Best sounding load box for DI/silent recording.

Soundstorm

Soundstorm

Well-known member
It seems that there aren't a ton of options in this area. Pretty much: Ox Box, Suhr RL/IR, Captor X, Fryette Power Load IR, and maybe a couple of others? I don't need attenuator options as I'm just looking to silent record with this setup.

It doesn't need to have IR capability, and honestly I probably won't use it if it does so I can just run it through an IR loader and have some flexibility later on if needed. I just want a good high quality DI signal from the amp.
 
I think the sound differences in these units strictly used as loads is way overrated, and it's more about features and use-case. I've owned the Mesa CC IR (which may be a Captor in a simpler box), Suhr, Ox, and Fryette. The load of the Suhr is supposedly the most nature/accurate to a 4x12 cabinet, but there have been some people who claim that's not the case, and it definitely has a steep reduction in low-end compared to the other loads. BUT, if you are strictly wanting to load something down to a line level signal and handle IRs in your DAW, the Suhr is probably the best bang for the buck. However, at one point in time the non-IR version of the Suhr needing to be run into an instrument DI for proper impedence instead of going to line level, which was a nuisance when I owned it. I don't know if that has been changed since, but the Suhr RL IR definitely can run typical line level. The most inspiring and straight up fun for me has been the OX, but it's expensive and has some downsides too. You might not want to spend extra coin for features though and the basic Suhr RL or whatever do what you need. If you want to use them live and not just recording I would probably go Captor. Fryette is great too but if you aren't needing reamping/attenuating or whatever it's overkill.

There are a handful of load box comparisons out there on the tube.
 
Spaceboy said:
I think the sound differences in these units strictly used as loads is way overrated, and it's more about features and use-case. I've owned the Mesa CC IR (which may be a Captor in a simpler box), Suhr, Ox, and Fryette. The load of the Suhr is supposedly the most nature/accurate to a 4x12 cabinet, but there have been some people who claim that's not the case, and it definitely has a steep reduction in low-end compared to the other loads. BUT, if you are strictly wanting to load something down to a line level signal and handle IRs in your DAW, the Suhr is probably the best bang for the buck. However, at one point in time the non-IR version of the Suhr needing to be run into an instrument DI for proper impedence instead of going to line level, which was a nuisance when I owned it. I don't know if that has been changed since, but the Suhr RL IR definitely can run typical line level. The most inspiring and straight up fun for me has been the OX, but it's expensive and has some downsides too. You might not want to spend extra coin for features though and the basic Suhr RL or whatever do what you need. If you want to use them live and not just recording I would probably go Captor. Fryette is great too but if you aren't needing reamping/attenuating or whatever it's overkill.

There are a handful of load box comparisons out there on the tube.
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Thanks for the input! Are there any downsides to going into the Hi-Z with the Suhr RL? I’d read about that same issue, and I don’t believe it was ever addressed. So you have to basically go unbalanced into the Hi-Z input to get good sound quality on the RL?
 
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