Posts by heldal

Quote from sailor

Sure, but as I mentioned, the situation has changed. They went years without any direct competition to their profiling. Those days are over. The timing of the Mk2 release seems like pretty strong evidence of responding to market pressure. Otherwise, they would have released the Mk2 in the summer when the new profiling is ready.

... or it could be that some of the components in the 15 year old mk1-design have become obsolete and they had to rush a face-lift to be able to continue production. With more powerful hardware engineers will pick up on that and utilise it to improve algorithms and data-points.

Quote from drog

Most of things things are not needed or you can get with third party vendors. The price of the units would go up as well. Every company makes concessions for price and to serve most people.

Ethercon I have added to my rack with a 3rd party panel.
POE is only needed for very long remote runs, most never need that.
Scribble strips are a luxury and I would never use it live. I already know what I’m stepping on, I don’t have time to read.
If you are worried about damage to floor units, they offer a head and rack version with a remote.

I’m not saying these are not items that would not be welcomed but for most they are not needed or there are work around available.

Just my opinion

POE is a requirement for an external switch if you want to hook a head or rack-model up to both the Kemper-remote and your wired inhouse-network at the same time. POE is required to power the remote, and when it can not be connected directly to the head/rack it has to get power elsewhere.

The remote is also a floor-unit, and vurlnerable at that so ditching a Kemper-Stage/Player for Rack/Head witch a remote isn't much of an option. I'm a Head-user myself.

Except for that I agree there are workarounds, but I'd rather pay to have quality-features added than spending hours and days of my time searching for solutions.

I find it a weird policy that someone who has been a Kemper-user and supporter for 13 years is not permitted to express a wish for hardware to match the excellent software that Kemper makes for these premium products. I think it is only fair to expect the hardware to be equally as superior as the software is when compared to competing units 1/4 of the price.

Quote from Terrapin

Just had a reply back from Kemper this morning and was told that they are indeed compatible!

Compatible or equivalent? Has the remote been upgraded? For a user upgrading to a mk2 head or rack, are there any benefits at all to replacing their old remote with a mk2 one?

According to Kemper faster switching and general performance-improvements are what is available now. The exciting new and/or improved algorithms enabled by the more powerful hardware in mp2 are supposedly in testing and will be released in new firmware over the summer.

This is a general request applying across models and accessories.

I belive a premium product also should have premium hardware design-features such as:

• More rugged and easier to repair chassis-mounted external connections and controls instead of the current ECB-mounted ones.
• EtherCON, not plain RJ45-sockets.
• A builtin 2-port switch and and extra network-port to enable both network and Kemper-remote connection simultaneously without the need for an external POE+-capable switch that very few consumers own in the advance of acquiring a KPA.
• The flimsy and exposed LCD contrast-pot on the remote should either be removed as it can be controlled from the head/rack-unit, replaced with a more rugged chassis-mounted pot, or at least made flush with chassis-surface to be adjusted with a screwdriver or similar.
• Floor units should be improved with illuminated switches and scribble-strips instead of the sometimes hard to interpret 2-level LEDs
• Floor units should come with better protection for controls and screen(s) included. Preferably shielding that is replaceable and available separately
• Connectors duplicated on the remote: Input, sends/returns, MIDI in/out

Then there are all the missed opportunities wrt features, both current and future, that could have been enabled with the inclusion of WiFi and/or Bluetooth (with kill-switches for stage-use). For stage use I prefer things simplistic without builtin touch-screens and stuff just like the mk1-design, but there are features for programming and rehearsal involving external gear where these technologies would come in handy.

Quote from naslanidis

The key is the supposed new profiling technology. If it's significantly better or more accurate, then it's more than just a facelift.

Nah, that is just enhancements enabled my more powerful hardware. Any developer would cease the opportunity to improve algorithms and data-points. I still belive it is a rushed hardware upgrade forced by components availability. The complete absence of any attempt to address the flaws in the old design says so.

• Still ECB-mounted external connections and controls, as opposed to more rugged and easier to repair chassis-mounted equivalents
• Still no EtherCON for remote
• No builtin 2-port switch and extra network port to enable both network and remote connection simultanously
• The flimsy and exposed LCD contrast-pot on the remote is the same.
• Floor units would have been improved with illuminated switches and scribble-strips instead of the somtimes hard to interpret 2-level LEDs
• Floor units should come with better protection for controls and screen(s) included (replaceable)

Then there are all the missed opportunities wrt features both current and future that would have been enabled with the inclusion of WiFi and/or Bluetooth. For stage use I prefer things simplistic, but there are features for programming and rehearsal where the KPA is lagging behind its competitors.

Quote from naslanidis

The key is the supposed new profiling technology. If it's significantly better or more accurate, then it's more than just a facelift.

As a developer I know very well that almost any algorithm for realtime signal processing can be improved with more processing capacity.. I still think the facelift is driven by component availability, but developers will of course take the opportunity to improve the software too. It will be exciting to hear how mk1 and 2 compare.Don't get me wrong. I'm excited by the improvements. I love my Kemper, but I'm not Kemper-religious so I'm a bit surprised by the complete absence of improvements other than audio given the technological development over the past 15 years.

Quote from wziogio

looks to me just an esthetical change, just to make the remote compliant to the mk2...

True. They have not even done anything to the flimsy and exposed contrast-pot that imho not should be necessary at all.

This is mk2, not Kemper2. Hence, I view it as a facelift. I don't even think it is based on feature requests, but rather an update to address issues with components obsolesence to be able to continue production.

Quote from Burkhard

The Remote has its own pot since multiple Remotes could be connected to the same PROFILER via PoE hub.

The KPA should be able to identify each remote at least by mac-address if there is no other id available. I would have added separate pages of setup for each attached remote in the KPA firmware instead.

That said, I do not understand why such a flimsy pot is used on a premium device at all. It should at least be chassis mounted to simplify repairs. Once set I never touch it unless it has been moved in transport, so a surface-flush control to be turned with a small screwdriver would be better. From pictures it seems that this design even is carried on to mk2 which I find disappointing. I had expected the design of both the new remote and the stage-model to be a lot more rugged than mk1. There are 3rd party solutions, but in this price range I think replaceable protection for screen and controls should be included for units intended to be stomped on.

I find this more of a facelift than a comprehensive upgrade. It looks more like something rushed out to be able to continue production. 15 years is a long time in the digital era, and parts obsolesence could have made continued production of the original model complicated. For a premium device it is peculiar that physical weaknesses that were pointed out from release have not been addressed, such as the flimsy and exposed LCD contrast-pot on the KPA remote, the flimsy RJ45 without EtherCON for the remote and circuit-mounted controls in general. Premium devices intended for touring should be prepared for heavy handling and be designed with chassis-mounted controls and external connections. Other obvious features that competitors have introduced over the last 5-10 years have been missed, such as separate Ethernet for external connection, WiFi, Bluetooth etc. While I personally prefer to keep things simple for performance and would be happy doing all editing on an external device of my choice I would at least have opted for OLED displays, not just for colour, but which could be easier to read in difficult light. And I would have designed some kind of improved protection for screen and controls on the remote and the stage model. I've been very happy with my mk1 head for 13 years. I'm holding out for a while unless something breaks or tests should indicate that mk2 is vastly superior, cause I believe the competition will force a more comprehensive Kemper-2 redesign within a few years. Many recent comparisons indicate that Kemper still is heading the field in terms of audio quality, but the competitors are catching up rapidly, while also offering features of convenience for setup, rehearsal and preparation that Kemper does not address with this facelift.

Quote from timo

This is a common misunderstanding. It is just that the same amount of data covers half of the time. OR for the same latency, you have to double the amount of data.

I should have specified that it requires adequate resources to maintain the same buffer-size, no bandwidth-constraints and that it only affects input and output. Any added latency in processing changes adds to the aggregate latency passing through the device. For conversion it is simple: A/D and D/A latency is decided by how fast the chosen conversion-buffer-size is filled, and that happens faster the higher the samplerate. Double samplerate means that the buffer is filled in half the time. Cutting the buffer-size in half would have the same effect, but that I have been told has for some reason proven worse to achieve in places.

Quote from GearJocke

96 khz doesn't enhance audio quality.

Not in and out but it halves the latency, and provides better resolution in processing that may (or not) accumulate to better output. There already exist software using up to 384kHz for internal processing for this exact reason.

Quote from BayouTexan

No need for a Kemper 2 at all. That's like asking for a Plexi 2 which did not work out so well.

Not really. Valveamp-designs have not changed much in the last 50+ years. Digital devices develop at a very different speed. In the 15 years since the release of the KPA chip-performance and memory-capacities have multiplied by at 10 to 100 or more, and touch-screens are everywhere. I've been a KPA-user since 2012 and have enjoyed it a lot. I applaud the developers for not just maintaining, but also enhancing the device over all these years. That is outstanding compared to anything their competitors have shown so far. Despite being a long-term fan I have to admin that it is showing its age and I am reluctant to invest much more time and money on the mk1 at this point.

I've had my KPA-head since 2012 and the remote since it was released and it has probably been hauled for 1000+ rehearsals and gigs over the years. Now the remote has developed a problem that I first though was the LCD, but turned out to be the contrast-pot. It has become somewhat loose and the screen flickers when the knob is touched.

Firstly, I think it was a mistake to put that control on the device when there is a remote-LCD-contrast-setting on the KPA. Why the seemingly duplicate adjustment? It is not like the remote ever is going to be used as a standalone device. If anything the pot should at least be a durable chassis-mounted one. I was skeptical from the day I receive the remote, and it is a wonder it has survived this long.

I found an old post with instructions to repair and replace the pot with a more sturdy and chassis-mounted generic 10k-pot made from metal. The post describe the problem just as I experience it. Before I start the repair I would first check if the firmware in the remote could be made to ignore the switch, possibly with a firmware update. That obviously won't work if the pot is hardwired to the display, but could work if the signal is processed by the remote's firmware. Does anyone know?

At this point I am skeptical about putting money towards spares and parts to the KPA mk1. The KPA has served me exceptionally well for much longer than any other digital device I've ever owned but the design is starting to show its age wrt performance, and it is at an age where certain components are expected to approach EOL no matter what quality components were selected for the build.

I like to be able to adapt to different situations using this: https://www.k-m.de/en/products/dr…itation-leather

Quote from Wheresthedug

If I remember correctly the older units had an upgrade around 2020 (ish) to make them the same as the stage for SPDIF. Prior to the update they had to be set as the master for SPDIF clocking but after the update the Head and Rack were able t0 run as slaves. There might have been a few other minor changes in that upgrade but nothing that affects the sound.

True. Forgot about that one. SPDIF improvement should be the only real change.

An old device in working order does the job perfectly. All head and rack-units sold are functionally identical. Except from possibly the use of different but equivalent components in production over the years there have been no changes to the design.

Quote from Jandalf

I haven't seen any integrated one-chip solution for a PoE powered Ethernet interface yet. You still need a PHY (physical layer chip) and a power acquiring circuit and a (preferably isolated) step-down converter to bring the PoE voltage to a lower level as required by your device. There are integrated chips containing the power circuit and the converter and the Remote uses such a chip. Basically, everything required for an implementation supporting both modes on the Remote would have been already there.
However the Remote was released way later than the Profiler, where they had already made that bad decision to go for a propietary and spec violating solution. So they probably took the easy way, which was to just continue with that bad decision when designing the Remote instead of using the opportunity to get this right. As to what they were thinking, i have no idea and i'm not sure if we'll get an official comment on that.

Here are power-sourcing IC's (need to be fed the correct voltages): https://www.ti.com/power-manageme…t/products.html

These are circuits for the receive/consumer side: https://www.ti.com/power-manageme…s/products.html

I bet several other manufacturers can offer something similar to those from Texas Instruments. It is a point that the KPA predates many of these products, yet most of the relevant IEEE-standards predates the KPA.