Amp/Guitar modeling and related discussion thread

The JCM 800 model, honestly, barely sounds like the real thing at all IMO, it just sounds kind of flat, dull, fizzy and slightly lifeless compared to a real deal Marshall JCM 800.
The Behringer V-Amp 2 was released in 2002 as well, and we have had another 6-7 years of modeling technology advancement since then, and I've heard computer software amp modelers, like the latest edition Guitar Rig, Peavey Revalver MK III and a few others that make the V-Amp 2 sound like a toy in comparison.

Edited by danova - November 26 2009 at 10:16

I've noticed lately just how ridiculously good free amp sims are now.
They have gotten to the point where I've decided against paying for a copy of Revalver (and in this regard, I was lucky POD Farm was free for me anyway, being an X3 Live user), because the guys making free amp sims have pretty much equaled the commercial amp sims in quality and in some cases, even exceeded the quality.
Don't get me wrong, Revalver sounds stunning and the 6505 amp sims and JSX amp sims have really won my heart over, but I can't really justify paying 300 USD for it when I don't even use over half the amp sims, and when I can just download great free ones, donate perhaps 30 dollars to the creator if I feel they have made a quality product and just pick and choose the ones I want without having amp sims sitting around that I don't need.
I'll be honest , I don't even use more than about 10 or so of the ones included in POD Farm, most of them just aren't useful to me.

I will admit it takes more EQ-ing to get 8505 sounding right compared to Revalver's 6505, but to be fair 8505 has less front panel GUI tweaking abilities and you only have to cut, not boost, any frequencies with 8505 for it to sound great, and of course, as we know, cutting is a much more attractive and sonicly pleasing option than boosting since you don't run the risk of phase issues etc.
I pretty much just get rid of a chunk of 800Hz and 8505 sounds gorgeous.

My usual signal chain with 8505 is:
8505 > TSS > Voxengo Boogex > JB Ferox.> Ableton EQ Eight (to just remove frequencies, but it's mainly there for low and high pass filtering.

TSS (Tube Screamers Secret), is something I highly recommend as a replacement for the tube screamer simulations you get in most commercial packages. I even use it with Revalver now, that's how much I enjoy the sound of it
I use Catharis-Awesometime-fredman impulses, which can be found here
http://catharsis.supremepixels.com/impulses/
I've used literally so many different impulses that I cannot even begin to count, and have found these ones are among the best you can get for when you need high distorted tones for rock and metal.
JB Ferox is a fantastic, and also free, tape simulation plug in that really adds some sonic beef and some pleasing harmonics to your sound.
I pretty much never go without JB ferox now, no matter what I do. It works great on pretty much any mix buss application, be it guitars, bass, drums, or whatever. Not so much a good mastering tool, but there are other saturators out there for that application anyway.
I've never had the chance to really try out the expensive saturation plug ins, and many of the people that spent lots of money on saturation plug ins were quite impressed with JB Ferox, which says a lot.


Edited by Petrovsk Mizinski - November 24 2009 at 01:47

Woops, you're right actually.
Lately, I've just been doing some less tight stuff and was experimenting with the TSS after the amp and then cutting lots of 800Hz to get a less honky sound yet with huge amounts of low end, so I was just kinda thinking about that was I was writing the post. Really great, sludgy, doomy tones that way.
Thinking back a few weeks, yes, I was running the TSS before the amp as usual, works great that way as a usual Tube Screamer too.
I think I did give the links to  8505 a while back. Did you end up ever trying it out?
Obviously, being modeled after a 6505/5150 (they are the same amp, just different names, the 6505 being the result of EVH leaving Peavey), it's good to use on metal.