Posts by guizmobro

Hey Alan, it's true that things improve dramatically as soon as I mix in some Reverb (definitely brings livelyness to the sound). Also, I noticed that I need a relative loud volume for the profiles to shine. This kind of defeats the purpose of using headphones for me, but the harsh reality seems to be "the louder, the better". I really want to try my HS8's to see if there's any noticeable difference. I most definitely am looking forward to the Kemper Kabinet though. Much more to that than the Kemper Stage Everybody seems to have forgotten the Kabinet...

Audio technica ath50 (Or something similar)

I was talking to Bert and he advised trying the Beyerdynamic dt770. He told me that the audio technica are quite heavy in the bass and low mids.

I’ll also try to use my Yamaha hs8 which are in storage right now.

Quote from Ruefus

For me, I *really* don't want to have to bend over to tweak. Nor do I want to use a software editor as a primary method of management. But that's just me.

same for me. Let’s hope that this will generate loads of cash for Kemper.

Preis anscheinend bestätigt: 1.600 EUR. Kein schlechter Preis. Die Toaster and Remotes werden auf dem Gebrauchwarenmarkt definitiv billiger werden. Ich habe vor weniger als einem Jahr diesen Preis für einen Toaster (ohne endstufe) mit Remote und Mission Engineering Expression Pedal gezahlt...

Ich würde heute aber trotzdem lieber den Toaster haben. Für zu Hause zum tweaken gefällt mir das super.

Finde es schade dass der Bildschirm nicht geupdated wurde. Das finde ich heutzutage echt ein bisschen grenzwertig für ein Produkt dieser Preiskategorie. Aber nunja, der Sound ist am wichtigsten und hier hat der Kemper die Nase vorn. Wenn man sich mal anguckt wie viele Guitar Heroes jetzt live Kemper spielen... Habe am Samstag Rammstein gesehen und der Sound war wirklich super.

Jetzt bitte schnellstmöglich ein aktives Kabinet

Für mich ist der Kemper Stage eine reine Produktadaptierung um das Bedürfnis einer relativ großen Zielgruppe zu befriedigen. Die Hardware is ja nahezu identisch. Praktisch fand ich pure Floorboard Lösungen nie, aber der Markt will es halt und das hat man bei Kemper sicher auch erkannt. Ich hoffe die verdienen damit jetzt richtig Kohle um tolle neue Produkte zu entwickeln. Den Kemper Stage betrachte ich eher als recycletes und nicht neues Produkt...

I have the feeling that my profiles generally sound a bit dull and flat. And I'm talking about commercial profiles. They sound awesome in the demo videos, and the guy demoing the profiles plays a flat eq...

Sometimes it's like there is a blanket over the loudespeaker (I mean the virtual loudespeaker as I play the Kemper through headphones).

For almost all profiles, I really have to increase definition, treble and presence quite significantly to make it sound more open and realistic. I have to say that I mainly use my neck position on the strat. The pickups are also aged, not only visually, but the magnets aren't as strong anymore (they're supposed to replicate original 61 strat pickups and they sound stellar through tube amps).

I often need to increase definition by +1 or +2 (and even more in some cases) and treble and presence around 1.8-2. Is that normal? It kind of bugs me to do such drastic changes...

Anyone else experiencing something similar?

Quote from skoczy

My guess is, that the unit is about:

- 46cm wide

- 29cm deep

- 6.5cm in height (switches are 15mm in height also)

That is quite big. There's also a picture on gearnews of a dude carrying the unit.

Happy for those who absolutely wanted a floor unit, even though I don't see the point except for competing with Fractal and Helix. Personally, I use my Kemper at home and at small gigs and I'm very happy with the Kemper sitting on my desk and my remote at my feet (at home and on stage).

It is clear that this is a pure adaptation of a product to what part of the market wants. Hardware does look exactly the same. The unit's screen is still very old school in comparison to directly competing units.

I hope that this will generate loads of cash so they can invest that in R&D for a Kemper mkii (with dual profile capacity, a nice fancy hd / retina screen showing me exactly how I eq'd my amp, 4 parallel and serial paths, at least 16 stomp / effect slots, and many more fancy stuff).

More seriously though, I'd love a real Kemper mkii, but I'm already more than happy with what I have now.

The headphone amp of the Kemper is awesome. I have a Universal Audio Arrow and when using it to track my Kemper the headphone sound is ok, but I much prefer tracking through the Kemper. So as bshaw92 and hartgtrz mentioned, feeding the interface output to the Kemper works really well.

Enjoy tonal bliss!!!

There are plenty of similar posts in this forum and people (including myself) commenting about why this machine is still as awesome sounding now as it was when it came out.

Many of the arguments have already been mentioned (regular FREE updates including new or improved effects, new OS, upcoming editor, etc.).

My 2 cents:

I bought the Kemper less than 6 months ago and I couldn't be happier. The sound quality amazes me every time.

As for your fear of option paralysis : I have to admit that when I got the device, I was overwhelmed by the sheer amount of available profiles (free ones on Rig Manager and paid ones). I bought about a dozen packs, which in retrospect maybe wasn't the smartest thing to do. After a couple of months though, I found +/- 5 profiles, which I have been using almost exclusively since then.

I would advise to use Rig Manager in order to go through the profiles and choose the ones you really like.

A thing that kind of puts a limitation to option paralysis: there's only so much you can do to change a profile... There's so much choice that it's easier (for me at least) to choose the ones I really like, make minor adjustments and go from there.

hope this helps

Quote from ColdFrixion

Undoubtedly a lot of people spend more time tweaking vs. playing because they're always searching for the ultimate tone, however that obsession is a mental thing, and if they don't learn to control their impulses, they'll end up trading an obsession twisting knobs for an obsession finding the perfect KPA profile. At some point you just have to stop questioning your tone and accept that it's good enough to start making music. If you can do that, it doesn't matter whether the gear has a million buttons or knobs.

Totally agree! I keep coming back to a handful of profiles. When I'm feeling adventurous, I try out another profile, play it a day or two and then come back to my favorite five. But the Kemper makes things very easy for me. I play more than I tweak. And if I want to change something in a profile, there are only very few tweaks needed (definition, some eq, a bit of verb and voilà).

I'm always glad when someone is happy with his or her tone device. I don't care if it's a modeling, profiling device or a real tube amp! So, enjoy!!!

About your comment on used Kemper prices: I bought mine used and paid more a less the price you mentioned. The fact that used prices are so close to the new prices might also be an indicator of the quality of the Kemper. Why should it be worth less than 2 or 3 years ago? If it still sounds great and if there is no other newer piece of kit which thanks to new technological evolutions is mucher better sounding, I really don't see why the used price should drop?

I mean, a Mesa amp isn't going to be cheaper in a couple of years just because of time passing and a new model coming out...

Imho, the fact that used prices remain high is because the quality is there and nothing better came out. For me, it just means that this 7 years old piece of technology isn't aging as quickly as other comparable devices

My personal experience: I bought mine right before NAMM this year and I was also kind of worried that they'd drop something new right after I bought mine. In the end, they just announced the editor, the new os and the kab. The former 2 being completely free and adding value to my newly bought Kemper.

When I use my Kemper, I don't feel like using old technology. It just works and sounds amazing (to my ears). The effects are absolutely brilliant. I use a UA interface and the new Reverbs on the Kemper are on par with the top notch UA Reverb plugins (Lexicon, EMT plate, etc.).

Even if the Kemper had more processing power, I honestly doubt that I would use it. I mean, I don't see myself using dual amp profiles, or extremely complex stereo effect setups. But that's me...

I'm actually happy with plugging into a 64 Deluxe Reverb, a Plexi, a nice Super Lead or a percussive Two Rock (or my all time favorite Twinkleland profile). Add some reverb, maybe a Delay and eventually some modulation effects and I'm more than happy. The Kemper can do so much more than what I need it to do.

Would I look into buying a 2nd generation Kemper? I'm not going to lie here, sure I would... But that would just be me having GAS

So I just got the Furman and sadly the issue is still there. Seems to be something very similar to your problem kylehoegen

I really don't know what to do anymore. It's clearly not the Kemper as is works fine elsewhere. Also, I have the same issue when I play through my UA Arrow with a plugin. Exactly the same interference sound as with the Kemper.

I tried to switch of all the electrical consumers I can think of, but still the same issue.

It's definitely not the guitar too, as I have the interference simply by putting my finger against the jack which is supposed to go into the guitar.

I'm really at a loss here...

I'm open to any ideas or suggestions.

I'm going to send back the Furman as I don't want to spend 200 bucks for something that doesn't solve anything...

nakedzen This is hilarious. I totally get the guy too

Hi Arkho , I'm still waiting for my power conditioner to arrive. I really do hope that it'll solve the issue. I'll post back here with my findings.

Thanks nightlight and Monkey_Man ! I will look into those. I probably will buy a used UA Arrow, which you can get for about eur 350. If I don't like it, or if I need more inputs, I can always resell without loosing too much money. Also looking at the RME Babyface pro (which has spdif). But I have to say that I'm quite tempted by the UA universe. I might as well go with the Apollo, which has an adat in.

nightlight  Monkey_Man

You both have a point. However, my reality is that I'm a living room guitar player, playing exclusively with headphones and studio monitors (right out of the Kemper). It sounds amazing.

If I want to record that amazing sound, I need to spend more than EUR 500 on an interface (I saw admins posting on this forum that interfaces in that price range are necessary to capture the Kemper's sound in all its wonderfulness).

You're advising to look into the MOTU ultralight (thanks for the tip btw), which is an 18x22 interface. Now, never say never, but there's like a 1% chance I will one day need all those ins & outs. I don't sing... I might need 2 inputs for a hardware synth once in a while and that's it. I just want to record some tracks within my Logic session with all my software instruments (omnisphere, ezkeys, ezdrummer, etc.). I don't need a gazillion ins & outs. Basically, I pretty much only would use the SPDIF in (not a reamping kind of guy, so no point in using the spdif out). It kind of seems overshoot to buy such an interface and to only use one freaking input.

I never recorded with Line6 or Fractal hardware, but I can't imagine the interface being that bad... I would be quite curious about that actually.

If you look at it, pretty much all direct competitors of Kemper do have an inbuilt interface. It's not the end of the world that the Kemper doesn't, but it still gives me a lot of headaches in terms of what to buy

The only thing I envy is the integrated audio interface. It's one less thing to buy, and one less object on the desk. I'm currently looking for an interface and it's really tough. I'd like to buy something with SPDIF as it seems a bit silly to buy such an expensive piece of hardware and not using the best possible output of the device.

I have been looking, but I couldn't find an interface that really convinced me. The headphone-amp of the 6i6 isn't great (tested that myself) and it's big. The Arturia Audiofuse kind of fits the bill (tons of ins&outs and it's small), but reviews aren't that great.

I really wish the UA Arrow would have spdif, because I love the fact that it's bus powered (one less cable) and that it's small (I like a clean desk). I'm really tempted to buy that interface and use the main xlr outs...

Anyway, to come back to my point, I guess that I'll spend around EUR 600 for the interface + quality cables. And I'll have an additional device on my desk, which I really don't like. That's a real disadvantage of the Kemper.

Great post! Personally, I have to say that I quite like the sound I get out of my headphones (Audio Technica mh-something). I also have a nice pair of Yamaha HS8 monitors, and there is a difference. However, I'm often forced to use headphones due to baby and wife (mainly wife, because the baby really digs guitar). But as I said, really happy with my headphone sound...

The Kemper actually cured my GAS. I don't feel interested at all by other gear at this moment. I also don't get why so many people absolutely want a floorboard version. But I'm a living / bedroom musician and like to interact with the Kemper using my hands. This is also why I'm not super excited about the upcoming editor. I have the remote as well, which is fun for looping and playing an entire song without needing to stop. I guess that a floorboard version is more interesting for gigging musicians. Whatever makes people happy I guess...