Does Anyone Like Waves GTR3?

For the life of me I can't get good tones with this thing. I have gearbox and AT2 and can get Great tones out of them but this GTR is not very good in comparison. I tried it with and without the interface and still nothing even remotely decent. Well, clean tones are ok, but the distortion section of the amps are not very good for some reason. Anyone have any tips or thoughts on this product? I do like how the pedals are available separate from the amps so that I can use them on my channel strips easily. Still I just can't get any usable sounds with it.

 

Thanks

funny you should say. my younger friend got it and was way stoked about it. but then i heard it for myself. flat, lifeless, "controlled static" came to mind. coulda just been him, but im not running off to get the thing.

Exactly!!! The distortions are terrible. I'm pretty good at getting tones out of these emulators but this thing just doesn't have it. I find it strange because Waves makes great products but this one just falls short. I tried it with and without the interface and it was no better either way. I'm just sticking to Gearbox now. To my ears Gearbox is THE best sounding emulator out there. Especially for Hi gain metal tones. It's a shame because I had high hopes for GTR3. Thanks for the reply.

 

Have a good one.

Personally I haven't impressed with that which I have heard so far.

 

I will tell ya, though - the Alien Connection (now Peavey), Ravalver MKIII is getting a lot of attention. It already sounded good with MKII, but now they have replicas of Peavey's flagship heads, too!

 

FWIW

FWIW - here is a link for a free demo:

 

ReValver MKIII Demo for Mac

 

You should give it a whirl ... you might dig it.

i know right? watching the waves demonstration video, about how its been expertly paired up with PRS technology and whatnot, made me drool a little bit. the expense was the only thing holding me back....but now.....gearbox you say? what others have you heard and liked/andor been disappointed with?

 

ill give that revalver a try too

Hi

 

The revalver is pretty damn good. Might pick it up later on. Gearbox, to me, is the absolute best sounding AND most CPU efficient emulator of any of the Big guitar plugs. I've ran 10 instances in a large mix without even freezing the tracks. As for tones, Gearbox and AT2 sound the best to my ears. Waves...well . I also have NI Guitar rig and don't really care much for that one either. Again the distortion sounds crappy to me. I have heard people get good sound with it though, so... I love how easy Gearbox is to get a usable tone. Pick an amp, adjust the gain, eq, mic and BAM!!! Something usable every time. I think out of the 70 or so amps they have maybe 3 or 4 of them I couldn't get anything good out of. Gearbox is the easiest to Coax a good tone out of. AT2 sounds great 2 but it is more limiting in amps and is much more CPU hungry than Gearbox on my system. If there are demos I'd suggest trying them out. The revalver demo was cool. Thanks WB.

 

Have a good one.

Gearbox, to me, is the absolute best sounding AND most CPU efficient emulator of any of the Big guitar plugs.

 

I use a POD xt for demoing, which I think does the same processing as the Gearbox plug, and I have a heck of a time getting good crunch tones. I think it does a good job of clean or cleanish tones (I love the Hiwatt sim for most low-gain applications), and pretty good high-gain stuff (the Recto tones are great with, I think, the Tube Screamer sim in front), but I can't seem to get good mid-gain, AC/DC-, hard rock-type tones that aren't either fuzzy and mushy, or thin and wimpy.

 

Any tips? I think GAP does a pretty nice job of mid-gain sometimes, but I'd rather lay down a solid tone while I'm tracking than have the option to fiddle too much once it's there.

yeaaah, i landed with guitar rig 2. not quite my cup of meat either. super cpu hungry and rather blah. im off to gearbox to give her a try!

Amp simulators...

 

I'd rather spend my day having dental work done.

 

Small amp coffin (you can build one yourself out of basic building materials), Epiphone Valve Jr. or Fender Vibro-Champ, RAT or Big Muff Pi...

 

Much happier.

I am diggin' my Tiny Terror .... haven't used any sims in a long time.

 

just stuck it in the closet, placed a '57 in front of it, and it's sounding good so far.

 

But i can't knock the sims. I have been using them for a while - since we have had children.

Yeah I like the options and the ease of setup the best with sims. Emulators will never be as good as the real thing but they are getting mighty close. At least to my ears. I find a real good trick with them is to not only roll off the low end but also some of the really high end too. I find that there is a lot of "Digital" fuzziness that lives up there. Once I filter that out the tone really starts to come through even more. You need to be careful as not to take out too much of the high end as you will kill the tone if you overdo it. Just a bit of filtering to get that really digital sound the hell out of there is all I use it for. I'm happy with the tones I'm getting though. I think forgetting about the fact that It's technically not a real amp also helps. I find a lot of this modern studio trickery can really mess with your head if you think about it too much. Though that's probably just me.

 

Have a good one.

Amp simulators...

 

I'd rather spend my day having dental work done.

 

Small amp coffin (you can build one yourself out of basic building materials), Epiphone Valve Jr. or Fender Vibro-Champ, RAT or Big Muff Pi...

 

Much happier.

 

agree!

 

i have a '65 twin reverb, which is loud as shiiite though. Ocassionally if im really well prepared i'll unleash the sonic brutality upon my neighborhood for short bursts at a time- but it would be nice if i could eventually save that motha' for the stage.

Amp simulators...

 

I'd rather spend my day having dental work done.

 

Small amp coffin (you can build one yourself out of basic building materials), Epiphone Valve Jr. or Fender Vibro-Champ, RAT or Big Muff Pi...

 

Much happier.

 

agree!

 

i have a '65 twin reverb, which is loud as shiiite though. Ocassionally if im really well prepared i'll unleash the sonic brutality upon my neighborhood for short bursts at a time- but it would be nice if i could eventually save that motha' for the stage.

 

Hahaha... You know the blackface Twin is, like, the loudest combo amp in history, right? I have a '66 Super, which can be painfully loud, but nothing like those monsters...

 

Seriously, I have a coffin that I built myself that sits in my control room. It's isolating enough to have a Plexi driven half-stack or an SVT in it and still work right next to it. Not totally silent, but quiet enough to hear most of what is coming from the monitors, rather than thru the walls from the amp. Mine is big enough to double as a vocal booth (4'x4'x8' tall) but you could make it any size.

 

Almost all stuff you could buy at your local Home Depot or whatever...