TC has done it again....

[RobA]

[...]
I had a lengthy conversation with an amp tech at a massive gig I played at, and we were talking about valve amps vs ss amps. He was saying that the reason valve distortion sounds so nice is that the breakup stacks harmonics in a way that is musically pleasing to the ear, where as solid state stacks up harmonics differently. Not sure how true that is. But it made sense to me, I never heard a solid state amp, with a good overdrive built in!

I'd agree that the harmonic content is a whole bunch of the sound of tubes versus SS. But, there are other things going on too. How the tubes compress when hit hard and voltage sag come into it too. I agree with you though, I've yet to hear SS or DSP that does what a crap Sears amp from the 50's can do.

My personal opinion on this is that it's only a question of how much effort you put into the dsp software.
Add a few more filters and you start sounding surprisingly analogue.
And for me nothing beats convolution for reverb. But I don't know of pedals with this cpu power.
For dirt I still prefer analogue, but mostly because of the massive oversampling requirements in dsp.

I agree with everything you say here. In the DSP effects I've done that just include a bit of non-linearity in the filters to get some grit, I've had to go up to 8 times oversampling. I do think we are at the point now where we can do that much in a pedal now though. But, I still think analog distortion is going to be better for some time to come, just because of the way you can't overdrive the front end of a CODEC and get good results. I've yet to find a DSP based distortion device where I can purposefully abuse it and have it sound good.

[pickdropper]

Here's a classic IEEE article on tubes writted by Eric Barbour, an applications engineer at Svetlana.  It's an interesting read:

http://spectrum.ieee.org/consumer-electronics/audiovideo/the-cool-sound-of-tubes

[RobA]

Here's a classic IEEE article on tubes writted by Eric Barbour, an applications engineer at Svetlana.  It's an interesting read:

http://spectrum.ieee.org/consumer-electronics/audiovideo/the-cool-sound-of-tubes

That was a interesting. I've read articles before where tubes are analyzed for the sake of modeling them in DSP, but the perspective in this article is very interesting.

[micromegas]

I never heard a solid state amp, with a good overdrive built in!

Still have to check it live, but it sounds good to me

[Matt]

I need to start saving some money for one of these and maybe a Ditto...

Can't comment on the reverb but I just bought the Ditto and I absolutely love it!  I just wanted it for jamming alone and it's perfect for that, simple and quick to record/play back, plus its ridiculously small!

[GermanCdn]

I've always thought TC makes good Swiss Army Knife type effects, not always the right tool for the job, but gets the job done when you need it.

Their rackmount stuff, on the other hand, seems to be infested with tone sucking demons.  Picked up a G major for my second rack, and while the effects are all right, what it does to my overall tone is just unpleasant.  Not to say I probably can't program it out, but my $180 Lexicon MX200 sounds worlds better than it in a plug and play war.

[kothoma]

Here's a classic IEEE article on tubes writted by Eric Barbour, an applications engineer at Svetlana.  It's an interesting read:

http://spectrum.ieee.org/consumer-electronics/audiovideo/the-cool-sound-of-tubes

That was a interesting. I've read articles before where tubes are analyzed for the sake of modeling them in DSP, but the perspective in this article is very interesting.

Yeah, thanks for this link!