Hi All,
I'm on 3.3 and was thinking about going to 4.0.6, but to be honest I'm not interested in the morphing feature.
Aside from some big fixes, etc., is there any sonic difference between the 2 releases? With the 2.X to 3.X update we got Pure Cab and other things with a substantial difference in sound, but if 4.0.6 sounds the same as 3.3, I may not update any time soon.
Sorry if this has been asked, I could not find it with my searches.
Griff
Well, got home from the gig and though, "I'll turn it on and just see..."
Sure enough, worked just fine. Restored it from backup, all seems just fine.
It does appear that odd things happen when I connect to the Rig Manager once in a while (strange noises, etc.) But this is the strangest thing I've ever seen. Usually it's nothing that makes it unusable for more than a few seconds.
In any event, seems to work fine now and I guess I'll call off the dogs.
Well, turns out that the post I read didn't mention turning the unit to the tuner position and not just any "on" position. I heard back from support almost immediately (within just a few hours) with that detail included.
I was able to init flash but, unfortunately, it's down for the count. No more signal is coming through, I think the popping sound I was hearing before was something on its last leg.
So I've written support back about repair. This will be interesting to see how long it takes to get the unit repaired. It is just over a year old so I suspect out of warranty at this point.
Griff
I wish it was, that I would know how to handle. This is when standing alone after several reboots. And the fact that I see no lights on the input whether I plug into the front panel input or the alternate input in the back makes me wonder.
Fortunately I have a backup toaster for today's gig - that's why I always have 2 of everything!
You should contact support to ask for the right procedure
I have done that, was just hoping to get a faster answer here. Thanks Ingolf.
For some reason my KPA Rack quit working in that all I hear are loud clicks and pops out of it. With the guitar plugged in I get no lights on the input and no sound at all.
I had just hooked it up to rig manager to copy a couple of rigs around, and am wondering if I got into some sort of state, as opposed to it being a hardware issue.
So my thought was to do a factory system reset - wipe it completely clean - and restore in pieces from backup.
However, when I did the "hold system key while turning it on" thing, it didn't wipe it clean of all the rigs and performances.
Then I tried holding down soft button 1 (the left one above the display) while turning it on, as I've read, and that did nothing at all.
I'm on firmware 3.3.11... whatever the release version is.
How do I reset this thing to determine if it's hardware or software related?
I've been working a lot with direct (no cab) profiles of my own gear lately running them through a matrix power amp and then through my guitar cabs.
I've found that when I dial up an amp (I have several very nice high end amps I've collected over the years) through a cab the way I like it, then profile just the amp (no cab, direct profile) and then run the KPA profile through the matrix power into the guitar cab I cannot tell a difference from the original amp... it's as perfect as my ears can perceive.
What I wonder about, however, is if the same is true for your profiles because they are all studio profiles and not merged - meaning that a little of the amp gets into the cab block and a little of the cab gets into the amp. The separation is not perfect and I've read about it in other places here on the forum (as well as experiencing it myself.)
So I wonder if you'd get better results using a direct profile through your cab as opposed to a studio profile with the cab block turned off?
Merged Rigs offer an option you might prefer - the Main Output send to the PA includes a mic and cabinet, and the Monitor Output send to a linear power amp and guitar cabinet does not include a mic.
Absolutely, and there are times when I do that as well. But it seemed the OP was using IEMs for reference (I also have the 215s...but I upgraded to the 535 and it really made a world of difference.)
Which does bring up a big point - I reference through my 535s (which really are light years more accurate than the 215s) Atomic CLRs, and QSC K10s or K12s, along with potentially my studio monitors (Presonus Eris.)
It's AMAZING how often I think I've got something dialed in on one listening environment and then I notice something really glaring on another. When I fix the problem and go back, I realize I never really noticed it there.
I guess it's kind of like listening to mixes on multiple sets of speakers... some will point out things you might not catch in other places.
That's just my experience, of course, and I've gotten a lot better at judging what my profiles sound like just from the CLR or just from my 535s... but that's taken a really long time and a lot of trial and error.
Tried it again with my shure se215. Now, i've got more high end clarity obviously. But not as major a mid push as i experienced on the PA.
Maybe we could try a different method. I'll be in our rehearsal room on Sunday. Could anyone tell me a profile of either a Mesa Mark 4/5, 5150, or Bogner XTC/Shiva which they really like played direct? I'll then use those and relisten. Maybe i just need to reset my expectations coming from years of playing through a 4x12 cab...
That is a big part of the equation with the KPA in my experience...
For me, there is no way to get a rig that sounds great through the FOH and also sounds like a real cab to me. Don't misunderstand, I don't mean that to be a bad thing, but when I listen to my amp through my 4x12 there is no mic involved - it's cab to ears and it's just different, not better or worse.
After some time, you'll get used to hearing your tones "mix ready." But it does take some getting used to.
While that's not really news to those of us who have used the KPA for a long time... you bring up something I've been working with for the past few weeks.
Admittedly, merged profiles (profiling the amp and cab separately) don't sound exactly the same as their studio profile counterparts, but I've found I can work around the subtle differences with slight adjustments inside the KPA after the fact.
So lately I've been working more on profiling just an amp using my Torpedo Live as a load to take the signal back to the KPA. I still have the speaker hooked up while doing it so I dial in the sound the way I like it, profile just the head, then to test my profile I run the profile through a Matrix power amp back into the same cabinet to make sure it's the same - it is always identical, I can't tell the difference.
For me, this means I now have a profile of just an amp which I'm finding is a little more useful in the long run. For sessions I run it into the computer and use the Torpedo WOS plugin or some IRs to find the tone I want - but I'm able to go through several cabs and choose what works best.
For live, I run the KPA through the Matrix into a real cab and get the feel of my amp at a controllable volume, and I can either fly in a cab IR to run FOH or mic the real cab, my choice at that point.
For the most part, I use IR's for this process and I'm also making IRs of my cabs to suit my tastes. But separating the amp profiling from the cab profiling/IR capturing has really helped for my use.
I read somewhere recently that back catalog sales last year for the first time ever beat new release sales...
I think that speaks volumes to the quality of music now. I'm middle-aged (44) so growing up and turning on the "oldies" radio station was obvious because the sound was poor. That music was recorded in the 1940's - 1960's.
When my kids turn on the oldies station and hear Van Halen or AC/DC, they don't know it's 30 year old music because it doesn't sound appreciably "worse" in quality to them. It's a level playing field.
So teenagers and young adults today might be just as likely to want to purchase something from a band that is 30 or 40 years old as they are to want to purchase something made in the last 4 years... that's where streaming services do have an advantage. And the way I see it, streaming services like spotify or whatever apple is calling theirs is simply the new radio. Royalties will be low but something is always better than nothing.
Personally, I'm excited to see new artists emerge with new ways of monetizing their music. I don't think it's wise to either rely on the old model, or even care too much about it. If you make your music (which "anyone" can do now,) and get it into the hands of your music buyer directly (which can also be done fairly easily these days,) then the industry won't mean much to you one way or the other.
Keep in touch with your fans, let them know what you're doing, and build that bond. People will always want to bond with people, not industry. That's the way people are made and I don't believe it will ever change. Artists like Rush and Metallica knew this back in the 80's when they couldn't get played on the radio to save their lives. They persisted and connected with fans and those fans followed them until they created their own mainstream. I don't know who will do that now, but it will be fun to watch.
I've asked for an additional Studio EQ in the stack section before a long time ago (along with other folks) but your idea of some sort of "baking in" feature sounds better and would accomplish exactly what I want.
Sometimes you get a good profile except that one little frequency that you don't realize is bugging you until 2 weeks later - it seems a shame to have to use the X slot just for that... and sometimes the rotary eq controls are simply too broad to fix the problem.
So +1 on this one!
As a sound man my experience is that it depends. If you're going from a tweed combo to a dual rectifier the sound man has little option but to put you in a pretty small sound space if it's a big band.
If it's a 4 piece where there's not a lot of competition it won't matter much.
That being said, you do have a lot of variety to play with as long as your levels are pretty consistent.
Thanks everyone. I recorded the gig last time when I used them but haven't had a chance to mix any clips. I hope you can make some music with them.
Sorry, looks like it mangled my link:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/9kk9…-Egnater-Profiles-All.zip
Hopefully that works better.
Profiling this amp is pretty much the reason I bought the KPA 2 or 3 years ago... but it's been a challenge.
First, these amps are now pretty old (this is a pre-rocktron one) and if there are issues (as mine had) getting them fixed is difficult. I finally got Dave Friedman to go through it and get it working well again... then I found a set of NOS Winged "C" tubes for it and all of a sudden it was back to life.
But then came the task of really capturing the sound the way it really is, which is no small feat either. I've collected mics, preamps, and made many attempts - all of which were just not quite right.
I've learned a TON in this process and now feel very confident profiling some of my other amps going forward, but for now I'm just going to enjoy this one.
I did my first gig with it a couple of nights ago and could not be happier. Out front it sat in the mix great, and I was inspired to play all night long. In fact, when I got home I put the headphones on and played some more.
I did hi pass and do a little mid-range cut for the front of house mix to fit in with the band (it's an 8 piece band and it's not always guitar driven so I have to fit in.) Your results may vary and in a trio or 4 piece I probably would not have touched the EQ.
I have 2 sets of profiles:
Those with "5" are a combination of a 57 and Fathead II, and a TUL FET47. I spent hours getting the mic placement right to avoid phase and get the best sound. I little EQ was applied, of course, to remove low-mid rumble.
Those with "6" are my TUL G12 mic alone. And to be honest after the gig where I tried both, I like the G12 stuff better. That mic is dead easy to use and with a little hi pass and low mid dip you really don't have to do anything else.
The settings on the amp were the same for both mic combinations, so I did a direct set that all end in D- as well.
These amps have many switches - on the clean channel (channel 1) there is a Bright switch that can be 0, 1, or 2. So you'll see channel 1 with B0, B1, or B2 after it.
Channels 3 and 4 have a mid switch "Vintage," "Modern 1," and "Modern 2" so you'll see VN, M1, or M2 respectively for both channels 3 and 4.
I finally now don't have to worry if this amp goes down again because I finally feel like I've captured this amp the way it was meant to sound. And while I haven't changed the profiles since I made them, I've played with them enough to know that subtle changes in the mids and highs can alter the sounds for various guitars and styles of music easily.
In fact, currently I'm digging channel 2 with a touch more gain as my blues tone over my Two Rock Emerald Pro - but that's my next profile so we'll see how long that lasts.
Anyway, here's a link to a ZIP of all of it. I hope you can make some great music from these.
https://www.dropbox.com/s/ya27qpe4gu9df1g/G3 Egnater TOL Profiles All.zip
Griff
first of all there is no 'trick' needed to get accurate high gain profiles, in fact even refining isn't mandatory.
to make things simpler I would advise to use a mic directly into the Profiler, no preamp.
When you say 'phasey' I immediately think there are two signals present in your daw, resulting in comb filtering.
If that were the case, the same rig with the other head would have exhibited the same symptom and it did not.
get what you're saying, but I can assure you that's not the issue. It's not a phase cancellation sound I just don't know how else to describe it. In any event I'll try and get some time later this week to try again.
Hi Guys, thanks for the input... I see I forgot to mention a couple of things.
I've had this happen in 2 case, one in which I was micing a cab in the other room with a single TUL G12 mic, the 2nd going through my Torpedo WOS Plugin. In both cases I'm monitoring on my Presonus Eris 8 monitors, Atomic CLR monitors, and my Shure 535 IEMs just so I'm sure of what I'm hearing.
In the case where I was micing the cab, I also profiled my egnater with the same setup and it worked like a champ, the only variable was the amp head.
I did have my clean and distortion sense lower because I was using my Les Paul and was hitting the red on both input and output lights. Maybe that's the culprit.. though again it didn't seem to be an issue for the Egnater which is no slouch in the gain department either, just not like that beast of a 5150.
I'll play around some more and see what I can discover. I'll put the clean and distortion sense back to 0 and use a guitar with lower output and see if that helps. Thanks.
I've been trying for the last couple of days to profile my 5150 III 100S and have had a terrible time trying to get an accurate profile.
I'm running the head into a 4x12 loaded with Greenback RI speakers (an old Egnater cab from the days before Rocktron and their modern offerings) and I've tried a variety of mics through a Chandler TG2 preamp or straight into my Roland-Octa Capture.
Interestingly, I was able to get some great profiles of my Egnater TOL100 (which I'll be testing, tweaking and sharing soon if they sound as good at the gig as they do at home) even on the highest gain settings... but even at the highest gain settings on that amp, it cannot compare to the gain that 5150 will put out... it's a beast.
With every scenario I tried (with the 5150,) the resulting profile had considerably more high end content and a somewhat "phasey" character to it. The low end and more scooped mids of the 5150 just weren't there.
I tried "refining" several times and played dozens of chords for several minutes. And while it got closer, it just never got there.
So I guess this question is for you guys that have done these super high gain profiles... what's the trick to getting them to come out right?
I have to agree with many that my KPA is way more reliable than my tube amps ever were. I have a 2nd one that I've never had to use and I've been using it for about 2-3 years now as well.
That being said, it is true that tube amps have the benefit of (usually) a part swap will fix it. If it's a tube, or a fuse, or maybe a loose connection somewhere it's user serviceable on the gig.
For most digital devices, if one little part fails the whole thing is down and you're not going to get it working again in the field.
Before I had my 2nd KPA, I had an old Boss GT8 as a backup. It wouldn't have been awesome, but it would have gotten me through had I ever needed it. If I had to do it again I'd build something around a little FlyRig 5 and have a serviceable backup for the price of a good set of tubes.
