What's in a preset?

I guess this is a silly question and one I think I’ve figured out through experiment, but I thought I’d ask. When I save a user preset, does it save just the configuration that I’m using at that moment? Or does it save the settings on every amp? Every amp/speaker combination? Every speaker configuration? And all the pedals? It looks like the eq settings are saved for each amplifier? And it looks like the pedal settings are all saved but that they’re not tied to the amps the way the EQs are.

Thanks for any insights, especially for what the designers were intending with this implementation. I think there’s something cool here that I wasn’t aware of.

-Jim

Hi @jim.virgo. I’m not sure if I understand your question, but if you open one of the preset files with a text editor, you will see that it contains the specific value for any modifiable parameter. One of those parameters is “AmpType”, which means it’s saving only the amp you’re using for that preset.

Thanks Gonzalo. What I was thinking was that I could have a preset called “Strat” and in that preset, setup one amp for a clean Hendrix tone, one amp for a Richie Blackmore tone, one amp for … and they’d all be saved. Then I could just switch between amps within a preset. Maybe that’s not necessary: presets are free. -Jim

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Hi Gonzalo. I know this is an old post, but I am new and was searching info on the preset files and saw your comment.

Did something change about the format type or encoding of those XML files? They do not open in a text editor. They have some binary data. I would really like to parse the XML files myself and create a preset browser, but those XML files are not entirely text-based and are not like any XML files I have encountered in the past.