What's the deal? What's the deal with chasing tone? Got plenty of options as I'm a guitar player who likes vibe. ToneX, Parasise, Neural DSP and Line 6 HX Native are great. So is my HX stomp-based board. As far as Neural DSP goes, if you own a STRAT Cory Wong is fantastic.

 

Thank you so much for this. Here I am spending my days wondering why URM doesn't call me back, turns out they're not my friend. What would I have ever done without you?

I now know that the vast majority of people here praising Neural DSP are wrong and you are right. I'm absolutely 100% positive these plugins suck and that it's definitely not a lack of skill issue on your end.

I will now spend the rest of my night taking notes on everything else you wrote as you are clearly a genius. Your presence in this forum is truly a blessing.

 

Why?

Let's talk Bogner lol

Never tried the real one,
but I can see there's a massive difference between Nembrini's Extasy and Mercuriall Euphoria..

Mercuriall is clearly more oriented towards Highest Gain Chugging,
with a Warmer and more Compressed sound..

While Nembrini is completely different,
much more Bright and Open sounding, much less dark and compressed.. but with a very Wide range of tone it can provide.


With a Fender Strat, I feel like Nembrini's version is more like a normal real amp,
although a bit too Bright, and with not enough Mids or Bottom to be 100% satisfactory..

However I see it as an absolute technical marvel, is it not?
you can see how Complex the amp is.. and all the internal routing elements seem to interact nicely, and give a result that makes sense.

Mercuriall Euphoria is totally different, certainly geared towards a different type sound or music style.
It didn't give me a good result with the Strat, but that's totally expected.. it's just a different type of beast.


I have to test them again for good with my Metal guitar (Maverick) with Humbuckers, and see how they react.
And this will be a completely different test; the type of Pickups make all the possible difference..


-So what's your take?
Has anyone tested a Real Bogner Extacy unit?

Which version would you say is closer to the real one?
Or is the real unit capable of giving you both types of tone, in such a wide spectrum?

 

Last edited: Dec 24, 2025 at 3:04 PM

IIRC Guthrie Govan used a Pod 2 to record some parts of his Erotic Cakes disc, so there's that..

Altho as an owner of a POD HD500 I woundn't recommend it even to my worst enemy.. lol

 

Damn, I didn’t realize my post could single-handedly destroy Neural DSP, expose the entire industry, and get me quietly blacklisted by URM all in one go. I’ll try to use this newfound power responsibly, i might be an actual genius, who knew...

Sarcasm aside that was funny, in any case, what i wrote represnts my personal experience, you can ignore it, or maybe take it for what it is, an opinion that can help you, seek out your own truth. good luck.

 

Calm down, people.
i'll be banal: but share your own experience. References to other people’s or internet authorities do not work here.

The likeness of a sound or a plugin is such a purely subjective experience. Reading that someone likes or dislikes it does not oblige you to anything. It is simply another opinion, and the witches have given everyone the opportunity to make up their own mind.

 

POD HD serie is VERY hard to master. Because it is the last POD. They PUSHED the tech up to HD, but when they added options, they simply set the default values wrongly ... just to show new options changed sound.

So as base settings, you need to reset most settings to 0 (RES, Thump, ER ...).
And even doing that, to get a really good sound, you need dual amp (trick used by Dino Cazares since the first Flextone ...), SM57 off axis, TS in front ...

POD HD can sound really good BUT with a lot of tricks. And finally not much variety, because most of those "new" settings s*cks and need to be neutralised to zero.

I even seen ppl only using preamps (and not full amps) because the "new to HD" power amp section was bad to their ears.

 

Yup.. it's the snake that bites its tail lol

HD500 with Humbuckers and for High Gain Rock/Metal tones; Rhythm or Solo, was actually Great..
You could work with it no problem and replicate any tone easily.

With Single Coils tho is a different story..

The solution I found in my case, with a Fender Strat + Vox Tube dist is basically:
Park 75 Amp + Amplitube 4 Cab

That's the best I could make it sound.

I agree resetting all the Bias config is crucial,
and it's got a surprisingly wide range of variety in tone and dynamics that you can get..

And all of that is mostly the curated Line6 algorithm isnt it?

(The MeAmBobbo guide was the holy grail back then lol)

I tested the Helix VST and I can see the refinement,
altho the real unit must be better, probably on another league in comparison with the HDs..

 

Last edited: Dec 24, 2025 at 9:26 PM

This is the bass staple anyone into producing modern metal today will agree.
And the guy Douglass made Darkglass.
Punny name.