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Post subject: Technophobe needs help - volume, master, gain?
Posted: Mon Jul 11, 2011 10:31 am
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I'm such a dinosaur that I don't quite get the relationship between these three controls. I'll get a sound I like and save it as a preset, but the volume levels aren't consistent. I'm handicapped so I can't move to the amp easily to turn up or down. Can someone give me some guidelines?


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Post subject: Re: Technophobe needs help - volume, master, gain?
Posted: Mon Jul 11, 2011 10:59 am
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Hi!

Let`s first put thing in the right order you should see things:
1) Gain
2) Volume
3) Master

Usually if you read left to right, the knobs are in that order on most amps.

The gain is the signal strength being fed through the amplification stage (don't shoot me I am keeping it to very bare basics, I know it's more than that!). This is what dictate the "saturation" of the power tubes in a tube amp. This is mostly true for controls on the amp itself.

Since it would be too simple :), the preamp also comes into play because if you boost the gain with a "boost/overdrive" pedal i.e. the signal strength, you can also "overdrive" the preamp as well as the amplification stage. For tube amps it can be a very good thing if it sounds right, for solid-state it is a big no no because the distortion you get from the preamp is an abomination, no exception on this one :)

Volume, if simply the "volume" at which the signal leaves the amplification stage or post-amp.

Master, is the "volume" at which the signal is being fed to the speaker.

This is why you need to balance the volume and the master for a multichannel amp because high gain will by definition have a stronger signal than a clean. But you don't want a major signal drop by switching from high gain to clean or kill your audience with a heart attack with a major spike of volume when switching from clean to high gain :)

Now as if this was not complex enough, you can put everything I told to the garbage if you add distortion pedals in front of the amp or anything in the fxloop like an eq/boost pedal. The problem with all this is that there is only guidelines, no true rules. The only thing I never saw working is a distortion pedal in an fxloop...but then again, someone might just prove me wrong :D The only true rule: it has to sound good, more than that is just guidelines.


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Post subject: Re: Technophobe needs help - volume, master, gain?
Posted: Mon Jul 11, 2011 11:04 am
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Hi, Woody.

The GAIN determines how hard the preamp is being driven. Lower settings mean cleaner sounds and less distortion or overdrive and higher settings mean more distortion or overdrive.

VOLUME controls how loud that preset is and is saved with that preset when you hit the SAVE button. It's useful for evening out the volumes of your presets as you switch from preset to preset. The distorted presets that have higher GAIN settings will of course be louder so you can use the Volume control to turn them down and even it out with the less distorted presets. Don't forget to hit the SAVE button after you get the volume where you want it.

The MASTER sets the overall volume of the amp and is independent of the GAIN and VOLUME settings.

O.


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Post subject: Re: Technophobe needs help - volume, master, gain?
Posted: Mon Jul 11, 2011 5:35 pm
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It's the same on my Vox Valvetronix (which has 2 valves) but with one important distinction. The Master Volume controls the amount of tube saturation - something which you can't unfortunately do with the Mustangs. But then, you Mustang owners can alter the sag & bias settings & select different cabs which is very neat, & are features I don't have in my AD120VTX! :(

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"I started out with nothing ...and I've still got most of it left!" (Seasick Steve)


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Post subject: Re: Technophobe needs help - volume, master, gain?
Posted: Mon Jul 11, 2011 6:13 pm
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Thanks guys - I think there's a glimmer of light in the distance for my ancient brain. :idea:


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Post subject: Re: Technophobe needs help - volume, master, gain?
Posted: Tue Jul 12, 2011 12:04 am
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Rockcat wrote:
It's the same on my Vox Valvetronix (which has 2 valves) but with one important distinction. The Master Volume controls the amount of tube saturation - something which you can't unfortunately do with the Mustangs. But then, you Mustang owners can alter the sag & bias settings & select different cabs which is very neat, & are features I don't have in my AD120VTX! :(


Well... almost, RockCat.
Although the Mustangs don't have valves, they do try to model the best attributes of valves with some intent. For example, and this may not be plainly obvious, but if you choose an amp model that actually has a Master Volume in real life and you go into the Advanced Amp Settings, there appears another "Master Volume" control to the left of the Noise Gate buttons. This Master Volume control is the virtual representation of the real amp's Master Volume. The only reason Fender would put this in is to simulate power tube saturation. This control disappears on non-master volume equipped amp models like the Twin, Deluxes, Champ, Princeton and Bassman. So basically, Fender designed the Mustangs so that the Preset Volume control is like having a virtual power soak. Not much different from your Vox other than the lack of valves.

BTW, I had created a preset I'd called "Not So Clean" which was a cranked Twin driven even harder by a compressor. Sounded really cool, but it wasn't what I was after at the time so I dumped it. I might revive it again though.

O.


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Post subject: Re: Technophobe needs help - volume, master, gain?
Posted: Fri Jul 22, 2011 6:07 pm
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I have a related question.

The overall question is has to do with the ideal the MASTER volume. The knob goes to 10, but I can't use it. As the presets are set now. Master @ 2-3 is a comfortable listening volume and I can't get the MASTER past 5 without going deaf.

Is there an advantage or disadvantage to saving with preset with the Master volume set to 5 for example? In which case I would need to reset the GAIN & VOLUME lower on my favorite presets so that MASTER=5 is the new normal. When the day comes that I need to fill stadium I can turn the MASTER to 9 instead of 4.

It seems to me that there could be some better tone or Signal/Noise ratio by doing this.

I hope that makes sense.


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Post subject: Re: Technophobe needs help - volume, master, gain?
Posted: Fri Jul 22, 2011 9:35 pm
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mrgscales wrote:
Is there an advantage or disadvantage to saving with preset with the Master volume set to 5 for example? In which case I would need to reset the GAIN & VOLUME lower on my favorite presets so that MASTER=5 is the new normal. When the day comes that I need to fill stadium I can turn the MASTER to 9 instead of 4.


The master volume setting is not saved along with the preset.

The volume should be used to equalize the preset volumes, and its setting is saved with the preset.

PITA


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Post subject: Re: Technophobe needs help - volume, master, gain?
Posted: Fri Jul 22, 2011 10:14 pm
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Hi Woody,

LoL! I love reading what the guys who really know the stuff write! It's hard to "dumb" stuff down. Let me try a bit as I'm probably closer to your level of experience with these amps, but do have experience in technical support.

First you will need to go into "Utility mode" by pushing the utility button on the face of the amp. On the Mustang III it is near the aux, phones, USB jack. You will need to keep pushing the "utility" button until you get to the "memory lock" window and turn the knob until you have selected "memory unlock" this will allow you to keep the changes to the presets when you hit the “save” button after you have made the changes. If you do not do this the preset will just return to it’s original state when you turn the control knob upon completion.
When you make changes to a preset expect the volume to change as soon as you move any value in any of the controls (soft dials or real ones) there is nothing wrong with this.
I’m not going to get into the “deep stuff” but very simple to start with; when you have selected the preset that you want to use/ fool around with set the “preamp” to a low (2, 3) to get a “clean” sound. This is good for practice, country, or mellow rock. Set the “preamp” to a higher value to get a distorted sound for heavy metal, some blues, and hard rock etc. In the case of setting an amp, distortion is not a bad thing. It is meant to be able to be set this way. If you set the preamp to low you will need to increase the volume to make up for it and then adjust the “master” to balance the over all loudness of the amp to your preference.
Hope this helped. Like I said it would be basic, if you want to go deeper into the operations email me back and we can set up a time to go over it on the phone.
Good luck and don’t worry there isn’t much that you can do that will cause any damage or problems with a solid state amp.
Steve


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Post subject: Re: Technophobe needs help - volume, master, gain?
Posted: Fri Jul 22, 2011 10:19 pm
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[size=150]OooPPs! Sorry Woody, My email is svaisey@tampabay.rr.com[size=150]


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Post subject: Re: Technophobe needs help - volume, master, gain?
Posted: Sat Jul 23, 2011 2:14 pm
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@svaisey Maybe I came across more green than intended. I understand how to lock unlock save and move presets. I understand that more gain = more distortion. I also understand the master volume is not saved with the preset.


Here is an example. My preset #88 Basic Champ has a Gain=7.3 Volume 7.0. If I turn the Master to 5 my neighbors will call the cops. This got me wondering "Why are the presets programmed with the GAIN/VOLUME eq'd for the MASTER to be used in the 2-4 range when the MASTER goes to 10 which I can't conceive of using even in outdoor situation.

I'm wondering if there would be a technical advantage, powerwise, tonewise, or noisewise to lower the PRESET VOLUME to 4 for example. By doing this, I could perhaps turn the master to 8 or 9, thereby using more the the Mustang's Master power instead of the presets Volume power.

The big disadvantage I see is that I will need to adjust all of the presets because going from 88 to 89 will result in a huge jump in volume.

I hope that is more clear.

Greg


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Post subject: Re: Technophobe needs help - volume, master, gain?
Posted: Sat Jul 23, 2011 8:26 pm
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The presets are all F***ed :) You need to retweak them all and don't try to understand why they do that lol Of course running an amp at 10 is never a good idea if you want to keep it for a long time, but by rescalling the volume/gain you can get more volume variation out of the master and leave the amplification to the amp amplification stage and not to the digital modelling portion.


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Post subject: Re: Technophobe needs help - volume, master, gain?
Posted: Sun Jul 24, 2011 10:44 am
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mrgscales wrote:
@svaisey Maybe I came across more green than intended. I understand how to lock unlock save and move presets. I understand that more gain = more distortion. I also understand the master volume is not saved with the preset.


Here is an example. My preset #88 Basic Champ has a Gain=7.3 Volume 7.0. If I turn the Master to 5 my neighbors will call the cops. This got me wondering "Why are the presets programmed with the GAIN/VOLUME eq'd for the MASTER to be used in the 2-4 range when the MASTER goes to 10 which I can't conceive of using even in outdoor situation.

I'm wondering if there would be a technical advantage, powerwise, tonewise, or noisewise to lower the PRESET VOLUME to 4 for example. By doing this, I could perhaps turn the master to 8 or 9, thereby using more the the Mustang's Master power instead of the presets Volume power.

The big disadvantage I see is that I will need to adjust all of the presets because going from 88 to 89 will result in a huge jump in volume.

I hope that is more clear.

Greg


Greg,
I think you're still lumping the Master Volume with the Gain and Preset Volume. Think of it this way; For tweaking purposes, ignore the Master Volume. Use it only to determine how loud you want the amp to be so set it and leave it alone while you're tweaking the presets. Set the Gain to the amount of overdrive that you want, tweak your EQ settings and then set the Preset Volume. Use the Preset Volume to even out the volume differences from preset to preset.

Now, here's where things get a little tricky. Obviously, the cleaner presets will have a lower output than the overdriven ones so your preset volume settings will depend on your style of playing.

In my band, I typically only use clean settings for rhythm playing so I set them lower than my overdriven lead sounds. If your style requires that the clean and overdriven sounds be relatively even, then you'll have to get as much output from the clean sounds as possible and lower the preset volume of the overdriven sounds to match the clean ones. This can get tricky depending on which amp models you choose to use for clean sounds. The Twin has the loudest clean outputs of all the amp models but even its output can be a little low. The Deluxes and Princetons break up fairly early so to keep them clean, you have to use very low Gain settings and the output levels take a nosedive to impractically low levels. I compensate for this by using a Post Gain Compressor at very low compression settings and boost the Level of the Compressor. This boosts the preset's overall output to more practical levels and allows them to keep up with the overdriven presets. From here you can even out all the preset levels for the ones you use. Now you can use the Master Volume just to determine how loud you want the amp to be. That is the Master Volume's only purpose and its setting has absolutely no effect on the presets.

This brings me to an annoyance I've had with every single company that makes amp modeling devices. To my knowledge, none of them take into consideration the lower outputs of clean amp models and make no attempt at compensating for it. Call me crazy but to me this is stupidly obvious yet not one company has ever made an attempt to address this issue.

O.


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Post subject: Re: Technophobe needs help - volume, master, gain?
Posted: Sun Jul 24, 2011 1:33 pm
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Vassago66 > You may have the short sweet answer to my question.
Orcatraz > Your reply was a bit more helpful.

But I'll take it one step further. Why does the Master have go to 10 when we can't use it. Should I reEQ the presets so that I can use more Master volumes?

Maybe I'm wrong about how others are using the amps. I understand loud is relative. I'm always in the house, so there is no need for the 5-10 on the Master. For you guys that play in bands or in live situations, do you ever get to crank your Master volume?

I figured that when I have more time I'll test this myself.
I can take a Basic preset #90 for example and duplicate it to #91.
On 91 I'll save a lower the Preset volume.
Then I can a/b compare the sound quality of both presets at given Master levels.

Here is what I think I will find.

More usable volumes:
I'm suspecting that #90 will sound more full at lower Master volumes but there will only be a small range of Master volumes to enjoy, (TOO LOUD, 3,2,and off.)
Whereas the new preset #91 there will be more "in betweens" on the master. ie (TOO LOUD,7,6,5,4,3,2,Off).

Background Noise:
I also suspect there could be a signal/noise problem with the new preset. Similar to playing a tape or cd that was recorded at too low of a volume initially. By the time you adjust the volume on your stereo to preferred volume, there is a lot of background hiss. Maybe the digital amp world is different than the analog tape world in this aspect.

Tonal advantages:
This is where I'm really weak on this topic. Guys talk about how the various amps and tubes behave with under different gain/volume/compressor/gate situations.
Say I wanted to play just loud enough to make my windows rattle. Let's say that an acoustic meter will read 60dB. Which of the these two presets would produce the best tone and playing dynamics?
Would the winner be the beefy preset with the master at 5 OR the milder preset with master 9?

I think that the replies so far have missed my overall question. If the replies are the same as before, then I'll accept that I don't get it and I'll read through them again until I do get it. But I think, I'm asking a slightly different question than I'm getting answered.

Thanks for your understanding.


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Post subject: Re: Technophobe needs help - volume, master, gain?
Posted: Sun Jul 24, 2011 4:26 pm
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mrgscales wrote:
Vassago66 > You may have the short sweet answer to my question.
Orcatraz > Your reply was a bit more helpful.

But I'll take it one step further. Why does the Master have go to 10 when we can't use it. Should I reEQ the presets so that I can use more Master volumes?

I'm suspecting that #90 will sound more full at lower Master volumes but there will only be a small range of Master volumes to enjoy, (TOO LOUD, 3,2,and off.)
Whereas the new preset #91 there will be more "in betweens" on the master. ie (TOO LOUD,7,6,5,4,3,2,Off).



Let me reiterate, the Master Volume has no tonal effect on the presets. Lower the Preset Volume if it's too loud compared to other presets. Don't forget to hit the Save button.

Ignore the numbers - they're irrelevant... even if they go to 11. :wink: Just set the master volume to where the sound is comfortable for you and leave it at that. There are no magic number settings so don't get hung up on them. Twist the knobs until you like what you hear. Ultimately, liking what you're hearing from the amp is the primary goal. It should be the only goal. It doesn't have to please anyone but you. Selfishness rules supreme in matters of personal tonal preferences. Otherwise, we would all sound the same... boring. The basics of how the controls work have been thoroughly discussed. Now it's up to you. Listen and learn how each control affects the sound and when you come across something that inspires you, for Pete's sake, hit the Save button. :mrgreen:
Again, don't get caught up in the technicalities and have fun!

O.


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