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  #1  
Old 03-12-2018, 01:36 PM
guitaniac guitaniac is offline
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Default Using A Soundhole Cover With ToneDexter

I've started using a thick rubber soundhole cover when amplifying my guitar with ToneDexter. My reasoning is that it helps to minimize the guitar top's reaction to speaker sound and allows me to up the gain a bit more before my "full character" setting's sound begins to get too ambient and hinky sounding.

To my way of thinking, the WaveMap was trained to convert the pre-processed raw pickup sound to a miked guitar sound. There's no speaker sound being generated during the standard training process, so there's no amount of post-processed signal being recycled through Tonedexter via the guitar top's interaction with speaker sound. It would be a mistake, therefore, to expect the WaveMap to yield good results with a pickup signal which includes a large component of post-processed signal that's being recycled through ToneDexter via the guitar top's interaction with speaker sound.

That's my theory, anyway. All I can say for sure is that a heavy rubber soundhole cover has definitely helped me to get a pleasing guitar sound (on the full character setting) at a high enough level for bare-fingered picking to be heard in a noisy room. Using a heavy rubber soundhole cover with ToneDexter may be worth a try for other folks out there who need a little more gain in a noisy setting.

I should add that it also helps to use a standard WaveMap (as opposed to a slot 22 Wavemap) which reduces the signal at the guitar's two lowest resonant frequencies. Even with the soundhole cover, I was getting excessive loudness at 110Hz with a slot 22 WaveMap. That particular pitch was noticeably louder every time I'd hit it with my thumb.
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Old 03-12-2018, 01:48 PM
Petty1818 Petty1818 is offline
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I will have to give that a try! I actually just trained my Tonedexter using a K&K mini and found that the blend control is crucial to getting a good sound. I am glad they added this with the newest firmware.

With the K&K, I felt as though a full wavemap was too thin and bright but dialling it back to about 50/50 produced a nice warm tone with a nice top end.

On a side note, does the TD ship with an SD card for firmware updates?
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Old 03-12-2018, 02:37 PM
guitaniac guitaniac is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Petty1818 View Post
I will have to give that a try! I actually just trained my Tonedexter using a K&K mini and found that the blend control is crucial to getting a good sound. I am glad they added this with the newest firmware.

With the K&K, I felt as though a full wavemap was too thin and bright but dialling it back to about 50/50 produced a nice warm tone with a nice top end.

On a side note, does the TD ship with an SD card for firmware updates?
Mine didn't come with an SD card. There's a slot on the side, but I have what I want (the home recording-friendly version) and haven't needed to upgrade.
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Old 03-12-2018, 05:34 PM
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James May James May is offline
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Using a soundhole cover for playing back through a WaveMap created without it works great. Almost no difference in sound, with much more feedback immunity.

We are glad you're liking the blend. Every time you use it, please appreciate the fact that the blended signals are automatically time and polarity aligned Without that little detail it would not be nearly as nice a feature.

SD card does not ship with TD. Since they are so ubiquitous, we didn't want to burden the pricing structure by adding that.
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Old 03-13-2018, 04:41 AM
AeroUSA AeroUSA is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by guitaniac View Post
I've started using a thick rubber soundhole cover when amplifying my guitar with ToneDexter. My reasoning is that it helps to minimize the guitar top's reaction to speaker sound and allows me to up the gain a bit more before my "full character" setting's sound begins to get too ambient and hinky sounding.

To my way of thinking, the WaveMap was trained to convert the pre-processed raw pickup sound to a miked guitar sound. There's no speaker sound being generated during the standard training process, so there's no amount of post-processed signal being recycled through Tonedexter via the guitar top's interaction with speaker sound. It would be a mistake, therefore, to expect the WaveMap to yield good results with a pickup signal which includes a large component of post-processed signal that's being recycled through ToneDexter via the guitar top's interaction with speaker sound.

That's my theory, anyway. All I can say for sure is that a heavy rubber soundhole cover has definitely helped me to get a pleasing guitar sound (on the full character setting) at a high enough level for bare-fingered picking to be heard in a noisy room. Using a heavy rubber soundhole cover with ToneDexter may be worth a try for other folks out there who need a little more gain in a noisy setting.

I should add that it also helps to use a standard WaveMap (as opposed to a slot 22 Wavemap) which reduces the signal at the guitar's two lowest resonant frequencies. Even with the soundhole cover, I was getting excessive loudness at 110Hz with a slot 22 WaveMap. That particular pitch was noticeably louder every time I'd hit it with my thumb.
Interesting. I’ve been using a soundhole cover and run the notch control around 115hz. I only blend in extreme conditions. I’m usually on focus control #1.
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Old 03-13-2018, 06:20 AM
varmonter varmonter is offline
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i wouldn't think you'd hear any difference
at all using a soundhole cover with a wavemap.
other than what you would normally hear acoustically
from the guitar itself.
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Old 03-13-2018, 06:38 AM
guitaniac guitaniac is offline
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One of the things which has surprised and fascinated me about ToneDexter has been how well it can work for modeling. For example, a WaveMap which was trained with a standard acoustic-electric can sometimes work well with a hybrid stage guitar like the Yamaha Silent Guitar (given both guitars are UST equipped). I suppose that using a soundhole cover with ToneDexter could be viewed as a mild form of modeling, since the guitar with a soundhole cover installed is a somewhat different animal than the same guitar (without a soundhole cover) which was used for training the WaveMap.

I recall that one of my friends who also plays with bare finger pads would have me roll off the bass to nine o'clock when running sound for his Fishman UST-equipped D28. I suspect he needed that bass roll-off to avoid feedback at the high gain level which he needed (for bare-fingered picking) - or at least to avoid an excessively loud bass note every time he plucked a resonant frequency. Thanks to ToneDexter's notching down of the low-end resonant frequencies, and its compatibility with the soundhole cover, I can get the necessary amount of gain with a flat EQ and a more natural amplified sound in the bargain.
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Old 03-13-2018, 08:03 AM
guitaniac guitaniac is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by AeroUSA View Post
Interesting. I’ve been using a soundhole cover and run the notch control around 115hz. I only blend in extreme conditions. I’m usually on focus control #1.
Is this the guitar with the Ultra Tonic in it? If so, I'm a bit surprised that you'd need notching in addition to the Ultra Tonic's feedback-rejecting nature and ToneDexter's automatic reduction (with most WaveMaps) of the guitar's low-end resonant frequencies.

On the other hand, its good to be reminded that ToneDexter has an additional tool to manage problem frequencies. I have a friend whose Anthem-equipped guitar goes ballistic every time he plucks an A# on the low E string. (At 116.5Hz, I'd guess that particular A# is also your problem pitch.) All he can do about it is try a phase inversion and/or roll off the entire low end.
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Old 03-13-2018, 11:16 AM
AeroUSA AeroUSA is offline
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I did initially (without the cover) and now I just leave it on.

It’s a dread and I play loud so I assume it may be an issue. I’d have to test it to know.
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Old 03-13-2018, 12:20 PM
Petty1818 Petty1818 is offline
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A bit off topic but has anyone tried using the Tonedexter in the effects loop of another preamp/DI?
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  #11  
Old 03-13-2018, 03:35 PM
guitaniac guitaniac is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by AeroUSA View Post
I did initially (without the cover) and now I just leave it on.

It’s a dread and I play loud so I assume it may be an issue. I’d have to test it to know.
It wasn't your use of a soundhole cover which surprised me, it was your need to use the TD notch on what appears to be your guitar's low-end resonant frequency. I was a bit surprised because both the Ultra Tonic pickup and the standard WaveMaps are designed to deal with that resonant frequency problem. I haven't yet felt the need to use the TD notch on my own guitar's low-end resonant frequency, but now I'm curious to give it a try.

Regarding the use of a soundhole cover, I suspect it actually improves the Dexterized tone at a high volume level. A soundhole cover reduces the guitar top's response to speaker sound and thereby reduces the amount of post-processed signal that gets recycled through ToneDexter.
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