Posts by TasmanAxeman

  • Player + Fender ToneMaster Pro: Match made in heaven?

    Quote from RosboneMako

    Every unit I have ever had, has some cool thing about it nothing else has.

    Yep, combining the best features of gear old and new can get great and unique results. But Live, it's gotta be easy!

    I’ve still got a 20 year old VG8 guitar synth which produces some sounds nothing today can match IMHO. I've run it with the Kemper and ToneMaster.

    But it weights a ton, needs a 13 pin cable and special Roland GK-3 guitar pickup. So only good for fun at home.

    The great thing about the new Player and ToneMaster together is it really is simple to setup, relatively small footprint, and I would be confident on a stage with it.

  • Player + Fender ToneMaster Pro: Match made in heaven?

    I’ve been using my new Fender ToneMaster Pro and the UI is so wonderful nothing will ever be the same. I feel total freedom. Goodbye user manuals.

    I also love the clean Fender amp sounds.

    But… I don’t want to give up my amazing Kemper Stage sounds.

    I’ve integrated the Stage into the Fender ToneMaster by simply assigning a button to route the send/return stereo aux.

    Create parallel routing on the ToneMaster: One for the Fender + foot switches, a parallel path for the Kemper AUX return.

    So, one button labelled “Kemper” (in green😄) switches off the Fender amp path and switches on the Kemper stage path. It works perfectly.

    But, the stage and ToneMaster is a tad hefty (and wide) for a pedalboard!

    Enter the Player. I will be selling the stage at some point, buying the Player. My Fender Tonemaster becomes the beautiful mothership, with one button access to the Kemper, in a nice neat pedalboard package.

    I will also see how I go about adding Midi control and if I can assign more granular control on the Kemper, from the Fender.

    So great to have this big beauful display of the Fender Tonemaster and have the amazing Kemper sounds sitting right there in the background on demand.

    My partner rolls her eyes but it all makes perfect sense to me 😎

  • Solution to small size of Stage LCD screen?

    Wow Toast ME looked incredible. A labour of love. It does show that Kemper Midi implementation is only limited by your imagination.

    I have made a start - found a old Yamaha MD-BT01 (wireless Bluetooth adapter) in my toys box, and have connected it to the Stage and sending commands from my iPad wirelessly to the Stage using TouchOSC - program changes/SysEx etc. Works well, but this could be a long learning curve/project and will ultimately be a very simple display/interface (which is what I want).

    If I manage to create anything remotely useful I will check back here and post the files

  • Solution to small size of Stage LCD screen?

    Thanks all for your perspectives.

    Well it doesn’t sound like what I want is available, so this old man will reluctantly try the MIDI route;-

    Kemper Stage -> MIDI ports -> Roland WM-1 (Wireless MIDI) -> iPad -> TouchOSC app

    I will see if it’s possible to replicate the LCD screen on an iPad mini.

    Will report back later if I have any success. Don’t hold your breath 😄

  • Solution to small size of Stage LCD screen?

    Hiya thanks for chipping in old man 😄😄😄

    What I mean is, the Performance Mode screen on the iPad is a fab editor but not the kind of screen you want to glance at just as you tear into a lead break. What I want is simply a reflection of the LCD screen (which is quite hard to read when gigging and surrounded by stage lights etc) plus of course the old diminished eye-sight problems. Simply beaming that LCD information to the iPad would be a great Live Use mode (for me). It could of course be expanded with customisation of layout to further enhance the live experience.

    - Unless of course this already exists and I am missing something basic?

  • Solution to small size of Stage LCD screen?

    + for the Performance View. I tried physically magnifying the screen but didn’t work too well unless the magnifier was a few inches above the screen, which looked a bit ridiculous.

    I too have an iPad Mini, and if I could place that anywhere to monitor my performance it would be perfect.

    I don’t need to change parameters or even patches, (got a Stage for that!) just view the current status and what FX blocks are currently activated in a nice clear full colour iPad display would be awesome.

  • Solution to small size of Stage LCD screen?

    Playing live, I like to keep things really simple, just clear visual feedback on patch selected, which FX are on/off.

    The Stage LCD screen gives me exactly what I need in performance mode.

    Only problem is, as we all know the LCD screen is too small, and being an old bugger and not having the eyes of an eagle anymore I have to get down on my hands and knees to read it.

    Using the Rig Manager as a visual monitor on my iPhone, or even my 12.9” iPad doesn’t help much, as it’s more of a (great) editor than a live gigging display.

    Other option is to get technical and use midi to display rig status in an external app. Don’t want to go there.

    So, back to the LCD screen which has the info I want but is too small for me to read….

    Has anyone tried setting up a rectangular fixed magnifying glass on the LCD screen? I have started looking at gig-worthy solutions, but thought I would run it by this forum to see if the idea has been already tried and in use - or laughed out of the forum.

    Thanks

    p.s. would be REALLY nice if there was a Rig Manager mode which just displayed the Stage LCD screen on my iPhone or iPad

  • New Power Kabinet 200 fuzzy

    FInally got refund for damaged speaker from the store.

    So, how did this all happen? I’ve tried to figure it all out…

    Where did it get damaged?

    Speaker damaged leaving factory in Germany (unlikely)

    Physically damaged during shipping to store and shipping to me (unlikely, original box and speaker looked fine)

    Speaker damaged by customer - me - (impossible, this I know)

    Speaker used and damaged during time it spent in store (possible) Date stamps on box show it was in the store nearly 3 months, small tell-tale signs the box had been opened and repackaged eg loose mains lead stuffed down side)

    How did it get damaged?

    In 50 years of gigging I’ve only ever blown a guitar speaker once - an outdoors gig with a heavy rock band. Is the Kabinet more susceptible to damage being a powered FR design? Maybe.

    Here is one scenario it could happen;-

    Shop has Kabinet in quiet room on display for months alongside many other amps and speakers.

    Shop customer plugs into it from a powered amp in the room.

    Power amp output to Kemper power Kab input - Kaboom!

    No-one in shop is aware of issue, boxed up & shipped to buyer (me)

    After all, the input to the speaker cab looks like an input to any other speaker cab. A jack input. If it was already powered up someone could easily plug a Marshall 200W amp into it, not realising they were plugging into a power amp input stage.

    Makes me wonder why all manufacturers don’t have different colour standards for jack sockets - say black for passive speaker and bright yellow for power amp input.

    Anyways, all my speculation. All a pain.

    The irony of all this is I won’t buy another item from a music store now unless they unbox it and I can test it!

    My next purchase of a new Power Kabinet will be from Kemper direct, which I probably should have done in the first place.

  • New Power Kabinet 200 fuzzy

    Yes likely the cone - Not sure of the elecronics inside so no idea if there could be a component failure instead.

    I wonder if this is a rare failure from the factory? or abuse in transit? Maybe the shop rocked out before packing it off to me 🤷‍♂️

  • New Power Kabinet 200 fuzzy

    Week 2 in the Kemper world and a new challenge:-

    My PowerCab arrived, very excited, plugged it in, sounds like crap! Arghh horrible! Like a fuzz-box

    Spent a while with settings, Kemper Kone on, Monitor Cab on/off and Imprints, Main out instead of Monitor.

    Then tried by-passing the Kemper Stage by plugging in a guitar straight into the cab - still horrible! Tried different leads and guitars.

    Just arranged to send it back as faulty unit. Has anyone else experienced this?

    Makes me a bit nervous re reliability if I buy another one!

  • Newbie: Trying to make sense of profile naming conventions in search results

    It’s been a baptism of fire with my first week with the Kemper Stage. I started off frustrated- moaning and groaning about weird naming conventions whilst trying to re-create my old amps & cabs I grew up with. I realise now (thanks Finally) that the weird names are all about copyright issues that this disruptive technology brings with it.

    There have been great suggestions re bulk renaming of amps/cabs etc. to something more meaningful (awesome Wheresthedug) and adapting a logical shorthand (as per BayouTexan)

    Strangely, after countless hours experimenting, I’m already starting to adapt to a my new way of doing things… simply selecting a profile I like, save to Kemper and renaming it to what is meaningful to me, and not caring about what amp or cab it originated from!

    After all, if I called a profile “Bananas On Fire” and it had a great sound, and I identify with that name and sound, maybe that’s all I need? An easy way to utilise this tech.

    I wonder what week 2 will bring 😄

  • Newbie: Trying to make sense of profile naming conventions in search results

    😄Thanks Tony yes I can see that. I guess I was starting with what is on my factory Stage - 1500+ profiles all (IMHO) bizzarly named and for me impossible to search. I would have thought Kemper would lead the charge and set some consistent standard. E.g. somewhere in a tag the word Fender or Marshall etc. seems like a good start, instead of having to reverse-engineer the name.

    I mean, if you are looking for an iPad 4th gen you don't search for “a1458”

    I guess I won’t be taking this on the stage for a very long time, but it’s too good to give up on so I will persevere. I will dig into the exchange profiles.

    Pretty frustrating, very time consuming, BUT amazing tech, so I still salute you Mr Kemper!