Thermionik Amp VSTs - Holy S***!!!!!!

[niffnoff]

I actually think that the whole "it's to monetize thing" deeply wrong. How many here have purchased amp sims and thought. "Gee I really don't wanna use this "Hi-Gain" amp because I play Blues!" Paying for what you need over everything is something that I think is 100% better than anything out there. Amplitube is just starting to do it. I think Therminonik is 100% good for value. And on the Recabinet think, I would rather it be seperate anyway, if I have to focus on everything in one plugin, I guarantee I'm going to get sloppy. Just save your signal chain as a preset once you find something you like. Don't blame a dev for making something in his/her vision to do one thing well.

my 2 centz....

 

[vertibration]

FWIW, I consider it a significant downgrade in terms of interface/usability and like the other user (whether correct or not) makes me feel like it was a play to further monetize.

The recabinet interface is absolutely wretched at this point, IMHO. As a paying customer, I would LOVE to see it reworked at a bare minimum, if not reintegrated to Thermionik, if you decide to proved some kind of wrapper to integrate them as a sparate thing, I hope it will be provided to those who own both products.

Image Line came out with a free wrapper called minihost modular

https://www.image-line.com/support/FLHelp/html/plugins/Minihost Modular.htm

I kinda dont think people even want a host/wrapper. I think people are asking for integration. It doesnt have to be "bloatware" to integrate them both. As far as doing one thing really well, and other amp sims having "bloated" interfaces, I judge that statement by how much CPU it uses. If its low on CPU, and sounds good, then why not have some eye candy. I personally like the interface of the X50. Looks sleek, and sounds awesome.

I agree, Recabinet as a seperate IR loader is like why? No offence to Kazrog, as his products are awesome, but its the direction that is steering me away towards an all in one sim.

Not to mention that Fractal Audio confirmed in a thread that they will release their own Amp Sim "soon..."

So if I am the competition, I would go back to the all in one suite idea, because its not that its what everyone else is doing, but its kind of what is expected. Just make your all in one suite refined, simple, bloat free, but make it all in one so people like us wont complain about liking the product, but have issues based out of functionality frustration.

 

[Kazrog]

I appreciate the feedback, guys. It's impossible to please everyone, but I am working on solutions that should solve 99% of the gripes mentioned here.

 

[vertibration]

I appreciate the feedback, guys. It's impossible to please everyone, but I am working on solutions that should solve 99% of the gripes mentioned here.

At least you understand, and are willing to take these things into consideration. Thanks, I like your sims a lot, so Im looking forward to your solutions

 

[Descent]

I'm also utterly confused by the nomenclature and the look is generic, so it doesn't hint of the emulation.
BTW I'm getting better at using these and I like what I'm squeezing out in terms of sound but am using a lot of DAW plugins to massage the signal chain.
I find they work better on active pickups BTW.

 

[Kazrog]

I'm also utterly confused by the nomenclature and the look is generic, so it doesn't hint of the emulation.

I tried to make the names as intuitive as possible, but if you get stuck, there is a list on the website and in the manual itself. As for the look, it made sense to go to a generic look for a variety of practical reasons - this allows the focus to be put 100% on sounds/function, rather than 3D rendered graphics. As much as I enjoy doing 3D graphics, it's incredibly time consuming and was not going to be sustainable when putting out as many emulations as I have planned over time.

BTW I'm getting better at using these and I like what I'm squeezing out in terms of sound but am using a lot of DAW plugins to massage the signal chain.

Sure, just like with the real amps in a real studio environment, custom-tailoring the tone to your mix may require additional processing. That's one of the reasons why the whole suite takes a modular approach, so you can do things like separate preamp from poweramp and run things in the loop between, etc.

I find they work better on active pickups BTW.

I've gotten great results with both actives and passives, in many guitars. Depending on your interface and DI, you may need to make adjustments depending on pickups. Every amp in the suite has -24/+24 dB of input trim gain on tap, which is stored at the preset level.

 

[steelyad]

Here's a question for you - I usually track at about -12dBfs for plenty of headroom (I think in analog levels for several reasons). If I boost my input gain above the point where if would, in theory, clip, does the plugin have additional internal headroom so it'll act like a boost pedal and not just square-wave clip?
Cheers

 

[Kazrog]

Here's a question for you - I usually track at about -12dBfs for plenty of headroom (I think in analog levels for several reasons). If I boost my input gain above the point where if would, in theory, clip, does the plugin have additional internal headroom so it'll act like a boost pedal and not just square-wave clip?
Cheers

It takes a lot of gain before you really start to even push the virtual tubes into audible soft clipping. Every model in the suite has more headroom on tap than any real tube amp, actually, as the lower points along the gain knob taper are usable until you reach actual 0.0. This is an intentional design decision that allows for extra sonic possibilities, such as playing true cleans on a lead channel (some of them sound quite excellent this way.)

 

[Descent]

Here's a question for you - I usually track at about -12dBfs for plenty of headroom (I think in analog levels for several reasons). If I boost my input gain above the point where if would, in theory, clip, does the plugin have additional internal headroom so it'll act like a boost pedal and not just square-wave clip?
Cheers

"Input trim" and "saturation" are actually really cool on this design. You can play with these to get better gain staging. I noticed that you can change the whole response structure on these with it, which is cool.

 

[RobPhoboS]

Cheers for the vid !

I downloaded the demo last night to have a quick twag around but I found it horrendously noisy and like it was taking away attack, I'm wondering if there is something specific I needed to set in FLStudio as it seems a bit odd.
I'm going from my guitar into a decimator 2, then into an audient iD14 into FL.

Aside from the weird attack issue, would you put a noise gate after the amp but before the cab, or just after the cab ?

 

[steelyad]

Cheers for the vid !

I downloaded the demo last night to have a quick twag around but I found it horrendously noisy and like it was taking away attack, I'm wondering if there is something specific I needed to set in FLStudio as it seems a bit odd.
I'm going from my guitar into a decimator 2, then into an audient iD14 into FL.

Aside from the weird attack issue, would you put a noise gate after the amp but before the cab, or just after the cab ?

Hey man

Just so you know, virtual amps aren't noisy at all, that is to say they don't add any, they will however amplify any noise you already had. Are you running into a preamp set in "Instrument" mode? If not, the impedance will be wrong and will bring in additional noise and probably soften off your transients as well.
As for the decimator - don't use it. If you need noise gating, do it digitally - analog noise gates play well with analog gear but not so much with digital interfaces.
Also, how high were your gain controls? You may find they don't need to be up so high to get a really beefy tone with a lot of these amps.

 

[NosralTserrof]

Bumping this thread:

These plugins are goddamn amazing. I used them in my band's latest single (warning: not metal) and they respond and sound like real amps. Crazy.


Also the new amps/pedal sims that are out are sick. Absolutely nails (lol) the HM2 tone.

 

[heathenhotel]

I have purchased literally every bit of guitar software out there. I had really high hopes for thermionik and I liked it at first but it did take a lot of tweaking to get something really usable. Then Mercuriall came out with the U530 and Spark plus ENGL has their two plugins plus TSE and the x50 2.0, after that, I deleted all the thermionik stuff because it just couldn't compare.

 

[Carl Kolchak]

Being just a livingroom recorder, I neither have the pc skills or the money to make the Thermionik amp sims sound as good as some of the clips I've heard. This is why something like BIAS FX is ideal for someone like myself, as the ability "point and click" a signal chain in one handy track is a godsend.

 

[heathenhotel]

Being just a livingroom recorder, I neither have the pc skills or the money to make the Thermionik amp sims sound as good as some of the clips I've heard. This is why something like BIAS FX is ideal for someone like myself, as the ability "point and click" a signal chain in one handy track is a godsend.

The positive grid stuff is a bunch of turds wrapped in pretty wrapping paper. Positive grid use their graphics and their PAID endorsements to suck people into buying half assed sounding and usually broken products with tons of bugs. But how could big names be wrong you ask? Positive grid paid them money and then those guys lathered the PG products with loads of other plugins to get them to sound good. Sure their stuff is easy to use but easy isn't always good. If you want to be able to get a great tone with little to no effort, pick up the two Mercuriall sims (spark/U530) for cheap and you will have great tone right away. I am a livingroom recorder too but quality is attainable for low costs. Get the two Mercuriall plugin free versions and see how easy it is to dial in sick tone.

 

[niffnoff]

Being just a livingroom recorder, I neither have the pc skills or the money to make the Thermionik amp sims sound as good as some of the clips I've heard. This is why something like BIAS FX is ideal for someone like myself, as the ability "point and click" a signal chain in one handy track is a godsend.

Impulses matter how you want to make your tone sound. Also sometimes adding a screamer helps. But, also the mix tone vs. a tone out of a mix is a huge difference.

 

[Carl Kolchak]

The positive grid stuff is a bunch of turds wrapped in pretty wrapping paper. Positive grid use their graphics and their PAID endorsements to suck people into buying half assed sounding and usually broken products with tons of bugs. But how could big names be wrong you ask? Positive grid paid them money and then those guys lathered the PG products with loads of other plugins to get them to sound good. Sure their stuff is easy to use but easy isn't always good. If you want to be able to get a great tone with little to no effort, pick up the two Mercuriall sims (spark/U530) for cheap and you will have great tone right away. I am a livingroom recorder too but quality is attainable for low costs. Get the two Mercuriall plugin free versions and see how easy it is to dial in sick tone.

For me, it's not so much about getting a good tone, but just trying to keep the ones I get from sucking as much as possible.

I tried both of Mercuriall's free versions of their Spark and U530 sims, but don't really think they're a significant improvement over the TSE X50 to warrant dropping another $50-$100 on.

 

[steelyad]

If anyone's interested, there's now a Thermionik Screamer which works very nicely, and 2 Diezel VH4 amps in there (blue and silver face) which are tighter than a nun's hoohoo.

And an SVT for fat bass tones which really grits up and saturates like the real thing. I used the Amplitube SVT classic for years, but even on full gain it never gave me that hefty tone.

 

[heathenhotel]

If anyone's interested, there's now a Thermionik Screamer which works very nicely, and 2 Diezel VH4 amps in there (blue and silver face) which are tighter than a nun's hoohoo.

And an SVT for fat bass tones which really grits up and saturates like the real thing. I used the Amplitube SVT classic for years, but even on full gain it never gave me that hefty tone.

Where did you try any of those plugins when they haven't been released yet? I pre-ordered the overdrive legends pack and the site still has yet to post them. There's no free/beta versions available either.

 

[NosralTserrof]

Where did you try any of those plugins when they haven't been released yet? I pre-ordered the overdrive legends pack and the site still has yet to post them. There's no free/beta versions available either.

Have you checked your email? There might be a registration thing there. If you look at the website you should see a demo for the complete collection vol. 1.