The Big Guitar Amp Sim Roundup + Review

[Anderton]

Mats, nothing personal, but please stop posting things that require me to correct you. It's a huge waste of my time, but because I've been asked to moderate this thread, in good conscience I need to prevent the spread of misinformation.

<<Yes, obfuscating a bit aren't we? Guitars, in total, which includes acoustics too (which has ramped up), don't try to do smokes and mirros with all of us here! >>

Just because people like Ed Sheeran and Taylor Swift have (currently) shifted the focus to acoustic guitars, they’re still guitars, and the vast majority are ACOUSTIC-ELECTRIC guitars that plug into amps, audio interfaces, and effects boxes. Hollow-body electric sales are up too (thanks, Dave Grohl). Maybe you consider only solid-body guitars as electric guitars. You're welcome to that opinion, but you should state that's where you're coming from. I would find a little more with which I could agree if that's what you believe.

<<AFAIK Amp sims caters to electric guitars only, if I am not mistaken.>>

Yes, you are mistaken. You would need to modify your statement to "primarily electric solid-body guitars." As I said, acoustic guitars have output jacks and so do semi-hollow body models. Maybe you’ll walk back what you said and say “well those aren’t REAL electric guitars” but if they have pickups and output jacks, they’re electric guitars or at least, acoustic-electric. Peavey’s ReValver even has a module to alter the sound of acoustic guitars into other acoustic guitars. I created a TH3 FX chain specifically for acoustic guitars that was bundled with Sonar. Acoustic guitar players are not troglodytes, I was writing about using effects with acoustic guitars decades ago. Today's players use sims as well as floor boxes and rack effects.

<<I make a link to my opinion, and it's not something I got out of the blue and claim as a fact:>>

Unfortunately you are repeating the claims of people who also have not done their research. You, and they, are confusing units shipped by companies with units sold, and to who. The second-hand guitar market is thriving – ask reverb.com – and their main demographic for second-hand sales are (as it is for brick-and-mortar retailers) people under 30, who have less disposable income. Ironically, you also linked to an article that says “acoustic guitar sales are a totally different story.” Remember, most of them have output jacks...

Electric guitars don't crumble into dust. When someone trades up, they often finance their purchase by selling their guitar on the second-hand market to an aspiring guitar player.

You should also look at trends. Electric guitars did have a major dip, but the past few years they have been on an upswing (which you'll find out if you read the research I've linked to below). Sales of musical instruments are fashion-driven, and cyclical. Looking at any 5-year slice of time of fashion-driven sales will usually be misleading.

<<If you have something to say against [the Washington Post article], why not mail the WP in the above link and tell them they're full of it?>>

I didn’t have to, the job had already been done for me, several times over (see below for a sample). (And the irony of a newspaper talking about the death of something is not lost on me, LOL.) I wish you would please search more than one source when claiming something you've heard someone else say, and of which you have no first-hand knowledge, is a fact.

https://www.rollingstone.com/music/musi ... ng-630446/
https://www.guitarworld.com/news/guitar ... tudy-finds
https://www.statista.com/statistics/440 ... ail-sales/
https://www.statista.com/statistics/440 ... market-us/
https://www.ibisworld.com/industry-tren ... uring.html
https://www.musictrades.com/census.html
https://brandongaille.com/17-fascinatin ... tatistics/

From the last link: “Guitar sales saw an increase of 4.6% over the last year, doubling what the industry was able to produce.”

So who took up the slack because guitar companies couldn't make guitars fast enough? Well, this is why companies like reverb.com that sell used instruments are doing so well, and while aggregate shipments – not SALES – are down 0.7% (don't ask me for the link, it's in one of the links above). FYI - Gibson guitars cannot keep up with the demand for their electric guitars. This is a FACT. I know people at the company. I know their job search for people who can make guitars. I know how many guitars Gibson USA needs to produce in a day to meet orders. I doubt you do.

And here’s an update to a gloom-and-doom article published by Quartz over two years ago: Fender CEO Andy Mooney told Quartz via email that Fender currently has under $100 million in debt, less than half the amount it had in 2012. “Sales of fretted instruments are in great shape and Fender’s electric guitar and amp revenues have been steadily rising for several years,” he said, adding that electric sales are holding steady, acoustic sales are on the rise, and “ukelele sales are exploding.” Of course you'd expect him to say that, he's Fender's CEO. But their sales figures back him up.

I'm sure you don't consider ukuleles electric guitars - neither do I - but they are laying the foundation for people playing electric, electric-acoustic, hollow body electric, and acoustic guitars in the future.

One other factoid the Washington Post conveniently forgot: in the years preceding the writing of that article, sales of all traditional musical instruments had dipped. But I guess it's better clickbait to talk about the death of the electric guitar than the home electric piano, because there are more guitar players, so that increases the odds of clicks.

<<Now, please show me the statement you provided, the link to it. It should be open and not paid for. Independent researches are always open, and preferably pdf file.>>

The links are above. What you're saying about "independent researches are always open" is total fiction. You'll find out how wrong you are as you click on the links.

If you want to speak from a position that's based on more than just pulling opinions from anecdotal sources that fit your desired results, spend the money for the reports linked to above, and base your opinions on facts – not discredited clickbait articles, your not acknowledging acoustic guitars have pickups, and your fantasies about companies that spend literally millions of dollars on research that you expect them to give away for free - “preferably as PDF file.”

<<Don't just view things from an American perception out there. There's Europe and Asia too>>

Another incorrect, fictitious assumption based on - well, as usual, nothing. I most certainly do know what exists outside America (by the way, I'm part-Swiss, lived in Europe for several years, have given seminars in technology in the arts in ten countries and three languages, and visited Asia, Europe, and South America on business several times). One of the linked articles above on guitars states that Germany and the United States make up the biggest share of global sales. Germany is not part of America. Have you checked guitar sales in India? I doubt it, so I'll do it for you.

"Guitars led the market with Rs 744 mn followed by keyboards with Rs 558 mn, string instruments with Rs 215 mn, drums with Rs 153 mn, piano with Rs 122 mn and wind instruments with Rs 37 mn, the report said."

Because your favorite rebuttal in lieu of actual facts is to try "Gotcha! Show me the link," here's the link (and for the record, I've provided links for all your other requests for links):

http://www.radioandmusic.com/content/ed ... 96-mn-2017

You too can know what the global guitar sales are outside America from a reputable, highly accurate research company. It’s the same global research company used by Philips, Panasonic, LG, BASF, Bridgestone, IBM, KPMG, Leica, Michelin, Microsoft, and others, so you KNOW they better be giving correct data to retain clients whose hundreds of billions of dollars of current and future expenditures are dependent on receiving accurate, timely market data.

https://www.fiormarkets.com/report/glob ... 55175.html

If you want to know sales in the US, subscribe to the monthly MI SalesTrak reports:

https://www.misalestrak.com/overview/

I worked as a C-Level executive at Gibson for 4.5 years until a little less than two years ago. I know the industry; I had to. Go work as an executive at Warwick for 4.5 years, then come back and share what you've learned with us instead of just making assumptions that you pass off as facts.

At this point, I cannot spend any more time correcting you, so you have carte blanche to write as much fiction as you want because I have better things to do with my time. Besides, I think by now, readers of this thread can decide for themselves whether your analysis of anything other than your personal opinions of amp sims have any merit.

And I still think you own Michael Scuffham an apology. If you don't already know why, there's no point in my trying to explain it to you.

[Anderton]

Peavey ReValver 4

I don’t think Peavey has ever gotten quite the recognition it deserves for its technology. Peavey did a lot of things either first, or before they hit the mainstream—like their digital power amps, CNC guitar production, MediaMatrix digital networking, and software-based audio systems. Speaking of which...at a trade show, Hartley Peavey was standing in front of a wall of rack-mount hardware processors, and extolling the virtues of software-based audio processing. I commented it was a little strange that he was standing in front of all this hardware while touting the advantages of software-based systems. He gestured at the rack units, and said “Someday, these are all going to be obsolete. I’d rather put myself out of business, than have someone do it for me.”

ReValver 4 probably won’t cause people to stop buying Peavey’s physical amps, but it’s faithful to the Peavey ethos: reliable, simple if that’s what you want but deep enough for geeks, well-executed, and probably underrated. Now produced by Audio Media Research (a company spun off from Peavey), it includes the basic “tribute” amps—one each from Fender, Vox, Orange, vintage Marshall, new Marshall, Diezel, Hartke, Mesa Boogie, and Engl. But the emphasis is on Peavey amps—nine of them, and two Budda amps (a Peavey division). There are over 30 effects.

The architecture is two parallel signal paths in a rack paradigm, each with three serial slots: pedalboard for effects (Fig. 1), Amps+Cabs (Fig. 2), and Effects (about a dozen “studio” effects). However, you can also split each path, for a total of four parallel paths.



Figure 1: I never did find out the maximum number of effects you could include in each pedalboard, but it certainly exceeded my good taste.



Figure 2: The main ReValver section, where you insert amps and cabs. This preset splits the signal path to two cabs for stereo imaging.

You’ll also find input and output sections with various utility functions, like matching the input gain to pickups, input and output level “learn,” tuner, mixer for the two parallel splits, etc.

I’ve often said that if you call up an amp sim preset and it works, you’re lucky. Most of the time, I need at least to vary the amp and speaker options, as well as tweak with some EQ before and/or after the amp. But ReValver 4 offers two significantly different tweaking options.

• You can load VST and AU plug-ins into the pedalboard section, the main rack, or the output effects. Interestingly, with the AAX version of ReValver, this also means you can load VST and AU effects into Pro Tools (although you can’t load AAX effects into non-Pro Tools hosts). ReValver also works stand-alone.
• The amps, pedals, and rack effects can open to a schematic view, where you can change the circuit down to the individual component level (Fig. 3), including resistors and capacitors. You need to know what you’re doing, but you can customize your amp to a degree not possible with any other sim—BIAS Amp makes a similar process more user-friendly, but ReValver goes much deeper. You can even swap out the distortion circuit diodes for red LEDs



Figure 3: Changing tubes in the module tweak page view for the 6505+.

ReValver also uses the IK “custom shop” purchasing model. Like some other amp sims, you can get a free demo version with a limited number of modules. But you can also buy more amps and effects à la carte, or the “Producer Pack” (currently available for $99.99) that gives all the current amps and effects.

Also note that while being able to operate in stand-alone mode isn’t unique, a Gig mode allows switching among up to 8 presets glitchlessly by storing the 8 selected presets in memory. You can also load your own cab IRs.

Bear in mind that ReValver can be a “rabbit hole” amp sim, because if you total up all the possible permutations of cabs, mics, amps, mic positioning, effects, and component changes you can make to the schematics, it’s probably in the hundreds of millions. So it’s time for my usual advice for this kind of sim: when you create a preset you like—save it! Also note there’s no undo function for edits, so editing is a one-way street. I’ve definitely become friends with the Quick Save button. Quick tip: One of the biggest differences you can make in a preset is to change the mic position on the speaker. That change can often change a preset from “no” to “yes.”

PREVIEW OF COMING ATTRACTIONS

There are some interesting features coming up in the next version, and AMR was kind enough to let me try out a beta version and give an exclusive preview of one of the new features to those following this thread

The feature I’m allowed to mention is an update to ReValver’s Audio Cloning Technology input module (Fig. 4), which is now called the Instrument Modeler and does a guitar transformation similar to what we covered for the Axiom.



Figure 4: The Instrument Modeler transforms your guitar sound into the characteristic sound of a different guitar.

You “profile” your guitar, and select your target sound. So, does it turn your guitar into a copy of the target guitar? Well, I don’t have all the target guitars to do an A/B comparison, but the transformed sound did acquire the target guitar’s character—my Les Paul Studio had the glassier, chimey Strat sound, or could turn into a twangy Tele. In any event, this features multiplies your potential number of guitar timbres. Of course, trying to convert an electric guitar into an acoustic guitar is only going to go so far, but the end result does acquire an acoustic-like quality that fits into a track the way an acoustic would. On the other hand, transforming one type of acoustic into a different type is more doable.

Finally, let’s talk about the sound. ReValver doesn’t give you a zillion amps from dozens of manufacturers; if you want a wide selection of amps, there are better choices than ReValver. That said, ReValver gives you “Peavey’s Greatest Hits” in virtual form, and does so realistically—other sims may give you only one Peavey amp. This is also where the buying model comes into play. If you already have an amp sim with a ton of other amps, you can download the free version of ReValver, and buy just the Peavey amps to add a different sonic palette. The ReValver site’s shop has plenty of audio examples you can audition to hear what the different amps, clones, and effects do—you don’t have to “buy blind.”

ReValver had stagnated for a while, but with these changes, it’s on the move again—and there’s more to come.

[Soundwise]

Love the ReValver 4. Can hardly wait to find out what's to come in new RV5. Hopefully, they'll improve UX, add new gear and finally make it true stereo/dual mono capable.

[Soundwise]

I created a TH3 FX chain specifically for acoustic guitars that was bundled with Sonar

That chain gives excellent results! These two tracks were processed only with that chain and nothing else.
Augustin
Telegram

[imrae]

Red pig cabinet on EVERYTHING

You may be onto something here

[reggie1979]

That one just seems proper.

I'm not one for "Fender" this or "Mesa" that so to speak. I just try and mix and match what sounds the most pleasant to me ear.

[audiojunkie]

Here's an effects order question for Craig and everyone else:

Normally, there is an accepted order to effects. I know that rules can be broken and you can do what sounds good to you, but I'm asking to understand the way it works in the modeling realm.

The following setup seems to follow the real world 4CM settup:

Guitar > FX > Amp > FX > Cab

In modeling, things are a bit different. The "Cab" is basically the cab modeler and the speaker. For example:

Guitar > FX > Amp Modeler > FX > Cab modeler > Speaker

However, it seems that a lot of these modeling applications seem to throw the amp and cab modeler together as one inseparable unit:

Guitar > FX > "Amp modeler/cab modeler" > FX > Speaker

So, my question is: Does having the Cab modeler before the second "FX" rather than at the tail end of the chain (before the speaker) affect the sound in any way? If so, in what way?

Thank you!

[Dewdman42]

First realize that The order of FX matters. For example, if you put a reverb before delay, it will sound very different then a delay before a reverb. If you put a distortion pedal after the amp, then it will have a completely different sound then if you put it after the guitar. In particular, what happens before and after the AMP is the main decision you need to make.

Secondly realize, people have plugged guitars into pedals and amps and rack mount effects in all manner of ways, all in the name of getting cool sounds...sometimes extremely muddy, in a cool way, sometimes not. There is not an absolute right or wrong way to approach any of this... Want to run 35 pedals in front of your amp? You won't be the first person to do it, and let's not forget that in the 1960's and 70's the whole name of the game was creating lovely mud!

But that being said, historically people have usually put certain kinds of FX pedals between the guitar and the amp. Tube Screamers, boosters, noise gates, fuzz pedals, compressors, EQ, etc. All of these things have a direct influence on the way the amp responds after going through those pedals. So people tend to intentionally put those in front of the amp. A chorus pedal before the amp sounds totally different then a chorus after the amp. Neither is correct or better though, just different. I personally think that distortion after the amp sounds like mud, while chorus before the amp sounds like mud. But it comes down to preference really, though people have gravitated towards certain conventions and sounds over time.

Also historically people have recorded their amps by putting a mic in front of the cab and recording dry amp sound to tracks, then adding reverb and other effects like that to the sound that came out of the cab. Pedals in front of the amp, obviously had to be placed in front of the amp, but ideally they wanted to record a dry signal after that, that they could tweak FX later during mix down more than anything I reckon.

Modelers tend to be organized to use that basic recording signal chain. some of them will let you insert FX in between the amp and the cab, why not, go for it, but just realize most of the time in studio recording situations, you probably see this, which mirrors the situation of micing up your cab and applying the more sophisticated effects later in the mix or at least after the mic.

Guitar->FX->amp->cab->FX

Thus the modelers provide that tried and true signal chain.

Now when you are playing live with your band with a traditional amp setup, Its hard to do the above signal chain. So you have to use the FX loop on your amp. That ends up like this:

Guitar->FX->AMP->FXLoop->Cab

You ask about the discrepancy and I get it. I personally don't see a reason to use the FX before the cab other then the fact that you are needing to use the FXLoop of your amp to do it for practical reasons and the sonic difference there is probably not very much, but its not nothing. Certain kinds of FX probably wouldn't notice any difference, but some others might. There is a much greater difference between pre-amp and post-amp FX.

For recording, its the actual sound coming out of the speaker that represents your instrument's tone and sound, not the fizzy pre-cab sound. And that is the post amp sound will want to chorus, delay, reverberate, etc.. In some cases it may not matter, but in some cases it could if the effect does frequency domain stuff. Generally the amp/cab together approach will prove to be what you want to do if you can, and use the FXLoop approach only when you have to while playing gigs and don't sweat it too much.

Modelers are modeling the amp/cab->FX approach, so they don't have to make the small compromise. And its just how most people have recorded guitars most of the time, in the past. But there is no rule that says you have to.

hope that makes sense.

[Anderton]

So, my question is: Does having the Cab modeler before the second "FX" rather than at the tail end of the chain (before the speaker) affect the sound in any way? If so, in what way?

Let's just compare these two:

Guitar > FX > Amp Modeler > FX > Cab modeler > Speaker

Guitar > FX > "Amp modeler/cab modeler" > FX > Speaker

We can consider the second one as:

Guitar > FX > "Amp modeler > cab modeler" > FX > Speaker

So reduced to essentials, because the beginning in both cases is guitar > FX > amp modeler and the ending is speaker, we're really comparing:

FX > Cab Modeler vs Cab Modeler > FX.

Let's assume that at its heart, the Cab Modeler is an EQ. In that case, what matters is the FX itself.

If the FX is distortion or dynamics, then distortion or dynamics before EQ is different compared to distortion or dynamics after EQ.

With time-based FX, the distinction isn't quite so clear. If you take off the highs going into a chorus unit, it probably won't sound that different compared to taking off the highs after a chorus unit. But if you take off the lows before going into reverb, the character will be different compared to the taking off the lows after going into the reverb.

The other variable is that a lot of "iconic" guitar sounds included more than just a miked amp, like added rack-mount processors in the control room.

[Tj Shredder]

But all this amp modeling is about getting „real“ sounds, never heard about FX which you could drive with signals intended to drive a speaker without destroying them... FX have to be before the amp to get a sound like the real thing or did I miss something?

[Anderton]

But all this amp modeling is about getting „real“ sounds, never heard about FX which you could drive with signals intended to drive a speaker without destroying them... FX have to be before the amp to get a sound like the real thing or did I miss something?

Well, the rules are different in the virtual world The only physical effects you could drive with speaker levels are voiceboxes and power soaks.

To sound like "the real thing," with the exceptions noted above, yes, FX would need to go before the amp. However, remember that FX have often gone after a miked speaker in the studio. So conceptually, it's not a new idea to follow the amp/speaker combination with effects to get a particular sound.

[Dewdman42]

But all this amp modeling is about getting „real“ sounds, never heard about FX which you could drive with signals intended to drive a speaker without destroying them... FX have to be before the amp to get a sound like the real thing or did I miss something?

There are several common ways that musicians, producers and engineers have achieved "real" sounds without using any modelers...

Guitar-->FX pedals-->(Preamp-->AMP)-->cab

Guitar-->FX pedals-->(Preamp-->FXLOOP-->AMP)-->Cab

Guitar-->FX pedals-->(Preamp-->Amp)-->Cab-->mic-->FX

In the first case above, let's say you have a little combo amp that doesn't have a FX loop built in and you're playing a jam session with your buddies. That's how you would set it up, all the FX before the guitar amp.

In the second case above, some FX can be placed between the preamp and AMP (before the cab). Amps that have an FX loop capability(not all do), might use that, especially for gigging, that is a common setup.

The third setup is what is commonly done in the studio where you have the ability to not only mic the cab but also to control the FX that are assigned to the mic'd cab sound. Usually that is not possible in a live scenario, but that isn't to say it couldn't be done with enough motivation.

So no, not all FX need to happen before the AMP. As I said earlier, some FX need to happen before the AMP in order to do their intended task (such as distortion pedal). Others will sound like mud there and so people decide to put them after the preamp, and ideally after the cab.

Modelers tend to follow that paradigm used in the studio, which is FX after the cab. And I would argue that is the most ideal "real" setup.

Some modelers have the preamp and amp separated as separate modules, so you could find a way to experiment with placing FX anywhere you want and see what you get!

As to the question of the difference in sound between option2 above and option3. I think there will be some difference, but it will be much more subtle then the difference between option1 and the other two. As to which sounds better, I leave that to you to decide for yourself.

[audiojunkie]

Excellent answers everyone! Very informative and enlightening! I learned a lot! Thank you!!

[Dewdman42]

I also don't happen to think there is anything wrong with using creative solutions, if it gets the sound you want. I used to run a Vox Tonelab modeler into a 20/20 tube power amp and 2x12 cab; when I could have rather ran it direct. It sounded definitely different that way, particularly because I was usually running through both a modeled amp and the actual 20/20 tube power amp...and as well I was often using modeled cab....and then the real cab on top of that. It meant I had to dial in my presets a little brighter to get through two layers of cabinets, but I felt that the feel and raw tube sound through my 20/20 was just more fun and sounded great on stage. Sometimes I would go around the modeled cab...in which case the sound was definitely a bit more dynamic and sounded more like my real cab....spankier........and in that case...the FX were before the cab....more like the FXLOOP scenario....sandwiched in between the modeled amp and the real amp.

Not conventional I know to have a modeler feeding a real amp and cab, but it sounded good and I preferred playing through celestions any day over what would come through my in-ears. This was while everyone on the internet was trying to tell me I needed a full range monitor speaker or something different, in order to preserve the pristine modeling. Ok. maybe so, but it sounded better, warmer, tubier, and just more fun to play when I ran through real tubes and real cab...so I did...not a conventional signal chain to be sure, but since I know what the real thing is supposed to sound like, I was able to make it sound just like I wanted... not a problem. Mostly it just took some of the high end off would wasn't always a bad thing anyway.

All this software and modeling provides a lot of different options and there is no reason not to experiment. They say Hendrix used to daisy chain amps together to get some ginormous new sounds.. (shrug). Whatever works really.

[reggie1979]

It's not about it making "you" sound good, it's about YOU making "it" sound good