Posts by Grooguit

Whatever you do, make sure you set the clean sens correctly before touching any volumes, be mindful that browse mode and performance mode may have different clean sens settings, the input section can be locked or left unlocked and therefore different per Rig. I'm a use-one-guitar a performance guy, so I keep the input section locked and set clean sens for the guitar I'm using that day. The clean sens is adjusted correctly when if you go to a gainier profile and reduce the gain and the volume stays consistent at all gain levels. (If the cleaner sounds too soft, up the clean sens, if it's louder, lower it, single coils need higher values) Figure out what the clean sens should be for any other guitars you play.

Only then worry about volumes between Rigs.

I would do any leveling in browse mode. I'd pick one Rig, perhaps your favorite, that you forever use as your volume reference, whether you continue to like and use it or not. (Might not be a bad idea to see if this reference Rig's volume is one that is typical of Rigs in general, don't pick an unusually loud or soft one) Whatever Rigs you plan on using in performance mode, edit in browse mode first. Even better, make a copy of that Rig first, perhaps give its name some sort of special character that distinguishes it from raw Rigs. Take that copied Rig in browse mode, (perhaps save it in a special folder for edited Rigs) and do any basic tonal adjustments, (gain, EQ, definition, clarity, Pure cabinet, etc,) and save it. Maybe add some go to effect presets you use in general when you don't need anything special and save that in those Rigs too; then you don't have to reinvent the wheel over and over in performance mode. Then when you create performances, bring in those edited Rigs into performance mode. All your Rigs across various performances should then match in volume. Then you can tweak just about any parameter add various effects to your heart's content and all the volume should match.

Keep in mind that the KPA is the absolute best in volume when compared to any other multi effects modeling/capturing unit out there. It is the ONLY unit that doesn't screw up the volume when you adjust the amps gain, but automatically compensates, as long as the clean sens is set correctly.

One caveat: perceived volume when playing in isolation is different than when played in a mix. You can adjust everything perfectly when playing solo and it matches, but tones that in particular don't have as much high mids will sound lower in volume in a mix. So it's not a bad idea to save the X slot for an equalizer. See if subtle adjustments there fixes any volume inconsistency in a mix. A great way to test that (again ideally working in browse mode and adjusting there) is to play along with a recording on your computer and see how it cuts comparatively to other Rigs. If you're using an audio interface and DAW it's easy. Otherwise, utilize the aux input on the kpa and hook up your phone or computer's headphone output and play along with a recording. Then you can switch Rigs and see if the new one cuts as good as others. And again, do this before using the Rig in performance road.

Another thing to try is to set the ducking parameter to 1.0 or so and just leave the delay on all the time. Then it stays out of the way while you’re doing rhythm stuff. Worth playing around when anyway. I never thought I’d like such an effect and now I’m hooked.

I set the amp compressor to about three. And that seems to make the rolling back your guitar’s volume so much more versatile because you don’t lose as much perceived loudness.
I often try to just switch to a cleaner version of the profile, by rolling the amp gain back some. But given that I’m also singing simultaneously in many instances, I always like being able to clean up with the my guitar’s volume knob, the amp block compressor helps. I use a treble bleed in my guitars, which also cuts down on the need for as much amp block comp

Thought of another option. Skip using morph. Assign the reverb and od to one foot switch, with od off and reverb on hit save. Assign the delay to an adjacent footswitch. Then you can toggle it with the one switch. If going to solo and delay is already on, just hit the switch that toggles the od and reverb. If the delay was off and you wanted to go to a solo, hit both adjacent buttons at the same time.

over time I’ve tended to find it easier to utilize five main combos of sounds I need across the five performance rigs. If I need more than that, I create additional versions with instant morph. Then ten combinations of sounds are never more than a quick double tap away on one front row switch. For example if I’m in the morph state of Rig 4, I can jump to the morphed state of Rig 1 by hitting footswitch 1 two times real quick. If I find myself needing to get to the morphed state of that rig often while in other rigs, I probably should have that sound as the bass state of one of my five performance rigs. Or tweak a copy of the performance.

Quote from Amcolan

I understand the concept of changing the mix but by changing the mix to zero on the non morph setting it then turns off the effect and doesn’t allow that effect to be used in non morphing mode. If I want to still turn that effect on with the effect switch I can’t anymore.

Best way is to just copy and paste the rig into another slot in the performance.
however, If you want to also be able to use the delay when not soloing and not change rigs you could do this:

Place the delay and reverb in their dedicated slots, and the drive model in one of the a,b,c, or d slots Use the mix settings for each to effectively turn then on and off, the delay and OD would be set to zero in the base state while the reverb is set to whatever percent you what it at. In morph state turn the verb down and the delay and OD up.
step 2 place the same delay model in the Mod slot. Assign it to a back row switch, but then turn the effect off with the button. Also assign the main delay to this foot switch, but then keep that delay on. Hit save. Then this switch toggles both delays, when one is on the other is off.
now if you are in the base state the main delay is effectively off because the mix is at zero. But you can turn on the identical delay with the toggle switch. If you want to go to your lead sound with the morph switch, it doesn’t matter which delay is toggled on. If the one in the mod slot is on, then the main delay with the morphed mix is switched off, and it won’t matter if the mix is “morphed” to 45% or whatever. One catch is that if you go back to the base state from herein this scenario, the delay in the mod slot will still be on until you manually turn it off. Another is that it uses up the mod block for this rig and the delay in that block won’t spillover if you go to another rig. But if your goal is to stay put in that rig for the whole song, that shouldn’t be an issue.

*edit: if spillover was a concern you could put the solo delay in the mod slot and the one you’d like to toggle in the base state in the dedicated delay slot. Whichever one you’d most likely need to go directly to another Rig from.

I think you all are missing something. All the effects have a mix control. You can accomplish the same thing as turning an effect on or off by setting the mix to zero in the base state and whatever other percentage in the morph state. This way you can morph somethings while simultaneously turning other things off by morphing for zero to 100 or zero to whatever.
so for example, you want the delay off in the base state, leave the delay block ON, but set the mix of the delay effect to Zero. Hit the morph button and set the mix of the delay to whatever you want it for the solo, say 45%.
You can effectively turn on or off any effect with way with morph using the mix control. Even better, I find it helpful that if I want a more prominent delay for part of a song, leaving just a little of it mixed in when I don’t sometimes makes the transition smoother, since I’m not complete bypassing the effect.

obviously, as others pointed out, you could just copy and paste the rig into another slot in the performance and tweak it different for that part. However I found it useful for a while to put all the sounds I need for a particular song in just one Rig when possible. Utilizing morph this way gives me two completely different combos if effects with just one button press. Often times I could fit four or five songs worth of Rig into a single performance. Given that I also use the ducking parameter set to about 1.0, I find I often don’t turn by delays on and off mid song as my playing style naturally takes care of it.

Quote from lbieber

We could quibble about the meaning of 'game changer', but there is nothing to be gained from that discussion IMO. What you describe regarding IK is nothing significant from my perspective, it is simply a different gear manifestation and won't result in any sound improvement over what I already have with the Kemper

I actually agree with you. I used quotes for "game changer" as tongue in cheek. But seriously, when it comes out it will probably be a worthy competitor to the high-end profiling all-in-one marke and will suit some people's needs more than others. For my uses, the KPA is still the top: spillover between presets, volume compensation, ducking on most effects, and never needing to worry about DSP. I just returned the QC because I liked my KPA more

the next "game changer" will be an all in one by IK. Think about it, they already have 3-button mod, delay, and reverb, and distortion pedals with presets that do the fancy stuff for $329 a piece. The original tonex pedal will remain popular, as it's the most logical product for people that want to use a traditional pedal board and have a small pedal dedicated to their amp/cabs. Kemper and QC are overkill in price and size for this purpose and are suited to those that want to go all-in-one.

I just returned the QC after three weeks. I SO wanted to love!. The KPA generation 1 in my opinion is a superior product and has more power and versatility where it counts.

Pros: the captures and such sounded great, not better than kpa profiles. I like the touch screen for naming things. I like how it took so little room on my desk and could fit in my computer book bag. That's about it. Can function as an interface. But, I already own an interface that I leave on in my office while working, would never want to leave my kpa or QC left on all day so I can use it to listen to music through my studio monitors.

Cons:

1) Dual amps is cool, but I couldn't find a combo I'd prefer to any single amp, so what's the point of adding the complexity for editing sake?

2) No volume compensation. The supposed time saved with a touch screen? I forgot how much I hated compensating volume after making minor gain adjustments; wasted so much time. Set up some scenes with different gain stages, then realize that overall it's too loud compared to other presets. back and forth, back and forth adjust, adjust, compare, hit save, repeat...... Oh wait, I could just adjust the overall volume by adding a EQ effect at end of chain, darn not enough DSP.

3) No dual delays. You NEED to set up a parallel path to merely have a 1/4 and 1/8 dotted delay. Delays in general were quite limited compared to KPA. The kpa delays come with so much complexity that I personally never need two at the same moment in time anyway; with spillover in the delay slot, there's no need to cram additional delays in the same Rig for other songs or parts of songs; just copy paste the rig and add a different delay.

4) No effect presets. You can only set the default for an effect type. Huge waste of time.

5) No ducking anything. I use ducking delays and even a little ducking on more ambient reverb all the time, cuts down on tap dancing. KPA has ducking on all delays, reverbs, mods, pitch, etc.

6) No editor: the touch screen speeds some things up, but then it's on the floor, whereas the iPad/iphone app for the kpa takes a moment to turn on.

7) Not enough foot switches, which are too close together btw. You have to use Scenes since there's an audio gap and no spillover between presets. But it's cumbersome to get to another preset; getting back to preset mode requires stepping on two switches, and then hit them together again to get back to Scene mode. BTW the footswitches make this irritating scratchy sound when pressed. The KPA's front row of switches are closer to the ground requiring less foot raising and easier access to the second row as well. No dedicated tuner button on the QC, I kept screwing up the bpm trying to access the tuner.

7) a vulgar exaggeration of power. I ran out of DSP using a compressor, 1 OD, two captures, an EQ, two delays (necessary because they don't have a dual delay model) and a reverb! I had to turn off the global EQ! And yes I correctly spread everything out among two sections to utilize all of its DSP. Though the kpa only does one profile at time, I could do all of these other things on the kpa, only needing 1 delay module to do what QC needs two to do, add an extra OD model, add a couple mod effects, utilize the looper, transpose, a 2nd compressor via the amp block compression, no need to turn off the global eq! Even better I can do all this on the kpa and go to another rig without an audio gap and maintain spillover, unlike the QC.

The capture menu on the QC is an absolute mess. Even though I downloaded less than 100 amps+cabs, presets, and OD captures it was a total pain to find what I was looking for. Totally disorganized, unsearchable, stupid categories. Suppose you capture the amp and speaker of a Fender twin? This would go in one category. Then capture the Fender twin plugged into a physical separate guitar cabinet. This is supposed to go in another category! Even though they're both capturing an amplifier and a speaker! Create or worse download a bunch of captures and try and remember which ones are in which category! and then scroll down the whole list of each trying to find the one you are looking for.

The Tonex pedal intrigues me, but not as a kpa replacement. (I'm convinced that the differences between a profile or captures are largely minor, especially once you tweak, and I use commercial ones I chose because I love them, irrespective of accuracy to original anyway)

However, if I got a Tonex, I'd use it in the kpa effect loop. But not because I think I'd get better amp and cab sounds. Rather for organization. On my KPA, I've long created lots of Rigs and sometimes whole performances for specific songs (thanks to spillover between Rigs) especially the bpm and wet effects dialed in specifically; they usually are built on the same profiles of a particular amp that's my favorite du jour; which from time to time I change my mind about. I'm often fickle in what profiles I want to use, especially if I'm playing different guitars on different days. To be able to load up a few gain-staged presets on a unit like the Tonex, and then be able to use them in any of the Rigs and performances I set up for specific songs would be great. Tweak those captures last minute just once, rather than go to a dozen Rigs and make the same adjustments over and over. This isn't a knock on the KPA, just the way multi effect units in general operate. I returned the QC because of how much I hated having to constantly adjust volumes (among a number of other things that the KPA is better at)

Quote from Low Volume

Very true, just had me wishing it was because I already build computers! I was just thinking about the instant on that new macbooks have with their SOC and thinking of how that could be applied to something like the Kemper if/when a new version is released.

Genuinely if startup time is my only complaint (which it is) then things are going swimmingly indeed.

This is great advice that I read somewhere else when I first got my unit and you are spot on. I have loads of rigs but like most I suspect I tend to play a handful more than any others for my day to day tones practicing and whatnot. How many do you usually have on the profiler itself? I assume I can backup the stock profiles somewhere and remove those as well correct?

You can back up everything. A good rule is to create a backup anytime you do significant change. I like to do one before I update to the latest OS, just in case something goes wrong. (In the 11 years owning a head, now a stage, I've never had to to utilize a backup, but peace of mind...) You can create a backup with a USB drive or from within Rig manager and it saves wherever you like on your computer. For the factory content, within Rig manager there are Rig packs in the left side. Someone can correct me if I'm wrong, but these are the categories of free stuff from Kemper, which I believe includes all of the factory content. Not sure if all of this comes installed on a new unit or not. But suffice it to say that all of that stuff is always available in those folders for you to import into your physical kemper. There's also the Rig exchange folder, which includes every Rig that's ever been shared on the user exchange and updates automatically whenever you open up Rig manager. When your kpa is hooked to Rig manager you can drag any of those rigs into the local library, where you can place commercial profiles, copies of ones from the factory rig packs or rig exchange, and ones you've made. Any of those in the local folder, rig packs, or rig exchange can be dragged to your physical KPA. Likewise any on your physical kpa can be dragged into the local folder.

If you haven't done so, watch a tutorial on how to utilize Rig Manager, as it's easier to see than explain. In any case, it's super easy to drag whatever you want onto your KPA. Often there's little need to. When using Rig Manager you can play any Rig in any of those folders just by double clicking on it. You only need to drag it onto your KPA itself if you want to use it when not connected to your computer.

Quote from Low Volume

I just bought my Kemper ( classic unpowered toaster) and so many of these features you’ve all mentioned would be amazing. For me the number one feature I want is instant boot. Waiting for this thing to fire up before I can play is painful. Had me considering how to go about upgrading the ram and the hard drive myself the other day lol.

If you haven't already, utilize Rig Manager and only keep your favorites Rigs on the head itself. I have thousands of profiles from various packs and so forth in Rig Manager, some I've never even tried. So after some point, it's not worth keeping what you don't need when time matters on the KPA itself. You'll cut down on the load up time substantially if you do this. Plus if you're away from your computer, it's a lot easier to navigate through rigs and such if you don't have too many on I've found that if I turn on my KPA, it's ready to go by the time plug in a guitar cable and hook up a guitar. About as fast as the QC turns on btw.

Quote from Wheresthedug

While the colour LCD and Looper may need new hardware the time based effects updates could easily be achieved in the current KPA.

I'm inclined to agree. While I have a long wishlist, the features I suggest might be a little futuristic DSP wise. The KPA gen 1 has a surprisingly great versatility within a performance. What combo of sounds you can access in a song without audio gap or awkward ambience cut offs is what ultimately determines the flexibility; not how much you can cram in a single preset or Rig. You essentially have access to 40 effects (8 times 5) not counting the amp section, looper, or noise gate in a performance!! The question is, can you live with the one amp/cab at a time and spillover in the delay and reverb spots only. I can live with both. I can't think of time where I was like "gosh I need another effect for this song and ran out of effect blocks" Chances are if I want another effect and if I've run out of room in a rig, I'll want to turn something else off when I add that effect. Copy and paste the Rig into an adjacent slot in the performance. Replace the one effect; problem solved.

The hidden secret about what makes the KPA competitive with the latest/greatest are certain advantages that are related to its simplicity, but not always obvious to those without first-hand experience. A KPA 2 has room to improve, but should seek to continue its unique approach rather than replicating the competition. Profiling is not the only thing that made this unit special.

• Continue to have a fixed (but bigger) signal path with a dedicated amp section. (keep or expand the parallel path and something like the del/rev parallel thing) The reason you can do convenient things like lock certain blocks is because there is such a fixed place for the amp section to go. This is also (probably) what makes the KPA's unique volume compensation when adjusting gain practical. Harder limits on the number of effects per Rig is the reason that there's DSP leftover to allow the Del and Rev slots (the place 90% of guitarist want these effects) to Spillover into other Rigs, as well as global access to the Looper. This is what makes it possible to switch between 5 Rigs in a performance, each with a morph (which is basically a variable second SCENE) during a song, as opposed to the build-a-mammoth preset model of the competition.
• Add 2 effects blocks before the amp section and 2 after, for a total of 6 before and 6 after. Add some sort of dual amps and cabs in the amp/cab section, with three possible modes: One is a simple A or B switching mode to switch between profiles in a Rig, a parallel blend mode (zero is 100% amp A, 100 is 100% amp B, 50 is half and half), and a spread mode (equal amounts of A/B with a single pan knob). These parameters would of course be accessible in a morph or if there’s SCENES.
• Add a parametric and/or graphic EQ as an additional set of parameters in the Cab section (freeing up the X slot that a lot of folks use for post amp EQ, and, more importantly, making such refinements something that can be saved with the amp/cab settings since that’s what’s its tweaked for) Figure out a way to have these dual amp options function without losing the super convenient automatic volume compensation that all the competition lacks. Let people who "need" four amps and cabs at the same time and endless possibilities of parallel satisfy their desire with a competitors product. Allow the saving of single amp/cabs like in generation 1, but also allow the ability to save the entire amp section with both amps as a preset that can be called up in the creation of other Rigs.
• As noted: the automatic volume compensation that lets you dink around with the gain setting on OD models and the amp and not have to adjust volume to taste (and the misery of then having to go back and forth between other rigs to see if the volume still matches) Don't give this advantage up to replicate the open canvas grid model of competitors.
• Don't sacrifice simplicity for the guitarist to make room for other instruments. Seriously, why would anyone ever want to share an all-in-one unit with another musician in a live setting? If you MUST include such a feature, make it fixed and call it the SIDECAR. Single stereo/mono 1/4" input and output jacks; dedicated to this use only. Hit a button and access this alternative signal path that has nothing to do with the main guitarists signal path, other than being able to customize it per Rig, performance, or lock globally. Give it three effect blocks, one of which could be a single amp/cap profile. That will suffice for bass, acoustic, vocals, keys who could otherwise just plug into direct box; beggars can't be choosers. By no means replicate the wide-open grid format of QC and Helix and the DSP juggling game, again let those that prefer that arrangement, buy one of those and live with the disadvantages.
• Importing of KPA 1 generation rigs (one more reason to continue to have a fixed signal path) By default, imported 1st generation Rigs would have their one amp and cab in both the dual amp spots, leaving the ability to swap one of them out later. Effects A,B,C,D would be placed in blocks 2,3,4,5 (leaving the 1 and 6 empty as I proposed 6 effect blocks before and after the amp section) Effects X,Mod,Del,Mod,Rev would go in blocks 8,9,10,11 (leaving blocks 7 and 12 empty). *Perhaps changing where the imported effect blocks of 1st gen Rigs go globally could be tweaked, say if someone wanted A,B,C,D to import to 1,2,3,4 or 3,4,5,6.
• Full stereo signal path. Allow panning of otherwise mono effects like OD models. Perhaps expand the parallel options a bit; there is some in KPA 1.
• Priority spillover. With an upgrade in DSP, minus the extra DSP to do the things I mentioned, perhaps allowing 3 or 4 blocks to spillover; let's assume 4. Don't go the Helix route that allows spillover of everything by giving up half your DSP. Instead allow four effects needing to be in the Del and Rev blocks to spillover, allow them to be wherever. So you can add up to 4 such effects to any rig and not think about it. If you add a fifth delay or reverb effect, either the left most or right most (globally chosen) will not spillover by default. However, perhaps you could manually choose the odd man out if you wanted a fifth delay for some odd reason: choose "no spillover on rig change," in that effect's parameters. Since so many of the singular effects even in KPA generation 1 allow all sorts of parallel/serial, dual and quad, mod and pitch options, having four such simultaneous effects with spillover is more than enough. Allow those that want the never-ending mammoth preset with no spillover and large audio gap route to go to a competitor.
• Profiling OD pedals. Perhaps streamline the controls for DSP sake and give gain, Mix, 3 or 4 band EQ and a simple tone knob, perhaps functioning like the Definition knob that’s in the amp section? Since we’re going full stereo, allow it to be panned left and right. As a different type of profile, (even if the process is similar) your OD profiles are in a separate list/folder than your amp profiles for organization’s sake.
• Blue tooth audio. In a world where $25 blue tooth speakers exist, why not allow your phone to connect via blue tooth (not just for Rig manager) but to stream audio, as you can now use the aux inputs to monitor an external source for practicing along with a recording. Would be nice to not have run a cable for this.
• Scenes: These might be disorganized to offer alongside morphing? Perhaps either or? (you can set up a complex morph or create a certain number of scenes in any Rig) Not sure how I’d organize this though, in terms of number of Rigs per performance or bank, number of possible scenes per Rig. Some way that makes logical sense with the rows of footswitches.
• Keep their unique approach to effects. They are the only unit (perhaps Fractal does this) that provides a ducking parameter to just about all their effects. This feature alone has made me do so much less tap dancing when more and less delay are needed in different places, and therefore less need for something like scenes and more effect blocks or Rigs to get through a song; and it’s a lot easier to set up. The Kemper Drive and Kemper Fuzz are second to none.

Quote from Ruefus

If you haven't uninstalled and reinstalled, try that.

Then I'd submit a ticket. Sounds as if something may have become corrupted.

It seems to be working now. I tried it a few more times, resetting my computer a 3rd time, etc. Just as I was in process of force quitting for the 8th time or so, the icon started jumping and I was prompted to get an OS update for the Stage, which I did, and now Rig manager doesn't freeze at start up. Strange, as I was on probably the beta just before the release which was almost identical. But problem now solved.

Quote from MarcusRayner

Can’t this be simplified by putting the loop in the delay slot which always allows spillover?

Nope. Spillover of the slot wasn't the issue. It was an issue with the Eventide. You can put a delay or reverb pedal in the effect loops, which you could use in the X slot (or any other slot ) and it will spillover if you go to another preset that has the effect loop active, whatever place you have the effects loop. This is because the external device isn't cut off and just keeps reverberating. If I didn't send the H9 midi messages, it spillover nicely to other Rigs regardless of what slot I put it in.

I wasn't just placing the H9l in the KPA effects loop, I was sending it midi messages, so that when I went to a certain Rig, the KpA it would tell simultaneously open the effects loop and tell the H9 what reverb or delay preset I wanted to use. I only commonly used 2 or 3 presets on the H9 and often left the same one on for a whole song. Naturally, I would program each rig I wanted to use an H9 preset to send the PC number that matched the preset I wanted to use with it. The H9 didn't have spillover. But worse, if it received a midi message telling it go to the preset it was already on, rather than ignore it, it would reset its preset which would cut off its on trails. I contacted Eventide with a feature request to ignore midi messages telling it to go where it already is, and got a short cold response, like I was asking something silly.

The work around was to build a performance on the KPA in which only the 1st Rig sent the midi message, which meant I couldn't use other H9 presets in the same song. I sold the H9 once the KPA delay updates came out 5-6 years ago or whatever, as it wasn't worth the aggravation.

I'm running an M1 2020 mac pro, OS 13.1 Ventura and can not get Rig Manager to stop freezing. This is a new problem, though I haven't used Rig Manager for a few weeks now, but haven't changed my operating system or anything like that since the last time I used it, when it was working fine. By fine, I mean other than telling me there's a new version of Rig Manager every time I open the program that I've already installed. (I have 3.3.49 installed already) It freezes up while that pop up screen notifying me to update comes up, which happens within a few seconds of opening the program. I've tried opening Rig Manager with and without my Stage plugged in and resetting my computer and closing other programs.

Quote from ElectroFuzz

Let's say you have a great preset but the sound is a little bit muffled.

By boosting the clean sense you add more definition.

It sounds the same but it sticks out more a little more in the mix.

Note it's not gain, just more of the clean tone for definition.

Yes I can find a workaround but the clean sense is fast, easy and works every time.

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there is a parameter in the amp section called “definition” and that can be morphed. I find that this is the first control I touch whenever a profile is a little brittle or a little dull. I also liken it to a pickup position adjuster. Dial a profile to sound good in the bridge pup and the neck will be too dark. Sound good for neck pup, bridge is too bright. A nudge on the definition allows one profile to work on both pups.

Where I think Kemper is missing out on the action is in the hx stomp market. A lot of guitarists don't want to ditch traditional pedal boards which what you see is what you get physical pedals, even if they're open to embracing digital modeling or profiling. The HX is the perfect little box to throw on the back of a pedal board, even for a guy that usually uses real amps and sometimes has a need to play direct (along with the convenience of practicing with headphones while using your whole pedal board) The fact that you could easily throw on a few of its effects and toggle them, it's a good swiss army knife/toy for effects you don't have space to dedicate a whole pedal to.

You can pull the thing off your board and it's all you need for an acoustic guitar or bass gig, or direct recording. You could spend 2/3's as much to get something like a strymon iridium, but it can't cover all of those bases.

But the HX stomp is a terrible option for someone looking to use it as their entire rig, whether it's easy to edit on the device or not, because at the end of the day, you're stuck with 3 foot switches, and that's just not enough for most gigging guitarists. And if you're not gigging, why the heck is something like the kemper stage or head, the helix or the Pod Go too big to be convenient?

So a 3-foot switch "mini kemper" wouldn't be ideal to use all by itself either. You'd throw it on a traditional pedal board and being able to add a couple effects blocks before and after the amp/cab section, your swiss army knife, add its noise reduction and call it a day. Or take it off your board, use it for acoustic and bass gigs and direct recording.

Would be cool to try. I presume both comps are next to each other before the amp section?