Mooer Radar and other lesser known IR loaders

[rb1591]

In another thread on this forum Shufflebeat wrote:
… if you're ever considering using IRs on guitar the EQ section of the Mooer Radar pedal is surprisingly good, infinitely flexible, programmable and quiet. - and a free IR loader into the bargain.

Shufflebeat, if you have other insights, positive or negative, about the Radar please post. Also, a recording would be great.

Does anyone else have experience with the Mooer Radar or other lesser-known IR loaders with acoustic guitar? If so, please jump into the discussion.

[Cuki79]

I have used

The AMT Pangeae & the axoloti DIY board (20ms IRs).

In both case Parametric EQ or graphic EQ and HPF was a must have. Then I did not have the Match process... Now with my latest process to make IRs, it would not be less important.

Note that you can find second hand NUX NSS-5 for little money and get (46ms IR).

Anyway a 20ms IR well made will greatly improve a piezo pickup. Longer IRs only gives you better resolution in the low end. The most important part of the job is done even with a pedal such as the Mooer Radar. Just be sure to have an active pickup because the input impedance is low.

[rb1591]

Originally Posted by Cuki79

I have used

The AMT Pangeae & the axoloti DIY board (20ms IRs).

In both case Parametric EQ or graphic EQ and HPF was a must have. Then I did not have the Match process... Now with my latest process to make IRs, it would not be less important.

Note that you can find second hand NUX NSS-5 for little money and get (46ms IR).

Anyway a 20ms IR well made will greatly improve a piezo pickup. Longer IRs only gives you better resolution in the low end. The most important part of the job is done even with a pedal such as the Mooer Radar. Just be sure to have an active pickup because the input impedance is low.

Thank you, Cuki. My signal path would be either Baggs Anthem or J. May UltraTonic > Red Eye pre effects loop out > Mooer Radar. Do you think those would work OK?

I use your IR software "light" 1.0. Is that the latest?

[Cuki79]

The download link point to the GitHub site where the latest is.

I think it would work.

Why the radar? Because of budget?

Here is a link with all the IR pedals I know

http://acousticir.free.fr/spip.php?rubrique10

[rb1591]

Originally Posted by Cuki79

The download link point to the GitHub site where the latest is.

I think it would work.

Why the radar? Because of budget?

Here is a link with all the IR pedals I know

http://acousticir.free.fr/spip.php?rubrique10

Someone mentioned the Radar having both graphic and parametric eq capabilities. That seems like a great feature to me especially at the price.

Of course, budget is always a consideration. That said, I don't mind saving toward a VoicePrint or ToneDexter. I simply want to spend my money as wisely as I can. What's you opinion, cost vs performance/features?

[Cuki79]

Originally Posted by rb1591

That said, I don't mind saving toward a VoicePrint or ToneDexter. I simply want to spend my money as wisely as I can. What's you opinion, cost vs performance/features?

If money was not a problem I'd buy a Tonedexter. When I started making IRs, Tonedexter v1 was nowhere to reach the French market and was planned to cost nearly 1000€... That's why I made my own thing.

But I would have save time and money buying a Tondexter honestly.

The Baggs VoicePrint DI can be appealing for the EQ power/Phone control... but honestly I'd bought the JBL eon one compact for EQ power and I barely use it. I tend to tweak my tone with the EAE stompmix rather than with the JBL... go figure...

I'd say at some point too much tweaking possibilities become destructive for the music itself.

Simplicity let's you focus more on what is important: the performance & the music.

The concept of Tonedexter is simple.
1) Tweak the mic position to get the core tone you want.
2) Adjust blend and basic EQ

If for some reason, it does not work LIVE, it might be more because of a misunderstanding of your tone-realworld gear relationship... Think of loudness, room resonance, amplification (PA/speaker). Once you figure out what you need (probably a clean solid but natural string tone), you go back to square one.

3) Tweak the mic position to get the core tone you need. (With less wood resonance & rumble that was pleasing at home)
4) Adjust blend and basic EQ at the gig

My 2 cents,
Cuki

[shufflebeat]

Originally Posted by rb1591

In another thread on this forum Shufflebeat wrote:
… if you're ever considering using IRs on guitar the EQ section of the Mooer Radar pedal is surprisingly good, infinitely flexible, programmable and quiet. - and a free IR loader into the bargain.

Shufflebeat, if you have other insights, positive or negative, about the Radar please post. Also, a recording would be great.

Does anyone else have experience with the Mooer Radar or other lesser-known IR loaders with acoustic guitar? If so, please jump into the discussion.

I'm a keen TD user and concur with everything Cuki says, however I also (will) use the Radar from time to time, sometimes when I'm using the TD for my own instruments I'll use the Rdr for colleagues on fiddle, banjo,mandolin. etc. It will take some time to set up but once that's done I'll load the preset from my PC on the day of the gig and dial them in as previously saved.

Any IR loader is only as good as the IR but here are a couple I've made with the help of Cuki and JonFields using my Crafter dread (Fishman Matrix Infinity UST) and an Audix f9 mic. One is a 100% IR mix,the other is 50/50 as the Rdr has no mix facility.

They are stereo files with (hopefully) raw pickup on the left and IR on the right, no EQ, limit, power amp emulation (works great on some IRs) or anything else.

Unzip, load into a DAW and play with EQ to see what's possible. For me I would be taming the low mids with EQ and adding some bite at the top end. Otherwise just listen on headphones and compare one ear with the other.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/13uJ...ew?usp=sharing

[shufflebeat]

When time allows I'll do some further tweaking with the processing previously described and post back.

[shufflebeat]

Here you go:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1WGi...ew?usp=sharing

Processing
- power amp emulation (el34, not much)
- IR (50/50 as previous)
- EQ (hi-pass @80Hz, notch @194Hz, slight boost at 300Hz & 8kHz)

Dry PU to left
Radar to right
Same performance.