Now what do I do?
Hi All,
Its been a long time since I've posted here. Its kinda sad too see what used to be such a great forum turn into a ghost town. I know there's still a few die hards that must come around now and then. I know I still do, even if the only new posts are spammers.
If you old timers here remember, I got the very 1st gnx4 that was shipped to Canada (back when I still lived there), and I ended up building a modest home studio around it with a 12 ch mixer, and a pair of behringers, a midi keyboard, and a few other toys. Thanks to Mike and the MTProsound bunch, my '4 has had a long and prosperous life and has and does sound like a champ to these old ears. I still use it and my atomic reactor 112 often, if not daily.
Here's the thing...its time to move on. As much as I was satisfied with my setup, I now need to update my gear. Thats the frustrating part, there just doesnt seem to be much that offers an interface, modelling and recording in a single solution. I looked in to the eleven rack, but I am turned off by pro tools, and the fact that you can only interface on your computer to the unit if your running pro tools. Yes I know about fractal and their li'l gem, but I am not about to wake up every morning only to go on their site and see that the bots have bought the entire days stock AGAIN!! Not to mention the more than hefty pricetag. I've already decided that if I'm gonna spend 2grand for a modeller, I'll just buy a 50w 5150III, a 2 x 12 cabinet and become a tube tone snob lol (jk).
I hear alot of good things about amplitube 3, but it is only a single channel interface through the stomp io. I don't like the line6 models, so thats out. So unless theres something out there I dont know about, am I pretty much screwed? I mean screwed if what I want is a modern version of what the gnx4 is/was?
Anyway, if anyones out there, I'd love to hear what your now using. I'm open to suggestions, as long as its gear that I can go to the store and try before I buy...
Peace,
Dobb.
Its been a long time since I've posted here. Its kinda sad too see what used to be such a great forum turn into a ghost town. I know there's still a few die hards that must come around now and then. I know I still do, even if the only new posts are spammers.
If you old timers here remember, I got the very 1st gnx4 that was shipped to Canada (back when I still lived there), and I ended up building a modest home studio around it with a 12 ch mixer, and a pair of behringers, a midi keyboard, and a few other toys. Thanks to Mike and the MTProsound bunch, my '4 has had a long and prosperous life and has and does sound like a champ to these old ears. I still use it and my atomic reactor 112 often, if not daily.
Here's the thing...its time to move on. As much as I was satisfied with my setup, I now need to update my gear. Thats the frustrating part, there just doesnt seem to be much that offers an interface, modelling and recording in a single solution. I looked in to the eleven rack, but I am turned off by pro tools, and the fact that you can only interface on your computer to the unit if your running pro tools. Yes I know about fractal and their li'l gem, but I am not about to wake up every morning only to go on their site and see that the bots have bought the entire days stock AGAIN!! Not to mention the more than hefty pricetag. I've already decided that if I'm gonna spend 2grand for a modeller, I'll just buy a 50w 5150III, a 2 x 12 cabinet and become a tube tone snob lol (jk).
I hear alot of good things about amplitube 3, but it is only a single channel interface through the stomp io. I don't like the line6 models, so thats out. So unless theres something out there I dont know about, am I pretty much screwed? I mean screwed if what I want is a modern version of what the gnx4 is/was?
Anyway, if anyones out there, I'd love to hear what your now using. I'm open to suggestions, as long as its gear that I can go to the store and try before I buy...
Peace,
Dobb.
Comments
Good luck in your gear search...
I'd rather have another GNX3 than a GNX4 b/c I'd like to keep using S/PDIF and native MIDI rather than switching to USB.
-Rf
You know, I'm thinking I might do the same thing Ilia. I was only half joking about the 5150III...I see that theres a few '4's real cheap on ebay. I'll buy a backup and maybe put my dough into a nice tuber.
I guess the reality is that this is America, and profit margins are prob more important than the evolution of an excellent concept.
Thanks again for replies guys!
Peace,
Dobb
\"Will the guy with the cure for cancer please sit the flock down...we're holding a press conference to introduce our new Gore-Tex cellphone app...\" :roll:
It’s me Dennis, you know densco. The old guy in Oregon. I can’t remember my old password so this is the new me, monkey boy.
I love my gnx4, my guitars don't like me to say that out loud, but I like to tease so I say I love my gnx. A few years ago it stopped recording and i lost a few functions and abilities to edit to set parameters. I took the unit apart and sopped up some brown goo, said a chant of healing and put it back together. Some function came back but it was still not working perfect. Luckily for me I don't need perfection. I use the unit a lot, most days. Either in the studio or out at jam night or on stage. This January it went south for good and would only blink at me and I decided to toss it in the pile of old electronic waste. It was tossed in the pile Johnny. I started looking at replacing the unit. I'd love to get new stomp boxes and wire them in series or buy one of the other multi function boxes, and spend spend spend. Instead I retrived the unit from the pile and sent it back to Utah with a check for $85. The repair tech. called me and told me that it was really messed up. That he had done all the testing and cleaning and it was blown. He told me that it would cost $250.00 less the 85. My unit was back in action in 10 days and is 100%.
Unfortunately, my brand new imac will not let me load/use Xedit. And I had deleted it form my old mac cause , well, er, ah, I, sort of threw my unit in the pile and wasn’t expecting to use it anymore, so i am glad my unit is fully functional, but still , using Xedit was so much more accessible than to edit using the unit alone. Know what I mean.
I love my guitars and my gnx is so cool, it just sits and does what I want it to and don't complain or get jealous.
When I play music these days, I record the band on my Zoom HD16CD multitrack recorder. It records 8 tracks live, which is not too bad for capturing our live gigs. I record right off the mixer channels. For about $800, a person can buy 2 Zoom R16 recorders and link them together for recording 16 tracks live. That would be sweet. I don't do music projects at home, by myself, anymore. So it's all about recording the band for me.
Since my main sound comes from my GNX4 directly to the mixer for the FOH speakers, I only need a cheap bass amp on stage which I use as a monitor. Can't afford an Ampeg stack and head, but get the tone from the GNX4 at a fraction of the price.
Use a number of DAWs to remix our live tracks at home. Never fell in love with any one particular DAW. Used PTP for a few years, but then moved on to Cubase and Adobe for VST plug-ins. Currently use the free Audacity and have been looking at Reaper lately. If PTP offered VST plug-in support, I'd probably still be content with that. Well, the newer DAWs (some of them free) offer so many features, it just made sense to move on.
I used the drum machine on the GNX4 for a number of years to lay down the backbone of my drum tracks. Then I would go into the midi track and edit the drums to get a more natural feel. Sounded good, but took lots of time. Finally tried out EZDrummer, which has the humanize feature, and never looked back. Again, that required a DAW with VST support.
The reality is that my day job is taking more and more of my time and I have less and less time for my music. So I'm pretty well set with equipment for the foreseeable future. If this job goes south, maybe I'll have more time for the music and start looking at new gear (if I can afford anything). Actually, just very happy to have a good day job after a long strech looking for work.
I don't imagine it will be too hard to spend $2K on gear. For me, I'm trying to find the time to hit the woodshed and build up my skill set. Even the best gear still can't play the guitar for you. I guess I'd like to invest $2K worth of time in the woodshed, because that's probably the best investment I could make for myself at this point in my life. Take care.
The Fender has amazing sounds going direct to pA. Really really good sounds. Better sounds than my Gnx4.
The Mustang comes with Abelton Lite 8 and is a very complicated program,,,almost as complicated as PTP
Having driver issues with it...........just like I did with PTP and windows!
Fenderfuse is what they call Xedit. Its better! EAsier and way cool.
Go to Guitar Center soon to try one out.
Still using my Washburn HB35 semi-hollow body guitar, but I have a Squier Classic Vibe 60's strat in lay away. Should have it payed off in May. Will make a nice addition to my meager collection.
Take care and keep pickin
Mike B.
Over the years we've seen many new gizmos on both ends of the budget spectrum. Interesting GNX4 still hangs with some of the best.
It will likely be several years or more to see companies like Digitech compete in a way they can use higher end dsp's. Zoom and Line 6 have been using AD Sharc's but on the low side. Digitech has their proprietary design which stands up to some higher end units as well considering teh entry cost of those products.
Some of the software has come a long way. I personally like Scuffham's works with S Gear. Otoh, that depends upon having a quality interface with high end DSP as well as a late model PC spec.
Still around, still diggin my GNX4, but this place along with many others I frequent has turned to a ghost town..
AxeFX, is pretty damn good, but I'm not dropping 2500 for effects.
Jammin through my Acoustic Image Corus, L5CES, and my GNX4.
Once again...Hi guys..Good seeing you guys around!!!
they are heading out the door also I think..
The world is pushing micro hand held devices, so the Desktop PC, and laptop are slowly becoming obsolete. I don't like it too much myself. Even Windows 8 is touch mobile operating system not really made for PC.
I'm also thinking about going back to the old days and just having an amp, one with a headphone jack would be kool, back in 1990 I had a Crate TD-50c that was great... My live rig is Crate GT1200H Stack, not really good for playing at night lol... , or recording..
I myself have a GNX3k, GNX4, RP7, etc... A good sound card, USB, PCI, PCIe etc... is probably the way to go at this moment, you can just hook in any line level device to it, that's how the USB mixers work..
I'm looking into Yamaha's mixers. Something like this http://usa.yamaha.com/products/music-production/interfaces/
or if you want a larger production, I like these
http://usa.yamaha.com/products/music-production/mixers/mg_series_usb_models/?mode=series
Basicly we are all either screwed, or left in the legacy era.
So...the tech industry can foist as many new fads and methods and doodads they want...they'll get my money when they build something that works better than what I have, at a price that wont' require me to sell a kidney...
Well Said....
The GNX4 is really a great all one piece of eqipment.
Too bad my memory card part does'nt work. But I do have a JamMan Sterero to replace that featue.
Basicly I'm using the GNX4 as the PC Interface.
A GNX3k, JamMan, MM6, and everything else is mixed through a Yamaha MG10/2 then run into the line inputs of the GNX4, it's there to be used, but not with the looper, cause it's last in line. I paid like 175.00 for it, and it's the best sound card interface i've used. USB, Firewire, PCI, or anything.. Hands down. The timing is really good. I notice other interfaces are a bit slower to rediculous
I think the technology industry is just getting lazy, and greedy.
it always comes back to people like us, they will be making something like a GNX5 when all this stupid status shit takes a plunge.
And real musicians need to buy real equipment.
GNX5 (FTW)
...
it looks to be awsome. but not sure, I found alot of samples on their facebook page.
http://www.fractalaudio.com/p-axe-fx-ii-preamp-fx-processor.php
I found it through another member.
http://www.guitarworkstation.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=11044
maybe the Roctron Prophecy II would be a little cheaper.