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Vox Stomplab 1G - verdict?


paul_5
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I'm looking for a one-stop-box to let me record guitar parts (alt/prog rock and occasionally metal) in my Pro Tools rig. My Macbook Pro is slowly getting to the point where it's not fast enough to run amp simulation software alongside IR reverbs, EZ Drummer and other general production tools, so I'm looking to process the guitars 'out of the box' and just track them in PT.

The Vox Stomplab caught my eye, I just wondered whether anybody had any experience of them, or could suggest anything better for a similar budget?

I figured that instead of having to bounce every guitar track I might as well get the sound right and then record it, instead of fannying about in mix down (one of my pet hates).

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Never tried a Stomplab but I used to use a Johnson J-Station then moved onto a Pod. Plenty of cheap s/h examples of those out there.

Thing was, I found software amps more useful in the sense that one could profitably dick around with them in the mix, rather than be tied to a pre-recorded tone.

Faced with similar problems to yourself I discovered that one way round the latency issues was to reduce the number of instances of reverb.

Rather than have a reverb on every track or even just on each of the instrument busses I decided to reduce the load and go old school, running each track (if neccessary) out on auxes to just [i]two[/i] reverbs:

* A plate sim for specific things like vocals and snare

* A smidge of medium sized room for pretty much everything else - just to add a bit of 'air' to proceedings

I'd render everything down and save it as a 'master mix'. Then I'd open the stereo file in the DAW and apply some 'mastering' effects, including a further smidge of reverb to put some fairy dust on it (if needed).

Obviously one doesn't get quite as much control over each track's reverb but it saves a lot of processing headroom.

Not the answer you were looking for but it might save you £44.00 :)

Edited by skankdelvar
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Thanks Skank. I already use a master stereo reverb bus, and have bounced stuff for a while, but to run a decent amp simulator I can only run one instance. I've tried using more than that, and have even bussed guitar tracks to the same plugin (which has its limitations), but any more than that and everything goes wahoony shaped.

My Late 2011 Macbook pro is feeling the strain of a lowly i5 processor. My software is fairly dated (Pro Tools 10.3.10) and my OS is 10.8.5, so they're not the fastest, but I can at least use AAX format plugins (instead of RTAS), which helps to reduce the load somewhat.

Maybe I just need to find an alternative to Amplitube, as it's REALLY processor intensive.

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Well, I bit the bullet and sprang for the Stompbox 1G - not bad at all. I've just played through some of the presets and they don't seem half bad. Might have to try it in a mix with some of my projects later this week.

Less than 50 notes from GAK. :)

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  • 1 year later...

[quote name='Kiwi' timestamp='1441714003' post='2861075']
Why not add the reverb post production.. Or am I getting the wrong end of the stick?
[/quote]

I tend to have a couple of reverb busses on the mixer and have a master guitar bus with a high quality 'verb on it; it's more to do with amp modelling and effects.

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  • 2 months later...

I have one and use it a lot. The sounds are really nice and feel 'natural' to my ears compared to the processed sound of the Pod.

It is not as in depth or sophisticated as the Pod but all the sounds are grouped in genre and reasonably easy to edit once you have worked out the menu system. I now use mine as the go to box for recording and have moved away from plug ins etc. as I find it easier to get a sound I like and record it rather than tweaking for days afterwards.

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  • 4 weeks later...

[quote name='randythoades' timestamp='1498809518' post='3327138']
I now use mine as the go to box for recording and have moved away from plug ins etc. as I find it easier to get a sound I like and record it rather than tweaking for days afterwards.
[/quote]

Exactly what I do, although my choice of outboard digital amp simulator is the Zoom MS-50G. There's only me in my home studio, so if I don't like the guitar sound in the mix I can just do another take myself!

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