Posts by MacOSatch

- Fender Stratocaster Clapton CS (Vintage Noiseless-Set, booster, tbx)
- Gibson Axcess (Häussel 59 neck, Gibson 498T bridge)
- Fender Stratocaster Jim Root (Bare Knuckle Nailbomb Set)
- Ibanez JS1000 (Dimarzio PAF Pro neck, Seymour Duncan JB-4 bridge)

I can report only positive things about gigging with Kemper Powerhead. I started to use it live (after recording, home, rehearsal) few weeks ago and it works extremely well. I am going direct to FOH and use Matrix NL12 for stage monitoring. Controlled with Liquid Foot 12+.

Yesterday night, the tech of the venue saw/heard the Kemper for the first time – he did not know anything about it.
After the show – yes, this is one of this stories – he meant that this was the best sound (ok, perhaps he meant one of the best sounds) he heard, it sounded clear, full and fat, with good bottom end. Then he meant he had experience with the frac... but Kemper sounds for him way better. Of course, the reason could be the profiles I use, but a great portion IMHO is that is very easy to achieve a good sound with Kemper. He was surprised how big NL12 sounds too.

So, that is only one opinion from one tech, but it is a nice one and gave me some safety and confidence how to choose (I do not tweak a lot) the profiles.
Especially because we had a excellent sound as a band, so it seems he understands his job.
This profiles I find first at home with the headphones – I was looking for clear, not boomy/bassy profiles they sit good in the mix – and than tested them recorded (we record the rehearsal with Zoom R16), at the rehearsal through NL12 and some other normal guitar cabs.

The profiles that I use (we play some sort of hardrock/metal/punk):
- clean: some factory fender clean + chorus + delay + reverb
- main rhythm sound (70% of the time for sure): factory Tills JVM 2 Mics 2
- lead sound 1 (for some over the verse lines, not very cutting through the mix, but I want it so for this purpose): TAF Satriani JVM OD2
- main lead sound: TAF Diezel VH4 Solo

Solo sounds have Don Petersen (thanks again) delay on (with longer about 400ms delay time)

After few months now, I am still very, very satisfied with the Kemper and I think I never played more, because Kemper "calls" me to play all the time

I ordered it with prepay-option (top of the waiting list) few weeks ago, and it was shipped the next day

I would check:
- clean sense (input)
- compressor settings (if output turn red when you hit hard)

Quote

"You mention that the expression pedal (Roland FV500L) did not work well on the Midimate. How did it behave ? Blind spots while activating the pedal or something else.?"

so, the volume swell and wah operation were not smooth, stepless.

Quote

What are the build quality of the switches on the MidiMate ?

I would say very well and durable (I had Midi Mate for years, never had a issue), but I do not like the feel of them. Better to say, lack of feel.
I like the classic metal buttons much more.

The connection between Midi Mate and Kemper is monodirectional, so Midi Mate send the commands to Kemper.
You need to save the stomp states in Midi Mate presets and they will activate/deactivate the stomps in Kemper. If you manually change the state of the stomp on Kemper, that will not be automatically replicated in Midi Mate.

So the setting could be (I think you want it so):
first row: 5 presets
upper row: 5 effects from Kemper (via midi cc#) – eg.
- Stomp A
- Stomp B
- Mod
- Delay
- Tap Tempo

examples:
Preset 1: Profile PC (Midi Program Change) 10 / Stomp A ON / Stomp B OFF / mod OFF / delay ON / Tap Tempo
Preset 2: Profile PC 21 / Stomp A OFF / Stomp B OFF / mod OFF / delay ON / Tap Tempo
...

It is important to say, that you can not change "stomp-mapping" per preset in Midi Mate eg. in Preset 1 you want to have in upper row Stomp A/Stomp B/mod/delay/tap, but in Preset 2 Stomp C/Stomp D/mod/delay/reverb. The mapping is fix for all presets.

In some way, I could not use the first preset in the first bank in midi mate (number 0). I think because 1 send pc0, 2 pc1 etc.

And the expression pedal (Roland 500L) did not work well connected to midi mate, but very well connected direct to Kemper.

1.-3. You can try the Powerhead with your Mesa cab first.
I use Kemper so at a rehearsal and it sounds and feels like a tube amp – fat, punchy sound, feedback, everything as usual.
It is more as enough power to play with acoustic drummer (we play some sort of metalcore and my master volume is on 5,5 by poweramp boost +3dB).

4. No worry, they are in comparison to G-System (I had one) very good, and very easy to dial.

5. I use Liquid Foot 12+ with Mission Pedal for Switch/Wah/Volume, but it is pretty expensive. #No experience with Behringer, I hear only a lot o good things about it.

So, I would (as I did already order the Kemper first, then check it with your cab and the g-system – connect it as normal guitar head.
For me that simply worked! It felt so good and sounded awesome (with factory profiles :-). If you like it, then try to replace your g-system with Kemper effects – this task could take some more time (depends how intensive you use the effects). And when you are satisfied you can order some FRFR an check it, if you do not like the feeling of FRFR, you can always use your cab or buy (as I did some Matrix NL12 light weight cab.

Perhaps silly, but did you try to turn input noise gate down?

THANKS A LOT!

I would like to have different profiles of the global settings, such network-profiles on computer.
I use Kemper in different situation and must change few parameters every time I change the environment.
Here are some examples, to illustrate what I mean:

gig

• Master Out Mono
• Power Amp ON
• Power Amp Boost 3dB
• Space for Master Out Off
• Master Out EQ - neutral
• Master Out Master Link Off
• Master Out -20 dB
• ...

rehearsal

• Master Out Mono
• Power Amp ON
• Power Amp Boost 3dB
• Space for Master Out Off
• Master Out EQ - 0.5, 0, 0, 1
• Master Out Master Link Off
• Master Out -20 dB
• Monitor Out EQ - 0, 0, 0, -1
• ...

playing at home with another guitar cab/studio monitors

• Master Out Stereo
• Power Amp ON
• Power Amp Boost 0dB
• Space for Master Out On
• Master Out EQ - neutral
• Master Out Master Link On
• Monitor Out EQ - neutral
• ...

recording

• Master Out Stereo
• Power Amp Off
• Power Amp Boost 0dB
• Space for Master Out Off
• Master Out EQ - neutral
• Master Out Master Link Off
• Master Out -6 dB
• Monitor Out EQ - neutral
• SPDIF Guitar/Stack

playing at home through headphones

• Master Out Stereo
• Power Amp Off
• Power Amp Boost 0dB
• Space for Master Out On
• Master Out EQ - neutral
• Master Out Master Link On
• Monitor Out EQ - neutral
• SPDIF Stereo

look at kleinanzeigen.ebay.de

thanks! awesome!

Quote from tylerhb

Can you provide me with some details? Are you trying to use the Chimera profiles with rig manager? Or do you have problems getting them to your KPA via USB?

The cab files can´t be used in rig manager because it RM only handles rigs, and not cab files.

Hello, I can use them in Kemper, no problem. I made a fw-update, the rigs remains
What did not work is:
- I use Mac with Parallels/Win 7
- I wanted to copy the Chimera Pack from disk to Rig Manager (whole folder, than single rigs) but it does not work
- I tried to copy the cabs too, does not work

same here, I can not load the Chimera Pack

I am on the same way (powerhead + NL12) too. Sound very good in the band mix, sort of PA-ish, very clear.
I turn the presence in the monitor eq a bit down (-1 dB), sounds better to me. Enough loud with acoustic drumms.
I use the Deeflexx Aura with the cab, works very well!

I like very much how Powerhead sounds with the normal guitar cab. I played it with few different cabs, and of course the cabs color the sound, but it sounds always good. (Diezel Oversized RL closed 2 x Mesa V30, Koch RL closed 2 x Mesa V30, Custom Audio FL closed 2 x 12 - Mesa V30 + Creamback).

At the rehearsal volume level I prefer the NL12 – clear, sit well in the mix, at home a guitar cab – more "normal" sound, woodier, but NL12 sounds good too.

You can hear/see what sort of music we play: http://www.groundcollapse.com

Did you take a look on Bare Knuckle Homepage?

I really like Gibson 498T in my Axcess, and as Gary_W wrote, tweak a pickup height first

It is important that you have only one FX Loop in your rig and that need to be on X!
Because if you have a Fx Loop in A-D and in X, Kemper take always only the first one!

Then check that X is ON and push LOCK. So it will be ON in all your rigs.

perhaps is 7.2. sold out already?

Short update: I successfully "migrated" almost my whole pedal board to Kemper Effects, so I am using only Eventide H9 in the Loop and it works very well. I need it only for some presets that I could not (easily) translate to Kemper.