Is this what an SVT-CL and 810E sound like?

socialleper

socialleper

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May 31, 2009
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#1
I'm putting together a DYI studio and I got a few recommendations for amp sims and cab IRs. Now before you start screaming "wrong category", I want to know if this is a good approximation to the real thing?
The first part of the clip is just a Fender Noir P into my interface, then to the DAW- no eq, no plugins, nothing.
The second part is with a plugin loaded that is a SVT-CL sim and an SVT 810E IR. The amp is set with everything at noon, the Hi and Low boost are off. The IR has two mics, one SM57 on the center of the cone, and a Neumann 87 off center.
To people with a lot of experience with SVT rigs live and in the studio, is this plugin good to your ears? If I was to ever get a real SVT-CL and fridge, should I expect it to have this tonal character to it?
 
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#2
Hundreds of possible combinations with a SVT so I'm not sure what's considered SVT sound.

I've been running a 810 for years on stage and in the studio. In real life it has a certain bass bloom to it. That I like and use as a secret weapon live. In the studio it's annoying and easy to emulate. In real life a tube head and sealed cab has its magic feel to it. In a recording just sounds like any other

In a recording. Mics on the cab is somewhat frustrating for clean tone. Easier go straight to board.

With distortion based music. Cab mic was not essential. But the speaker cab made for a more better final filter. Straight to board sounded awful

With newer software it's a dream for the studio. All the annoying voicings and phase problems with mics disappear.

Ironically these software applications mimic microphones and room situations so well. It sounds exactly like everything that annoyed me with real mics lol.

Not trying to be negative. As far as the question to simulation of software. It's good, real good. To the point I usually turn off the cab emulations or adjust them to a more minimal settings to remove a majority of the traditional mic/cab sound. And more use it for a slight final filter to get a cleaner mix.
 
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#3
BogeyBass said:
Hundreds of possible combinations with a SVT so I'm not sure what's considered SVT sound.

I've been running a 810 for years on stage and in the studio

In a recording. Mics on the cab is somewhat frustrating for clean tone. Easier go straight to board.

With distortion based music. Cab mic was not essential. But the speaker cab made for a more better final filter. Straight to board sounded awful

With newer software it's a dream for the studio. All the annoying voicings and phase problems with mics disappear.

Ironically these software applications mimic microphones and room situations so well. It sounds exactly like everything that annoyed me with real mics lol.

Not trying to be negative. As far as the question to simulation of software. It's good, real good. To the point I usually turn off the cab emulations or adjust them to a more minimal settings to remove a majority of the traditional mic/cab sound. And more use it for a slight final filter to get a cleaner mix.
Click to expand...
And for my purposes, trying to have a SVT rig around would be difficult. Although it does seem to be on everyone's "bucket list" of must have items.
The Sim\IR seem to scoop to the mids and fatten up the low mids. The lows seem pleasant and would be powerful in a mix, but the mids and highs feel a little lacking. There doesn't seem to be a ton of articulation, or what some people would call hi-fi, or modern, clarity. The gain control on the sim sounds like it adds wooliness to the tone.
I have to be careful with my money, so I don't want to get something that isn't "right." Does this SVT sim\IR sound right to you? Or at least better than the completely unprocessed tone?
 
#5
Majority plugins I've used is from native instruments. Or IK multimedia.

I found a majority of the bass cabs to be no different than any real amp going from bedroom to live to studio.

One sounds great in one place. In another application it's lost in the mix.

Exactly The baked in tone on alot of bass cab emulations don't sound to great. Impressive solo. In the mix....nah

Majority of the time I ignore what the real product is in real life. And just listen to the overall sound I'm trying to get from the bass track.

Many times I've used " guitar heads" and even " open back" guitar cabinets for much more mid presence and even better warmer tone for bass.

To get a generic " SVT" sound that was familiar to me. I used a VOX head lol. And whatever cab emulation preset had less mumbo jumbo room size and dumb phasing emulation. I wanna say the 4x10 open back fender guitar amp cabs was clean and worked in the mix.

In real life I wouldn't be caught dead with a El84 vox amp into a open back cabinet lol. In software land whatever mumbo jumbo they used to emulate that sounded very clear for bass. And sounded like my svt in the bar when it actually was working lol
 
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#6
Nighttrain1127 said:
Too Dull lifeless to be an SVT unless you have the Mids and Highs turned down. At least to my ear and How I set mine and I get more natural mid grind with my P-bass
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It does seem a little heavy on the lows. However, I'm not sure that the regular tone of an SVT is. I've played through a SS SVT350 and an import 810. The basic tone of the IR isn't that far off from what I heard in the cab.
 
#7
There is a certain peak in the low-end with the Ampeg 810.
Think over the years I've even adapted my playing style to the cabinet. Walking around it playing tight notes. Then use the bloom of the cabinet to unleash a monster.

In the studio it carried over to being pretty close to the bloom you just hear EQ wise. With studio playback or plugins.

But in just practice playing into the plugin. It didn't get the dynamics with playing style like real life.

Some guitar cabs have that bloom. And I wanna say. Alot of the metal type head plugins or cab simulation. Actually got the bloom dynamic. Trying to emulate the cab response to finger response.

I always enjoyed ik multimedia take off on the peavey 51/50 / 6505 and native instruments generic dual rec head.

I tamed down the distortion and used the provided matching cabs. And got good play along feel. Those guitar cab emulations work with bass pretty good.
 
#8
That's the IK Multimedia plugin, right? Sounds like it to me.

So since micing off center gives you mostly low end, I think the 87 signal is skewing the low end to sound a bit overdone from the real thing. But in all honesty, other than that, it does sound in the ballpark of what you get with a nooned SVT/810e and what I imagine that bass with that pickup sounds like. In the CL and channel 1 of the VR/vintage SVT, you put the knobs at noon and you get a moderate hump at 100hz that gradually tapers down the higher up the frequency spectrum you go. And that's what this sounds like. And if you want a near flat response, the closest I've gotten in an SVT is bass 11:00, treble 2:00, mids 3:00 @ 800 hz, so you might want to see what happens when you do that as well. Mind you, I was using my ear vs a Markbass LMII to set it, which has flat response with knobs at noon. I don't think it's exactly flat and I'm certainly not looking for that on a gig (I like to hype the lows and cut mids a little) but it sounds close to me.

I've used the IK Ampeg plugin many times, and I thought it was pretty decent. You would certainly prefer the real thing if you had both to compare, but you can get some really good sounds out of the plugin that beat the heck out of a plain vanilla signal.
 
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#9
JimmyM said:
That's the IK Multimedia plugin, right? Sounds like it to me.

So since micing off center gives you mostly low end, I think the 87 signal is skewing the low end to sound a bit overdone from the real thing. But in all honesty, other than that, it does sound in the ballpark of what you get with a nooned SVT/810e and what I imagine that bass with that pickup sounds like. In the CL and channel 1 of the VR/vintage SVT, you put the knobs at noon and you get a moderate hump at 100hz that gradually tapers down the higher up the frequency spectrum you go. And that's what this sounds like. And if you want a near flat response, the closest I've gotten in an SVT is bass 11:00, treble 2:00, mids 3:00 @ 800 hz, so you might want to see what happens when you do that as well. Mind you, I was using my ear vs a Markbass LMII to set it, which has flat response with knobs at noon. I don't think it's exactly flat and I'm certainly not looking for that on a gig (I like to hype the lows and cut mids a little) but it sounds close to me.

I've used the IK Ampeg plugin many times, and I thought it was pretty decent. You would certainly prefer the real thing if you had both to compare, but you can get some really good sounds out of the plugin that beat the heck out of a plain vanilla signal.
Click to expand...
I didn't want to bias anyone's opinion, but yes, it is the IK simp\IR.
It certainly adds a fullness that is hard to get from a regular EQ, but I had to really crank the mids and highs to get major attack out of it.
 
#10
socialleper said:
I didn't want to bias anyone's opinion, but yes, it is the IK simp\IR.
It certainly adds a fullness that is hard to get from a regular EQ, but I had to really crank the mids and highs to get major attack out of it.
Click to expand...
I would lose the 57 and put the 87 on the center of the cone and just go with only it. Or maybe one of the other mic models in there...I forget what's in it. But definitely mic the center. Also, try the 4 Pro plugin. You might find that more to your liking.

Whoa! Just went to their website and found that they added the VR, V4B, Heritage B-15N cab, and 212av in an updated version.
 
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#11
JimmyM said:
I would lose the 57 and put the 87 on the center of the cone and just go with only it. Or maybe one of the other mic models in there...I forget what's in it. But definitely mic the center. Also, try the 4 Pro plugin. You might find that more to your liking.

Whoa! Just went to their website and found that they added the VR, V4B, Heritage B-15N cab, and 212av in an updated version.
Click to expand...
It is a shame that so much of that is split into two packages, or that the "standard" purchase of Amplitube 4 doesn't come with any of it. As usual we (bass players) are an after thought.
 
#12
socialleper said:
It is a shame that so much of that is split into two packages, or that the "standard" purchase of Amplitube 4 doesn't come with any of it. As usual we (bass players) are an after thought.
Click to expand...
I think the VT pedal does better at simulating mic'ed Ampeg tube amp tones than the IK plugin. I also heard some freeware plugin for the B-15 that smoked the IK B-15R, but I forget what it's called. I never bothered to download it because I have a B-15 :D Out of all the plugins in that first package, I thought the 4 Pro plugin was the best. But they did a respectable job on all of them.
 
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#14
If you have an E-V RE20 "mike" in your virtual closet, I would suggest trying it, either center or slightly off axis.

And yes, as others have said, a "real" SVT head/cab has a certain "bloom" or "moving air" effect that I have yet to hear in a sim. Although once you mix it with other tracks, that might not be too noticeable unless the song/track calls for a bass solo.
 
#15
You can make it work with whatever tools you can get your hands on. Digital can go a good job. As was mentioned, the mix blends a lot together and smooths out any rough edges.

It doesn’t have to nail a mic’ed SVT. It can get close. You want a good bass sound and that involves additional processing. An amazing plugin that I like to use on all bass tracks is renaissance bass:

Renaissance Bass - Bass Enhacement Plugin | Waves
 
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#16
JimmyM said:
And if you want a near flat response, the closest I've gotten in an SVT is bass 11:00, treble 2:00, mids 3:00 @ 800 hz, so you might want to see what happens when you do that as well. Mind you, I was using my ear vs a Markbass LMII to set it, which has flat response with knobs at noon. I don't think it's exactly flat and I'm certainly not looking for that on a gig (I like to hype the lows and cut mids a little) but it sounds close to me.
.
Click to expand...

Thanks Jimmy M, this info alone is gold!! I think I used to set my SVT 2 non pro like this and used the graphic eq for a scooped sorta john entwistle sound
 
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#18
diegom said:
How do you feel about the SCR-DI, eq section only, no scrambler? I love how it records, but I don't have an SVT to compare it to. You do! ;)
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The SCR-DI is a nice little box, but to me it sounds like solid state with an Ampeg-style EQ. Which is fine because that's what it is, but you can easily tell the difference.
 
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#19
socialleper said:
I'm putting together a DYI studio and I got a few recommendations for amp sims and cab IRs. Now before you start screaming "wrong category", I want to know if this is a good approximation to the real thing?
The first part of the clip is just a Fender Noir P into my interface, then to the DAW- no eq, no plugins, nothing.
The second part is with a plugin loaded that is a SVT-CL sim and an SVT 810E IR. The amp is set with everything at noon, the Hi and Low boost are off. The IR has two mics, one SM57 on the center of the cone, and a Neumann 87 off center.
To people with a lot of experience with SVT rigs live and in the studio, is this plugin good to your ears? If I was to ever get a real SVT-CL and fridge, should I expect it to have this tonal character to it?
Click to expand...


Am... How to put it... yes and no.

Dunno, the clank is kinda there but not really. You might have a lot of good results by using the sansamp though if you don't want to get the actual thing. SVT CL is kind of a niche thing - sounds awesome but not many occasions where you can actually use it. If i were playing big stages frequently, I would be all about the SVT-CL. I backlined one with an 810 classic and I instantly fell in love with it.

Also, you would be surprised how close the SVT3-PRO actually gets as far as a fairly clean SVT-CL tone is considered. The preamp on the 3Pro can overdrive but it doesn't get near the overdriven CL when you also push the power section. Then again, you can only play a completely cranked up CL on really huge stages... or mars.
 
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