Made a mistake...

[nickdahl]

A couple of months ago I thought I needed to make a change, so I sold my guitar rack (except for my VHT power amp), and moved to a PODxt PRO. I thought digital modeling would be the ticket for me, both in recording to my computer, and for playing live. It didn't work.

Although I had dozens of tones to work with, I missed the two or three that I thought were just fine to begin with, so now I'm rebuilding my rack. It won't be as ambitious as my previous rack, but it'll do the trick for me.

Six spaces: Palmer ADIG-04, Rocktron Replifex, CAE 3+SE preamp, VHT Two/Fifty/Two power amp.

Nick

[John Price]

We live and learn!

I'm just glad you saw the light! :D

[Stan Malinowski]

Ouch!!! I gave the "digital modeling amp" approach a shot also without much luck. Luckily I still kept my tube amps and pedals. The PODxt has been now relegated to late night "private jam sessions".

But then again, nothing ventured, nothing gained.

[joe1962]

The PODxt has been now relegated to late night "private jam sessions".

I've been using a Johnson J-Station for a while now for the same thing. Nothing beats a good tube amp, but it's hard to get a good tone out of the tube amp after the wife and kids go to bed (which is when I do 50% of my playing these days). The J is OK but lately I've thought about upgrading to a PODxt or the Vox thing now that everyone is selling them for $299.

[Turrican]

rack has been the way to go for me for some years. really flexible, and can get the great tones at bedroom level volume
IMO, digital modelling units show their value in home recording, when the room is too crappy sounding and the "super" amp always too loud, but nothing like a real tube amp to get a nice smile in the face

[pluto]

I really agree that a few great sounds is a lot better than a lot of mediocre sounds. That's probably why I've never really liked modelling type amps-just way too many amp models stuffed into an amp. I can see why a gigging musician playing cover songs would own one, but otherwise, I can't see the point. When I used to own a Flextone II 5 or so years ago, I kept the dial on one model and never changed settings. Last year, I played that HD147 and saw that there were tons of high gain models on it. Too bad all of the models didn't sound a thing IMO like the real amps they were supposed to model (excluding of course the Line 6 original amp models which weren't emulating anything). As a bedroom dufus, just give me a simple one channel Marshall, a pedal, two cables, and a guitar and that's good enough for me.

[michaelomiya]

As a bedroom dufus, just give me a simple one channel Marshall, a pedal, two cables, and a guitar and that's good enough for me.

A Marshall? ..... In the BEDROOM?!?!? :eek: :eek: :confused: You are a dufus. :D

So what do you have against the PodXT? huh? Ain't you "man-ly" enough to step up to solid state, I/C chip, compressed schmear tone? huh? what, your vintage, tube driven ears can't take a little "screamin' in digital"? weak. :rolleyes: :p

c'mon, I'll trade you a Cybertwin or Flextone2+ for your '70 Super Lead. You don't need all the wattage anyway. It's overrated. It's unusable. It's expensive to maintain. And the #1 reason you don't want a vintage 100W Marshall on your hands...... you can't throw it away when it breaks!! :D

[pluto]

And the #1 reason you don't want a vintage 100W Marshall on your hands...... you can't throw it away when it breaks!! :D

Too true. In fact the other day I was shaking in fear when the superlead was humming like a mofo, cutting in and out, and feedbacking at low volumes when I pushed the front end. I replaced the cable and V1 tube and was good to go, but I was worried for about 5 minutes that the vintage superlead was going to be nothing but an ornament. Vintage amps are cool, but dang, I don't need any more white hairs!

[michaelomiya]

Too true. In fact the other day I was shaking in fear when the superlead was humming like a mofo, cutting in and out, and feedbacking at low volumes when I pushed the front end. I replaced the cable and V1 tube and was good to go, but I was worried for about 5 minutes that the vintage superlead was going to be nothing but an ornament. Vintage amps are cool, but dang, I don't need any more white hairs!

'now what? when something's fading, breaking, dying, it's a matter of identifying the component and replacing it. Seriously. These amps are built to last forever - like the cars of old.

Nowadays products are generally designed to survive only until the next incarnation (AKA forced obsolesence). Built to last? Yeah, only until advertising can come up w/ the next billion dollar campaign. Marketing and appearance rule - function's now a concept of the past. And so, the lack of build quality, engineering and design, all align w/ the mass production mentality. With the exception of companies like TAG, most enterprises try and support their infrastructure through a large volume-and even larger margin-strategy.

IMHO, modeling amps fit squarely in the strike zone of the aforementioned corporate mindset.