Hello, it’s that time of the years again when I revisit QC to determine whether it has come of age. I was an earlier adopter with QC, but I was so unimpressed with the clean and edge of breakup tones that I took the view that Neural DSP was all about long bearded Scandinavian Strandberg-weilding guitarists (who are all jolly good chaps…) and really weren’t so focussed on the clean side of tones, and to be fair their plug-ins (although excellent) reflected that too … the feel under the fingers was simply no better than my Atomic AF12 at the time and I returned it, but that was two years ago, and since then I have used Strymon Iridium which personally I find is the best digital modeller for clean to classic rock, but obviously you end up with a clunky pedalboard.
So what’s QC like now? I read there been significant improvements. What I want to hear is really from players who have used Strymon Iridium and then bought a QC. Does it ‘feel’ like an amp at clean and edge tones?
I don’t understand your post. The QC can do it all. I’ve captured several amps each with numerous gain/tone settings and the QC produces these pretty much perfectly. It doesn’t have a preset tone or limitation. It is merely cloning what the output response is for a given input.
My live presets include clean, slight crunch (just starting to clip), full crunch, OD and metal. I’ve performed about 150 live gigs with my QC and still absolutely love it and often get comments about my tone. Patrons are shocked at how good I sound without a guitar amp. And I most definitely produce excellent clean and edge tones.
If you didn’t like it before, you won’t like it now. It’s fundamentally the same unit.
“Feel” is subjective and very hard to quantify. That aspect of the QC has not changed. It feels and sounds the same as ever.
However, that sound is pretty great. I only use clean and EOB tones and have never been disappointed.
I came from the Strymon Iridium and although it’s a great little unit the QC can do SO much more. How you monitor or amplify the QC is a huge part of the equation and basically by nature it will sound or feel like a recorded “amp in ANOTHER room,” not an amp in the same room- it’s a different experience and application. Running it into a power amp and cab may get you closer to that if that’s what you’re looking for
Hey there,
It’s intriguing to revisit the Quad Cortex (QC) and assess its progress, particularly in delivering clean and edge-of-breakup tones. Your past experiences with gear like Neural DSP and Strymon Iridium offer valuable insights into what you’re looking for in terms of tone and feel.
While I haven’t personally transitioned from the Strymon Iridium to the QC, I’ve heard from fellow guitarists who have made the switch and found the QC’s improvements to be quite notable. The advancements in modeling technology seem to have addressed many of the previous concerns, offering better emulations of amp characteristics, including cleaner tones and nuanced edge-of-breakup textures.
Thanks Manny, someone’s understood my point, have the core cleans and EOBU tones improved or is the unit and tones (as someone suggests) the same … I can’t believe they would still be developing this just for the high gain merchants… I guess the only way is to buy one, check it out and return it if it doesn’t make par. Thanks again!
It’s always been great for cleans and EOB. I imagine it’s quiet in this thread because no one really agrees with what you’re saying…
If you want it to feel like an amp, you need to pair it with a big amp (no shit) and a proper cab. If you pair it with an anaemic little SS pedal, it’s not going to perform like a 100W valve amp.
It’s not a question disagreeing, I was simply after was someone who had the same journey as me … didn’t happen… so I’ve ordered one and we’ll see, I can compare it vs real Boogie, and TKI, and if it really is as good as you all claim then great, if not end of.
As was mentioned previously, mic your boogie in another room run it through some Pre’s, a DAW, and listen through monitors. A QC will knock your socks off with how accurately it will replicate that tone.
Plugging your QC in and listening through headphones, vs standing 3 feet from your cranked boogie is an apples/oranges.
But to answer your initial question/post there are some really incredible clean/ EOB captures in cortex cloud and the rest of the ether.
dialing it in is going to be the responsibility of the user and will depend on all the other elements of the signal chain, especially regarding monitoring.
If you had one before and didn’t like it, don’t expect to this time either if you’re setting it up the exact same way.
That is a very good answer. I totally agree with that statement.
I went through all the different stages of trying to use the QC with an FRFR monitor, through an amp and cab, through an SS pedal amp and cab and then back again to FRFR.
It’s not just that it will sound differently based on what you couple the QC with, it’s also that your perception must be calibrated with what the QC is reproducing. You will hardly ever have that cranked up amp+cab behind your legs feeling with the QC. But if you are used to recording your analog gear and listening to it through some monitors, the QC will be extremely close to that.
What really got me to love the QC again was a simple change to the IN 1 LEVEL. Raising it from 0 to +8 made all my guitars come alive. You’ll have to experiment with how much works for you. Others say 4 is good, or 6. Try it with a common amp like the Fender Deluxe Reverb. EOB sounded just like the amp to me (I own the FDRRI).
Level adjustment is definitely good feedback. I have found that from all the modelers I’ve owned (Fractal, Line 6 Helix, Atomic, Ampero, Boss) the Quad Cortex was the most sensitive to level setting and took me a while to dial in. Not sure why that’s the case compression to their competitors (where I feel them close to plug and play)
This sounds like a fairly substantial misunderstanding.
The QC is a preamp in a box. It’s all the preamps in a box. Preamps make next to no noise on their own. The preamp in a 100W valve head will not give any feeling behind your legs either.
If you want it to sound like a cranked amp and cab, you need to plug it into a cranked amp and cab.
We are on the same page, actually. What I am saying is that if you want that “air behind your legs” feeling you have to use it as an evoluted set of stomp boxes and plug it into an actual amp and cab.
What I was pointing out is that it depends on how you are used to hear yourself.
If you are used to recording your cranked amp and cab and listening to it in studio monitors, then you will easily get the same result with the QC. But using just the QC with an FRFR and pretending it will feel the same as when you are in the room with your amp and cab is definitely not going to happen
Yes, although to be clear - actual amp doesn’t need to mean 35kg head. I run mine into a powerstage 700 and a 2x12. Sounds and feels like almost any amp on the planet, it and the QC fit easilly in a backpack, and together they weigh less than 5kg.
I did snag mine on reverb for £360 though. Current RRP is insane. I don’t think it’s worth £900, not by a long shot.
I spent a while testing it against my Engl Powerball, but one of the speakers in my 2x12 was dying, so I couldn’t get a fair comparison. I had the QC outputting to each amp driving its own speaker, using scenes to mute one or the other, but I had no way to hook up both amps to a single speaker to properly A/B test. Stupidly I forgot about my mate’s 1960AV, the two pairs in that are probably close enough but alas…
I got a loadbox, took a few captures of the power section just in case (makes a slight difference, but nothing a small EQ tweak couldn’t mimic), and ended up selling the amp. No ragrets.
