Question about EQ position in a rig

Before amp: you change the sound of the mic of your guitar, not the sound of the amp.

In the x-slot, you change the sound of everything before the eq.

It s normal.

Delay and reverb slots in "effect" are fix.
You have 2 others slots (x-mod and the other) to put/make what you want

Don't forget the eq in "amp section"

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Quote from warlus1

Before amp: you change the sound of the mic of your guitar, not the sound of the amp.

In the x-slot, you change the sound of everything before the eq.

It s normal.

Is this true? I never thought of it this way, but it makes sense.

Quote from db9091

Is this true? I never thought of it this way, but it makes sense.

Actually it's not entirely true. EQ before an amp changes the character of the distortion of the amp (preamp EQ) whereas EQ post amp is the classical EQ with the possibility to drastically alter the sound

Ingolf is right. EQ before the gain stages is similar to changing pickups or using a treble booster / tube screamer. When using a clean tone the effect is way higher compared to using a hi gain sound. This is due to the fact the gain stages apply a huge amount of compression. The tonal differences get flattened the more gain you use.

If you change something before the preamp section, and want to check for the impact on the sound, always check with a clean tone, even if you are a hi gain only player. In most cases, the impact gets way more audible this way.

Quote from tylerhb

Ingolf is right. EQ before the gain stages is similar to changing pickups or using a treble booster / tube screamer. When using a clean tone the effect is way higher compared to using a hi gain sound. This is due to the fact the gain stages apply a huge amount of compression. The tonal differences get flattened the more gain you use.

If you change something before the preamp section, and want to check for the impact on the sound, always check with a clean tone, even if you are a hi gain only player. In most cases, the impact gets way more audible this way.

This was well put n' said.

I've thought only the pre- vs. post- gain stage difference, but this "tube's EQ headroom" makes sense also and explains some experiences rather well (like wah effect might be less effective with hi(gher) gain sounds).

Mic of your guitar = pickup.... It s what i say

Well, actually not only the preamp section, but (potentially) also poweramp breakup, speaker interaction, all that jazz That's probably much less so than the effect from the preamp, though. But yeah, basically, you are pushing certain frequencies more toward clipping, compression etc. I don't know much about it but stuff like sagging I guess would also be affected.

They are two different purposes. As has been said, the EQ pre-stack influences which frequencies (or how much of these frequencies) drive clipping. Whereas EQ after the stack should be transparent.

For instance, I could imagine boosting the bass frequencies +10db before the amp and reducing them -10db after could result in some heavy chugging sounds, whereas the other way around could result in a much cleaner bass.

Experiment!

Think of it as input shaping and output shaping. You would use it in front to change the character of the signal hitting the amplifier, while in the post position, it would sculpt the frequencies of the resultant tone after amp. As mentioned, don't forget about the EQ in the amp block as a way to better tailor your sound.

My only issue with the pitch effects is that the transpose function isn't a switchable global setting for Input. If I need to transpose something, I probably need to transpose everything because of playing with someone who's tuned down a half step or a step ...

Not necessarily, there are some songs I perform by transposing the tune.
Of course you might lock the transpose in a slot, but this would most probably mess up some of your rigs...

Quote from RobAntila

The more I mess around with the kemper, the more I am liking it...I always found manuals vague in informing me on how to do what i want to achieve a certain sound..I really haven't spent a lot of time with it because I'm at work most of the time, but you guys are extremely helpful and I thank you all. I still don't care for the pitch shift at all...I am going to put my G Major in the loop to cure that problem.

Speaking of FX position in a rig:

Transpose will sound the most natural in Slot A.

Harmony pitch FX will sound the most natural in the X or MOD slot.

Quote from RobAntila

The more I mess around with the kemper, the more I am liking it...I always found manuals vague in informing me on how to do what i want to achieve a certain sound..I really haven't spent a lot of time with it because I'm at work most of the time, but you guys are extremely helpful and I thank you all. I still don't care for the pitch shift at all...I am going to put my G Major in the loop to cure that problem.

Surprised you don't like the pitch shift. Some users have even remarked that it tracks better than dedicated Eventide units. I find it excellent and there's minimal latency too.