billinder33
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On the advice of some members on different internet forum, I did a test of Helix Native, against some of the other sims I own. I did a lengthy writeup for them, and thought I would share it here as well.
Quick note... this test was in no way meant to be scientific or definitively say 'this is better than that'. The goal of the test was to see if I could dial in my personal tone and in doing so, to compare the different platforms I tested, and rank them based on their ability to deliver MY personal tone. Your tastes in guitar tone will almost certainly different than mine, and that would certainly impact how you feel about each platform. I am posting this here because there may be some value to others in reading about the platforms compared in this test.
--
Here's how I ran my test. I stacked 5 channels, and loaded one with Helix Native, one with Amplitube Mesa, one with ReAxis. On the 4th, I had a channel for HD500X via USB input. On the 5th, the Kemper with my favorite patch, a Splawn Nitro, lined into the Apollo16 via thunderbolt. I tried to switch between VST and non VST platforms as quickly as possible to make sure the previous platform was still fresh to my ear. I monitored through my Dynaudio BM5A MKIIs and occasionally though Beyerdynamic 880s headphones.
In this test, I was not trying to do the impossible of sound matching between each platform. I'm not a guy that's looking for 100's of vintage and modern amps. I'm just looking for the one or two guitar tones that resonate the best with my tastes, which I would describe as a mid-gain, mid-forward tone (think cranked Mesa .50 Caliber or a slightly dialed back Mark IV Lead channel). My style is progish-alternative rock (think Faith No More, KingCrow, 12 Foot Ninja, etc.), so I also like having a lot of FX at hand within a given platform, but that was not in consideration for the sake of this test. The use case under consideration here is only related to RECORDING and not playing live. Onto my conclusion...
First, they all sound seriously great in their own way. It's really just 'splitting hairs' for the most part. If I were 'stuck' with any of these platforms, I could make them all work just fine. So we're not discussing 'viability' here, just preference. In terms of my personal preference from this comparison test...
1) Nothing beats the Kemper for feel... it just feels real. It sounds real. The Kemper has made me believe that profiling, rather than modeling is just a superior way of re-creating a guitar tone. IMO it's because a profile captures the amp, cab, mics, and mic pres all in one pass, rather than modeling individual parts of the chain and then stacking them all together. The profiling method is not without it's drawbacks. It's certainly less tweak able, but honestly I'm not a guy that wants to spend all my time tweaking, I just want those two or three killer tones to do my work with. My favorite Kemper profile used in this test was a Tony McKenzie Splawn Nitro I downloaded from the Rig Exchange. Regardless of profile, the Kemper is just a much different animal in terms of responsiveness and 'feel' than everything else I've worked with.
2a) ReAxis for high-gain chug-a-chug work. ReAxis is a friggin' amazing sounding VST. It just scratches that high-gain itch.
2b) Amplitube licensed Mesas for mid-gain lead/solo tones. I really love the sound of the Amplitube Mark. It's not as dirty as Re-Axis or many of the other platforms' Mark representations. It's very .50 Caliber-ish, and I love that tone. Almost like my little Subway Rocket from back in the day, which was a killer amp... FWIW, I used to mic up the Subway's little 10' speaker and by the time I was done tracking and mixing, that little combo would sound like a pair of raging full stacks. Amplitube's implementation of Mark really brings me back to that tone.
3) HeliX Native - Awesome UI. Awesome FX section. Massive tweak-ability. 'Meh' tones out of the box, but after A LOT of messing around, I was able to get close to what I love about Amplitube and ReAxis. I did this by blending a Cali IV with a Cali Rectifier and tweaking mics and cabs and compressors and gain pedals and overall just way too much tweaking to land a few inches off the green. Additionally I felt that it was a little less responsive than those two... the overall platform has a slight "lifeless" or over-compressed quality to it. It reminds me a lot of the HD500X in this way.
4) HD500X, I've never been able to squeeze a sound out of it that I was really in love with. Which is not to say that it doesn't have some great sounds, just nothing that really resonated. Similar to the Helix, it probably has the ability to deliver, it's just that I'm not in love with the models L6 has decided to put on it.
So would I buy Helix Native? Already owning Amplitube Max and ReAxis, my answer would be "no". If I were starting with nothing, I would seriously consider it because of the value proposition... it's a great platform with tons of flexibility at a great price. It did seem to tax my CPU a bit more than the others.
That said, I'd seriously considering buying a used floor model in the future as an upgrade to my HD500X. The form-factor of Helix floor is excellent and their UI editors are awesome. I'm also more willing to compromise on my tone in a live situation than in recording. I would really love it if Kemper came out with a floor model that includes an expression pedal, plus a true IU editor to bypass their horrific front-panel UI, but I'm not holding my breath.
What I'd really like to see from Line6 is for them to publish a very large library of models for import/export - not user presets like they have now, but actual models - that way I could probably get to the sound I'm chasing, without all the extra hours of twisting so many parameters to force a tone that doesn't already exist natively. Also, I would like the ability (maybe you can already do this) to get rid of some of the stored models, cabs, and pedals, so that when I do start building patches, I wouldn't have to grind through so many amp/cab/pedal sims that I'll never use. I'm really interested to see what L6 comes out with at NAMM.
IMO, in comparing these platforms, it's really just splitting hairs here. If I were to quantify it in numbers, with a real mic'd amp starting at 100%.... I would rank the Kemper at 98%, ReAxis and Amplitube would be 95%, Helix Native 93%, and HD500X 87%. That's how close this all is.
Feel free to share your own experiences!
Quick note... this test was in no way meant to be scientific or definitively say 'this is better than that'. The goal of the test was to see if I could dial in my personal tone and in doing so, to compare the different platforms I tested, and rank them based on their ability to deliver MY personal tone. Your tastes in guitar tone will almost certainly different than mine, and that would certainly impact how you feel about each platform. I am posting this here because there may be some value to others in reading about the platforms compared in this test.
--
Here's how I ran my test. I stacked 5 channels, and loaded one with Helix Native, one with Amplitube Mesa, one with ReAxis. On the 4th, I had a channel for HD500X via USB input. On the 5th, the Kemper with my favorite patch, a Splawn Nitro, lined into the Apollo16 via thunderbolt. I tried to switch between VST and non VST platforms as quickly as possible to make sure the previous platform was still fresh to my ear. I monitored through my Dynaudio BM5A MKIIs and occasionally though Beyerdynamic 880s headphones.
In this test, I was not trying to do the impossible of sound matching between each platform. I'm not a guy that's looking for 100's of vintage and modern amps. I'm just looking for the one or two guitar tones that resonate the best with my tastes, which I would describe as a mid-gain, mid-forward tone (think cranked Mesa .50 Caliber or a slightly dialed back Mark IV Lead channel). My style is progish-alternative rock (think Faith No More, KingCrow, 12 Foot Ninja, etc.), so I also like having a lot of FX at hand within a given platform, but that was not in consideration for the sake of this test. The use case under consideration here is only related to RECORDING and not playing live. Onto my conclusion...
First, they all sound seriously great in their own way. It's really just 'splitting hairs' for the most part. If I were 'stuck' with any of these platforms, I could make them all work just fine. So we're not discussing 'viability' here, just preference. In terms of my personal preference from this comparison test...
1) Nothing beats the Kemper for feel... it just feels real. It sounds real. The Kemper has made me believe that profiling, rather than modeling is just a superior way of re-creating a guitar tone. IMO it's because a profile captures the amp, cab, mics, and mic pres all in one pass, rather than modeling individual parts of the chain and then stacking them all together. The profiling method is not without it's drawbacks. It's certainly less tweak able, but honestly I'm not a guy that wants to spend all my time tweaking, I just want those two or three killer tones to do my work with. My favorite Kemper profile used in this test was a Tony McKenzie Splawn Nitro I downloaded from the Rig Exchange. Regardless of profile, the Kemper is just a much different animal in terms of responsiveness and 'feel' than everything else I've worked with.
2a) ReAxis for high-gain chug-a-chug work. ReAxis is a friggin' amazing sounding VST. It just scratches that high-gain itch.
2b) Amplitube licensed Mesas for mid-gain lead/solo tones. I really love the sound of the Amplitube Mark. It's not as dirty as Re-Axis or many of the other platforms' Mark representations. It's very .50 Caliber-ish, and I love that tone. Almost like my little Subway Rocket from back in the day, which was a killer amp... FWIW, I used to mic up the Subway's little 10' speaker and by the time I was done tracking and mixing, that little combo would sound like a pair of raging full stacks. Amplitube's implementation of Mark really brings me back to that tone.
3) HeliX Native - Awesome UI. Awesome FX section. Massive tweak-ability. 'Meh' tones out of the box, but after A LOT of messing around, I was able to get close to what I love about Amplitube and ReAxis. I did this by blending a Cali IV with a Cali Rectifier and tweaking mics and cabs and compressors and gain pedals and overall just way too much tweaking to land a few inches off the green. Additionally I felt that it was a little less responsive than those two... the overall platform has a slight "lifeless" or over-compressed quality to it. It reminds me a lot of the HD500X in this way.
4) HD500X, I've never been able to squeeze a sound out of it that I was really in love with. Which is not to say that it doesn't have some great sounds, just nothing that really resonated. Similar to the Helix, it probably has the ability to deliver, it's just that I'm not in love with the models L6 has decided to put on it.
So would I buy Helix Native? Already owning Amplitube Max and ReAxis, my answer would be "no". If I were starting with nothing, I would seriously consider it because of the value proposition... it's a great platform with tons of flexibility at a great price. It did seem to tax my CPU a bit more than the others.
That said, I'd seriously considering buying a used floor model in the future as an upgrade to my HD500X. The form-factor of Helix floor is excellent and their UI editors are awesome. I'm also more willing to compromise on my tone in a live situation than in recording. I would really love it if Kemper came out with a floor model that includes an expression pedal, plus a true IU editor to bypass their horrific front-panel UI, but I'm not holding my breath.
What I'd really like to see from Line6 is for them to publish a very large library of models for import/export - not user presets like they have now, but actual models - that way I could probably get to the sound I'm chasing, without all the extra hours of twisting so many parameters to force a tone that doesn't already exist natively. Also, I would like the ability (maybe you can already do this) to get rid of some of the stored models, cabs, and pedals, so that when I do start building patches, I wouldn't have to grind through so many amp/cab/pedal sims that I'll never use. I'm really interested to see what L6 comes out with at NAMM.
IMO, in comparing these platforms, it's really just splitting hairs here. If I were to quantify it in numbers, with a real mic'd amp starting at 100%.... I would rank the Kemper at 98%, ReAxis and Amplitube would be 95%, Helix Native 93%, and HD500X 87%. That's how close this all is.
Feel free to share your own experiences!
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