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what IOS guitar amp/fx app sounds best in your opinion
these all seem to be in the same range as far as sound quality. Are there other I should consider?
Would love you all's opinion on this. Especially guitar players who use IOS amps a lot!
Bias
Flying Haggis
Jamup Pro XT
Amplitube
AmpKit
Comments
I should perhaps add tone stack to this list. Can assume it'll be up there on the list
I use JamUp for a lot of stuff. Bias is great but I'm not super knowledgeable in amp design so I just kinda throw stuff at the wall with it (it's fun to experiment with!). Amplitube has its qualities (there's a certain ambient character to some of their clean amp models that is nice, good for shoegaze-type stuff). Never tried Flying Haggis or Ampkit.
edit: In the end, my choice would be JamUp Pro, in conjunction with Bias. Sending homemade amps from Bias into JamUp is unique and useful, and I like the layout and the ability to route a rig however you want.
new list:
Bias
Flying Haggis
Tone Stack
Jamup Pro XT
Amplitube
AmpKit
Another guitar amp/fx thread! ;-)
IMO ampkit is top and haggis bottom. Don't know why, it got good reviews here.
For me, I'd have to say BIAS, but primarily because as a guitar player, I'm used to tweaking actual tube amps. I have been able to achieve some pretty realistic tones for electric, acoustic and bass amps that I use in most all my iOS recording.
Flying Haggis to just play
Bias to get any amp sound
Saturn and Timeless 2 in Auria to go from the ’50s to far into the 21st century. - splitting tone into 6 bands each with their own drive then hooking up LFOs to control anything with anything can get wild.
Matter of taste for the most part, but to me, Bias, Flying Haggis, Jamup in that order. Amplitube also quite good and has the best graphics IMHO; Ampkit perhaps bottom of the list for me; don't like their GUI either.
Of course there are differences in capabilities too...Flying Haggis sounds gorgeous but is the more limited option I guess, not much there for metalheads. Most of the others have a wider choice of amps and effects, but more often than not as IAPs. BIAS does come with many amps included, but lacks effects for which you'd have to use either sister-app JamUp or AB/IAA effects.
There is also StompBox and Stompbox Band which allows you to accommodate two players at once, given the right interface I guess. Never tried those two though.
Have yet to hear ToneStack of course, but looks/sounds promising in promo vids, and may have certain advantages such as stereo signal processing.
At least wait until tomorrow with your purchase...
Depends on the style of music. For heavier style tones Jamup ,Bias, and Ampkit are the best imho. For clean sounds they all work fairly well. Flying Haggis desktop version blows chunks can't say about the iPad version but I don't see how it could possible be better.
Yes what Hacked said, It depends on what music you want to play, and whether it's for recording with headphones or playing live through an amp etc. I agree with @Calcutta about Amplitube, the cleans are amazing. Ampkit has a terrible GUI, but it has something about it that beats Jamup for certain tones. Jamup seems the most versatile and easy to use.
Didn’t take too long for people to jump on this thread! Here’s my experience...
For iOS, I have AmpliTube, JamUp Pro/Bias, and AmpKit+. For the most part, they sound decent—but not breathtaking—out of the box. Some have better presets than others, but all need some tweaking to really sound impressive. You need to tweak to what your ears want to hear, and you need to tweak to your particular guitar’s frequency response (based on shape, wood, and pickups). Maybe that’s why so often I’ve found factory presets to be invariably underwhelming; they’re designed as middle-of-the-road tones that will please 80% of the people 80% of the time, and the other 20% is up to the particular guitarist to shape and hone.
I usually work with these apps in tandem with something else, which almost always includes some kind of EQ. When it comes to rock and metal, I often find reducing (yes, reducing!) the drive and really detailing the EQ curve will get me at least 90% the way to a solid tone.
That said, I’ve found a few tones that each particular app did better than others with less fiddling. For example, I got a great Uni-Vibe sound a la Hendrix’s “Machine Gun” and Mad Season’s “Artificial Red” from AmpliTube in minutes. Same goes for Tool’s stock rhythm tone using JamUp Pro. Of course, I used a Strat for the former and LP for the latter; you need a hammer to smash and a scalpel to slice.
Think they are all capable of getting good guitar tones. If you're only going to get one, I'd figure out if you need certain features and then see which ones have those features. Bias has no effects to speak of, for instance.
Wow! great feedback. Thanks so much everyone. Lots to ponder. Sorry to bring this thread up again. But I'm glad did. Good to have a re-cap especially on the brink of the release of Tone Stack.
As I figured, there isn't any clear consensus. All apps are pretty good and its a matter of bias (so to speak)...
I generally play clean or very lightly overdriven, so for me Flying Haggis and BIAS are the best.
Jamup and Amplitube are OK but I generally need to add some EQ to get some warmth out of them, otherwise I find them a little cold and sterile sounding. I don't do high gain really. I hated Ampkit.
Flying Haggis also has my favourite chorus effect on iOS, I find a lot of the effect sims in Amplitube and Jamup a little underwhelming - the Whammy effect in Jamup is terrible for example. I've been using Galileo by Yonac in the Audiobus FX slot for the Leslie and Wah, so I'm really looking forward to Tonestack.
Haha, this is truly the personal opinion situation. There are so many variables that I think the only way to find out is by trial and error. I am generally into clean to crunch and find Ampkit the most pleasing to my ears. I have a fender performer of a reasonable vintage and can get similar vibes from ampkit even though the real amp will always win for just playing. Recording may be another matter. This is as far as the amp modeling is concerned. I also tried to like bias with the beautiful interface etc. but it just didn't cut it for me, don't know why, maybe it is the acoustics in my house, maybe the speakers I use, maybe the headphones? Also what guitar/pick ups one uses will impact the sound hugely. I'm actually quite surprised that developers don't divide presets by type do guitar, at least the strat and les Paul etc. or at least have settings in the input section with a switch between a few different pick ups. Because of this I thing trying things out is the best, in fact most of the apps if I'm not mistaken give you the freemium version which I think is great.
As far as the effects are concerned people have different expectations depending on taste, ear, experience....I know I have a very good idea of what IMO a good phaser/flanger should sound like but somehow only Magellan hits the nail on the head for me, so I guess I'll find tone stack good too (haven't tried it properly yet). Some people like their delay with a vintage LP filter on the repetitions, some wouldn't give a toss. I like my reverb springy, others lush. I also suspect some of the apps have an invisible to the user compressor/limiter type of effects built in for safety, that will impact the overall tone. I like the fact that Ampkit has a good threshold signal on the out but that obviously may cause other problems if not careful. Wow, what a rant!
Bottom line, try it for yourself. But then again, what are the forums for?
@supadom: absolutely - everything to do with sound is always so personal and subjective. I think that everyone is bound to have their own take on what sounds best to them.
Some people like" warmth", others prefer "clarity", or "presence" - and of course everyone also has their own idea of what these terms actually mean!
@gkillmaster: Did you find something to fit your needs? I'm curious what you ended up going with.
@kgmessier, I went with tonestack which I like a lot and bias (which I don't have much experience with yet) for IOS and Guitar Rig on my iMac. Pretty much covers what I want/need. (as an aside I found an amazing preset in Guitar Rig called nickel power that I'm pretty much using for everything at the moment.)
I prefer whichever one @flo26 is playing through.
Bias by a long shot, for me.
Yeah, there really isn't any way to answer this question because of the subjectivity of it. The best way to address it is for you to describe a sound you are looking for, and for people to say if the app does that "well". For example, if you're a metal player, or just want a ton of saturated gain, you could safely say that the Positive Grid apps will work for you, but Flying Haggis will not.
I think that ToneStack and JamUp will be the ones that I've used "the most" when you look back on it, but I like having the different options, and as long as they are passable, I may use any or all of them at a given time.
One I recently picked up (for Auria users) is the THM Overloud plug-in. It's $20, and the feature set is similar to Flying Haggis (except with a few more effects and some more high-gain stuff). But the nice part of it is that if I'm working in Auria, it's just "there". No AB or IAA connection to worry about. And the amps have a nice "warmth" to them, even if I don't necessarily prefer them to other versions of those amps in other apps.
JamUp/ Bias is the short answer. ToneStack effects impress me more.
Would really like to hear more about Overloud. If it has a glassy clean that beats Bias, it might be worth getting.
Master FX. My subjective opinion doesn't need a lot of amplification. And now, even just Altispace by itself is a lot of fun on my Guitars. I guess if I want to crank it up I go with the JamUp/Bias tandem.
It used to be JamUp, but I have to say that overall, I think ToneStack nails it. @Flo26 is exactly right in that you need to dive into it and mess with the settings, but once you do, it feels very responsive. The presets generally have too much grit and treble for my taste.
It's the first guitar app I've played which gets the "feel" right pretty much across the board. Some of the JamUp (Meteor in particular) and AmpKit (London and Budda) amps do this, too, but the vast majority of the ToneStack models seem to do it. This may come from the reverb modeling, which does a good job of creating a space.
I generally prefer clean, gritty and hard rock/70s distortion tones, so that's where I'm coming from. Anyway, hope that helps.
Also agree with Flying Haggis for a good blend of sounds and simplicity.
Mike
@joegrant413 said:
I'd be happy to answer any questions you have regarding THM Overloud. (To be clear to everyone else, this is an Auria plug-in only, it is not a stand-alone guitar app for iOS). I don't have any audio samples of it right now (and not a ton of time to make any), but those can be misleading anyway based on guitars, setup, and playing style.
This link from John Walden's Music App Blog is probably the most comprehensive discussion about Overloud:
http://www.musicappblog.com/thm-overloud-review/
There may also be some YouTube demos, but not much. You will note from the article date that THM Overloud is not "new". I doubt that the objective listener would compare it to the quality of something like BIAS, which is quite advanced in its approach to amp modeling, though also at the cost of additional CPU resources.
But it is absolutely capable of pure clean sounds, though I struggle with the adjective "glassy", since it trends toward the warmer side of things. I haven't really tried to make it "sparkle" like some of the BIAS and Flying Haggis clean tones can, but I don't doubt that it can. It's also appreciated that each amp comes with a "level" control (which is literally app "output") and then some kind of gain control and a presence control.
The entry price is maybe a little steep at $19.99, but if you like the sounds, as I do, I don't think it's regrettable. You get the whole package with the pedal and rack effects plus something like 9 different amp/cabs, so there's no additional IAP's or anything. I don't think it sounds "the best", but it's pretty easy to make it sound "good", and the convenience factor is nice.
@Mike said:
It's funny - pretty much every guitar player I come across always says that...in other words, nobody says "I want face-melting amounts of gain and saturation that hide the crappiness of my playing...YEAH!". But the IAP's in JamUp were heavily skewed towards heavy gain/NuMetal players. That's why I really did like that 3-amp IAP from a few months ago with the Gurus amps. 3 amps for $9.99 had potential to be a (relative) rip-off, but each has multiple channels and they really do span the full gain spectrum. I enjoyed them quite a bit, though have been distracted by other releases and haven't gotten to play them as much as I'd like.