Hi, I recently buy one QC and sound bad, don’t sound near neiter to I ear in YouTube, sound really cheap. I really can say my old Yamaha THR5 sound better for far than the QC, whatever connecting the headphones output to the PA, or USB in to the Mac… The QC USB sound decent but not great, the outputs 1 to 4 sound good but not great in my PA system (Yamaha Stagepass 200), and the headphones sound very very bad in my 2 headphones, an AKG702 and a Audio Technica M40x. The sound in the headphones are really unusable, cheap and very harsh… However, I buy today (but come in 5-6 days) an FRFR system (Headrush FRFR108) and I’m thinking to buy a sound card (maybe Focusrite Scarlett). But… Is really necessary buy an FRFR system and an external soun card to sound good? I think by the price really it should sound good in all situation… I was changed the unit I buy for another in the music store, but the problem is the same. Is this situation normal? Is really necessary to buy an FRFR system and sound card? Thanks for you reply!
In any modeller, such as the QC, you have to adjust the EQ High pass and Low pass filters in order to eliminate the unwanted frequencies.
FRFR speakers will not solve your issue per se, since they generally reproduce a Full frequency range as low as 20 Hz to up to 20 kHz, while the core of guitar’s frequency range typically spans from about 82 Hz up to around 5 kHz.
Get rid of ur headphones first. Do u have a good amp to plug into the return fx? You just got it. It’s usually user error. Slow down and watch videos. Idk what kind of sound but studio rats on utube from a few yrs ago shows how to set up a sound. Or there’s a bunch of vide. Pick pros to watch. Again, you just got it. You need to learn how to use it first. It should sound great. Many pros are using it. I wish I could help more but patience helps and more knowledge. Odds are it’s not the quad.
You don’t have to have an audio interface (the QC is one) or an FRFR, although I prefer using an FRFR for monitoring. Others prefer to use more traditional guitar amps/cabs or power amps into cabs.
The QC sounds great through the Headrush FRFR108 despite the fact that it is an “entry level” FRFR. You can connect the QC directly to your computer and DAW so you may want to try that first before buying the Focusrite.
As @Heretolisten said, there is just no getting around the initial learning curve with modelers. You need to spend some time dialing them in with whatever equipment you have chosen to monitor them with. Especially focusing on EQ.
A low cut at 80-120hz and a high cut at anywhere from 5khz-10khz is a good place to start. Generally, 5khz is where many guitar speakers, e.g. Celestions, drop off dramatically, but your high cut can be set higher/lower than 5khz depending on the preset. Use your ears and sweep the cut until it sounds right to you, on your equipment. On some presets you may find you need no cuts at all.
A really helpful technique for learning how to dial in any modeler is to use a looper. Record a phrase into the looper and just let it play. That frees up your hands to make adjustments to the EQ and other block’s settings.
I agree. Not a fan of the QC through headphones. What has helped is aggressive high cuts with headphones only (4-5K) via an EQ block on the preset itself (as apparently the Global EQ has no effect on the headphone jack for some odd reason).
The other thing to check are the levels, as some presets may push the block levels too far for my taste. So fixing gain levels across the blocks on the preset also seems to help.
User error dude…
You sure you don’t have wah blocks in your presets and they are enabled with nothing to sweep them or turn them off?
Without an audio example, it’s pretty difficult to diagnose ‘sounds cheap’, because it shouldn’t, so something is wrong.
Do you definitely have a cab block on? And definitely not globally bypassed? That’s probably a good place to start. Flick through the cabs and find something you prefer.
An external audio interface isn’t necessary, and nor is FRFR. I get great sound from headphones (although I have stupid expensive ones from a covid headphone rabbit hole), but it should sound great on either of yours too, as they’re both high quality. However, I prefer playing through a solid state amp and a real guitar cab. Brings it to life.
I thought that mine sounded terrible - even on the 1A 2203 patch, but then I realised that I had an expression pedal plugged in and I was hearing a heel-down Wah version of all the patches! Unplugging it, or toe-down soon made me realise I need to double-check every in and out going on for things I’ve not programmed myself…
It’s user error.