How good are the Le Poulin amp sims?

[H-evolve]

Was curious to get your opinion. I did read that a lot of people actually like them... But, in my case,I can only achieve grainy/thin tones with them. Yes sure, one should not expect to be able to get a tone as good as a 4000$ tube amp going through 400000$ worth of other gear... And, they are free, so I have a hard time believing they are better than other amp sims that you would pay for.

So it's either I suck at recording (which is totally possible), or it's kinda normal for an amp sim to have a certain amount of grainyness.

What do you think?

 

[DullElysium]

Le456 is my to go ampsim when i play at home or record demos. I have podfarm too, but I like lepou better. I've also tried guitar rig and aplitube briefly but again.. Lepou won. In my opinion the free ampsims are far superior nowadays. Ofcourse there's bad apples too, but lepou, tse, ignite amps are top notch. There might be more amazin free ones that i'm just not aware of though.

One key component is the IR's you use. My current faborite is a free one Mickrich posted here a while ago. 57 to a mesa os if i recall correctly

 

[AntonioPetrole]

Was curious to get your opinion. I did read that a lot of people actually like them... But, in my case,I can only achieve grainy/thin tones with them. Yes sure, one should not expect to be able to get a tone as good as a 4000$ tube amp going through 400000$ worth of other gear... And, they are free, so I have a hard time believing they are better than other amp sims that you would pay for.

So it's either I suck at recording (which is totally possible), or it's kinda normal for an amp sim to have a certain amount of grainyness.

What do you think?

They are as good as the person using them. I guarantee sneap could get a better tone in a mix using free plugs than a lot of us can get using Mesa's and 5150's. Picking, impulses, signal chain and a million other things are going to effect the sound. Since you are new to this forum, are you maybe new to recording? We can try and help you out a bit if you are. What are you using to record? Guitar? Pickups? Interface/preamp?

 

[4Eyes]

I liked Lecto, that was really good, paired with some Mesa OS IR. I used TS pedal in front of my interface instead of some VST TS808 plugin. it sounded and feel was more realistic

 

[deLuther]

I`m using LeCto, just had some chance to record some DI and reamp through real Mesa DR 2Ch with ENGL Pro cabinet, than set similar sound using LeCto with TS-999 (my favourite VST screamer, much closer to my real screamer than rest) and, finally, made matching IR to sound like recording with real amp.

 

[The StabbinCabin]

Lecto, LexTac and SoloC ftw

You lose a sense of movement when you use static impulses, that's for sure. But that's not to say you can't get very "useable" tones from sims. HP/LP, narrow cuts from 2.5-6k and maybe some multiband comp around 90-150hz so you can still have some weight on palm-muted stuff.

A good DI, pickups and playing help, too. Experiment with a an actual TS going in to your instrument input, that helped me when I was stuck a few times.

 

[anotherpaul]

These ampsims are amazing! I made this with only lepou on all guitars (hybrit, lecto, legion) and bass (lecto on dirt channel).

 

[H-evolve]

They are as good as the person using them. I guarantee sneap could get a better tone in a mix using free plugs than a lot of us can get using Mesa's and 5150's. Picking, impulses, signal chain and a million other things are going to effect the sound. Since you are new to this forum, are you maybe new to recording? We can try and help you out a bit if you are. What are you using to record? Guitar? Pickups? Interface/preamp?

Yes I am new! And perhaps you saw a couple of my posts recently. I do ask a lot of question and I really appreciate all the help that was provided so far.

I have spent numerous hours doing tests. My friend and I record with the following gear :

- LTD ZH-7 (D-Activators pick-ups)/ Jackson 7 String with EMGs (81-7 bridge, 707 neck)
- Komplete Audio 6 (Native Instrument USB interface)
- Reaper

Now, we either try using only VSTs, Line-out of my friend's Dual Rectifier + Recabinet, or using a mic in front of his cab.

We are new to this, so mic placement is an issue, plus the room we use to record is the opposite of being optimal for this. Therefore we tried the Line-out + Recabinet. It did ok, but not significantly better than all VSTs.

We applied most of what I have read in this forum
- Noisegate
- TS9 Boost
- Amp
- Cab
- EQ (High pass below 100Hz, Low pass above 8 kHz).

Our tone, just listening to the guitars, is always relatively grainy. But then, I managed to find some guitar tracks from some of you guys (links that people leave in the forum) and they do sound "grainy" on their own (no EQ, only the "raw" tracks). So I come to think that it's inherent to gain/distortion, as I am confident the tracks I listened to were done by people with more experience than me. So they probably knew what they were doing.

So, perhaps we are just bad at mixing everything together.

Tones that we like : Iconoclast by Symphony X, Deceiver of the Gods by Amon Amarth,

Any help would be nice. I will try to create a dropbox in the few days so that I can link what I did so far and people can give their advice. I'd really love that actually!

 

[H-evolve]

These ampsims are amazing! I made this with only lepou on all guitars (hybrit, lecto, legion) and bass (lecto on dirt channel).
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZpBPJ2aYOUk

Wow great job man! Really sounds professional. Clearly I still have a lot of learning to do! I'll keep going on my trials and errors.

 

[Nimvi]

they are free, so I have a hard time believing they are better than other amp sims that you would pay for.

Just wanted to chime in and say that this is a very typical human logic flaw you have to be on the lookout for!

When it comes to hardware, there is definitely some truth to low-priced items cutting corners vs the boutique ones, but in software the price is often just a reflection of the programmer's worldviews and goals IMHO.

If you want another common example of that (next to the LePou stuff): Variety of Sound plugins. From what I've seen, many people on this forum use some of those plugins on every mix (and so do I). They are quality plugins and they are often very unique. Yet they are completely free. I actually think they shouldn't be, but it proves that there are people out there that are in it for the joy/obsession of creating a quality plugin, and not so much for the economic benefits. Keep that in mind, and you will save a lot of money in the long run!

As for the ampsims in question, I think I've used the Le456 as a clean amp in releases a few times. Did exactly what I wanted it to do. I think I liked the HyBrit too for crunchy marshally sounds. Hang in there!

 

[FF666]

Grainy, that's the word I use too to describe the lepou plugins. And I feel their distortion has more digital character than other plugins.
But many people use Lepou plugins, they must be good. Simply I don't like 'em.

Give another opportunity to lepou plugins and don't forget to try another freebies like Ignite Amps or TSE plugins.

 

[H-evolve]

Grainy, that's the word I use too to describe the lepou plugins. And I feel their distortion has more digital character than other plugins.
But many people use Lepou plugins, they must be good. Simply I don't like 'em.

Give another opportunity to lepou plugins and don't forget to try another freebies like Ignite Amps or TSE plugins.

I thought TSE were paid plugins? Or at least the amp sims (TSE 50X?)

I am personnaly not a fan of tones similar to Lamb of God, which I call a bit more crunchy, or perhaps grainy.

But I can't get rid of that "grain" using LePou plugins. I try EQing, changing Cab impulse... nothing really works completely. Considering my lack of experience, I am probably doing something wrong.

However, would you say that a high gain guitar, by itself (not in the mix), will always have some kind of crunch/grainy in it, as it might be the whole concept behind Distortion?

I really wonder how tones like, again as an example, Symphony X - Iconoclast (album), are achieved. ENGL Fireball + Experienced Sound Engineer?

 

[DullElysium]

I think it's the TSE X50 v2 which is not a free plugin. The first one still is.