Would an external preamp improve the quality of the profile?

    Hey guys,


    Just got my KPA a few weeks ago and so far I've been thoroughly enjoying the profiles I've tried from other users. However, over the next week or so I plan to profile a couple of my amps. Are most people using the built in mic preamp in the Kemper when taking their profiles? And would there be a significant improvement with a higher end pre...something like a Great River ME-1NV which I currently have?


    Of course, I know I need to try it for myself. But this question is purely for discussion purposes until I actually have a chance to compare the two. Anyone using an external pre with the KPA?

    I use the pres on my Apogee Ensemble to boost the signal going into the KPA. The KPA doesn't seem to have a pre on it's input, just a software based gain but i find it results in a much higher noise floor than using an external pre to boost the signal when you're not profiling an amp at really painfully loud volumes, so that's why I use the Apogee's pre, the results come in sounding a lot smoother, and I also like to use a couple of mics that require phantom power so it works out (there's no phantom on the KPA).

    Quote from viabcroce

    The higher noise in itself will not affect the final result tho, nor it will result in a more noisy profile :)


    Actually not true, I was surprised by this as well as given that it's just an amp sim you'd expect all the bg noise to drop out once the profiling is done, but too much noise and the KPA can't profile (it'll come up with an error), and in fact I've had Christoph even comment on how noisy a profile was that I made prior to using the external preamp. The final profile you get does remove at least some of the noise after you store it, but it seems to treat it almost as a part of the distortion if it's too high and if nothing else that skews the result.


    In fact you can hear in many of the user profiles variance in noise floor even with similar gain settings (I always leave the noise gate off), which I assume is down to the cab section pushing certain noticeably noisy frequencies on those profiles.

    Edited once, last by Per ().

    Quote from Per


    Actually not true, I was surprised by this as well as given that it's just an amp sim you'd expect all the bg noise to drop out once the profiling is done, but too much noise and the KPA can't profile (it'll come up with an error), and in fact I've had Christoph even comment on how noisy a profile was that I made prior to using the external preamp. The final profile you get does remove at least some of the noise after you store it, but it seems to treat it almost as a part of the distortion if it's too high and if nothing else that skews the result.


    In fact you can hear in many of the user profiles variance in noise floor even with similar gain settings (I always leave the noise gate off), which I assume is down to the cab section pushing certain noticeably noisy frequencies on those profiles.


    I may correct you in certain points:


    - The Profilers Return Input has an analog switching gain.
    - The noise floor of a rig is soon driven by input noise, at crunch and highgain settings.
    - Noise on the post-microphone path will never (!) influence the profile.
    - When a profile fails due to noise, then it's a high gain profile amplifying noise and hum at the input.