[ChrisN]

Originally Posted by HesNot

That's a pretty sweet arsenal right there!

If modeling is on the table I'll comment on my experiences with a Mustang II (my sons), a Marshall Code25 and a Line6 Firehawk FX. The first comment echos some others - you really have to dig into the software in my experience to get the best tones out of these amps and effects. I've yet to encounter a preset in any of them that I liked "out of the box". Admittedly I've not explored user uploaded presets from the various clouds but the stock ones generally don't get me to what I want. The Marshall and Line6 use Bluetooth apps (I repurposed an older Nexus 9 tablet as my "music" device) which makes them relatively easy to tweak - the Fender needs a PC but the interface is good and easy enough to manipulate. With some fiddling I have gotten some really good sounds from all of them. They have their relative strengths - not surprisingly I found the Marshall to get the best gain models - the Fender the best cleans and the Line6 is probably the most versatile in terms of a variety of good models. Which is not to say they can't do other things but those seemed to be the best.

The only issue I encountered is that while I'm not in a band I'm working with a friend to start one - and my band rig is a 40watt tube combo with a pedal board. So to practice I wanted to use my pedals to more closely mirror the bigger/louder setup and to explore the pedal options and combinations (a few of the pedals are still relatively new to me). While I could pick, say, the "fender" clean setting on the Marshall and run the pedals into the front end (or even a JVM clean) I did find that while some pedals seemed to work OK (chorus, compressor and delay) - the amp didn't seem to respond as well to overdrives (in my case a T Rex Moller, vintage TS10 and EH Soul Food). The Moller and the Soul Food sounded OK - not as good as into the front end of the tube amp but stlll usable just not as good, but whatever the TS10 circuit does befuddled the Marshall digital converters and it sounded like a swarm of angry hornets. Totally unusable.

Used by itself with the built in effects (I do not have the Marshall Code foot controller which might make it more user friendly but new at least they are pricey - nearly half of what I paid for the amp used) it sounds really good given the size/speaker limits. The onboard effects are not as diverse as the Line6 but are all usable and sound good.

I haven't used pedal into the Fender so I won't comment on that but the general consensus is that overdrives in particular don't pair well with digital modeling amps but it may be interesting to try it with the Mustang.

The Line6 is a different beast - it can be used with an amp although I haven't gone through the experiments (4 cord or otherwise) and have used it with headphones at this point. Regardless if you want to amplify it you need something in addition - a FRFR or an amp (ideally with an effects loop).

Without question I see the appeal of modeling amps and simulators - you get a dizzying array of options and the technology to my ear at least has gotten to a point where they mostly sound really good. Heck there is a great Anderson's TV YouTube video where they blind tested a range of classic amps against their profiled versions in a Kemper and two seasoned guitarists could not tell the difference with any reliability. Now the Kemper is in a different league and price point but it goes to show how far the technology has come and even at lower price points some of that has trickled down. There is another video comparing an original 20yo POD to the Kemper and the Amplifire and while the POD loses ground in higher gain models it sounds surprisingly good matched against one of the best and most expensive setups in the Kemper and a well regarded "mid range" modeler in the Amplifire.

Another factor is cost. Even being thrifty and buying used my two tube amps and pedals all in over time have cost me roughly $1300. New and or current market value (I have two vintage pedals I bought years ago that would cost me 4x what I paid for them back in the day to replace) would be a good bit more than that (north of $2k). And that doesn't include all the patch cables for the pedals, a power supply for the pedals and the time to build a pedal board which I still need to do... which adds up. At that price you could easily get a Helix and either a solid amp or FRFR - and you're within the range of an AxeFX or Kemper - although you'd still need a FRFR or with the Kemper power head a cabinet. And you'd have a much wider palette of options at your disposal.

I can also see once established in a cover band setting the flexibility of a modeling setup with preset patches for the entire set list would be a really attractive option. I heard a band recently who were Cracker Jack players - all covers but everything from Tears for Fears to AC/DC and Whitesnake - and the two guitar players and the bass player had not an amp in sight - all POD floor setups (one Helix and one POD500x) through the PA and in ears. They sounded great in a live bar room. Spot on tones for all of that variety. And their load in/out was a lot easier too!

While I'm not crazy about the spider amps themselves - I think the PODs sound better to my ear - the Mustang amps, the Marshall Codes, the Vox Valveronix and the Boss Katana are all affordable and sound really good if you put the time into tweaking.

So while I've settled for the moment on a pedals/amp setup some of that is driven by being old and used to that convention after x number of years (albeit with a 10 year layoff of very sporadic playing) - some of it is that I already had some pedals that I was familiar with - and some of it is just driven by how I currently practice and am building back my chops. But I have not written off modeling at all - I can easily see as my opportunities to play with other musicians advances (what I miss the most about playing actually having been in bands in high school, college and graduate school) working the Firehawk FX into the setup as a more flexible and portable solution to achieving a wide range of sounds.

Another ton of useful info I'll keep for later consumption. Thanks