metalhd77 Posted October 8, 2013 Share Posted October 8, 2013 Hey guys, I recently bought a 500X and am running through this Alto powered cab. I realize the learning curve on this thing is crazy, and you damn near need a sound engineering degree to fully take advantage and understand how everything works. I am more of a turn knobs kind of guy and not a tweaker. However, if I got the amps and cabs I would want, they would have to throw in a new bed too, cuz I'd be kicked out of the house for sure! I can only afford this setup right now, and just need to spend some time to figure things out. Here's the deal. I can play something through headphones and get it dialed in and sounding decent, then I get to band practice and it sounds like crap. I realize it may sound somewhat different, because the headphones are so near to the ears. Also, I played a gig the other night with a dual treadplate patch I downloaded from customtone. Through headphones it was sounding good to me. Not so good in the cab, and it was bassy as hell. Every time I would palm mute, the speaker looked like it wanted to jump right out of the cab. I also had downloaded a nice Acoustic simulator patch that sounded pretty decent in headphones. Didn't sound like an acoustic at all in the cab. More like just a standard clean channel on a Fender or something. Kind of almost rethinking my decision to go full-range, but so many people have had good luck. I'd like to eventually get a DT25, but don't want to spend that kind of money till I know the band is gonna get gigs to pay it off. One thing with the Alto, there is no EQ built in. Just level for channel 1 and 2. I know everyone is gonna say to get a QSC K10 or a stagesource speaker. $$$ is the issue for me right now. Anyone have suggestions or feedback? Should I have just gotten the Power Engine 60 so I don't have to screw around with cabinet/mic models? It's stuff like this that takes the fun out of playing for me. I barely have enough time to sit and learn songs that I need to learn, and to add all this tweaking and stuff in, that's a time killer. I don't have the luxury of being able to play through my cab at home and audition different sounds, so that's why I figured full range would be a good way to go. Tweak patches through headphones, and they should be pretty similar sounds coming through my cab. Any help would be appreciated! -Jason Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Leftzilla Posted October 8, 2013 Share Posted October 8, 2013 Have you tried running the headphone out into the Amp? This would at least determine if the Amp is actually "coloring" the sound meaning something in the input is adding or subtracting EQ or if not the outputs are set wrong (i.e. instead of studio direct they are set to power amp etc). Double check that. I run straight from my HD500 to the mixing board and everything sound the exact same as they do in the headphones. Also Behringer makes a very affordable (180 dollar range) small keyboard amp that I have used very successfully to edit my sounds and use on stage and sounds the exact same as the PA. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
guitarno Posted October 8, 2013 Share Posted October 8, 2013 I'm currently using Presonus Eris 8's, which are pretty good speakers ($200 per discounted). These do a good job on the acoustic patches, but take some patch tweaking to sound optimum on distorted tones - sound a little too "Crisp" in general, and still looking for settings that give that "In the room" feel. That may be the case with most (all?) FRFR systems. I am still considering the Power Engine 60 as a possible future route for amplifying the 500X. Not really a true FRFR system, but probably gives a more natural amp-like sound and response. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ur2funky Posted October 8, 2013 Share Posted October 8, 2013 Hey Jason, sorry for your struggle. I'm fairly new to using FRFR instead of my tube amps, but as I compared some tones yesterday between the two setups, you can make your set up sound great. Keep trying, it will be worth it! First thing, headphones vary greatly in how they color music, especially the low frequencies. Next time you're using them, press them against your head (if they're the ones that sit over your ear) and you'll be amazed at how different the low-end changes from doing this. Bottom line, your Alto cab probably has more lowend than your headphones do. Maybe you can adjust for this when creating tones, or better yet, try different headphones. Of course output modes on the HD500 make a huge difference. You should be running "Studio Direct". When you get a chance to play thru your Alto, play a riff and loop it, with the looper set to PRE (FootSwitch 3). This will allow you to go in and edit your tone as it is playing...a great trick! Get it dialed in just how you like. Good luck! You'll get it! ~S Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dbagchee Posted October 8, 2013 Share Posted October 8, 2013 The sound difference you are describing is textbook Fletcher-Munson curve (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fletcher%E2%80%93Munson_curves). Usually in headphones and at lower volumes in general you will boost the lows to get a beefier sound, as you turn it up to stage volume the same low end get disproportionately louder making it sound way to bassy. I've read a lot of raving reviews about the Alto so I think you should be good there. The key thing is to dial a patch at stage volume through the Alto - maybe you can get to band practice early to dial some stuff in. Whatever tone you get that sounds good at practice with sound thin in headphones or at lower volume. You can definitely get in the ballpark with headphones, just make the EQ adjustments and save a separate patch for that volume. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
matisq Posted October 9, 2013 Share Posted October 9, 2013 You need to remember that your every patch need to be tweeked by you. I can't imagine to play a live show using only downloaded preset without a tweak! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jcosta_sr Posted October 10, 2013 Share Posted October 10, 2013 Hey Jason, First of all welcome to the good and the bad of modeling. While you have all these wonderful patches available to you, amps and fx. It all depends on what you are playing it through and a what volume. Creating and tweaking a patch with headsets is very convient to do at home the problem is that the headset have a frequency response similar to an FRFR rig. While your alto live rig has a different frequency response. Hence, the difference. Also, there is a long standing law of accoustics that states as the volume changes so does the apparent frequency response of the listener. What that means is that if you take your live rig and create a patch at a low level. Then crank it up to practice levels the tone/sound will change. I'm sure that the headphones you are listening to are not at practice leve After I figured the above out. I realized that there was 2 levels or passes of creating a patch. First, I would sit at home and select the amp and the fx and do some basic tweaking. Then at practice I would listen as I play and either make changes on the fly or after practice. After a while a patern started to unwind. I usually had too much mix of the fx, most notably reverb and delay. Also, I found that I was adding too much drive to distortion. Then lastly almost all of patches were too bright with either too much treble or presence. I hope this helps. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rootmusic Posted October 10, 2013 Share Posted October 10, 2013 Hey guys, I recently bought a 500X and am running through this Alto powered cab. I realize the learning curve on this thing is crazy, and you damn near need a sound engineering degree to fully take advantage and understand how everything works. I am more of a turn knobs kind of guy and not a tweaker. However, if I got the amps and cabs I would want, they would have to throw in a new bed too, cuz I'd be kicked out of the house for sure! I can only afford this setup right now, and just need to spend some time to figure things out. Here's the deal. I can play something through headphones and get it dialed in and sounding decent, then I get to band practice and it sounds like crap. I realize it may sound somewhat different, because the headphones are so near to the ears. Also, I played a gig the other night with a dual treadplate patch I downloaded from customtone. Through headphones it was sounding good to me. Not so good in the cab, and it was bassy as hell. Every time I would palm mute, the speaker looked like it wanted to jump right out of the cab. I also had downloaded a nice Acoustic simulator patch that sounded pretty decent in headphones. Didn't sound like an acoustic at all in the cab. More like just a standard clean channel on a Fender or something. Kind of almost rethinking my decision to go full-range, but so many people have had good luck. I'd like to eventually get a DT25, but don't want to spend that kind of money till I know the band is gonna get gigs to pay it off. One thing with the Alto, there is no EQ built in. Just level for channel 1 and 2. I know everyone is gonna say to get a QSC K10 or a stagesource speaker. $$$ is the issue for me right now. Anyone have suggestions or feedback? Should I have just gotten the Power Engine 60 so I don't have to screw around with cabinet/mic models? It's stuff like this that takes the fun out of playing for me. I barely have enough time to sit and learn songs that I need to learn, and to add all this tweaking and stuff in, that's a time killer. I don't have the luxury of being able to play through my cab at home and audition different sounds, so that's why I figured full range would be a good way to go. Tweak patches through headphones, and they should be pretty similar sounds coming through my cab. Any help would be appreciated! -Jason Those speakers will be fine. I've been gigging for 18 months with the similar DB Cromos. Originally with an X3 live and now I am switching to HD500. I find it real easy to program with headphones and then dial in usually around 120-150 lo cut in the speaker parameters in rehearsals for final tweaking to taste - occasionally adding a little more treble/presence Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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