The Fractal Thread

jamesguitar

Keeping an open mind, but Fractal have historically been the worst products when it comes to being user friendly. 

If they could hire someone else to do design their software and menu layouts (and also bring the prices down a little) then they’d be killing it.

As always with this stuff we won’t know where it sits in the market until we have price and demos.

ColWilkie

The menu system is not too bad on the unit when you get used to it, but for this product it would make sense to simplify things a little.  Perhaps offer a basic and advanced option with the menu, who knows...

I'm still blown away with my FM3, both the amp modelling and FX.  It's the first time in a long while I've not been looking at picking up additional pedals and changing things up.  If I had kept an amp, and was looking to simplify my board to a single unit - now I've had experience with Fractal it would be a no brainer.

I find the FM3 price was reasonable, but this would need to be priced well to compete.  However with Meris and Strymon pricing their newest units around the £699 mark, I expect this not to be cheap.

Either way I'm glad it wasn't an FM3 replacement, that would have stung

DefaultM

jamesguitar said:

Keeping an open mind, but Fractal have historically been the worst products when it comes to being user friendly. 

If they could hire someone else to do design their software and menu layouts (and also bring the prices down a little) then they’d be killing it.

As always with this stuff we won’t know where it sits in the market until we have price and demos.

I used the FX8 on stage once and wanted to stamp it in to dust just trying to change a delay. Never again. 

Nerine

sweepy said:

Read the manual, I’ll pass, seems to not be too sure what it wants to be tbh, why bother with it also doubling as an audio interface ?. I’ll stick with my FM9 in 4cm

What? I’d say it knows exactly what it wants to be. The use case is pretty obvious. 

Weird take, imo. 

thomasw88

Nerine said:

sweepy said:

Read the manual, I’ll pass, seems to not be too sure what it wants to be tbh, why bother with it also doubling as an audio interface ?. I’ll stick with my FM9 in 4cm

What? I’d say it knows exactly what it wants to be. The use case is pretty obvious. 

Weird take, imo. 

This.  Its exactly what I'm looking for.  I have no real interest in modelling apart from for recording but  I have helix native and a tonex one so happy with that, plus the studio I use has excellent digital capabilitlies anyway.
  Live,   I prefer amps and usually of the valve variety.  But I would love to have a unit that can handle most of my effects  - happy to use a couple of external drive pedals and a wah as I don't really like digital overdrive and have the VP4 cover the rest.     I'm going for £800-900 for it in price.

DefaultM

DefaultM said:

jamesguitar said:

Keeping an open mind, but Fractal have historically been the worst products when it comes to being user friendly. 

If they could hire someone else to do design their software and menu layouts (and also bring the prices down a little) then they’d be killing it.

As always with this stuff we won’t know where it sits in the market until we have price and demos.

I used the FX8 on stage once and wanted to stamp it in to dust just trying to change a delay. Never again. 

Just remembered I got some third party iPhone app for it as well that you had to connect to your phone with a cable and adapter. I took it to another gig and started trying to sort it and I just thought this is ridiculous and switched to my pedalboard.

Nerine

thomasw88 said:

Nerine said:

sweepy said:

Read the manual, I’ll pass, seems to not be too sure what it wants to be tbh, why bother with it also doubling as an audio interface ?. I’ll stick with my FM9 in 4cm

What? I’d say it knows exactly what it wants to be. The use case is pretty obvious. 

Weird take, imo. 

This.  Its exactly what I'm looking for.  I have no real interest in modelling apart from for recording but  I have helix native and a tonex one so happy with that, plus the studio I use has excellent digital capabilitlies anyway.
  Live,   I prefer amps and usually of the valve variety.  But I would love to have a unit that can handle most of my effects  - happy to use a couple of external drive pedals and a wah as I don't really like digital overdrive and have the VP4 cover the rest.     I'm going for £800-900 for it in price.

I think/hope it'll be cheaper than that. 

That's too close to FM3 money for arguably a less feature-endowed product. Even though the VP4 would be a better value proposition to me than an FM3. 

I'm hoping for the £650-700 mark. Depends how much profiteering Fractal think they can get away with, I think. Perhaps we'll see £699. 

thomasw88

DefaultM said:

DefaultM said:

jamesguitar said:

Keeping an open mind, but Fractal have historically been the worst products when it comes to being user friendly. 

If they could hire someone else to do design their software and menu layouts (and also bring the prices down a little) then they’d be killing it.

As always with this stuff we won’t know where it sits in the market until we have price and demos.

I used the FX8 on stage once and wanted to stamp it in to dust just trying to change a delay. Never again. 

Just remembered I got some third party iPhone app for it as well that you had to connect to your phone with a cable and adapter. I took it to another gig and started trying to sort it and I just thought this is ridiculous and switched to my pedalboard.

I had a similar experience with the FX8   It sounded amazing in the house, and turned to utter shite on a stage. Couldn't get it to sound anywhere near as good as my regular pedalboard no matter what I tried.   It didn't play nicely with other pedals either. 
I don't want t a pedal board where I need a degree in audio science to work out how to get it sound good.

thomasw88

Nerine said:

thomasw88 said:

Nerine said:

sweepy said:

Read the manual, I’ll pass, seems to not be too sure what it wants to be tbh, why bother with it also doubling as an audio interface ?. I’ll stick with my FM9 in 4cm

What? I’d say it knows exactly what it wants to be. The use case is pretty obvious. 

Weird take, imo. 

This.  Its exactly what I'm looking for.  I have no real interest in modelling apart from for recording but  I have helix native and a tonex one so happy with that, plus the studio I use has excellent digital capabilitlies anyway.
  Live,   I prefer amps and usually of the valve variety.  But I would love to have a unit that can handle most of my effects  - happy to use a couple of external drive pedals and a wah as I don't really like digital overdrive and have the VP4 cover the rest.     I'm going for £800-900 for it in price.

I think/hope it'll be cheaper than that. 

That's too close to FM3 money for arguably a less feature-endowed product. Even though the VP4 would be a better value proposition to me than an FM3. 

I'm hoping for the £650-700 mark. Depends how much profiteering Fractal think they can get away with, I think. Perhaps we'll see £699. 

I was just thinking its going to be in the H90 territory which is an amazing sounding unit but really could do with an extra footswitch or two!

Nerine

thomasw88 said:

Nerine said:

thomasw88 said:

Nerine said:

sweepy said:

Read the manual, I’ll pass, seems to not be too sure what it wants to be tbh, why bother with it also doubling as an audio interface ?. I’ll stick with my FM9 in 4cm

What? I’d say it knows exactly what it wants to be. The use case is pretty obvious. 

Weird take, imo. 

This.  Its exactly what I'm looking for.  I have no real interest in modelling apart from for recording but  I have helix native and a tonex one so happy with that, plus the studio I use has excellent digital capabilitlies anyway.
  Live,   I prefer amps and usually of the valve variety.  But I would love to have a unit that can handle most of my effects  - happy to use a couple of external drive pedals and a wah as I don't really like digital overdrive and have the VP4 cover the rest.     I'm going for £800-900 for it in price.

I think/hope it'll be cheaper than that. 

That's too close to FM3 money for arguably a less feature-endowed product. Even though the VP4 would be a better value proposition to me than an FM3. 

I'm hoping for the £650-700 mark. Depends how much profiteering Fractal think they can get away with, I think. Perhaps we'll see £699. 

I was just thinking its going to be in the H90 territory which is an amazing sounding unit but really could do with an extra footswitch or two!

Hadn't considered that, to be fair. I mean, thinking about it, a Big Sky MX is £600+, so I guess Fractal will know what the market will bear. 

Perhaps we might even see £999. That would be a big ol' pill to swallow. That said, I guess you could sell off your existing verbs and delays and stuff to help fund it, which is probably what I'd do, but at that kind of money it's definitely more of a headscratcher than an impulsive purchase, I think. 

thomasw88

Nerine said:

thomasw88 said:

Nerine said:

thomasw88 said:

Nerine said:

sweepy said:

Read the manual, I’ll pass, seems to not be too sure what it wants to be tbh, why bother with it also doubling as an audio interface ?. I’ll stick with my FM9 in 4cm

What? I’d say it knows exactly what it wants to be. The use case is pretty obvious. 

Weird take, imo. 

This.  Its exactly what I'm looking for.  I have no real interest in modelling apart from for recording but  I have helix native and a tonex one so happy with that, plus the studio I use has excellent digital capabilitlies anyway.
  Live,   I prefer amps and usually of the valve variety.  But I would love to have a unit that can handle most of my effects  - happy to use a couple of external drive pedals and a wah as I don't really like digital overdrive and have the VP4 cover the rest.     I'm going for £800-900 for it in price.

I think/hope it'll be cheaper than that. 

That's too close to FM3 money for arguably a less feature-endowed product. Even though the VP4 would be a better value proposition to me than an FM3. 

I'm hoping for the £650-700 mark. Depends how much profiteering Fractal think they can get away with, I think. Perhaps we'll see £699. 

I was just thinking its going to be in the H90 territory which is an amazing sounding unit but really could do with an extra footswitch or two!

Hadn't considered that, to be fair. I mean, thinking about it, a Big Sky MX is £600+, so I guess Fractal will know what the market will bear. 

Perhaps we might even see £999. That would be a big ol' pill to swallow. That said, I guess you could sell off your existing verbs and delays and stuff to help fund it, which is probably what I'd do, but at that kind of money it's definitely more of a headscratcher than an impulsive purchase, I think. 

true  -  I've looked at an FM3 but it just seems overkill for my use case plus a few people say it doesn't integrate brilliantly into a pedalboard plus its large and heavy and can be complicated to use.  This looks like it's going to be a lot simpler to use , smaller, lighter (?)  and hopefully works well  in a pedal chain/4cm. 

 I never bonded with the HX effects when I had one, and the FX8 was a total pita to use so maybe this could be the answer..  

I'd sell my DD500, Mobius and a Neunaber immerse which would get a good chunk of the way.  

Beexter

Price is going to be key. From what I've read of the manual, Fractal have tried to simplify the interface for folks who have been put off by complexity in the past.
If they price it right, it could be a gateway drug to the Fractal ecosystem...

The way Fractal do things is a blessing and a curse- you have way more control over almost any parameter you can imagine (and even stuff you had never thought of) giving unparalleled flexibility. But you can keep it simple.
If you just want to adjust feedback, mix and time on a delay, you can. I think they do a good job of balancing the two extremes and it looks like they are trying to make it easier to stay out of the weeds with the new device.

When I go to a restaurant, I don't feel compelled to eat everything on the menu, I just order what I want at the time...

DavusPG

I haven't bought any effects pedals for years but given that the VP4 could replace the likes of a Big Sky and other high end pedals, and considering the number of effects in the box, I wouldn't be surprised if this comes in at around £1k.

I've been particularly interested in the hype around the VP4 as it's coincided with me taking the plunge and getting a tube amp, so it might be that my need for a Fractal unit with the amp block is no more. It's early days, so I'll refrain from a gushing post whilst still in the honeymoon period, but after one rehearsal I'm very much liking my new toy and haven't once felt the need to revert to an amp block in the FM9. What I will say though, is that the ease with which I was able to integrate the physical amp into my existing presets, whilst keeping the Fractal amp blocks in there should I want or need to use them is testament to how well designed and adaptable the grid and routing on Fractal products are.

The FM9 is also working perfectly with my new setup. The amp I got is a Hook Wizard 2, which is all tube but has 32 presets, a built in loadbox, IRs, Midi control and a direct out. For my use it perfectly straddles the analog and digital worlds as live we always go through our PA, but at home this week I've been loving playing through a physical cab for the 1st time in the best part of a decade. 

I won't go down this rabbit hole, but it's definitely different to the modelled sounds - even when going through the direct out with IRs. It's not the night and day differences some of our friends on the Fractal forum claim to hear between firmware updates, but to my ears it's definitely there. Being able to turn round and make adjustments on the controls of the amp itself is nice too, although of course we have the performance pages on our Fractal units for that. 

I could probably get away with the 4 blocks on the VP4, but would like a couple more, although as @Nerine said, add a physical drive (which I've also been toying with the idea of) and wah at the start of the chain and the 4 blocks and channels of the VP4 will have most users covered. If it's successful then maybe we'll see a VP6 or VP8? VP6 would be ideal. 

sweepy

The handy thing about the FM9 you can have it connected in 4cm and ALSO standard  modelling output using the normal outputs, another reason why I can’t see where the VP4 target market is 

thomasw88

sweepy said:

The handy thing about the FM9 you can have it connected in 4cm and ALSO standard  modelling output using the normal outputs, another reason why I can’t see where the VP4 target market is 

Does that work for swapping between clean and  overdriven sound (using the amp for dirt and delays etc in the loop (after the amp block?) Or do you have a clean amp block only?    

peteri

I have to say I’m disappointed, I’ve recently sold my Axe III turbo and replaced it with a tonex and two H90s. 

The only thing I miss is the 2290 delay type, I find the eventide effects at least as good as Fractal and for reverbs quite a bit better. 

And the H90 is really flexible with IO, I run one H90 four cable with the Tonex and being able to add mod effects either side of the amp (and varying it preset to preset ) is great. 

I think they’ve missed a trick on this pedal with the lack of IO, from what I’ve seen you don’t have enough for four cable 

sweepy

The 4cm means you have drives etc in the front and delays etc in the loop of my normal guitar amp . Output 2 then goes to my 400wstereo amp and cabs 

thomasw88

peteri said:

I have to say I’m disappointed, I’ve recently sold my Axe III turbo and replaced it with a tonex and two H90s. 

The only thing I miss is the 2290 delay type, I find the eventide effects at least as good as Fractal and for reverbs quite a bit better. 

And the H90 is really flexible with IO, I run one H90 four cable with the Tonex and being able to add mod effects either side of the amp (and varying it preset to preset ) is great. 

I think they’ve missed a trick on this pedal with the lack of IO, from what I’ve seen you don’t have enough for four cable 

The VP4 does do 4cm. Apparently you can put the loop anywhere in the chain of 4 effects.

peteri

thomasw88 said:

peteri said:

I have to say I’m disappointed, I’ve recently sold my Axe III turbo and replaced it with a tonex and two H90s. 

The only thing I miss is the 2290 delay type, I find the eventide effects at least as good as Fractal and for reverbs quite a bit better. 

And the H90 is really flexible with IO, I run one H90 four cable with the Tonex and being able to add mod effects either side of the amp (and varying it preset to preset ) is great. 

I think they’ve missed a trick on this pedal with the lack of IO, from what I’ve seen you don’t have enough for four cable 

The VP4 does do 4cm. Apparently you can put the loop anywhere in the chain of 4 effects.

Yes but it only has two in and out out analogue - so if you use a loop you can’t do stereo out unless you use spdif.  This seems limited to me 

Heartfeltdawn

jamesguitar said:

Keeping an open mind, but Fractal have historically been the worst products when it comes to being user friendly. 

No way. Axe Edit was fab on my old AFX Ultra. The UI on the Boss GT-1000Core is hideous. It's worse than the software for Tonex, that is how much I hate it, and I am someone who happily dialled in sounds on the Boss GT-3 and GT-5. 

BTW folks, it's apparently $799 according to a post on something Fractally on Facebook. 

Given that the FM3 is $1099 in the US and £1165 through G66 and the FM9 is $1800 and $1900 respectively, I'b be going for £850 to £899.

If it's £800 then compare that to buying a top end reverb pedal and a delay.