Low processor-power amp simp?

[Metaltastic]

Hey guys, my roommate just got a toneport UX1 and has been using Gearbox as his ampsim. Unfortunately, when tracking, his computer just can't keep up (Celeron 3 ghz, 1.5 GB of RAM), even after reformatting his hard drive and getting it back to primo condition. So we were wondering if there were any amp sims that were a little less greedy in the processor power department, or if there's any way to make this one less demanding. I should mention that this is the standalone free version of Gearbox, rather than the $200 plugin (for that money I told him to just buy a Pod).

Any thoughts?

 

[doc_backmask]

Wagner Sharp
Dirthead
Freeamp 2

more to come when I get home. I've got about 15 different (and free) ampsims. Some are good, others are shite. Most are tolerable for tracking purposes.

 

[Metaltastic]

Yep, cuz I'm his tech support, and believe me, we've tried everything - when we substituted my Podxt as the interface rather than his toneport, it worked fine cuz he wasn't running GB

 

[Metaltastic]

Oh, and we'd rather not bother with impulses because of the latency on any freeware convolution plugins (as far as I know, anyway) - so that rules out Dirthead, Wagner, etc.

 

[Loren Littlejohn]

Gearbox won't run on that? I run gearbox on a 1.5 G5 with 1.25gigs of RAM. Something has to be wrong.

 

[devouredremains]

I recently got a chance to try out waves GTR3 for a couple hours. First and foremost it sounds ok. Basically, It can't hold a candle to revalver whatsoever but I was impressed by the efficiency of the software. 1 mono instance of the sim with internal cab sim enabled topped out at under 2% cpu on an AMD 5200+ 2.7ghz 512x2 L2 w/ 2g Ram.

Strangely enough I was able to obtain much better distorted tones with the internal cab sim rather than impulses which is the first time I've seen this.

In the simulators defense it's able to procure some very nice clean tones with the clean guitar amps and also nice bass tones with the included bass amps. One of them being a very decent overdriven bass amp model.

Bottom line, for strictly distorted guitar I personally would not purchase this software at it's current tone to cost ratio but it's very efficient.

It may also be worth noting that the sim has an internal latency of 256ms on top of your interface latency.

 

[VH100R]

dirthead as a decent cab sim on it.

 

[Metaltastic]

I know, I agree that it seems odd that his comp. can't handle it, but we've downgraded DAW's (from Cubase SX3 to SX2, yes it's pirated, cuz he's just starting out, once he gets into it I'll encourage him to go legit, I myself wouldn't have been able to get into recording if I hadn't had SX 2, so I can relate, I know I know shut the hell up get off my dick) and reformatted the hard drive, and still whenever GB is on, after a few seconds of recording everything starts to ssssssllllllloooooowwww dddddooooowwwwnnnn with all sorts of digital *schkrunches*, to bust out a little onomatopoeia. Once we turned off GB and ran the pod as the interface, all was well. And to reiterate, this was the GB program, rather than the plugin - I don't know if that would make a difference.

Devoured, thanks for the heads up dude, but definitely way out of this poor bastard's price range!

VH, I didn't know Dirthead had a cab sim - we'll check it out, thanks!

 

[Metaltastic]

Hmm, I dunno dude, I've used a lot of computers that are way older than this one and never had to clean the processor or do any other maintenance like that (we did vacuum out all the dust from inside, though). Any other suggestions, perhaps from toneport owners?

 

[Notuern]

My first suggestion is to NEVER vacuum a computer! You can damage alot of components, the best way is to use compressed air(Some computerstores have cans of compressed air for about 5-10$).
Have you checked bios so that nothing is wrong there? Because there a tiny bitty witty chance that the clockrate isnt set to 3ghz.
I mean, crap, I have friends that runs these things on like 800mhz computers!
The processor inside the frikkin XT is only on about 60mhz.

So basicly this means that the computer should be able to handle it, the question is whats wrong. ;X