Anyone got a Kemper?

[Vercingetorix]

Hello guys,

Well, apparently the Kemper touched down in Australia last week and before you could say, "**** I hate Australian summers" the unit was sold out.

So I thought I'd throw out a couple of question out into the ether. And seeing as there has been nothing happenning on the 11R front - thanks Avid - U can't see the moderator getting his knickers in a knot.

So has any forumites got one of the beasties? I still think they look like some sort of 70's throwback, not nearly as nice as my little orange box. Germans are good at making things efficient not at making things aesthetically appealing .

Also, does it sound good? Does it sound great? Does it live up to the hype? Does it profile accurately? Have you profiled any sounds yourself? Can it do metal? And lastly, is it worth the money?

Ok, so that's more than a couple of questions .

[guitardom]

i messed with it at namm for quite awhile and spent some time with one of their guys asking 10 million questions.

does it sound good???
yes. the adjective i would like to use before "yes" might get me banned.....

does it live up to the hype??
guess that is up for a user to decide. imo, i will own one, probably soon. if that answers that question

does it profile accurately??
its a catch 22 here. it profiles off your microphone. which means microphone placement on your cabinet is vital. not everyone knows how to do this. the problem is you are hearing all the speakers from the cabinet full on. your not hearing that little spot where the mic is picking up. so a person w/o the knowledge of mic'ing lots of cabinets in their life could totally jack this up and be able to say "no it doesnt profile accurately" and "sounds like crap". with what i know, imo, yes it works very well.

profile any sounds yourself??
yes. they had a boogie roadking head (which i owned a roadking for a few years) running to a isolation cabinet we could mess with and profile.

can it do metal???
oh yeah, what do you think i was profiling!!!!

is it worth the money??
subjective again, imo yes. it is quite versatile and the onboard effects actually sounded good. my question is how it will interface with a foot controller. he said they are working on one though and hopefully out later this year. it will "work" with other boards, i just dont know how well.

what blew me away was after profiling this killer metal sound on the boogie and then playing it through the kemper, you drop the gain down and you have damn near a sparkling clean guitar. it boggled my mind a bit how it does that!!

[Vercingetorix]

Thanks guitardom for your somewhat biased answers .

No really, thanks for taking the time to answer them you've pretty much answered everything I needed to know.

This Kemper thing looks like it might be right up my alley. But still the thing looks awful it looks like it belong on the deck of the original Star Trek series.

[guitardom]

Originally Posted by Vercingetorix

Thanks guitardom for your somewhat biased answers .

No really, thanks for taking the time to answer them you've pretty much answered everything I needed to know.

This Kemper thing looks like it might be right up my alley. But still the thing looks awful it looks like it belong on the deck of the original Star Trek series.

it does look very "vintage" he had a couple different colored models. not sure if he is releasing both the colors or only one. he had a black and grey one that i liked. once you start navigating through it and seeing how simple everything is layed out, you forget about those looks!!!

honestly i would love a 3-4 rack space version of this. it would be much more transportable and able to give it a spot better in the studio.

[Obsidian Dragon]

Yeah, It looks ugly but that is part of the charm. Everyone who know what it is will be in awe when they see it. It will also help retain it's value over time as collectors will instantly recognize it.

Now I have a question. Since I own just a couple guitar amps (some good and some not so good ), the strength of the Kemper is that I can model them myself. The problem for me is that I don't have access to many other guitar amps to sample/model. I suppose I can try to get the salesman at my local music store to let me sample/model their guitar amps but I'll need to setup the cabs. mics, and do this in a not so perfect room and maybe have some head banger shredding in the background. So the question is will there be a library of models available to download and load into the Kemper via a computer? It makes sense but I don't see that in the ads. It simply says that you can sample/model any guitar amp rig. Is there an editor?...oops, I'm sounding like I speaking about the Eleven Rack again.

[blewis]

Originally Posted by Obsidian Dragon

The problem for me is that I don't have access to many other guitar amps to sample/model.

But you have the internet so...

So the question is will there be a library of models available to download and load into the Kemper via a computer?

They plan to. They've said that in various interviews. So you'll virtually have access to those amps.

Currently, the profile sharing is pretty unorganized in a forum setting. No idea when things will get organized.

[Marshall881]

Originally Posted by blewis

But you have the internet so...



They plan to. They've said that in various interviews. So you'll virtually have access to those amps.

Currently, the profile sharing is pretty unorganized in a forum setting. No idea when things will get organized.

YEah this amp sounds awesome, but my concerns would be lack of any amp to profile, so I could see the whole forum being the mainstay of the amp.
(Bear that in mind Christopher Kemper )
Is it possible to profile from music videos or solo's from digital media?

Peace Mike

[Obsidian Dragon]

Originally Posted by blewis

They plan to. They've said that in various interviews. So you'll virtually have access to those amps.

Currently, the profile sharing is pretty unorganized in a forum setting. No idea when things will get organized.

I would be nice if there was someone or some organization that would professionally profile some of the most sought after amps in the world or profiles of famous guitarist's rigs and place them into the library. To me this would be more useful than a whole bunch of less than usable profiles made in a bedroom or garage using cheap mics. I'm not trying to put anybody down but I think you get my point about getting quality profiles. This is a similar concept to quality sample libraries.

It is good to know that there are plans to allow people to share profiles however.

As for profiling from music videos or solo's from digital media. How does that work? It would seem ideally to profile properly, you need to capture the unchanged source (input) and the altered sound (output) of an amplifier to provide the necessary information to create an accurate profile that models the way an amplifier affects the source sound into the amp'd sound. Maybe I'm not familiar with how the profiling works so forgive me since this a new technology.

Now if somebody can write a converter that will allow the Eleven Rack to use the Kemper profiles as a model, that will be really cool. Before everyone jumps on me about copyright infringement issues, I liken this to the times when a Roland sampler can read an Akai sample disc or Kontakt can import sample libraries from other manufacturers. I know this sounds far-fetched but again, wouldn't it be cool?

[Tony-N]

I'm absolutely certain there will be tons of profiles after some time to download, anything between really good and really bad, free to quite expensive.

I think the Kemper can do some serious damage to the established modelers. I can definitely see myself buying one of these in the near future.

I'm sure we won't have to bitch about a STANDALONE EDITOR either...how about that Avid?

[guitardom]

Originally Posted by Obsidian Dragon

As for profiling from music videos or solo's from digital media. How does that work? It would seem ideally to profile properly, you need to capture the unchanged source (input) and the altered sound (output) of an amplifier to provide the necessary information to create an accurate profile that models the way an amplifier affects the source sound into the amp'd sound. Maybe I'm not familiar with how the profiling works so forgive me since this a new technology.

Now if somebody can write a converter that will allow the Eleven Rack to use the Kemper profiles as a model, that will be really cool. Before everyone jumps on me about copyright infringement issues, I liken this to the times when a Roland sampler can read an Akai sample disc or Kontakt can import sample libraries from other manufacturers. I know this sounds far-fetched but again, wouldn't it be cool?

it is not possible to profile from video or media.

i did talk to him (kemper) about profiling say the 11r, amplitube or anything like that. he said a lot of sims use weird things in their algorithms like compression to achieve their sound. they do not profile well at all. i asked specifically about eleven and he said it profiles really bad.