My Fractal FM-3 thread.
- Thread starter Mark Wein
- Start date
I'm surprisingly happy with the unit, and part of that is the realization that even the things that I am not in love with are improving over time. I have two shows this weekend that I'm using it for and one of them is Sunday afternoon at the Long Beach Grand Prix where the load in will be marvelous with just my guitar, rolling case for the FM3 and guitar supplies and my wedge. Saturday night is back to the Blue Beet where I am in a familiar environment.
Next year I'm going to get whatever form the FM9 device ends up in. I might wait until they have the next generation so that I can use it for social media fodder too but you can see how hard some of my presets are hitting the processor in the video. Having two amp blocks, two cab blocks and more processing would solve many of my problems.
Uh oh. I've discovered the saturation control in the preamp section of the amp block. It's kind of magic. Between 1 and 1.5 is the sweet spot.
Between this and a preset I built to play Chicago-style blues with using the new jumped 5f8 tweed deluxe I think I have my next video blog
Between this and a preset I built to play Chicago-style blues with using the new jumped 5f8 tweed deluxe I think I have my next video blog
Yeah...you can manipulate things on a very granular level. You can even chose diodes for the drive pedals.
It can be any sized rabbit hole you want to deal with. Stay on the top level of each block and you can get good sounds. Want more? keep digging!
Hehe. What are you doing with it so far?
ugameus
inbetween
I am just going through the options and trying to understand how it's organized and structured. It is surprisingly intuitive yet uber complicated and unfamiliar at the same time. This is not plug and play. I can't get it to work going into an amp yet. I am sure it is just a setting somewhere I haven't checked. This thing can do A LOT!!
Are you trying the factory presets?
If I was going into an amp, try using the FX sends and the corresponding level control dial on top:
I use output 1 with the XLR for the PA or recording interface and output 2 with the 1/4” jack to my speaker so that I can have separate output levels.
ugameus
inbetween
I think it has to do with the output and whether or not cab and/or amp sims are on. I think I need, at the very least, to have the cab sim off and select the proper output. But yeah, once I learn this thing it will be an incredible tool. I already know I will be selling off a bunch of gear. It's no question. It makes a Scarlett and a handful of decent pedals look like a really poor investment.
Bob411
thrumming with potential
I can see it being hard to remember anything.
Lol. I wasn't "distracted" as much as trying to get to the sounds I need on the fly since there are no set lists or preset orders with that band. If I had one of the other Fractal devices that allowed multiple amp and cab blocks life would be much easier since 90% of my sounds are either fender clean with a Marshall-style crunch or now some sort of Vox class A tone with the Morgan AC20 model. Most of my needs could be met on one or two presets if I had an FM9. Since only one amp and cab block is usable at a time on the FM 3 each of my presets is based around one amp at a time...although, I could probably run a preset with 4 scenes of one amp on a channel and 4 scenes of another so I'd have clean, rhythm crunch, lead and maybe one modulation as a "catch many" preset. That might be kind of cool.
micwalt
Too Controversial To Have An Athleisure Line
GX-100 has two amps per preset with seamless switching between the two, as well as more available blocks than you can shake a stick at.
Just saying.
Pretty much every other device on the market has that, other than the FM3 as far as I can tell. It's really my only complaint about this thing. It sounded pretty glorious on the big stage yesterday, though. I'll definitely be upgrading when I can because of this one issue but even the sound guy (who is a Helix user in his own band) was really impressed with the sounds that I was getting. He had some good advice for me as far as using it live, too.GX-100 has two amps per preset with seamless switching between the two, as well as more available blocks than you can shake a stick at.
Just saying.
So this week I decided to make a video that I wish I had run across a few weeks ago. I finally found my answer in the Fractal forum, but I wanted to do a quick demo anyway. If you want to run an output to the PA and a second one to our speaker or amp with separate output levels this is what I found: