Avid Eleven Rack.

Since I am doing the cover band things and my pedal board is tremendous, I wanted to try an upper class modeling thing. I can't afford the and have heard excellent things about the 11R. Some people have said the amp modelers on the 11R are better than the snax but that the effects are WAY better on the snax. 11R effects are pretty minimal, but I will say the amp models are excellent. I only got a chance to go through the presets a few times and made some quick changes, but it is very easy to use from the front panel. It comes with Pro Tools 10 and an iLok and I will need to upgrade my recording PC to Windows 7 for that which I hope to do tomorrow. I promise this time I will actually post up some samples of this bad boy.

Yeah, the effect section of the 11R seems to be mostly basic useful stuff. The is totally OTT in what it can do as a pure effect box- I think of it less as a preamp/modeler and more as an amazing effect unit that happens to have a killer preamp too. I'd happily use it on anything (non-guitar) just for the effects. The 11R seems more pure guitar in its way; less esoteric Eventide studio shit and just solid stuff to rock a guitar through.

I have heard the same thing about the amp models depending on what sort of toan(s) one is going for. Both sound fantastic recorded. I have played through the and I have no issues with the feel of the thing, so if the input impedance thing on the 11R does what it says on the tin, I am betting it is pretty sweet, and not like, say, a Pod which feels like plugging into a 2x4 playing through it.

I'd love to hear what you think of it once you've spent some time with the thing.

Yeah... yeah, we gone need to hear that.

I may have prodded our Fearless Leader in that direction. Chris-from-Garda has been prodding me in that direction. He wants the for the snob appeal, but wonders if it's worth it for what he does and we have heard good things about the 11R. His reasoning being he doesn't use that many effects anyhow beyond verb/delay unless they're obvious fucked-up sounds, and I'll just run pedals into the front end for whatever I need anyhow.

And our mutual friend/former bandmate/my occasional collaborator replaced most of his rig with an AxeFX Ultra (and uses all the effects to fake boutique pedals and uses the synth, too.) Gearwhores think these are acceptable as just another amp now. Shit has gotten good, real good.

Talking with my Mr. Chris, I realized, looking at the 11R's feature set, as long as I can set an envelope follower on the one delay to do a filter sweep, I can cover all of what I need for the Garda stuff as I've been playing it live with just that, no pedals, nothing. Says a lot for such a basic effect collection. (My solo stuff not so much.)

The Axe vs. 11R comparison clips... Gotta go to my email to find the link, they do sound different. Neither is "better" and it may be mostly the settings, y'know? Both sound like amps and not like sort-of-amps or Pods or whatnot. Fuck, my Pod XT is like 10 years old now.

I was working a bunch of sounds last night. I've been so far just taking the preloaded patches and altering them which is working ok for right now. Can't wait to load up PT and try editing with the gui. There's a few decent 11R sites, like 11Hack (https://sites.google.com/site/elevenhack/) and http://www.elevenrackpresets.com/ and I did order the Behringer floor controller. also a cheap eprom available for it, which seems cool although programming it should not take very long http://www.eurekasound.com/eurekaprom/configurations/11 No gigs for a bit as the new singer is working stuff in, so I should have time to record a few things.

Awsum, what i have heard of it, it does seem to make a fine ampnoise.

I will say I am a skeptic when it comes to these noisers. I have been really impressed with the response to pick attack and volume though.

This information was reported to Mr. Chris From Garda when we rehorsed last night, that you had acquired one (and have a fine realamp collection) and it does what it says on the tin.

I've been downloading a shitload of the patches from the 11rack presets site, some are shit, some are really good. I mean really good. Narrowing it down to a few and of course tweaking will take some time, but I am quite impressed. So was my lady who is quite used to me cranking the JMP or the Shivae. It might make it to practice tonight....

Of course some are going to be bullshit because, well, guitar players.

That being said, the good ones... I know what you have. I am very familiar with the JMP and Shiva for obvious reasons and know how those sound. I am rather fond of those sounds. If you are impressed, I am impressed.

Also, if your significant other recognizes this is quality, that is a very good sign. I remember my ex walking in on me mixing once and commenting the drummer's snare (not my band) sounded like shit- which it did in the room- and telling me not to bother and replace it with a sample- which I did. That is a good thing. But you would know.

well tried it out at practice last night. I only went through our practice mains for about half of practice, then I decided I needed to use one of the monitors pointing up at me. That made me feel much better. It's definitely going to take some tweaking. Most of the patches had way too much verb, and my favorite patches were very dry , one being based on Bogner green, one based on Bogner red, two plexi, two AC 30's and one tweed. I love being able to use the expression pedal on one particular patch to go from uber clean almost acoustic to adding a little dirt. that was super awesome.

TLDR version: Jury still out.

joey darling, I am guessing we have compatible tastes, at least when it comes to normal guitar guitarsounds, based on your choices there and what I know of yer collection.

The way-too-much 'verb does not surprise me, given the tendency of any guitar premap with effects onboard to have way too much goddamn effect dialed in. And I heart effects- I practically live on the stuff- but damn.

The monitoring thing is what I'd be most concerned with. Not having a cab behind you is weird. Getting everything (or at least most of everything) from a wedge is weird too though, at least as a guitarist- go figure, seeing as we both play keys I'd assume we'd be used to this. Don't know how much you sing live, but same deal, y'know? For guitar it's a different animal. We are so used to the conventional rigs. Hell, my friend with the runs it through a 2:90 and at least one cab at all times live. I've had to rock the Pod live when my rig broke down and that was strange. I did it intentionally over the summer making a guest appearance at an industrial show for one song, and again, not having the amp behind me was disconcerting. That whole band ran direct, no amps, even the drummer with an e-kit. If it sounds like an amp and feels like an amp though...

My apologies to Future Of The Left: does it fuck like an amp?

yeah the strange this is not having a cab/combo there. I will give it a proper try though. My favorite from last night's hour of playing was a clean tone I made (sounded like the Bogner clean) then I push my KOT in front of it. I hate to climb about band wagons but there is a reason the KOT has a waiting list.

I, too, do a lot of singing in my band so yeah the monitor would be something I am used to. It may just take some time to acclimate. I may try to bring one of the QSC k12's to see how it runs through that. I used that at home and liked it much more that anything else.

There is nothing wrong with that, running stuff in front. It's just another amp, after all. Even if the monitoring is strange. I rarely, unless it's a large venue, want any guitar in the monitors at all. Vocals, electronics, that's it. I will go for greater stage volume first, which is usually preferable given what passes for average systems and operators. Had I one, and gigged it on my solo stuff, I would have to run a few things in front just to get the sounds, because nothing else does that.

Even if it sounds and feels like an amp- which apparently it does ("sounded like the Bogner clean" I will take as praise!) having the sound come from the wrong place is still gonna throw you off your game.

I take it you like the powered QSCs?

Love the K12's. I hear the 10's are very good, I just love the flexibility of the K's. Normally when we run sound ourselves I run a loop from the K12 main right to my in ears so I can keep an ear on the mix since I hear what is coming out front. I ran the 11R straight to one for home practicing, sounded good. I wasn't as impressed running the 11R to the yamaha PA we use for practice. I'll tweak again this week see how it goes.

OK I picked up some patches made by a guy called singtall. Holy shit they are good. He actually mods/builds amps and evidently can make some great 11R patches. I will post something by him soon.

Here's a link to the forum post and he has soundcloud clips: http://www.elevenrackpresets.com/forum/ ... #Post25285

HOLY SHIT

I ran a few of the Singtall patches. Unbelievable. I settle on a Bogner Ex Blue patch that was one of my favorites. cleaned up just like a real amp when rolling down the volume and got nice an ugly when I hit it full on. So fucking sweet. The Plexi tones he made are great. I'm not a Mesa guy but the Mesa tones a really well done. If you ever try out an 11R you have to try these patches. I was seriously going to send this thing back, now I am in love.

Nice. I am pretty good at dialing in gear to sound like me (note my sounding the same through everything) and if I will be gainfully employed again... I really want to retire my dearest Stephanie to studio work. I've played the , I have GR5, I get what the current stuff is capable of.

Modeling stuff does, I think, require a different mindset- you can't swap out the tubes- but the results are in there somewhere these days. The problem is finding where.

I noticed a lot of the fizz, and we all know I hate fizz (re:6100) and there were some tips guys were saying to use the ParaEQ which was starting to work, but for the $10 I spent on the 300+ patches this guy made (he works by donation so it is whatever you can afford) it saved me hours of tweaking. Of course I will be tweaking from there but it is really a great starting point.

Wow, I thought those things were a lot more pricey.

Shit, I might have to sell the AC15 and some other bits to put towards one of these.