I’ve tried almost every amp modeler since the original Line 6 POD and Neural DSP just gets me from plugging in to great tone quicker than anything I’ve ever used.
HiJohn. I discovered your channel about six months ago. Just want to say thanks for all the great content. You are a genuine inspiration to me. I bought a PRS SE DGT a few weeks ago after hearing your Tonex ODS demo. I gigged it last night and loved it! Wishing you and yours a great Christmas!
I come for your playing at the beginning. I don't have the 'headrioom' or the budget to really caee about endless dissections of gear. For what it's worth, I'd really like to see you talk more about your approaches to improvisation. Those are your best videos imo
Scuffham S-gear is awesome. I think that I have tried almost everything out there and must say that Scuffham is my number one. Line 6 Helix Native is also very nice😊👍❤️🎄
While you obviously sound godlike on everything. In my opinion ToneX with Amplitube is just superior to the neural stuff. I tried the CoryWong and the Imperial from Neural and it just falls short to a good tonex capture in tone and feel plus with all the posibilities of amplitube at a much cheaper price, its just a nobrainer.
Yeah, you can do a lot with gain staging, and don't just stick with what's recommended. On Neural plugins, I often dial the input down -10 to get great clean tones. Once you learn to gain stage for your taste, Neural plugins are great. But Helix Native is no slouch. I use it a lot, as well as my HX Effects. We have so many options it's getting crazy.
I’ve watch a couple video’s recently where they advocate for setting your hiZ input on your interface to zero. Then setting the input on the plug-in depending your pickups. With my humbuckers it’s usually at unity with Neural and slightly less with amphub.
I've acquired 4 Neural Suites iver the last couple of years. Gojira, Plini (x), Soldano & Henson. All very different but as home player, theyprovide me with what I need in a user friendly excellent sounding format. Ive tried most of the competitors but always return to Neural. They probably are a bit overpriced but i have only ever bought them in thier twice a year 50% sale. TBH I probably would never have gone down the Neural path at full price
and I’ll repeat once more for the input level thing - to have the correct gain levels from ALL NDSP amp sims, for any guitar/pickup, you must have 12.2dBu of input headroom (this does not mean your peaks are 12dBFS below clipping, it refers to the available analog headroom of your interface before clipping occurs). A UAD Apollo instrument input has exactly this amount of headroom when gain is at 0, it’s approx 3V which is about the most you’ll get out of playing humbuckers as hard as possible. Focusrite interfaces like the 2i2 etc also use 12dBu, as do many other interfaces. But check the specs for “maximum input headroom” - if it’s a higher number than 12.2dBu, then you must boost in the plugin input by the difference, if the number is lower than 12.2dBu, then you cut in the plugin. This will give the same gain response as plugging any guitar or bass directly into the real amp, all the volume adjustments and different pickups will all behave the same as what would happen when plugging them into the amp.
You were telling that 2 months ago, before that came to be a discussion between content creators. Well done!!! I have discovered it just last week, made all the difference in the world.
Hi JNC, awesome channel, awesome playing! @13:52 you open up Plini plugin and I saw you have a whole lotta ton of presets...are they maybe available somewhere?? Edit never mind, I had just forgotten to update it to "X" version...
That is always the compromise... everyone would rather turn real knobs and have dedicated knobs for everything than dragging lines or incrementing numbers. The grail is to defy physics and have usable 1 to 1 knobs in a small portable package.
This all goes back to the issue of factory presets being sub par on the Helix/HX platform compared with other modelers of its caliber. The factory presets could use a major makeover imho, because it's absolutely possible to make this thing sound as good or better than anything else out there. I had to spend a solid couple months reformatting my presets when I first got my Stomp, unfortunately.
Regarding Neural. I have 3 of the archetypes. They are all rad. They all LOOK great. That being said, it is more often than not I am replacing pre and post fix with other plugins like Natuve or Valhalla, Soundtoys in the channel. And Cordy., Neural dresses every output win an amount of really good compression. The plugins are louder. So it’s easy to say they “sound” better. But in many ways they do…. And if one understands Native? It’s a no brainer which to use for pro audio.
Gain staging is critical and is the most frequent reason guitarists will say, “I keep hearing my DI in my DAW.’ It’s not gain staged. Native has the meters for it. But GAIN STAGING is SO important. And Cordy, No makes their presets very loud as you know. Native does not. But you can increase the output signal out of Helix a couple db if it’s all you need.
The neural plugins are great. What’s really awesome is the ability to dial in a tone very quickly. I was doing a course by Plini recently and each chapter came with the XML files. 10 seconds and the tone was identical. Couple of minor gripes. I never seem to be able to get the volume/ gain quite right and the feel still isn’t quite as good as the quad cortex or dare I say it, a real tube amp!
Sorry I thought I replied already. It is the course on Pickup Music. It is most excellent- there’s a lot of great stuff on there including an intermediate prog course that was also super helpful.
Im sort of curious about the new revalver and I have helix native and amplitube/ tonex as well already but I am saving up to snag an FM 9 next. That is how I plan to go. if I need to play a sim I will use one of these and I will upgrade my revalver to 5. Also have guitar rig and ampfire but they are not in the same league. If I were to try other sims then they need to be a good deal and not split up over a number of different products that add up to a total price that is high. I am also leaning towards getting THU and Bias as well but Revalver can host other plugins so it is very useful if it turns out to be great I can load Helix or amplitube/tonex inside of that and then add on additional plugins for lexicon reverbs or other delay plugins like a pulsar echorec etc.... Neural is down the list for me because of its high cost of total ownership.
What does it mean when you say that Neural DSP “have the world of plugins pretty much sewn up”? You mean they have it all? Or they are better than everything else?
I agree that Neural’s interfaces are overall much more user-friendly,. However, my main gripe with Neural DSP is that, up until recently, there has been a HUGE amount of overlap in their catalogue: metal guitarist Archetypes ad nauseum. For me, they released one of the most versatile suites 4 years ago: Archetype Nolly. I still use it today alongside Helix Native. Helix Native can definitely be a cure for Neural DSP’s aggressively astroturfed marketing once you learn your way around it. Aside from from some niche effects, Native can do just about all the tones and effects in *all* of the NDSP products imo.
@@MrIantodd stl amp hub looks fancy & sounds good i guess but its subscription for ~$120 a year & still has a lot less stuff than other options so if you want a subscription i’d highly recommend the slate all access pass which comes with overloud th-u slate edition amp modeling suite plus a ridiculous amount of plugins for mixing/production. The best option for purchase rn is probably Amplitube 5 max v2 which is on sale for $80 & has 430 gear models. They have a bundle of amplitube & tonex for $130. Th-u has 89 amps 60 cabs & 83 pedals & is $150. Both options have way more value than the STL stuff imo. Amp hub only has 41 amps 23 cabs & 27 pedals.
the price is absurd as well. $400 for just the plugin??? crazy. only reason to get hx native is if u already have an hx stomp or something. Overloud Th-u is $150 and arguably better quality sound + much better looking
neural dsp is so overrated. their plugins are overpriced and mediocre. Marketing really is everything though and they have had some good marketing. $100 for 3 amps and 3 cabs & 4 fx or $150 for 89 amps, 52 cabinets & 83 fx plus rig player and super cabinet with TH-U. it's a no brainer to me but what do i know?
Saying they’re mediocre is absurd. The Neural DSP tones are phenomenal and 89 amps with 52 cabs would just give me option paralysis. Being able to open up the Morgan Amps Suite and know exactly what I’m getting is invaluable to me. No one needs 89 real amps so you probably don’t need 89 plug-in amps… if you have 3-5 great amps, you’re set forever.
@@robsmith5434 maybe if you're just a guitarist but if you're an engineer/producer you're not always producing the same style music so having a wide color palate available is a big plus. does neural even have an oversampling switch anymore? looks like they removed that feature on the plini x, kinda liked the older version better tbh but i only had the trial. the tone was good but the feature set for the money is deff mediocre. there's a significant markup to pay the artists.
@@xlilxillxYea. Good point. I think it really depends on what you’re doing. If you’re a guitar player that has used a lot of different real world amps, the Neural stuff feels like home. If you’re a producer or electronic musician, there are probably better options. It is kinda the same with the UAD stuff. If you’ve used a lot of analog gear, that stuff makes sense but if you have mostly mixed in the box, UAD stuff isn’t as intuitive as other options and is also more expensive.