About to order my Kemper, need help with signal chain and rig setup before I buy

    Greetings Kemper forum.


    As soon as bitcoin breaks the 4000€ limit I will buy myself the kemper I have been wanting for 2 years now. However, I have some doubts on how to set it up so here is my current plan:


    Guitar -> kemper -> audio interface via SPDIF -> Computer via USB3 -> Reaper -> sound out of the monitors


    ^^ Would this set up work or not, will there be latency? Any ideas for a good (and cheap) audio interface for home recording purpose? Active or passive monitors? Will any expression pedal work with kemper?
    My budget is between 2500-3000€ and I'm not sure whether to buy the powered or the unpowered version (what are the benefits). I will probably want the footswitch and the toaster instead of the rackthing. I will be buying everything I need (kemper, the interface, the monitors) from thomann.de.


    So, a little help for the newbie? :)

    Edited once, last by Nahjus: Forgot the expression pedal. ().

    1. The interface should have "direct monitoring" so you don't need to have the guitar sound run through the computer for monitoring. Most interfaces do have this "direct monitoring".


    2. The powered version (imho) makes sense only if you plan to gig through a guitar cab. Keep in mind that the Profiler's poweramp is mono so it will be of no use e.g. to monitor through (passive) stereo speakers.


    3. For home use it's very convenient to have active speakers (again, imho). No need to find a place where you put the poweramp, no troubles with picking up noise through speaker cables. In addition, if you fancy to listen LOUD sometimes, you can still add a Yamaha DXR10 to your arsenal and seriously hurt your ears. :D


    4. For this budget I think you can get a nice setup:
    Kemper Profiler: 1695 Euros
    Yamaha HS-8 speakers (pair):: 482 Euros
    Yamaha DXR10: 488 Euros
    ____________________________________
    Total: 2665 Euros


    So there's enough money left to get a few cables and maybe a few commercial profiles as well.


    PS: Oops, forgot about the audio interface but I'm sure you'll manage that, hehe

    Thanks for the comprehensive answer! Just a couple of dumb questions for clarity... Direct monitoring basically means that simultaneously as the sound goes into reaper it plays the sound through different cable (that comes straight from the kemper) out of the monitors? Can you also clarify the signal being mono, I mean, I know what mono means but the sound is still gonna come from the left and right speakers right? (and why would the active speakers be better for this?)
    Despite almost 8 years of guitar experience this makes me feel really dumb


    Also would be great if other people could also post their suggestions and opinions!

    Direct monitoring in a nutshell means that your audio interface can playback (send) the input signals directly to its Main Outputs. So basically you can monitor e.g. a backing track from your PC and at the same time play the guitar over it with no extra latency. Typically these interfaces have a built-in mixer. Either very simple by just one knob right on the interface or in bigger interfaces via a mixer control software that allows you to make use of the interface's mixing and routing features.


    Long story short, you hookup your monitor speakers to the audio interface and you can listen everything.


    Regarding the other question:
    The poweramp in the Profiler is a high powered single channel amp. You just don't want to use that for regular (passive) home or studio monitor speakers. You only want to use this poweramp if you either power e.g. a guitar cab or another cab like a passive stage monitor or FRFR PA speaker.

    @Nahjus, don't forget to include the interface into the calculation if you want to record yourself into Reaper :)


    I use a simple Scarlett 2i4 from Focusrite. It is OK for my needs - though it has no SPDIF. So if you want SPDIF you would have to go with the version 6i6.

    Quote from lightbox

    Direct monitoring in a nutshell means that your audio interface can playback (send) the input signals directly to its Main Outputs. So basically you can monitor e.g. a backing track from your PC and at the same time play the guitar over it with no extra latency. Typically these interfaces have a built-in mixer. Either very simple by just one knob right on the interface or in bigger interfaces via a mixer control software that allows you to make use of the interface's mixing and routing features.


    Long story short, you hookup your monitor speakers to the audio interface and you can listen everything.


    Regarding the other question:
    The poweramp in the Profiler is a high powered single channel amp. You just don't want to use that for regular (passive) home or studio monitor speakers. You only want to use this poweramp if you either power e.g. a guitar cab or another cab like a passive stage monitor or FRFR PA speaker.

    Hmm.. but wasn't the kemper you suggested the unpowered one? Do both of them have "a high powered single channel amp" in them? Or am I just confused :D

    Quote from Ksawery

    @Nahjus, don't forget to include the interface into the calculation if you want to record yourself into Reaper :)


    I use a simple Scarlett 2i4 from Focusrite. It is OK for my needs - though it has no SPDIF. So if you want SPDIF you would have to go with the version 6i6.

    Yeah this I of course must not forget. The Yamaha DRX10 is optional I think as long as I have the other monitors so that gives more budget for the interface. I've heard good things about focusrite so I will check them out. Scarlett 6i6 seems to only have usb2.0 output... I wonder if it will be enough?

    Quote from Nahjus

    Scarlett 6i6 seems to only have usb2.0 output... I wonder if it will be enough?

    If you prefer firewire look at the Saffire Pro series (i.e. Saffire Pro 24). I do not see those @Thomann though.



    Quote from Nahjus

    Can you also clarify the signal being mono, I mean, I know what mono means but the sound is still gonna come from the left and right speakers right? (and why would the active speakers be better for this?)

    The signal out of the Kemper is stereo (left + right) which allows you to use stereo fx (i.e. a stereo delay). So you can direct this stereo (left + right) signal to a set of powered FRFR cabs or to your active monitors via your interface for example. In either case you need an external power solution.


    The powered out of the Powered Kemper on the other hand is mono (the amp has one channel). So if you hook up the Kemper via the powered out to a guitar box for example you will not be able to run your fx in stereo. If the stereo feature is important to you, maybe an Unpowered Kemper + a separate 2 channel power amp (like the Rocktron Velocity 300) would be a better option for you.

    Edited once, last by Ksawery ().

    @Ksawery FX in stereo I think is irrelevant since I'm going to be manually double tracking anyway. Judging from this I should probably get the unpowered version or is there a clear advantage to the powered one?

    Quote from Dean_R

    What lightbox suggested, for your situation is perfect the way I see it. Except that you might not even need the DRX10 if you don't plan on gigging in the short term.
    Regarding the audio interlace, I would go with anything USB 2 or USB3. Don't get involved into the latency thing and simply use direct monitoring.


    The main reason to achieve low latency is if you want to record while monitoring / hearing the software audio plugins. The Kemper setup flexibility allows you to record the dry signal while you can hear the wet signal from the Kemper effects. The Kemper effects are more than adequate and since hardly anyone records the wet signal, you should be fine with direct monitoring while using the KPA effects. Any of the the focusrite with SPDIF should be a good choice, however, make sure you get their second generation most recently released. USB I believe is much better than firewire because just in case you run into any issues, you can test or try it with virtually any computer as they all have usb.

    @Dean_R This makes sense to me. This is gonna sound like a dumb question but how do I "wet" the dry signal afterwards? As a bit of context I am currently using line6 pod ux2 and pod farm 2.5 and I just record straight into reaper and monitor from my speakers at the same time. I haven't noticed any latency problems with it though.

    There is no reason to look specifically for USB3 audio-interfaces for this purpose unless your computer or operating system favours USB3 over USB2 in some way. While USB3 offer superior bandwidth and thus can carry more concurrent signals there is no difference in terms of latency. USB2 can carry many more channels than the smaller audio-interfaces have even at the highest of sample-rates. Most gear is probably moving to USB3 in the years to come, but at this time you will only find USB3 on some of the most recent higher-end interfaces with many channels.


    Make sure your audio-interface support hardware-monitoring. I.e that it is able to pass the signal being recorded directly to the monitors so that you avoid the latency added by passing the signal to the computer and back. With current computer hardware latency is not a huge issue anymore unless you're working on a large project using many tracks with lots of audio-processing, but it doesn't hurt to be prepared for that situation.

    Hi,
    I have the same setup as you want. It"s working very well.


    Regards Petr

    Music isn't sport :)
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