Mesa Boogie And Tube Amps & Kemper Amps

[NorCal-Mesa]

Ok I have pretty much have had every tube amp over the last 11yrs and all of the Mesa Amps. I still have my collections of amps. Ok I went for it and bought a kemper amp. They claim this new 3.0 software is a game changer for them, ect. I really liked the idea of all these incredbile amps in one amp. Well that is the case and for clean stuff its pretty top notch. For high GAIN these Kemper amps seem too color the tone so all the stuff sounds so simular. Yeah its close in tone when I profiled my amps but there is somthing non organic about the tone, makes it sound simular to other high gain profiles on the Kemper. So long story short Im sure 5 yrs or less from now these companies might nail it down. For now the old saying stays true. THERE IS NOTHING LIKE THE REAL THING.

 

[vick1000]

Well, they can replicate the clipping structure of a tube preamp pretty well, but they can't digitally replicate the dynamic signal response of preamp tubes at all. It's electronically impossible at the moment. Tubes actually respond faster to signal changes than even the fastest transistor, due to the massive voltage and large grid structure. Combined with the effects of cascading gain stages and power tubes that sag and swell, digital replication is a pipe dream right now.

 

[elvis]

Um, not really. We have multi-GHz transistor amps, but nothing like that with tubes.

I think the real issue with modeling tubes is that there isn't a ton of money in it, so not much development effort. If modeling tubes were the next internet, we'd have it already.

We already have extremely sophisticated models for transistors that allow design of wildly complicated integrated circuits. Nothing stopping us from having the same for tubes, except who would pay for development? Processor speed is probably adequate given the quite small number of components in a guitar amp.

 

[vick1000]

Not at current levels needed in a live sound setting. Too much undesired distortions, and poor harmonic response.

http://www.allaboutcircuits.com/textbook/semiconductors/chpt-13/tubes-versus-semiconductors/

http://www.theaudioarchive.com/TAA_Resources_Tubes_versus_Solid_State.htm