Are there any guitar plugins that can rival Axe FX?

[paulyc]

A buddy of mine swears up and down that the amp models in the Ultra are better than the II, FWIW...even being an older unit.

 

[nevusofota]

I was thinking of an Axe Fx for recording also but now I think I’m just going to use my collection of tube amps and go the UA Ox route.

 

[Dingleberries]

Thank you, I may give it a try, but in the demos I’ve heard, the Fractal stuff pretty much destroyed it imo.

The thing with BIAS is it takes time to figure out and you've gotta tweak it. A lot of people have the attention span of a gnat or are just lazy, and all they want to do is plug in, pick a patch and go.

I get fantastic results that are as good or sometimes better than Fractal (or any modeler) with BIAS (PC) and a little "studio magic".

I also help the process by running into a UA 2-610 with NOS Mullards.

Thanks, I understand Bias, alone with most modelers need extensive tweaking to bring out the best in them, and as far as preamps go, ill get the best one I can afford irregardless.

 

[thiswaythatway]

I was thinking of an Axe Fx for recording also but now I think I’m just going to use my collection of tube amps and go the UA Ox route.

$1300! Ouch.

 

[thiswaythatway]

Reaxis is the best plugin I've used. Helix Native is a close second, but I'll freely admit that beyond the Mark IV lead channel sim, I have grown dissatisfied with Helix. Check out the various Thermionik offerings as well. Good trial options and the tones are up with the better plugins I've tried.

My experience is that the Fractal offerings sound better than all of these.

Reaxis is truly very good though and combined with a separate IR loader like Torpedo Wall Of Sound, quite flexible.

Reaxis is the only plugin I'd spend money on right now.

 

[Monkey Man]

Dingleberries, seeing as you haven't set your PC up for recording yet, I assume you haven't taken the plunge on all the various FX and processing plugins you'll "need".

The most-elegant solution I can think of for you, should this be the case, is to subscribe to the Slate Everything Bundle or whatever it's called. I think it's about $170 US a year.

You'll get truly-excellent, real-world-hardware-modelled EQ's, compressors, limiters, preamps, delay, arguably the best-bang-for-buck, most-versatile reverb plugin out there (and it sounds phenomenal), and so on, but here's the icing on the cake for you...

You'd get S Gear as part of the deal!

Something to consider...

 

[PBGas]

I was thinking of an Axe Fx for recording also but now I think I’m just going to use my collection of tube amps and go the UA Ox route.

Great idea! Love my OX! Sound fabulous and does everything I need for home, studio and live to FOH!

 

[Dingleberries]

Dingleberries, seeing as you haven't set your PC up for recording yet, I assume you haven't taken the plunge on all the various FX and processing plugins you'll "need".

The most-elegant solution I can think of for you, should this be the case, is to subscribe to the Slate Everything Bundle or whatever it's called. I think it's about $170 US a year.

You'll get truly-excellent, real-world-hardware-modelled EQ's, compressors, limiters, preamps, delay, arguably the best-bang-for-buck, most-versatile reverb plugin out there (and it sounds phenomenal), and so on, but here's the icing on the cake for you...

You'd get S Gear as part of the deal!

Something to consider...

Awesome, thank you!

 

[nevusofota]

I was thinking of an Axe Fx for recording also but now I think I’m just going to use my collection of tube amps and go the UA Ox route.

$1300! Ouch.

What's the Axe III going to be priced at?? The Ox is a bargain relatively speaking and it's really not that expensive when you dig deeper and see everything that it does. And its a very easy to use format all packaged in one box. See below:

- One of the best Reactive load boxes on the market.
- Top notch impulse response speaker emulators
- Access dozens of mic and guitar cabinet models
- "Room" controls the ambient room sound of the Rig emulation

Besides, when you have multiple $2-4k amps at your disposal, what's another $1300 to actually be able to use them on your recordings.

 

[Monkey Man]

Dingleberries, seeing as you haven't set your PC up for recording yet, I assume you haven't taken the plunge on all the various FX and processing plugins you'll "need".

The most-elegant solution I can think of for you, should this be the case, is to subscribe to the Slate Everything Bundle or whatever it's called. I think it's about $170 US a year.

You'll get truly-excellent, real-world-hardware-modelled EQ's, compressors, limiters, preamps, delay, arguably the best-bang-for-buck, most-versatile reverb plugin out there (and it sounds phenomenal), and so on, but here's the icing on the cake for you...

You'd get S Gear as part of the deal!

Something to consider...

Awesome, thank you!

Your effusive display of gratitude... made my day, Dingleberries!

 

[dfrattaroli]

Absolutely. I own the Mercuriall Reaxis, Amplitube 4 and Guitar Rig 5. My faves are Reaxis and the Mesa certified add-on pack in Amplitube. They're not just good but great. The Bias Amp 2 demo that I tried this weekend is really great too. For getting a solid guitar tone in your DAW these are as good as you could want.

 

[PRS]

I've tried a lot of the Amp sims and next to S-Gear, Amplitube 4 has blown every thing away hands down. I have AP4 with the Metal pack add on, recently tried the Helix Native and the Line 6 plugin didn't hold a candle to Amplitube.

 

[Spaceboy]

I was not impressed with Amplitube 4.

 

[Steinmetzify]

I was not impressed with Amplitube 4.

Wasn’t either until I grabbed the Mesa Boogie and Orange packs, those two are fantastic.

For the OP; Mercuriall stuff is awesome and one of the reasons I sold my Axe. The U530 is a badass Engl sim, Spark does Marshall stuff with 4 different models that are all really good, and their new ReAxis plugin is the best sounding Mesa sim I’ve used. Sounds better to me than the Axe did in that regard. $90 or so for them, much cheaper on sale. Delays, boosts, gates, chorus, cab IRs, mic positioning, stereo processing among other things make these awesome values. They have demos for all the Mercuriall stuff, it’s a quick download to try it out. Give it a shot, they’re great.

Hope you find something that works for you!

EDIT: aside from the sound and immediate feel of ReAxis, the coolest feature to me was that you can actually load TriAxis patches into it; I had a folder saved from years ago of my TriAxis stuff, loaded em right up and they sound exactly how I remembered them sounding. So friggin cool!

 

[controlled_voltage]

i have a friend that is in a well known thrash band that has records out and plays huge festivals in Europe and tours internationally.
He makes and releases records with NI guitar rig pro and NO ONE ever says anything but great things about his playing/tone and the music.
i see jaws drop when he tells peeps what he uses
Bottom line is the gear is important but not really.

 

[Dingleberries]

I was not impressed with Amplitube 4.

Wasn’t either until I grabbed the Mesa Boogie and Orange packs, those two are fantastic.

For the OP; Mercuriall stuff is awesome and one of the reasons I sold my Axe. The U530 is a badass Engl sim, Spark does Marshall stuff with 4 different models that are all really good, and their new ReAxis plugin is the best sounding Mesa sim I’ve used. Sounds better to me than the Axe did in that regard. $90 or so for them, much cheaper on sale. Delays, boosts, gates, chorus, cab IRs, mic positioning, stereo processing among other things make these awesome values. They have demos for all the Mercuriall stuff, it’s a quick download to try it out. Give it a shot, they’re great.

Hope you find something that works for you!

EDIT: aside from the sound and immediate feel of ReAxis, the coolest feature to me was that you can actually load TriAxis patches into it; I had a folder saved from years ago of my TriAxis stuff, loaded em right up and they sound exactly how I remembered them sounding. So friggin cool!

Thank you very much for the in-depth rundown, I will absolutely check those out. Hopefully ill get a couple PC’s built over the weekend and start running through everything. I cant wait to move up from an iPad

 

[Purpleibby]

I would be weary of latency....it's never going to have the immediacy of a real amp IMO.

 

[Steinmetzify]

I would be weary of latency....it's never going to have the immediacy of a real amp IMO.

True story, but the stuff posted is gonna murder what he’s using now. Plus the Mercuriall stuff is really close to the Axe in immediacy, which is one of the reasons I went that route and sold the Axe.

 

[PRS]

I would be weary of latency....it's never going to have the immediacy of a real amp IMO.

Never had a problem with latency.

 

[shredhead7]

I would be weary of latency....it's never going to have the immediacy of a real amp IMO.

Never had a problem with latency.

What is your DAW and specs? I'm new to this as well. Currently using Reaper, with my older laptop, i5 4gb ram and I'm definitely pushing the limits of its powers, as I get clips and warbles, even at the highest buffer settings.