Which amp?

[Steve]

[konradh]

Thank you, Steve. I have an older version of Sonar, and will experiment using your directions.

My VS-1680 has some amp simulations, but I'm not wild about them. They are mostly too extreme and noisy. What I need in most cases is just a little tube roundness with a touch of overdrive.

For something raunchier, it would also be nice to get the sound of a Fender amp with alternate 6L6s pulled out.

I'm showing my age as a studio guy here. For new guys, use a rag or glove when you grab those tubes.

[mwarts]

Since I have the Slayer 2 Synth since quite some time and there is also aFX / Amp Plugin, I tried that out with my brandnew Realstrat and it has some nice sounding presets .
Freeamp is great also. The Amplitude Duo thingy always stops to work in my FLStuio 7 as soon I record something...

[playz123]

In my humble opinion there's no comparison between the version of Amplitube that comes with RealStrat and the full version. The latter is, in my opinion, excellent, and is highly recommended. GuitarRig is good too, and either will do the job extremely well, but I like Amplitube myself.

[konradh]

I think I mentioned this on another topic, but I bought a Line 6 Pod (hardware) to use with RealStrat and it is awesome. Not as convenient as a computer SW solution, but the sound is great.

[RS]

I was very disappointed by the Amplitube Duo which came with RealStrat. So I thought about upgrading to the full thing (well, that's the strategy behind bundled software) but also searched the web for alternatives. And I ran into Revalver MkII, a awesome product which I bought in the end. It is cheaper then Amplitube upgrade or Guitarrig and I received a 25% discount for having the DUO version. What a great deal!
But the prize was not the driving factor to by this product. Comparing it to Amplitube and Guitarrig it sounded WAY more realistic to me. But make up your own mind with the demo supplied on their site.
And its very funny to read the comments about Revalver of longtime POD users on Line6 forum, too.

Ralf

[tonyalexa]

I'm reading comments sayng it's Amplitude over Guitar Rig. Really?

I guess that proves it's all personal taste because Amplitude doesn't even come close to Guitar Rig in my opinion. Amplitude sounds very weak to me. I wouldn't even think about buying it. But then...I own Guitar Rig 2 and the upgrade to 3 is literally in the mail as part of the Komplete 5 upgrade package....

[OldGeezer]

Well. I've downloaded and demoed a bunch of amp sims out there. If you're thinking of buying Amplitube 2 based on the Duo version you get with Realstrat, then download the demo version from their site as it lets you try everything, and the difference is huge.

I've also tried the demo versions of Guitar Rig 3, Izotope Trash and Revalver 2.

To me, Guitar Rig 3 is the clear winner. The closest competitor, to me, is Amplitube 2. But while Amplitube 2 has some nice sounds, I find it's distortion FX to be a bit on the noisy side. Playing with the presets in the Guitar Rig 3, I found myself thinking "wow" quite a few times. Most importantly, to me, the GR3 demo produced the finest hard-rock and heavy metal sounds I've gotten out of Realstrat, and that was just playing with the presets. The interface looks great, and the sound quality, wether clean or distorted, just seemed alot better in GR3 than in any other.

It could be the best amp sim depends on what kind of music you're going to play and what guitar you're going to plug into it. In the case of RealStrat, for someone who's into modern pop/rock/metal, I think the newest version of Guitar Rig is the best match for Realstrat.

My 2 cents....but don't take my word for it -download the full demo of Amplitube 2, Guitar Rig 3, Izotope Trash and Revalver 2 and decide for yourself. You'll have sampled the best amp sims that I know of.

I'm still exploring the freeware route as well. So far, as a single-app solution for modern pop/rock/metal, nothing, to me, compares to FreeAmp2. But I'm looking into combining certain apps and FX to achieve better results. In particular, I'm trying to find the right combination of plugins to insert before the Amplitube Duo app that comes with RS. If I find a startlingly effective free solution I'll post it, but it's looking like Guitar Rig 3 is the ultimate companion to Realstrat, at least to me.

[Helge Kautz]

[Steve]

[OldGeezer]

No idea. I've only tried 3. Just download the demo...you can't go wrong when you use your own ears to judge. Some of the sounds under the "Metal" and "Rock" categories are just beautiful.

I put Amplitube 2 under closer scrutiny last night and it is pretty close though. Even Revalver 2 is pretty impressive. I wish I could afford all three, but if I had to pick any one app for free, I'd pick GR3.

Edit: I've also been playing around with the freeware Simuanalog "Guitar Suite". The interface on each component is basic and butt-ugly, but that JCM-900 (Marshal amp), once you figure out that thetop slider is really a switch and you switch it to amp B and crank up the drive, holy crap does it ever sound great as a hard-rockin' amp. I suspect that with the right combination of free FX that JCM-900 can sound as good as anything out there. It's a mono plugin though, meant for guitar, so I had to switch my audio track to mono in Sonar in order to avoid having the right-side clean left-side amped. You can route it to a stereo track and use a nice stereo reverb or other FX to give it a bit of stereo depth afterward. So for anyone wanting another free solution, SimuAnalog Guitar Suite is worth checking out. Comes with a few separate amps and FX. That and FreeAmp2 are your best bets.

[OldGeezer]

I think Musiclab should maybe start Free Amp and Commercial amp discussion threads and make them stickies, or even start a separate RealStrat Amp forum, coz I predict amp discussions are going to start popping up alot.

I have totally revised my opinion about the "big 3" commercial amps...Amplitube 2, Guitar Rig 3, and ReValver II.

Sadly, I've spent almost all my free time with RealStrat in the past week, playing with all the amp sim demos I could get my hands on. I've even purchase a couple of the cheaper ones, and I'm sure they'll come in handy. But I've pretty much made up my mind I'm going to get one of the big 3...namely, Revalver II.

At first glance, Revalver II seems pretty barebones compared to the other two, and in some ways, I suppose it is. However, there are 3 reasons I've decided to buy Revalver instead of just slugging it out with the cheaper apps I've got.

1- It is a dream come true for gear-heads and tweakers. All you have to do is click on a tube or a triode and see the frightening menu that pops up, letting you change the value of resistors etc... to know that this is alot more than just a plug and play amp, if you want it to be. Not that you need to do that, but the more tech-oriented users have already started sharing their tweaks in the Revalver forums. There are alot of preamps, amps, a beautiful impulse speaker sim as well as a pretty deep speaker construction feature. Of all three major amp sims, it feels like Revalver is the most likely to let me find any tone I need.

2- Ingeniously, Revalver will let you insert any other VST you want as a rack effect, anywhere in the chain! Wether it's the pedal board from Virtual Guitarist, a compressor from digitalfishphones or another amp sim. That is awesome! I can see myself using any of my other amp sims inside of Revalver to take advantage of it's speaker simulation and other FX. There are a few really good freeware preamps out there and being able to expand the sound pallette by inserting one into the virtual rack between some stomp pedals and a power amp or EQ or whatever, all in one interface, makes it incredibly versatile.

3- Of all the amp sims I've tried in the last week, I've finally made up my mind today that Revalver's many tones sound, to me, the most like a real amp is plugged in. It may not have as many bells and whistles in the looks department (though it still looks gorgeous to me), but I'd rather have a handful of really convincing preamps/poweramps/speakers with a bunch of good stomp and rack FX than all the visual bells and whistles in the world.

So, considering that, if I'm not mistaken, ReValver II is the least expensive of the three, I strongly advise you not to buy anything until you've installed the demo and really checked it out. BTW...there are alot more presets to browse than is evident at first. Selecting something in the second dropdown menu exposes different presets in the first menu...you'll see. I feel wishy-washy changing my mind like that, but I am now of the firm opinion that Revalver II is the best of the main 3 amp sims (I know there are better far more expensive options, but most can only afford one of the main 3).

[restonian]

I picked up RealStrat a week ago, and not being a guitar player, had no idea what I was getting into, in terms of hearing a dry DI strat. At first I was like "Whaaa???" Then I read up here and elsewhere about, doh!, you need to plug it into an amp for it to sound good. And thus, the relentless cycle of software purchases continued its forward march. After a few days of demoing various ampsims and reading reviews, I settled on Amplitube 2. It is really not a bad deal - $210 shipped, that, obviously, because the DUO included with RealStrat qualifies for the Amplitube 2 crossgrade/upgrade. GR3 is $400, and I couldn't determine what Revalver cost b/c it was priced in British pounds, but I think it worked out to around $225.

Haviing now played around with it, there's a LOT of stuff in Amplitube 2. The Amplitube DUO product does a huge disservice in the sense of not showing what Amplitube 2 has to offer. Some of the sounds are cheesy, but others are great, as you'd expect with 400+ presets. I even took the very thin, unimpressive Kontakt 3 guitars and put them through Amplitube and got impressive, usable results. There's mucho sound tweaking potential, and I've had some good luck starting with clean-sounding presets and working from there to customize. It is fair to say DUO with its extreme limitations provides no or virtually no window into the potential and extensveness of Amplitube 2.

My personal opinion: the discount on Amplitube 2 makes RealStrat a better all-around deal, maybe even a "bargain".

[OldGeezer]

I know...I agree 100%.

Now that I've got a high quality impulse speaker/cab simulator and speaker construction kit in Revalver2, I took great, GREAT, almost sick pleasure in wiping Duo from my hard-drive. I was only keeping it around as an alternative cabinet sim for freeware preamps. Btw, I heard that Amplitube 2 sounds much better with impulse samples loaded for cabinets. I'm not sure if they are by default...I hope so or I don't envy you the cpu hit on top of the already hefty cpu usage (it was pretty bad on my old 3Ghz P4).

If I only had Duo on which to base my opinion of Amplitube2, I'd have thought you'd be better off with freeware than Amplitube2. What a horrible, horrible way to take RealStrat for a test-drive. I apologize if anyone from Musiclab take offence to that... I believe it was very nice of MusicLab to include an amp sim of any kind, but I hope they didn't pay IK for the free advertising. Hopefuly Musiclab will put clearly visible links to the best freeware amps out there (as well as the best commercial amps) so new customers and demo-users can get a better hi-gain feel for RealStrat.

Fortunately, I was able to make a more educated decision after downloading the full-featured demo of Amplitube 2. I know I picked Revalver MkII (personal taste), but Amplitube 2 is indeed infinitely better than than Duo would suggest.

Whichever of the big 3 you buy, it's a humongous improvement over Duo, or any of the freeware/budget solutions out there. Then again, just about any of the freeware/budget solutions out there are a humongous improvement over Duo.

If I had less than a hundred bucks to spend though, and was primarily interested in overdriven/heavy tones, I'd be reasonably happy with GreenMachine Amp II for 89 bucks. It has separate preamp/amp/speaker sections that you can disable, so by itself or combined with a few of the better freeware apps out there, one could do respectable work. It has a demo too...and tweaking those mic settings (even when the speakers are disabled) can give you a huge variety of tones. It's alot higher-quality than a first glance might indicate. I'm actually glad I've got it along with Revalver II as I'm sure it'll come in handy for heavy rhythm guitar doubling variety.

But if you buy Revalver2, Amplitube2 or Guitar Rig3, no matter which, consider yourself very, very fortunate. I've had to play with the freeware stuff for the last year or two (like thousands of others out there) and trust me, you have every right to feel like a kid in a candy-store! I know I do...finally!...Muhaha!

[OldGeezer]

Hey! This thread is stickied! Well, for any amp shoppers out there, here's a list of the best Freeware, Budget, and Commercial Amp sims that I'd recommend. You can either download these for free, or download demos that let you sample what they have to offer:

FREEWARE AMPS:

SimulAnalog Guitar Suite:
http://www.simulanalog.org/guitarsuite.htm
Ugly GUI (it has none) but sounds absolutely amazing. Comes with two Separate amp sims (JCM900 Marshall and Rednef Twin (Fender Twin) along with several pedal sims. The JCM900 on "channel B" is one of the best sounding distortion amps out there, even compared to the commercial amps. Even though I own several commercial sims, I'm still keeping this one around.

FreeAmp 2:
http://frettedsynth.asseca.com/as.htm
Nice GUI, comes with tons of features. Makes beautiful clean tones and unique distorted tones.

Boogex:
http://www.voxengo.com/product/boogex/
Alot of guitarists like this one too. Has a good cabinet emulator with a nice big list of cabinets to choose from.

Wagner Sharp (Preamp)
http://www.the29a.org/nickcrow/Wagner_Sharp_v0.6.zip
This is a great preamp that pumps out signifigant distortion which is getting great reviews. Since it is a preamp, you must use it in conjunction with at least a cabinet emulator. You can insert it into the audio track and put Boogex (see above) right after it (turn the drive in Boogex all the way down and experiment with different cabinets). You can also use Amplitube Duo after Wagner Sharp and experiment with that too (try bypassing the amp section in Amplitube and just use its speakers for example).

Juicy 77
http://www.bteaudio.com/software/Juicy77/Juicy77.html
Another nice freeware amp that is capable of some nice tones.

TS' Secret
http://www.bteaudio.com/software/TSS/TSS.html
A "Tube Screamer" overdrive pedal sim that can be placed before any of the amps above to further expand the palette of sounds at your disposal

So if you've bought Realstrat or are thinking of buying it, and you're discouraged by the thought of having to buy an expensive amp sim, you can most absolutely get some great sounds in just about any style you can think of with all the above FREE software.


BUDGET AMPS:

Studio Devil
http://www.studiodevil.com/home/
Great tube amp sim that does clean and distorted tones really well.

Green Machine:
http://www.greenmachine.pwuq.net/html/greenmachineamp.html
Great unique distortion amp sim with a speaker section that really lets you taylor the sound.

The Big 3 COMMERCIAL AMPS:

Revalver MkII
http://www.alienconnections.com/products_revalverii.htm
The least expensive of the "big three", it has more basic features but sounds fantastic

Amplitube 2
http://www.amplitube.com/Main.html?prod_AT.php
Another super amp sim, you get a special upgrade price since you already have Amplitube Duo that came with Realstrat.

Guitar Rig 3
http://www.native-instruments.com/index.php?id=guitarrig3se
Another fantastic full-featured amp sim with everything you'd want.


This list should get you started. The freeware options are good if you can't afford to buy anything yet. The budget amps I've mention both sound great (I'd prolly go with Studio Devil but I own GreenMachine and it is fun to use.

DO NOT BUY ANYTHING UNTIL YOU"VE DOWNLOADED AND FULLY TESTED THE DEMOS!!! There's no excuse for not liking an amp sim you bought when there are demos that let you try all the features, and the links I've provided will let you download such demos for each product I mention.