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  #1  
Old 06-05-2015, 02:11 AM
mattz63 mattz63 is offline
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Default Guitar Preamp Before Eleven Rack?

Hi,

My 11R will be here soon. I have an old Alembic F2B that I absolutely love, and I generally like to warm up my guitar before getting it digital. Will this negate the impedance matching, and cause me miss out one of the great selling points of this piece? Will let my ears decide of course.
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  #2  
Old 06-05-2015, 08:04 AM
nst7 nst7 is offline
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Default

The best thing will be to see how it sounds. From the looks of it, since it's a preamp, you will probably want to use it straight into the line input (or inputs) of the Eleven Rack, rather than trying to go through the 11R guitar input.

Don't worry about losing the True-Z function. In my experience, using a better quality DI/preamp through the line ins is a major improvement over using the 11R guitar input, regardless of True-Z or not.
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  #3  
Old 08-05-2015, 12:35 PM
RalphNYC RalphNYC is offline
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Default Re: Guitar Preamp Before Eleven Rack?

Quote:
Originally Posted by nst7 View Post
In my experience, using a better quality DI/preamp through the line ins is a major improvement over using the 11R guitar input, regardless of True-Z or not.
I'm new here (hello forum members!). What kind of improvement do you notice going into the line inputs via a DI? I'm going to try it.

Have you also found benefits of bypassing the 11R's D/A and running the digital out into a pro-quality D/A unit?

Ralph in NYC

edit: and what DI do you like, the Radial stuff or something else?
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  #4  
Old 08-05-2015, 10:05 PM
nst7 nst7 is offline
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Default Re: Guitar Preamp Before Eleven Rack?

Keep in mind that you will get many different opinions by different users.

This was a few years ago, I had bought the 11R and returned it. This was before the Expansion pack was introduced.

In my experience, neither the built in DI (with its True-Z function) nor the digital conversion on the 11Rack were that great. The DI I compared it to was the Waves PRS guitar interface. The Waves unit is both a DI and preamp, and I tried it into the line in of the 11R. I thought it was a major improvement. As for the digital conversion, I compared it to my 003 at the time (which is nothing to write home about). I felt the conversion was not even quite as good as the 003 (which, again, is not saying much).

The Waves unit is a nice piece. I am in the market now to try a few different DI's to use with my various amp sim programs. I may be re-buying the 11R soon, because I may be needing something for live use. In the studio, I will most likely just use it like an amp sim/effects box, bypassing both the DI and digital conversion with something else.

Having said all that, lots of people are using the 11R both live and in the studio and getting great sounds from it. You should probably experiment with it yourself and see if you like using other equipment with it, or just on its own. There are a couple of newer DI's out that could be interesting to experiment with, such as the new Rupert Neve DI.
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  #5  
Old 08-06-2015, 07:40 AM
RalphNYC RalphNYC is offline
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Default Re: Guitar Preamp Before Eleven Rack?

Thanks for the reply. It makes me wonder - which I'm sure has been discussed - what part of the sound differences between hardware such as Axe, Kemper, Eleven, Atomic, Zoom, etc, are due to DI and A/D/A conversions and what part is due to modeling technology. It would be interesting if one could swap these components amongst the different units and see how sounds changed. I think in the case of the AxeFX, the DI and A/D/A might be similar between the Ultra and the 2, in which case one can perhaps discern difference in modeling more clearly there, which I think Cliff has essentially described as the Ultra being "darker". I have owned and used all of the above (except the Eleven which will arrive this week) and wouldn't say that one is "better" than another, they are just different and have different work flows and routing options and sounds. But I never got into using outboard DI or A/D/A which is an interesting avenue for experiment that I took away from your posts.

Quote:
Originally Posted by nst7 View Post
Keep in mind that you will get many different opinions by different users.

This was a few years ago, I had bought the 11R and returned it. This was before the Expansion pack was introduced.

In my experience, neither the built in DI (with its True-Z function) nor the digital conversion on the 11Rack were that great. The DI I compared it to was the Waves PRS guitar interface. The Waves unit is both a DI and preamp, and I tried it into the line in of the 11R. I thought it was a major improvement. As for the digital conversion, I compared it to my 003 at the time (which is nothing to write home about). I felt the conversion was not even quite as good as the 003 (which, again, is not saying much).

The Waves unit is a nice piece. I am in the market now to try a few different DI's to use with my various amp sim programs. I may be re-buying the 11R soon, because I may be needing something for live use. In the studio, I will most likely just use it like an amp sim/effects box, bypassing both the DI and digital conversion with something else.

Having said all that, lots of people are using the 11R both live and in the studio and getting great sounds from it. You should probably experiment with it yourself and see if you like using other equipment with it, or just on its own. There are a couple of newer DI's out that could be interesting to experiment with, such as the new Rupert Neve DI.
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  #6  
Old 09-24-2015, 12:13 PM
agrey80 agrey80 is offline
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Default Re: Guitar Preamp Before Eleven Rack?

Hey guys!

Hope someone can help me figure out what would be the best signal chain for electric guitar recording.

I thought about plugin the guitar to my UA 6176 pre, then to my eleven rack Line input and reamping internally in Pro tools.

Question:
1. Any suggestion about that signal chain?
2. When reamping will I need to turn the amp/cab off since the input signal has already gone through a pre (UA 6176)?

Thanks!
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  #7  
Old 09-24-2015, 12:25 PM
nst7 nst7 is offline
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Default Re: Guitar Preamp Before Eleven Rack?

Is there a particular reason to reamp? You can record it all at once. Set the line input to be the Rig input for the Eleven Rack. That way you record with the effected sound but getting the benefit of your high quality preamp.

You would not want to bypass anything because the sound of your preamp does not substitute for the emulation of an amp or cabinet. The difference will be subtle.

Also, I would just try going out of the preamp portion of the 6176, rather than also trying to run it through the compressor also. But you can experiment and see what you like.
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  #8  
Old 09-24-2015, 12:47 PM
agrey80 agrey80 is offline
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Default Re: Guitar Preamp Before Eleven Rack?

nst7, thanks for the help!!

I will definitively experiment only using the preamp portion. I was also thinking about using the compressor in 1:1 mode to allows the 6176 to act as a “tone box,” adding both solid-state amplification and tube overdrive.

Again, thanx man!
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