headphone amp, that should do the trick. It seems the 2i2's are inherently weak on the headphone side of it.

Sorry but cheap is the last option i wanna take into consideration.
I just got myself a 500€ interface with pretty loud headphone amps but thats basically all. They are loud but sound complete garbage.
I need a unit that sounds at least as good as the on in the kemper.

Hey guys,

I have problems to properly monitor my Kemper via Headphones and need some help here.

I'm using a Focusrite 2i2 for quite some time now and im sending my kemper into it and from there
to my Studio Monitors. This works good so far. The problems start with my headphones. I'm using high
impedance headphones with 250 ohm. The 2i2 has no chance in driving them properly. Its bus powered
so its clear where the problem is coming from.

Today i tried a way more expensive audio interface from Presonus with the hope that this would solve my
issue. But that was a big NO.
The headphone amps on the Presonus are way more powerfull so they get pretty loud but at the same time
they still sound absolutely shit. Sorry but this is not acceptable in such price range.

I tried the Presonus 1824 to be even clearer here.

Compared to the build in headphone amp of the Kemper the ones on the Presonus are complete garbage.

So what is this ? What is the magic behind the Kempers headphone output ? Why does it sound so
absolutely genius while other audio interfaces can only disappoint in that regard ?

I taught spending more Money on an Interface would provide more quality but thats just not true.

I want to be able to monitor the Kemper directly from an interface in the same quality as i'm getting from the
Kemper itself.

Can you tell me what way to go from here ? The monitoring with my Studio Monitors works ok with the 2i2
so far but my Beyerdynamic Headphones make totally clear what i'm missing in quality when not using the
Kempers Headphone Output.

Quote from Grooguit

The final deal breaker for the Helix was that the first weekend I was planning to use it, after creating several song-specific presets, I realized that I couldn't get from one song to the next because I needed two of the songs to flow together with no place for me to stop playing between. So I started editing the preset of the first song in order to add the blocks needed for the second song (with the thought of using additional snapshots) and ran out of DSP before I could add them. This is because I had built my song specific presets of base master presets that have lots of effects I'll use here and there, such as an auto swell, some ambient sounds etc. Since I often do things differently each time I use a song and may be the only guitarist, I leave my spice rack of favorites bypassed in my song presets so that I could quickly access them if I want to. Long story short, but the Helix simply couldn't organize the way I wanted to and forced me to organize in a different way than I would have wanted to. As a result, the Kemper was just simpler and keeps me more organized.

Hey i guess you needed a lot of effects there. In that case the kemper might be indeed a viable choice.
The Helix has alot of effect blocks but i can agree with you that you run out of dsp very fast. This is one of the big disappointments i had too.
Helix has a lot of power but if you do all the tone creation in the Helix itself this is often a limitating factor.

The Kemper might be more capable in creating amp sounds and still be able to do lots of effects.

Before going with the kemper for amp sounds i needed some serious DSP heavy sound modeling. with an amp block and various IRs with dedicated EQs etc.
This gets complex very fast so i often ended up using half of the effects block space only for the amp modelling itself without any other additional effects.

I used pretty basic effects routing back then so i just got it all done without running out of DSP but if you build very complex presets especially multi song presets the
Helix will let you down pretty fast. Thats a real issue with this system. So this should always be one of the biggest criteria. Make sure you can add everything you need.

Today I' only able to use everything in the Helix i need because the amp sound comes from the Kemper all ready to modulate n stuff.
If i had to model my amp in the helix too i wouldn't be able to achive this. My presets are that fully packed.

So yeah this goes to the Kemper no question.

Quote from Grooguit

I thought that the supposed advanced signal routing on the Helix would be great, but found it to be more trouble than it's worth. And the comparison of having 8 snapshots per preset to the Kemper's 2 morph states is fallacious.

The comparison is a bit apples and oranges. Consider: Instead of comparing Kemper Rigs to Helix presets, compare Kemper PERFORMANCES to Helix Presets. On the Kemper you have 5 Rigs in a performance with spillover between them and instant switching without any sort of drop off that would mar your playing to switch between song, whereas there's a terribly overt audio gap between Helix presets and zero spillover. However on the Kemper, If you've tweaked one Rig in a performance, you can copy and paste and save it to the other 4 slots in the performance in about 20 seconds without even using rig manager. From there you could tweak each one to taste, giving you the essentially same flexibility of having 5 Snapshots.

Not only that, but if you wanted to, you could swap out the amp profile and individual effects for each Rig in the performance. If you wanted to you could have 8 unique effects using the 8 pre and post effect slots and even unique amps and cabs in each of those 5 Rigs. That's equivalent to having 50 modules in the Helix, which is more than double the DSP limit of a single Helix Preset. Plus, each Rig in the performance can send midi messages to two different devices. Then if that's not enough, each of those five rigs in that performance can have two morph states which can either be instantaneous or all the inbetweens using a expression pedal or even gradual based on a number of seconds of your choice with a single stomp.

The Helix lover would reply, yeah but the Helix gives you banks of 4 or 8 presets. But these additional presets have a terrible audio gap between and no spillover. On the Kemper, if having 5 rigs in a performance times 2 morph states isn't enough, with the two midi messsages per rig isn't enough, you can always hit one button (Bank up or Down) to access the next or previous performance, but without the poor audio gap like between Helix presets.

In other words, if you'd use a single preset for a song on the Helix, you could do just as much and in fact more using a single Kemper performance for a song. (Not to discount the Helix advantage of midi messages than one could possibly need and the additional external effects loops:) If you play a set of songs using the Helix and you need to switch presets even between songs, you may run into issues if you ever do two songs seamlessly because of the audio gap. You could live in one Kemper performance for an entire set easier than you could in a single Helix preset.

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Hey mate, in general i guess you are right though your math had some weakpoints.
With the Kemper you have indeed a huge variety of sound options within a single performance and maybe more than everyone of us might really need.
Same with the Helix. You could set up a single preset to do a ton of different states and sound compositions because the snapshots enable you to do
lots of smaller and bigger adjustments. But this all gets to much into Fanboying Btw i never had any issues or gaps changing presets. Although the Helix
can't be configured to switch presets or snapshots in a way i want them to you named it with the spillover issues and there are lots of issues still in the system.
I send many feature requests to Line 6 via their ideascale platform.
I guess in the end its more a convenience thing which platform suits you more. I guess the Kemper alone could easily do most of the stuff i need with some restrictions.

Quote from JiveTurkey

I based my Helix VS. Kemper on sound alone. The Helix has a metric ton of cool features and bells and whistles; but if I can't get the tone where I want it to be; who cares? Kemper all day everday. I will echo my statements from TGP that a HelixFX (especially with updated verbs) would be AMAZING in conjunction with the Kemper as outboard FX and midi controller. The Helix drives are great and most of the other fx are good as well. I just don't like the amp modeling (and probably more specifically; their cab block as a whole). I don't like the way the Helix handles the cab portion. Whether it is included cabs or external IRs. There is a muddiness and a bluntness to it I found. I will leave the usual "user error" disclaimer in place, but that was my experience twice with the Helix.

This was basically the decision to buy me a Kemper. I spend at least 2-3 whole weeks dialing in a tone. Using the Helix Mark IV model witch at least 40 different impulse responses.
But whats the point if I want a Mark V amp sound So for me the Helix wasn't enough to get what I needed. But I think the Helix IR blocks are pretty good and overlooked by many.
You can set up millions of ways to dial in your IRs its not the plug'n'play approach. You definitely spend time with that part.
And if you compare those IR blocks with the Kempers cab sim the Kemper is losing this battle.

Because in my opinion the Kemper does a horrible job in differentiating the amp section from the cab section. And thats ok because how could the Kemper ever know what the amp
sounds like and what the cab adds to the mix. But thats where the DI profiles step in. Luckily because turning off cab sim is basically useless in my opinion. You always have
lots of cab character left in the mix.

The nice thing you can do with both units is to take a DI profile of an amp and run it through IRs on the Helix. I tried this and came to the decision to just stick to plain Amp+Cab profiles.
These sound pretty realistic although hard to dial to your individual likings. Thats an issue the Kemper definitely needs to address for upcoming generations.
The big problem with the Kemper is that it profiles a single state of the amp. And you might be able to add some lows mids or heights to the mix but this doesn't really sound good or realistic.
The Kemper should profile the EQ section of an amp as well so you can realistically dial in the amp tone. I tried so many Mark V profiles but they all sound kinda not right.

Don't get me wrong they sound good but its just like 95% good these last 5% is were you would need to profile the Amp yourself.

Quote from Janne

I haven't heard the Studio 68 but I guess it will not sound much different than the Focusrite over headphones.
From what I've seen in other discussions, the headphone amps on all budget/mid-price interfaces are mediocre, it's not a feature that potential customers are prepared to pay a higher price for...
And if the interface is supposed to be USB powered then the headphone amp will be suffering...

I have a Focusrite PRO 40 that drives my DT-250 (250ohms) great, but it's not bus bowered, but I don't like mixing on headphones anyway so I can't really compare.

To get great headphone sound I guess You'll have to get a dedicated solution like the Monitor Station.

You are right here i guess with USB powered devices we can't expect it to sound any good.
The Presonus 68 isn't USB power it has a dedicated power supply. And its spec say it can run up to 300 ohm Headphones.
What the focusrite isn't even supposed to cover.
So i think the presonus has much more to offer here. As far as i can remember I saw a test or comparison between the focusrite and presonus
where the focusrite headphone amp in particular got a lot of criticism. So i guess focusrite didn't chose any good on here.

But the big question is in what price range do I can expect any good Headphone or monitor signal quality.