Official Axe-Fx Q&A thread!

[Shask]

Is anyone actually buying a III. I feel like the II had immediate widespread adoption, and the III had almost immediate price drops and non-stop spamming me about sales. Imagining a huge warehouse full of sitting inventory somewhere.

I have kind of wondered the same thing. Although, I think their production is different now, and they can produce in larger quantities than they did back then.

I get the feeling everyone is waiting for their next floor unit. I think it will be their highest selling product when it drops. No one really knows when, but people predict mid-2019.

 

[Andromalia]

Is anyone actually buying a III. I feel like the II had immediate widespread adoption, and the III had almost immediate price drops and non-stop spamming me about sales. Imagining a huge warehouse full of sitting inventory somewhere.

Well, I bought one and am perfectly happy with it. But, again, it's not so much a tone thing than a stupidly easy to use piece of outboard gear, oh yeah and it's still a guitar preamp.
There's a good chance it being 3U repelled some people too.

I intend to release a few songs in May 100% DIY and I do intend the result to be professional sounding. All I'll use will be the axe III for *everything* but EQ and compression, which will be handled by the SSL plugin. What the axe III brings over the II for someone who "just" plays guitar might seem as not worth it compared to the competition Max cited.
But you can't mix and master an album with a Kemper. ^^

TLDR: the 8 way USB changes everything.

 

[crg123]

Soooooo. This happened

https://forum.fractalaudio.com/thre...pw86DGgbLYsc10A_-Z9i366lX98EW637kvlkxrh84SiAA

Cliff "This incorporates some of the modeling improvements from the III."

 

[mnemonic]

Soooooo. This happened

https://forum.fractalaudio.com/thre...pw86DGgbLYsc10A_-Z9i366lX98EW637kvlkxrh84SiAA

Cliff "This incorporates some of the modeling improvements from the III."

Cool, I wasn’t really expecting another update since the last one was almost a year ago.

There’s been a lot of whining on the axe FX II forum about firmware and it’s been ramping up lately, maybe this will shut them up.

Anyone tried it yet? I have everything sounding the way I like at the moment so I don’t really want to mess with anything too much.

 

[TGN]

Looking forward to checking it out when I get home:

"Ares 1.00
This firmware is a partial port of the “Ares” modeling used in the Axe-Fx III.
Not all aspects of the Ares modeling were able to be ported but the most
important parts were and the amp modeling should sound very similar. "

 

[lewis]

will that firmware update work with my AX8 ?

 

[mnemonic]

will that firmware update work with my AX8 ?

Gotta wait until he ports it to AX8 which I assume they will.

 

[lewis]

Gotta wait until he ports it to AX8 which I assume they will.

ah thank you!

Will sit on it and wait then. The most recent one for me before this was awesome and included some Axe III stuff I believe. Continued support for "older" products is really nice from Fractal.

 

[Shask]

Cool, I wasn’t really expecting another update since the last one was almost a year ago.

There’s been a lot of whining on the axe FX II forum about firmware and it’s been ramping up lately, maybe this will shut them up.

Anyone tried it yet? I have everything sounding the way I like at the moment so I don’t really want to mess with anything too much.

Yeah, and he basically said he struggled to make this one fit because the memory is out of ... memory. That is what stopped the Ultra/Standard also. I figure this is one last send off. Very cool though! I figured there would be more finalized update before the official end.

 

[lewis]

Yeah, and he basically said he struggled to make this one fit because the memory is out of ... memory. That is what stopped the Ultra/Standard also. I figure this is one last send off. Very cool though! I figured there would be more finalized update before the official end.

came at a good time for me too. Ive not had my AX8 6 months from new yet

 

[Shask]

Yeah, and he basically said he struggled to make this one fit because the memory is out of ... memory. That is what stopped the Ultra/Standard also. I figure this is one last send off. Very cool though! I figured there would be one more finalized update before the official end.

Yep, what I figured. One final update before the end to officially end the updates to the Axe-FX II.

"
FractalAudio said: ↑
I will release a final version of this firmware in a few days. That will be the last update (barring bug fixes) for the Axe-Fx II.
"

 

[TGN]

The II had a good run.

 

[Lorcan Ward]

That's really cool of Cliff to keep supporting the II a year after the III was released.

 

[mnemonic]

Installed the update yesterday afternoon and played around with it for a couple hours. I was gonna wait for a stable release but talk of a reworked ampeg SVT made me want to try it now. Cool amp for bass, but I still prefer the USA 400 and the Citrus Bass.

My patches didn’t really need any tweakingx except for one using the FAS Modern III, which was a bit boomier, so I just turned the bass down a bit.

I was liking my patches before the update and things still sound good. I didn’t really do an A/B test though, since I played guitar for like 10 minutes, did the update, then spent like an hour playing bass before taking a break and then going back to guitar.

I just read someone on the axe FX forum saying their Recto patches sound better, and the amp may have also been reworked, I’ll have to check them out as I tend to avoid the Recto models these days, as I find they take more work than they ought to and I can get better sounds quicker out of the FAS Modern III for example.

A couple bugs I noticed, there are two Porta-Bass models, one of which appears to be the ‘wrecker rocket’ guitar amp model, and the other is the bass model. Selecting the bass model freezes the axe FX some of the time. Also there’s a new Friedman hbe model with a name with extra numbers at the end. It does sound really good though, I usually don’t like the Friedman models without some in-depth tweaking but this one is super chunky at stock settings.

Also when switching patches sometimes there is a quiet ‘beep’ noise which I’m pretty sure wasn’t there before.

 

[Shask]

I am really curious to try it, but waiting for the final release since bugs have been found. It seems like there are a lot of good reports that it does sound and feel better overall.... however, people pretty much say that about every update, lol. I don't know if I will find it very noticeable.

 

[Elric]

The II had a good run.

Yup. It's a good stopping point, too. I loaded this last one and most of my presets on the II sound great without too much adjustment. Lifetime of tones still in that box. The UI will definitely not age well but toanz is toanz for eternity.

 

[Jason B]

As someone who does all tweaking via Axe-Edit, we’ll see if I make it to the next iteration of III before upgrading.

 

[FireInside]

Super stoked to have another update. Hoping to try it out this weekend.

 

[Andromalia]

As I have a III, I'm not upgrading before the axe IV. I had a standard and II and never felt the need to upgrade to a + or XXL model when they were released.
I hope in 7 years they will make a smaller unit.

 

[Hybrid138]

I would assume this has been answered several times, but is there a new SS.org favorite for a powered PA speaker for the Axe-FX? I bought an Alto 112/115 (it's been so long I forgot which one it was) and it finally died. It worked well for me, and I'm considering just buying another. Wanted to see if there's a new fan favorite I should look into.