I think I understand why there seems to only be a war between Line 6 & Neural, specifically even though other amps have always existed. They are both trying to maintain a quad cortex.

You'd be right in paid marketing going against it's competitor, being wrong. You would need a 3rd party, he even says himself these tests are deceptive so why should we trust his test if he's paid by one of them?

 

Very important data. I almost forgot. As direct competence as it gets. I guess soon a Kemper AI will get released. Even if it's the same with an AI stick

 

I'm actually more interested in seeing the process of dialing in his tone of both plugins then timing each.

That would be a more interesting watch, than this blind test in 1 week "but only if you leave that uh whats it called oh yeah that subscribe button, whats that do? I dont remembered, whatever its not important just sign up & I will tell you where I set the switch points. Don't forget I'm a youtube celery, hehe"

Seems Line 6 is shook Neural is about to take some of their clientele away.

 

I'm surprised he chose that amp but I guess he did it on purpose to prove his point.

 

I had been researching these Plugs for years, (Kemper user & love my amps). I bought Fotin Cali and Archetype Plini at Xmas as I felt they covered a lot of ground without buying the whole lot of 'em and I must say, they are awesome!

Especially with IR's and my Freyette Powerstation, (still love vacuum tubes) I can leave the Kemper off now and then when recording. In fact, now my good old trusty GSP1101 is for sale! I should of sold it long ago after buying the Kemper but it had it's purpose and I spent a lot of time and energy getting it dialed perfectly!

I bought Scuffham S-Gear too, really good stuff as well.

 

Nice. Can I ask what do you use the Freyette for when using along plugins? As a non-guitarist I took a look but it has several purposes.

 

For sure, just DI to my Apollo 8. There are so many different ways of using it. I have the PS-100 more for my amps as an attenuator or to push low watt amps hard and any modelers with cabs. It's so versatile and a handy tool in my home studio arsenal. I've had it for over a year now. This is the best vid to date IMHO (except when he slags Kemper haha): read some of the comments for more uses...

 

Sorry Xupito, you'd best back off before you get hurt...the natives are restless tonight.

 

Last edited: Jan 25, 2021

Mmmm.... soo... perhaps...
Yeah, kill the fucker. I'm a coward old fuck But I do really want to die really lot older

 

Interested to know @SEnki what is what you find better in the Nembrini Audio plugins over the PA ones as many if not all amp plugins from PA are modeled by Igor Nembrini himself. I like both but I am digging a bit more the PA UI than the Nembrini.

The Neural are very good but I dislike not knowing what amp I am playing. I have ordered a QC, by the way.

I'm completely new to plugins so it is an honest question to a more experienced user. Previously I used Kemper exclusively for 5 years (I have 2 of them) and before that 20 years playing a JCM800.

 

The modelling in Igor's stuff seem to be better in his Nembrini releases. While I like the PA stuff, I think he refined the modelling when he left PA. Compare the mega dual to the cali dual and you'll see what I mean.

In regards to not knowing which amp is which, I've come to terms with it. These days I just choose an amp that has THAT sound.

 

Honestly I don't quite like neither of the duals. I think I prefer both versions of the single recto.

I discovered the PA plugins, and finally this page and the sister site because of the VH4 plugin. I really like that plugin because I have been using VH4 profiles in my Kemper for quite some time now. I have come to the conclusion that is the way I want to go tone wise.

So I was trying to find a solution to play at home and be able to sell my second Kemper. Unfortunately the VH4 is one of the few that was not included in the release by RtwoR.

That is mostly why I asked you, because the VH4 was released under the PA brand. But maybe because it is one of the last ones, Igor had already a lot of experience modelling amps. I really think it sounds very good.

If anyone knows another good plugin of a VH4 let me know please. I have it in Helix Native and... meh... maybe I have to tweak it a bit more.

 

I have tested the offerings from Neural, Nembrini, Softube, Amplitube, Native etc. in the previous days (only Kuassa is still left to test) and compared them with my real amps. In fact, the Nembrini amps seem to be the best emulation to me at this point, especially the BST100, but the 8180 is also really well done. The Neural sims are also good, but they seem to have the typical amp sim issue of containing a certain kind of muddiness that is tough to EQ out without creating other issues. The Softube amps have a great basic approach, but the high frequencies tend to be really harsh and synthetic. Perhaps they could be better with better IRs, but IRs are the most important part in the signal chain anyway and so I rate the products for their stock IRs as well. Amplitube and especially Helix Native are very much suffering from mud city imho.

 

Last edited: Feb 1, 2021

Check out STL Tonality - Will Putney. There is a really nice VH4 in there but only two channels are modeled. You may also take look at https://nalexsoft2.blogspot.com/2019/06/gerbert-amp.html and try the free Gerbert plugin. Not exactly a VH4 but a really nice Diezel inspired plugin.

 

Last edited: Feb 1, 2021

I fucking love Parallax, especially for the way they handle IR's. They let you just load the folder then flick through them seamlessly.

I love Mammoth too, but it suffers from a small IR loader window so it's difficult to see the rest of the name of your loaded IR & you have to go back into your IR folder to load the next IR in the sequence instead of clicking the left + right buttons to switch through them quickly.

It causes confusion on which IR I loaded last therefore can't remember which one was next because they are all labeled with similar names.

Otherwise both of these plugins are extremely capable & worth every bit of it's price. Both are keepers for me. Made so many bass guitar patches for myself with them. Bought & hunted down free IR files from every corner of the internet.

@SEnki I think it was you that recommended me these, but Dr. Bonkers IR's are fucking mint! Will be buying more from him for sure. He closes the gap in what's available on the market & adds unique IR's with unique mics. Especially for bass guitarists. Very happy with these purchases, absolute keepers for me.

 

quad cortex dropped! come on U.S. government and send me a decent stimulus check bc i NEED this!!
really tho, this thing seems leeeeegit. there are a ton of reviews on YT right now but rhett shule is generally a vintage tube amp guy and knows his shit. its not a sponsored review and the unit wasn't given to him. its a demo unit and he has the option to send it back or BUY it. (he does btw).

what i like ab this one specifically though is the comparison to a kemper capture of the rig to a neural quad cortex capture, at 16:03 in the video. he does a capture of the exact same rig on both (literally just disconnects the input from the kemper after the kemper capture into the quad for the quad capture) changing nothing in the chain and then does a straight audio comparison of the real rig/the quadcortex/the kemper.

kemper has been knocked from their perch. at least until they go back to R&D

 

Last edited: Feb 2, 2021

Thanks for your recommendations @Bubak I will be checking them the next days.

 

I have a Kemper. Well, actually I have 2. But I also have a Quad Cortex on preorder. Some times these videos are crafted like a story. And this time the story was to tell us that Rhett likes the QC over the Kemper. That is fine.

But if I dig deeper I go to the files that Rhett uploaded for us to check. And he was talking about "edge of breakup" tone. And in the samples, the reality is that the Kemper does have a mid-low rumble that the real amp doesn't. But also the Kemper has very similar dynamics to the real amp. It cleans up when the amp does, and it goes into distortion when the amp does, depending on the dynamics of playing.

On the other hand, the QC is a lot cleaner all the time. Maybe it sounds "nicer" because of that, but if the point was to get the same edge of breakup tone, certainly the QC lost in this from my point of view.

Add to the story that apparently Rhett did not follow the correct way of profiling with the Kemper because he skipped the refining process, the last step needed to make a profile.

We will see. But I think it is too soon to say that Kemper where knocked from their perch.

 

This makes me wonder if they might release a plugin version of the QC unit in a few years, like line 6 did with helix native.