Funny you say that, specially considering the thread is mostly about BIAS alternatives (which is the tweaker's paradise/nightmare VST ampsim).

S-Gear "advanced" controls are basicall a 3-mode preamp character and a hi-cut. Nothing compared to the crazyness that BIAS or Revalver have. Anyway, for a more simple and "real amp" operation there is Thermionik which not only sounds outstanding, but it's also upgrading with new models very soon

About Nebula cabs... My main gripe with them is that they are very few of them and they are old samples, with old techniques and inferior equipment compared to say Ownhammer's V4 libraries. Considering the quality of the impulses those companies are releasing now, I see no point of using *older* Nebula cabinets.

Regarding the amount of impulse choices... It's really personal preference. When making my own presets for jamming and such, I always use 3 Sigma Audio impulses. They are essentially the same as Rosen Digital (same people), but cheaper and with more options. They sound the most natural and "real-life" to me. However, for mixing I find it much easier to fit Ownhammer impulses on the mix. They are "pre-processed" so to speak, even when they sey they're not. They have cut highis and lows and overall are middier, which makes them easier to mix with.

As with everything, you can't just fill a toolbox with hammers

 

Last edited: Jan 19, 2017

3 sigma has the best impulses, revalver doesn´t like me it's rare or am i crazy?

 

this are my top 5 amp modeling plugins.
1-S-Gear
2-Kuassa
3 Bias
4-Amplitube 4
5-Rockrack

 

New amp models and overdrive pedals by Kazrog:

http://kazrog.com/2017/01/19/kazrog-announces-thermionik-modern-classics-iii-overdrive-legends-i/

 

i've tried kuassa but it's ugly for me maybe i not tweak enough

 

kazrog have the best metal amps

 

not saying it's the most important thing, but a decent interface wouldn't hurt Kazrog plugs, that's for sure. not really into this supa minimalistic dark design.

 

I used to use Kazrog for the Igor cab emulation. Stopped after I started using Nebula for cab emulation. I don't think I ever found a Krank amp emulation in it which was what I was after. Definitely will include it in my shootout.

Agree with your gripes as far as not enough to choose from, and no new releases of cabinet samplings. I think it's a supply vs demand issue there, though.

What perked my ears up was the dimension or spatiality from the sparse Nebula offerings. They seemed to respond better to chunk playing especially palm muting more-so than I felt any of the IR's I tried did. Granted, I was doing this several years ago, and IR's may have evolved since then. My wish is that one of the Nebula 3rd Party Devs look at sampling some cabinets again. Maybe with the release of Nebula 4, this will happen. The sampling technology has changed to my understanding so it deserves a revisit IMHO. Someone should reach out to one of them to see.

 

maybe a little change in the knobs and color (in different models) would be better but for economize it's great his minimal interface

 

I'll tell you guys what, I've really been liking Blue Cat Destructor. I like how it emulates traditional amps from clean to high gain, but then goes beyond into glitchy, lo-fi aspects. Definitely worth checking out.

 

Hi.
I'm a guitar player and i bought Amplitube 4 MAX with Fender Collection 2 pack; I've tried all the softwares before buy (S-Gear, Revalver, BIAS and the others) and I think is the best. I use it for rock, blues and jazz in recording studio as in live sessions connected to the amp through an audio board and I drive it with an homemade pedalboard. It's great!

 

Nice, I agree that Amplitube 4 is great. I like to go to the amp room there and get rid of the room mix and use impulse responses instead, but I think it sounds great and has a nice interface.

 

I recently had a quick mail exchange with Markus from Kalthallen cabs (the link for his free Nebula cabs wasn't functional), but 2 things stood out for me from our communication:

1) He seems to have dropped the Nebula platform, mostly due to the fact that Acustica seems to "ignore" him trying to sell his commercial cabs (I am not sure of the whole process a 3rd party dev has to follow in order to commercially sell his libraries, but probably Acustica gets involved somewhere in this process)... It's also weird that Ownhammer as well seem to have dropped their Nebula formatted cabs... Maybe Acustica wants to handle it themselves (through new Acquas maybe?!?), thus ditching 3rd party cab developers?!? (these are just my speculations, don't take these for granted...)

2) Let aside the conspiracy theories in my first point, what he told me (although I wasn't able to properly test because his free Nebula cabs aren't operating very well with Nebula 4, too much clipping on the input which is somewhat weird) is that the sonic superiority of Nebula and the Volterra tech just isn't there with cabs (at least at the moment he sampled them which was quite some years ago)... He actually said that his normal IRs compared with Nebula and even the real cab in blind tests resulted that people couldn't actually tell any difference between them (although blind tests can be a little tricky as well)...

Lastly, don't take me wrong, I am a huge supporter of Nebula and their awesome tech, although nowadays there are so many cab choices (as already mentioned in this thread 3 Sigma, Rosen, Ownhammer and lots more) that should be able to fulfill our needs. Maybe Acustica has plans for cab IRs in the future that will make us all happier!

The only thing I'm curious about is Fractal's Cab Lab (which you can use without an Axe-FX) that can load the so-called UltraRes cabs... If anyone has any experience with this software and these supposedly ultra quality cabs, please drop a line and let us know of your experience


Update (after re-reading the whole thread):
S-Gear can actually do a great job with high gain sounds (the Wayfarer should be your go-to amp for this purpose), although almost every amp-sim I've tried (except vintage clean/low gain stuff) can do high gain sounds easily by boosting your input prior to your amp with a tube-screamer type pedal or generally some additional drive from any source you find suitable. (just make sure this pedal's level is set to max, drive + tone are a matter of preference I guess but I mostly keep them turned down a lot in order to minimize noise while maintaining playability... also make sure your amp's drive is not maxed out).
It's the exact same thing all famous guitarists have been doing since the 80's & 90's (and also keeping it a secret) and they got a monstrous sound from e.g. a JCM800 that sounded like a freakin' toy when you played it at home with no booster up-front!
I know these could sound trivial to most of you since this information is widespread right now, but for real, some years ago these were considered well kept "secrets" (and I am not a believer of knowledge that is not spread to everyone)...

 

Last edited: Feb 7, 2017

I have never really gotten on with virtual amps and simulations. I have an excellent front end coming out of my guitars and into the virtual domain but noise is always an issue. I don't do Nebula so I cannot say, but all in all my Vox AC15C1 mic'd with a Gefell UMT70S sounds just like a guitar plugged into an amp. I would thoroughly enjoy playing late into the darkened night and enjoying it whilst those around me are safe asleep and within the throes of Morphious, but I yet have found joy in that regard as much as I have really wished.

 

Last edited by a moderator: Feb 7, 2017

Same experience here. I have to drop the output from the amp-sim drastically. Sometimes I'll just use a trim plugin prior to the Nebula instance. I make sure the input level meter inside Nebula doesn't hit above -18. Then turn the output level up or down so that the Over light doesn't come on through the entire track.

This is also something I've used during tracking:

Great for running DI out of an amp, into this and then into your headphone mix.

 

Redbox 5 is really good, all incarnations of previous versions also. It is an active box and so needs phantom power.@digitaldragon .. here is a great secret weapon to compliment the original signal that you record, so tell not a soul...promise? OK. Use a microphone and pre.of.choice to record.the pre-recorded signal through your monitors, even at very low volume at night to capture a slightly different signal with a bit of air that you cannot.get with the Red Box itself. You owe me a coffee.

 

@superliquidsunshine mums the word! That's a neat trick. It should work using conventional IR's/Nebula, whichever, correct? Just to get some added air.
Have to figure out how to get a coffee to ya!
Thanks for the tip!

 

I've been experimenting with an alternative for the last few days, could be one of the best guitar tones in the box....
Try any OD pedal VST and/or guitar preamp VST in front of one of the Henry Olonga's Hi-res amp impulses. Add a few EQs in the chain
All available free from knowledge gathered here.