They have different strengths foe sure. Solely based on sound the Dream and Ruby are unbelievable. The nail the tone, character and dynamics of the real thing. The ACS1 is pretty hard to beat in terms of functionality. Having the chance to use two amps at the same time is really neat and in a live band situation it's going to be hard to tell the difference. But I wouldn't use them for recording, while I would do that with the Dream or Ruby. It's a lot to consider when choosing one over the other. But yeah, think of how much of a gamechanger UA will be in a home recording situation. You can get that shure 57 mic'd amp sound in your flat without bothering the neighbours?! Crazy.
awesome! love it. I used it the other day... took me awhile to dial it in that day for one reason or another. But it's still one of my absolute favourites.
@@muusevic So many Marshall AIAB pedals already. One of the Iridium choices is Marshall. A quality Hiwatt emulation is sadly lacking. Actually a 70s Orange one would be nice too. Also a 60’s Ampeg guitar amp one or 50’s Gibson GA-20 or GA-40. I would like Fender brown emulations beyond just a deluxe, including Blonde and blackface Bassman heads. Crap the list just starts growing!
Great review guys! I tried both the UA Ruby '63 and Dream '65 and felt they were the most convincing modelled amp tones I've tried to date, so authentic and truly amp-like - great pedals! However, I eventually sold them as I'm extremely happy with the ‘captures’ I’ve created of my Kingsley Constable, Jester v2 and Squire D tube preamps, in my Quad Cortex.
@@christianpacode6073 Whew, it's never advisable to tell someone what gear they should buy...there are so many variables to consider and tone is so subjective. Personally though and having owned a Helix I feel UAs amp modelling is the next level in this type of technology, it's easy to dial-in and sounds extremely close to the the amp circuit it's designed after. But, the Dream is only a Fender '65 DLXR amp model with Tremolo and Spring Reverb...the HX Stomp is many things. You should really consider what your exact pedalboard needs are and then design your tone(s)/effects the way that works best for you. I hope this helps!
@@777strat thanks a lot! Really appreciate it! I thought about what you said, but honestly i’m not even using more than 2 or 3 amps in the hx stomp and i’m having a hard times getting the tone i want, the worse is getting the sound to cut through the mix when i’m live, when everything is playing my sound get lost. I’m so frustrated at times i don’t feel like playing anymore. But i feel like the dream 65 will give me exactly the sound i’m looking for, especially live.
Makes you wonder if Strymon and Walrus Audio focused entirely on 1 specific amp based pedal, if they'd give UA more of a run for the money? 🤷♂️ This was a fun video!Thanks for sharing!
I don’t think so. UAD has such a different philosophy to the whole “modeling” idea. They are digitally recreating the entire circuit of the hardware they emulate, and using r&d that’s partially funded by their partnerships with scholarly institutional research. Strymon afaik is just trying to make the best sounding digital pedals they can. It would be hard for them to compete with uad’s ethos without taking a totally new approach to their mission statement of their company.
@@adamallington4717 the smart way forward now is machine learning, the research papers and tools are already out there. I expect even the lower priced vendors like NUX to be delivering perfect captures of real amps in the next few years. The product differentiators are going to be features, design and ergonomics rather than tone.
I'm not sure, but someone in another comment section mentioned that UA claims you can use the outputs on their pedals with a Y cable and run headphones that way.
Haven't heard that... Would be very curious to know if it's true though. I'd be surprised if it was / if you'd be able to get the level needed to do it.
I agree 100%. When I got an ACS 1 I must have tried 100 IRs to get the few that I like. It’s the only rabbit hole I actually gave up on once I found a few I liked. I use the Vox clean in both sides with two different IRs. The fender and Marshall amps don’t do it for me and I have a 66 Princeton and have owned a Marshall JCM 800.
The ACS1 can also run 2 amps in stereo the Dream can’t so if you sold the ACS1 to buy a Dream you lose half the capability. I use the Walrus live with my pedal board in front and it can sound huge, I’ve never experienced it sounding smaller I think you need to spend more time with it I also use aftermarket IR’s so maybe that’s a factor. Mostly I use a tube amp but some gigs are either limited space or the volume needs to be easily controlled so I went for the Walrus. No complaints from me and I’m a long time tube amp guy.
Hey! Thank you for doing the shoot out :D I’d like to run the Ruby and Dream in stereo with a stereo reverb pedal after, then into a DISO+. I’d like to reverse the polarity after the UA pedals. I’m just not sure how to do this. Is there a simple way to do this before it hits the reverb pedal? Thank you
We've had a BUNCH of requests for this... We can do it in a custom junction (email me at info@goodwoodaudio.com if you want to chat more about this) but I think we'll need to come out with something in future that takes care of this issue for these two pedals.
After a Kemper, I have owned the Iridium, the DLX Simplifier, and the ‘Dream’65. After hours and hours of tweaking (home studio use) , to my ears all of them definitely sound terrible, in terms of tone and dynamics, as compared with my small Fender amps (‘63 Princeton and ‘59 Vibrolux ).
great video, i need some advise. I have a Katana Artist and I want to do a WDW, using Katana as center and get a Dream UAFX for the effects amp. Can I run the stereo fx out of my stereo reverb into the Dream then stereo out the dream to a mixer. My Katana is also direct out to mixer as well. Any help would be greatly appreciated. If I was to purchase any needed switches it would be from you all as well.. FYI
You could do this, yes. I've run a very similar rig myself and the soundguy loved it. Sounded huge. Only thing you would want to do is run a dry split (with a mute to the dry amp / Katana). We make "Isolator TX" for this purpose. Then you run through your wet effects as normal - Dream (stereo is fine, yes) - Mixer. Now FOH and monitors can mix wet and dry independently! Big win for everyone. Does that make sense?
@@GoodwoodAudio I think so...I was planning using Isolator TX after my compressor and drive pedals. Split it from there. Dry Katana goes center then into mixer. The wet will start from Isolator TX out to my wet effects and stereo H9 and reverb then into stereo in of UAFX - then mixer . Right ? Side note - I am wondering If UA is gonna make a Marshall type pedal next?You know people would be all over that LOL. Again, thank you for the advice. Let me know that is right? Thank you!
Coudl someone elighten me as i'm kind of new to all these things. If i'm getting rid of my amp and have a Dream or Iridium at the end of my pedalboard, would i be able to go let's say to friends who have a receiver, either stereo or mono and connect my pedalboard to that receiver? And what if i would still want to use my amp, do i bypass the pedal or can i also use the amppedal to create a diiferent sound to my amp?
@@1717jaydog well i mean, let's say you have vinyl turntable, it needs a receiver, like the Teufel Kombo 62 which a friend of mine has. He has with that a speaker left and right for his vinyl. Does it mean i can connect my pedalboard via a iridium and have the sound come of the speakers? He has a Teufel Kombo 62 . Info much appreciated!
We essentially set gain, kept the EQ's fairly equal - although adjust them slightly to suit - and that's it. We could have done EQ after the fact (in post) but with a treated amp (like the mic'd amps these are emulating) seems a bit unfair but an argument could be made either way. We tried to do as little as possible to ALL amp and cab sims and let them speak for themselves as much as we could... But I see your point. We went for "If your headphones were plugged into the pedal for practice - what would you hear... This is close to that approach. Not sure if I'm completely making sense...hopefully.
It all hinges on what we have access to unfortunately! Agreed...lot's of other options we could have put here. These are the ones we come across the most though / have access to in the shop.
@Dave Davies haha. I got to respectfully bow out on this since I was turning everything on / off... I'd like to think I'd get them all right, but I have a feeling I'd fall short of my expectations.
I think how you use these pedals, will decide what you like. If you are going to only use these pedals alone, then the Dream or Ruby have a leg up. However, on a decent pedalboard, it does not matter, I have great modulations, reverbs and tone sculpting options that levels the playing field.
For amp / cab sims... it's arguably less of an issue not having an FX loop since you can place them right after dry effects. But I do see your point if you wanted control over pre and post wet effects... However, I think the biggest thing to consider here is just if you want the amp / cab sim placed pre-wet or post since that's really what the FX loop in a tube amp is allowing.
I wouldn't, no. Mainly because the Dream/Ruby are designed to EQ/simulate an amp... so you're running something that should sound like an amp into an amp (including the speaker / IR emulation). I think you'd get some odd results. Not saying you wouldn't find anything useable, just that your EQ is going to sound ... interesting to say the least.
@@LysanderLH in theory it will carry the sound assuming you have the correct load (4ohm or 8ohm or 16ohm cab)... But it probably won't sound as good as a cab / speaker designed for guitar.
@@GoodwoodAudio i just recieved the Ruby today, plugged it into the Syrics, unplugged it, put it back in the box and asked for a refund. It was definitely not right for me. The person i spoke to regarding the Ruby suggested a Line 6 Hx Stomp XL and i’m inclined to agree.
Luckily on this channel we are not bound to Rob! ha. To make it as blind as possible we had to be quick on finding a 'sound' with as little time to pick the pedal as possible... I also think some of the B-roll was before we picked settings...so the video (dependign on when you look) might not be accurate to the actual used settings.
Honestly... have no idea. I do know when we set the sounds it was eyes closed and what was the best sound we could get out of that pedal. If it's all knobs at noon but sounds best... All knobs were at noon. if it was treble all the way off.. so be it. But we definitely had to do some tweaking to on each pedal before doing the video.
@@GoodwoodAudio sorry for the mean tone, it’s just the whole point of a “blind test” was immediately lost with all the spring reverb and gain on the dream.
@@Ivan_Posokhin much more helpful! appreciate the detail. Will definitely keep that in mind in future. I think we got so focused on not getting familiar with the pedals (in an effort to keep it as blind as possible) we skipped some important points like what you mentioned.
It was an interesting comparison. But you didn’t say which IR you were using from the pre-loaded options. And the IR selection is there on each of these because it makes a huge difference in the final tone. I have the Iridium and I have one “Favorite” that essentially is my sound. If I just switch the IR out to one of the other 2 options that come in the box, it’s no longer a sound that I like. So if you have a similar comparison in the future, let us guessers know at the end which IR you were using. That’s my request. But again it was very informative as-is. Cheers!
@@GoodwoodAudioyes, it would be good to do the comparisons with the exact same known great quality IRs. York, Ownhammer, etc. I’ve heard comparisons with Dream and Iridium with the same IRs and it completely changes things. Always hard when comparing 2 variables at once.
Great video guys. The headphone jack doesn’t matter. You can get a dual TS 1/4” to 1/8” TRS Jack for a couple dollars and plug headphones into the Ruby and Dream. UA has said you can do this and I do this with my Ruby often. Use the Master volume to control the overall headphone volume.
Interesting. This hasn’t worked well for me in the past on other units. Maybe UA has included some measure to deal with this correctly. Or maybe I was just doing it wrong haha. Good to know it works with these pedals. That Dream was a dream, but I doubt I’m going to be switching anytime soon.
This works, yes, but the volume output on the ‘65 Dream was wildly lower than is reasonable. It requires nearly cranking the master to get a usable volume. This was with Shure SE215’s and Sony MD705.
I have used Shure SE215, 315s, and Beyerdynamic DT 770’s (250 ohm). I once used a set of over ear Sennheiser’s but I don’t know the model. Never used any conventional headphones, always monitoring headphones. The master volume does need to be high but the volume was loud enough for my liking with all these options. The 770s being my favourite. I’ve only done this when I needed to practice in a pinch. Using a proper interface is obviously preferable. As is using speakers.
I was disappointed you didn’t spend more time trying to get the pedals in their sweet spot with the same tone . You can get the Iridium to sound a lot better than this comparing it to the dream . Starting with the dream overdriven sort of spoilt that initial test for me 😔
Totally agree... We could have spent more time on each pedal. It was tricky... we were trying NOT to get used to each pedal before the video so it would be harder to blindly pick each one (not used to them as much this way) but there definitely are improvements to make to the approach next time. Thanks for watching!
I might be the minority here but I never liked the low end on UA amp plugins which I own many, Buxom Betty, Silver Jubilee, Fuchs etc and can hear that same quality in the UAFX pedal amps. I was surprised to liked the Walrus better than the Iridium which I owned before.
I've never used the plugins from UA so can't speak there... I was also surprised to like the ACS1 more than Iridium... I really wanted Iridium to win, but I couldn't quite get there. Although - no IRs were used, but stock out of the box...no competition.
Yep the combo of stereo amp with Fender and Vox into headphones still makes ACS1 the winner for me, but would probably go the Dream if it had a headphone jack.
I did get everything right on guessing which is which, however having owned an ACS1 I have to say that the "getting smaller with overdrives in front" became much better after the firmware upgrades. Nevertheless I swapped it for the Dream and couldn’t be happier with the sounds I am able to get now. Really stunning pedal with lots of different sounds in it.
The test is a little obsolete since the V2 firmware update on the ACS1 came out late 2023. The ACS1 was just ok until then but it has completely changed the pedal. UA has done a fantastic job, but people shouldn’t be making any decisions on the ACS1 based on this shootout anymore.
Thanks for doing this. I have an ACS 1 and was considering a Ruby. But may look into the Dream now. My reason to change would be if I can delete a drive pedal from my board. I actually run my ACS1 clean and always have 1 drive on. If the UA pedals have a 1st stage drive I like I could see changing it out. Otherwise I am happy with the ACS 1 when I don’t have an amp as an option.
Recently did a a side by side with the iridium and the dream 65. Dream 65 does what they claim and does it well, but it’s a one trick pony. The iridium has more options, punch and easier to adjust. Both are great units but I ended up keeping the iridium and offing the dream 65.
nice. Ya, we kept everything 'stock'... Still baffles me how aftermarket IR's can sound so much better than the company that spent so much time and money developing the product in the first place...
So I’m 14:26 into this video, Grant, and I’m bummed that y’all didn’t turn any knobs on the pedals. Why wouldn’t y’all try to get the best tone out of each of them, and then compare. Like, ya know… dial them in the way you would want to play them. Each of them. Then compare. Or, if #2 sounded best to your pastor, then try match that tone on the other 2 pedals.
we started by finding the best sound on each (before the vid) and then did an AB test... We were trying to keep the video as brief as possible, but will definitely keep this in mind for future!
Fender: don't know 1 and 3, thinking 2 was UA. Vox: 1 was UA. The dynamic thing I felt was there was more ... chest, more low end punch. Let's see how those guesses ended up ...
I own iridium, ruby, dream, helix and quad cortex. And I think the ruby and dream are the best. A bit more dynamic, if i had to just pick one then the dream is my favourite as is the real deluxe reverb amp my favourite amp.
This is good to hear. I’m trying to choose between these exact options, and I’m leaning heavily toward getting both the ruby and the dream and calling it a day until someone makes a JC-120 pedal.
I didn't see the answers of the blind test, but I'm sure 1-Acs, 2-Dream and 3-Iridium. 2 is the easiest because it's the only one of this pedals that breaks much earlier and like that. It was probably at noon btw. 3 is the Iridium, much less scooped than the others, because you actually need to turn the Mid knob all the way down to get a Blackface sound. It's on the manual, but nobody seems to know and do that. And 1 is Acs, I know very little about it, but sounded very good to my ears. I have both the Dream and Iridium btw, and I think the Dream is another level of emulation.
I like the sound of acs1 best…even in blind test…this makes me happy as I own one 😅…I was ready to be disappointed! Anyway. Thanks for the comparison..it was well done and fun to watch/listen to.
I recently sold my iridium to a friend, not because I didn’t like it, but so I could try the ACS1. UA sounds good, but I really like the option of different types of amps and wanted to try different amps left and right, and I definitely couldn’t afford 2 units. Additionally I need the headphone amp. This is absolutely 100% my only practicing tool. Someone suggested getting a 1/4” to 1/8” adapter. In my experience that doesn’t work. In the Iridium (haven’t confirmed with the ACS1) the headphone amp is an actual component that can amplify the sound for headphones. This is why it uses higher amperage while running with headphones. Trying to go out the standard ports with an adapter sounds very poor. I admit I could be doing it wrong. Anyway, on the fender test, I almost thought the UA was the iridium because of the amount of gain. The Vox I really had no idea between the three. I have to say though, on the Iridium and Fender I really loved the sounds I had on mine way more than what was played here. These seemed way more dark and muddy than how I set my pedals. I’m sure it was difficult to try to match but both of those pedals can be set to sound way nicer in my opinion. The dream sounded really nice, but I’m not planning on moving my ACS1 anytime soon.
Man.. I hate that I bought an ACS1 a couple of months before the UA pedals came out.. saying that the ACS1 was really good. I do find it hard to work with drive pedals
I had the dream and it was the worts experience I ever have In a live situation, pedal sucks for reals , it’s all lies . It only sounds ok with the clean and adding regular overdrives like tube screamers Anything else won’t sound good won’t work. I being a hard working musician for 25 years , for live no amp situations I normally use the helix or the boss gt-1 and it sounds really good , I wanted to bring my analog board and the dream it’s just a dream , I also tried the other one call 65 something a golden color one and same it sounds terreble.
I have trouble with the dream even working it stops while performing. Opened several tickets-on a pedal?!? Good grief. Think of switching to acs1 or strymon
I feel like the Simplifier has the best FEATURES (XLR stereo out, headphone jack, aux input, fx loop) but worst sounds unfortunately. That being said, I just ordered my dream 65 today.
Is it just me? Maybe the UA pedals spound good and have an amp-like response, but I don't think either of them sound like an actual mic'd Deluxe Reverb or Vox AC30.
Tricky to say...there are so many variables... The way I recorded them for one, but also - what's your take on a Deluxe Reverb and AC30 (rhetorical)... What mics, room, era, guitar etc... Hard to put 'one' sound on those amps.
Simple answer with the iridium is to update the IRs with modern York Audio offerings. IMHO, the ones offered in the iridium are okay, but not in the same class as YA.
I use a Mark V at church. I’ve yet to work with a sound man who good enough to run in ears and if i’m using a wedge i might as well use an amp. If a sound man can’t handle what amounts to me changing channels on my amp, he shouldn’t be running sound. Being limited to one base tone is ridiculous. Do you only play at church?
I still prefer running amps whenever possible as well, but in ears are definitely one of the big perks to it... means I can put my amp in an iso room and crank it. Running an amp on stage (quietly) really is tricky with getting as much out of it as possible. I don't really play anywhere at the moment! ha. It's rare these days. Getting the itch to play more again though.
@@GoodwoodAudio I'd be willing to try in ears at my current church. The regular sound man has a degree from Full sail and has a solid understanding of sound. I use the 4 cable method with an HX FX, and my amp has a footswitch with an 8-pin din. My base tones all come from the preamp of the Mark V. Thankfully, I don't have to crank it to get a decent tone. That is a lot of cabling to run into an iso room off stage. It might be better to run a reactive load and IRs. It would be nice to not be concerned with my volume. When I play bass, it's easier to worship. My only concerns are hitting the right note and following the kick drum. I want to start a more hard rock worship team that does special events. I'm praying the right people will come along. There are not a lot of Christian musicians in the small town I live in.
I've always wanted to get some time with one. Almost pulled the trigger a couple years ago but couldn't quite justify it. Do you have one? Worth the $?
I don’t really get the Iridium dislike. I mean, ever since it came out, it was praised as being an awesome pedal. I see it on tons of boards. Even when the Walrus Audio pedal came out, most people favoured the Iridium. Now the UAFX line comes out and all of a sudden the Iridium is crap? I feel like a lot of the flat character you are hearing on the Iridium in this demo is down to simply tweaking the eq.
fair. I don't think the Iridium is crap by any means... it's just when you hear it against the UA stuff, it highlights how much more life / feel the UA pedals have. Before they existed, that comparison wasn't available. But I still would 100% agree that if you love your Iridium, it's a great pedal! This is all just based on opinion at the end of the day... what an individual 'likes' more than something else...
We spent 30 seconds on each pedal (from memory, B-roll (where might SEE the settings) was done before any actual adjustments were made... The thought being, if you can't get a useable sound on a new pedal in 30 seconds to a minute, it's not an 'amp like' unit. Doesn't need to be 'perfect' but has to be something you can dial up quickly for a gig if needed.
@Dave Davies I didn;t run everything at noon. that was just Broll shots not actual audio. Hence my sarcastic "Don't use your ears" comment... Don't have time for disrespectful people on socials who can't be constructive or at least attempt to be.
I like the sound of the Dream, but consider its options utterly woeful. Primarily, I play bass and am using the Ampeg SGT- DI. Apart from two extra blendable inputs, and a headphone out - which are all great for practice, or can be used to run your own in ears from, I can run four different 1/4” outputs, one completely dry, one with the pre-amp but no IR and one with optional IR. It also has an XLR output with the option to run IR or not. For instance, if playing a gig that is being recorded, I can send the amped as well as a dry signal to the board and still be able to run an FRFR, a slaved amp, or my own IEM on stage. The Dream/Ruby allow the user to send one signal to the desk and then put up with whatever signal the desk sends back through whatever monitors the place has (if they have any).
I know it’s like two years later, but I just discovered this channel after having gotten most of the UAFX amp pedals and loved the blind test. I actually guessed the dream and the ruby correctly…just because I own them. 😂 … but it was still cool to be able to guess correctly. The lead creator of these UAFX pedals put a ton of work and heart into it. I’ve watched several videos where he talks about the level of detail and the legwork they did for each individual amp, and it’s very impressive. A labor of love, I think. Will check out more of your videos. Really enjoyed this one!
I guessed the UAs only because I’ve read a complaint in a review that the Dream is alway too gainy and can’t get clean. And here the second sample was obviously gainier and than the others. And once I heard the UA in the first round, it was fairly easier to hear the same qualities in the second round.
Listening through the Fender round currently. Although I'm late to the game im interested to play it! I guessed the same answers as Tim did before they came out of his mouth so 1-ACS 2-UA 3-Iridium for the Fender round!
Thanks so much for that blind test. I'm looking for a pedal to run into a mixing board for my small home recording studio. So for that use the lack of a headphone jack is not a problem, I will use the board's jack. I've been considering the UA Dream. I was also looking at a Two Notes ReVolt Guitar Preamp Pedal. However, those are not available yet. The advantage of those are that they are a true preamp.
@@BkBk-gy6vr I purchased both of them. The guitar version and the bass version. The Guitar one is way overloaded with treble and bite. It must have been like the SNL Cowbell skit in the development process with that. Someone kept yelling, treble, treble, we need more treble. I can manage it by pre-amping it with my Eden WTDI bass pre-amp. I use it as a compressor anyway. The bass version is better for guitar in my assessment and wonderful for bass. It doesn't have the treble problem the guitar ReVolt has. But overall I'm not as satisfied as I would have wanted to be with the two $400 distortion pedals. I have a Fender MTG Tube Distortion and I find myself going back to. It has a smoother, creamier distortion that I like. I would recommend the bass ReVolt for home recording. It brings my Danelectro 59 reissue bass to life using the clean channel. I also use it for guitar to get a nice tube-amp sound for direct to mixer DAW recording.
@@GoodwoodAudioboss needs tweaking. I just don t hear huge differences between the current generation of sim pedals. The difference between hearing a fender deluxe in a room and a pedal through monitors will always be big. But the difference in sound QUALITY between hearing a miked up deluxe through monitors and this generation of pedal through the same monitors is very small.
I know it's been a year, but why didn't you guys throw the Woodrow in the mix/test? Do you have a separate review on that, or did you not prefer it at all? Thnx, Brent
honestly... didn't have one to test! We only had these two in the shop at the time. Still have never had a woodrow on a setup or had one come through for videos!
Great Vid guys! Thanks for putting this together, any thoughts and rehashing this video with the 2.0 ACS1 update. They say it radically changed the tone and feel of the pedal
Was only interested in the Vox compare, guessed correctly. Have seen a sort of tribal thing in against UA. I've loved Strymon all along but would go with the Ruby Direct In with my Rickenbacker 325cv64. Would love to see a UA Ampeg w/Jensens and UA Hiwatt w/Fanes. The Fender I don't know. I once rented a Twin Reverb w/Altecs over one w/JBLs. I owned 3 Fender Showman heads with 15" Altecs but I didn't have much of an impression at the time.
Thank for this great blind test! I was thinking to get the Dream and now I'm sold. It sounded SO good!
They have different strengths foe sure. Solely based on sound the Dream and Ruby are unbelievable. The nail the tone, character and dynamics of the real thing. The ACS1 is pretty hard to beat in terms of functionality. Having the chance to use two amps at the same time is really neat and in a live band situation it's going to be hard to tell the difference. But I wouldn't use them for recording, while I would do that with the Dream or Ruby. It's a lot to consider when choosing one over the other. But yeah, think of how much of a gamechanger UA will be in a home recording situation. You can get that shure 57 mic'd amp sound in your flat without bothering the neighbours?! Crazy.
agreed...pretty impressive!
Got the dream two days ago, using it for studio recording and it’s quick and amazing
We have to reconsider also on how the pedals are tweaked, finding the right settings makes a huge difference.
Absolutely; Pedal #2 was brighter and louder. He does not only not know Rob Chapman; also for sure does not have his ears, unfortunately.
There is a ton of beauty in simplicity
Would love to see this with the new Simplifier mk2 in the mix if ya'll want to do it again some time. Great video!
ya, I need to include that one for sure!
Got the Ruby. And haven’t looked back at recording my guitars direct. Use an AC15hw1 live, and the Ruby gets me there
awesome! love it. I used it the other day... took me awhile to dial it in that day for one reason or another. But it's still one of my absolute favourites.
will any of these guys pleeeeeeease make a Hiwatt model
ooohhhh good idea!!
Marshall first please!
No
Gilmour’s rig, my friend?
@@muusevic So many Marshall AIAB pedals already. One of the Iridium choices is Marshall. A quality Hiwatt emulation is sadly lacking. Actually a 70s Orange one would be nice too. Also a 60’s Ampeg guitar amp one or 50’s Gibson GA-20 or GA-40. I would like Fender brown emulations beyond just a deluxe, including Blonde and blackface Bassman heads. Crap the list just starts growing!
Great review guys! I tried both the UA Ruby '63 and Dream '65 and felt they were the most convincing modelled amp tones I've tried to date, so authentic and truly amp-like - great pedals! However, I eventually sold them as I'm extremely happy with the ‘captures’ I’ve created of my Kingsley Constable, Jester v2 and Squire D tube preamps, in my Quad Cortex.
Nice! that's great to hear. Kingsley is amazing... big fan.
hey thanks for this comment! I have an hx stomp and I'm very close to sell it to get the Dream 65, do you think it's worth it ?
@@christianpacode6073 Whew, it's never advisable to tell someone what gear they should buy...there are so many variables to consider and tone is so subjective. Personally though and having owned a Helix I feel UAs amp modelling is the next level in this type of technology, it's easy to dial-in and sounds extremely close to the the amp circuit it's designed after. But, the Dream is only a Fender '65 DLXR amp model with Tremolo and Spring Reverb...the HX Stomp is many things. You should really consider what your exact pedalboard needs are and then design your tone(s)/effects the way that works best for you. I hope this helps!
@@777strat thanks a lot! Really appreciate it! I thought about what you said, but honestly i’m not even using more than 2 or 3 amps in the hx stomp and i’m having a hard times getting the tone i want, the worse is getting the sound to cut through the mix when i’m live, when everything is playing my sound get lost. I’m so frustrated at times i don’t feel like playing anymore. But i feel like the dream 65 will give me exactly the sound i’m looking for, especially live.
@Dave Davies 🤣🤣 right. I’m giving the hx stomp more time. Thanks a lot Dave!
Makes you wonder if Strymon and Walrus Audio focused entirely on 1 specific amp based pedal, if they'd give UA more of a run for the money? 🤷♂️ This was a fun video!Thanks for sharing!
Good question!
I don’t think so. UAD has such a different philosophy to the whole “modeling” idea. They are digitally recreating the entire circuit of the hardware they emulate, and using r&d that’s partially funded by their partnerships with scholarly institutional research. Strymon afaik is just trying to make the best sounding digital pedals they can. It would be hard for them to compete with uad’s ethos without taking a totally new approach to their mission statement of their company.
@@adamallington4717 the smart way forward now is machine learning, the research papers and tools are already out there. I expect even the lower priced vendors like NUX to be delivering perfect captures of real amps in the next few years. The product differentiators are going to be features, design and ergonomics rather than tone.
@@flyondonnie9578 Yea, it will be more like a tweakable well done capture I think, soon.
I’m sure they would. They just tried to be all things to everyone.
I'm not sure, but someone in another comment section mentioned that UA claims you can use the outputs on their pedals with a Y cable and run headphones that way.
Haven't heard that... Would be very curious to know if it's true though. I'd be surprised if it was / if you'd be able to get the level needed to do it.
@@GoodwoodAudio
The volume is really.
And you need headphones that are really easy to drive.
Let's be honest here. The spring reverb makes the dream super easy to get.
haha. ya... i did enjoy that.
It was a total giveaway for sure
Ye he dropped the ball there 🤣
It’s why the iridium sounded flat . Not a fair comparison 😔
@@markandclairethomas2062 eh I own both and the iridium sounds pretty lifeless in comparison
I have never been able to make the Iridium Chime sound as horrible as it did here! What did you run it through a 4x10 fender cab? LOL!
When I started playing there were no pedals. We would turn everything up on our amps to 10 for overdrive. Number 2 sounds incredibly close.
Would love to hear your thoughts on this after the ACS1's recent 2.0 firmware update.
me too! Still need to compare them! Too many good amp sim products to test these days.
I agree 100%. When I got an ACS 1 I must have tried 100 IRs to get the few that I like. It’s the only rabbit hole I actually gave up on once I found a few I liked. I use the Vox clean in both sides with two different IRs. The fender and Marshall amps don’t do it for me and I have a 66 Princeton and have owned a Marshall JCM 800.
The ACS1 can also run 2 amps in stereo the Dream can’t so if you sold the ACS1 to buy a Dream you lose half the capability. I use the Walrus live with my pedal board in front and it can sound huge, I’ve never experienced it sounding smaller I think you need to spend more time with it I also use aftermarket IR’s so maybe that’s a factor. Mostly I use a tube amp but some gigs are either limited space or the volume needs to be easily controlled so I went for the Walrus. No complaints from me and I’m a long time tube amp guy.
Hey! Thank you for doing the shoot out :D I’d like to run the Ruby and Dream in stereo with a stereo reverb pedal after, then into a DISO+. I’d like to reverse the polarity after the UA pedals. I’m just not sure how to do this. Is there a simple way to do this before it hits the reverb pedal? Thank you
Just watched your video on phase that was really helpful thank you. I’m looking into a dedicated single line phase inverter box now.
We've had a BUNCH of requests for this... We can do it in a custom junction (email me at info@goodwoodaudio.com if you want to chat more about this) but I think we'll need to come out with something in future that takes care of this issue for these two pedals.
@@GoodwoodAudio thank you!
After a Kemper, I have owned the Iridium, the DLX Simplifier, and the ‘Dream’65. After hours and hours of tweaking (home studio use) , to my ears all of them definitely sound terrible, in terms of tone and dynamics, as compared with my small Fender amps (‘63 Princeton and ‘59 Vibrolux ).
I noticed you had pancake plugs in the UA... would 4 of these fit for running in stereo? specifically the SquarePlug SP400
Yes, 4 SP400’s fit sideways on the UAFX pedals.
@@TimHeerebout awesome, thanks
great video, i need some advise. I have a Katana Artist and I want to do a WDW, using Katana as center and get a Dream UAFX for the effects amp. Can I run the stereo fx out of my stereo reverb into the Dream then stereo out the dream to a mixer. My Katana is also direct out to mixer as well. Any help would be greatly appreciated. If I was to purchase any needed switches it would be from you all as well.. FYI
You could do this, yes. I've run a very similar rig myself and the soundguy loved it. Sounded huge. Only thing you would want to do is run a dry split (with a mute to the dry amp / Katana). We make "Isolator TX" for this purpose. Then you run through your wet effects as normal - Dream (stereo is fine, yes) - Mixer. Now FOH and monitors can mix wet and dry independently! Big win for everyone. Does that make sense?
@@GoodwoodAudio I think so...I was planning using Isolator TX after my compressor and drive pedals. Split it from there. Dry Katana goes center then into mixer. The wet will start from Isolator TX out to my wet effects and stereo H9 and reverb then into stereo in of UAFX - then mixer . Right ?
Side note - I am wondering If UA is gonna make a Marshall type pedal next?You know people would be all over that LOL. Again, thank you for the advice. Let me know that is right? Thank you!
Need to revisit this with the new ACS1 2.0 firmware update.
agreed!
Coudl someone elighten me as i'm kind of new to all these things. If i'm getting rid of my amp and have a Dream or Iridium at the end of my pedalboard, would i be able to go let's say to friends who have a receiver, either stereo or mono and connect my pedalboard to that receiver? And what if i would still want to use my amp, do i bypass the pedal or can i also use the amppedal to create a diiferent sound to my amp?
What’s a receiver? And you would usually turn off or bypass the pedal if you were going to use your real amp.
@@1717jaydog well i mean, let's say you have vinyl turntable, it needs a receiver, like the Teufel Kombo 62 which a friend of mine has. He has with that a speaker left and right for his vinyl. Does it mean i can connect my pedalboard via a iridium and have the sound come of the speakers? He has a Teufel Kombo 62 . Info much appreciated!
I thought 1 was Iridium because it sounded flat, 2 the dream, 3 acs, I thought the 3rd sounded best to my ears
What channel did you guys use on the Ruby?
Sorry, for some reason I wasn't notified of comments anymore. Honestly, it's been so long, I can't remember anymore!
Why not set them all up to sound equally good? It’s definitely possible which makes me wonder why leave some of them sounding so flat and dull…?
We essentially set gain, kept the EQ's fairly equal - although adjust them slightly to suit - and that's it. We could have done EQ after the fact (in post) but with a treated amp (like the mic'd amps these are emulating) seems a bit unfair but an argument could be made either way. We tried to do as little as possible to ALL amp and cab sims and let them speak for themselves as much as we could... But I see your point. We went for "If your headphones were plugged into the pedal for practice - what would you hear... This is close to that approach. Not sure if I'm completely making sense...hopefully.
Fender:
1. Iridium
2. Dream
3. Acs1
Vox:
1. Ruby
2. Iridium
3. Acs1
Too bad you didn’t consider to test the all-analogue Deluxe 61 from Origin effects.
It all hinges on what we have access to unfortunately! Agreed...lot's of other options we could have put here. These are the ones we come across the most though / have access to in the shop.
Guesses:
Fender round:
1: Iridium
2: Dream
3: ACS1
Vox Round:
1:Ruby
2:ACS1
3:Iridium
Fender round / Iridium - Acs1 - Dream
Vox round / Acs1 - Ruby - Iridium
how'd you do?
It's been a while now I can't actually remember the answers...
@Dave Davies haha. I got to respectfully bow out on this since I was turning everything on / off... I'd like to think I'd get them all right, but I have a feeling I'd fall short of my expectations.
Rob Chapman also looks.
I think how you use these pedals, will decide what you like. If you are going to only use these pedals alone, then the Dream or Ruby have a leg up. However, on a decent pedalboard, it does not matter, I have great modulations, reverbs and tone sculpting options that levels the playing field.
Nice. Other gear definitely does make a difference.
Missing from the UA pedals are Effects loops. What's up with that? Balanced audio out would be a great value add too, especially for the price.
For amp / cab sims... it's arguably less of an issue not having an FX loop since you can place them right after dry effects. But I do see your point if you wanted control over pre and post wet effects... However, I think the biggest thing to consider here is just if you want the amp / cab sim placed pre-wet or post since that's really what the FX loop in a tube amp is allowing.
Would you run a dream or a Ruby directly into an amp with no fx loop and if not, why not?
I wouldn't, no. Mainly because the Dream/Ruby are designed to EQ/simulate an amp... so you're running something that should sound like an amp into an amp (including the speaker / IR emulation). I think you'd get some odd results. Not saying you wouldn't find anything useable, just that your EQ is going to sound ... interesting to say the least.
@@GoodwoodAudio I have a Syrincs speaker which I use for my eDrums, would that be the best thing to use or do I need something else like another amp?
@@LysanderLH in theory it will carry the sound assuming you have the correct load (4ohm or 8ohm or 16ohm cab)... But it probably won't sound as good as a cab / speaker designed for guitar.
@@GoodwoodAudio i just recieved the Ruby today, plugged it into the Syrics, unplugged it, put it back in the box and asked for a refund. It was definitely not right for me. The person i spoke to regarding the Ruby suggested a Line 6 Hx Stomp XL and i’m inclined to agree.
@@LysanderLH interesting! good to know. sorry to hear that though.. a bit frustrating. HX stomp is also very good.
Fender round; iridium, dream, acs1
Nice! What was your favourite?
You do not know Rob Chapman? 🙄
Well Rob for sure would ask to level down Treble of the ACS1 to the same amount of the other contestants...
Luckily on this channel we are not bound to Rob! ha. To make it as blind as possible we had to be quick on finding a 'sound' with as little time to pick the pedal as possible... I also think some of the B-roll was before we picked settings...so the video (dependign on when you look) might not be accurate to the actual used settings.
@@GoodwoodAudio 😎😅
No.
If the settings are ‘all knobs at noon’ I’d rather not have watched the whole video….
Honestly... have no idea. I do know when we set the sounds it was eyes closed and what was the best sound we could get out of that pedal. If it's all knobs at noon but sounds best... All knobs were at noon. if it was treble all the way off.. so be it. But we definitely had to do some tweaking to on each pedal before doing the video.
Yeah, but . . . my amp also functions as my monitor.
sounds like you've got a good thing going (an amp is still my fav. choice)
We need to storm UA and protest the lack of headphone jack
Im with you.
Well that was a rather pointless comparison
Constructive feedback is always welcome! But I think you might have met our pointless comparison with a pointless comment...
@@GoodwoodAudio sorry for the mean tone, it’s just the whole point of a “blind test” was immediately lost with all the spring reverb and gain on the dream.
@@Ivan_Posokhin much more helpful! appreciate the detail. Will definitely keep that in mind in future. I think we got so focused on not getting familiar with the pedals (in an effort to keep it as blind as possible) we skipped some important points like what you mentioned.
It was an interesting comparison. But you didn’t say which IR you were using from the pre-loaded options. And the IR selection is there on each of these because it makes a huge difference in the final tone. I have the Iridium and I have one “Favorite” that essentially is my sound. If I just switch the IR out to one of the other 2 options that come in the box, it’s no longer a sound that I like. So if you have a similar comparison in the future, let us guessers know at the end which IR you were using. That’s my request. But again it was very informative as-is. Cheers!
good feedback, thanks!
@@GoodwoodAudioyes, it would be good to do the comparisons with the exact same known great quality IRs. York, Ownhammer, etc. I’ve heard comparisons with Dream and Iridium with the same IRs and it completely changes things. Always hard when comparing 2 variables at once.
Great video guys. The headphone jack doesn’t matter. You can get a dual TS 1/4” to 1/8” TRS Jack for a couple dollars and plug headphones into the Ruby and Dream. UA has said you can do this and I do this with my Ruby often. Use the Master volume to control the overall headphone volume.
Interesting. This hasn’t worked well for me in the past on other units. Maybe UA has included some measure to deal with this correctly. Or maybe I was just doing it wrong haha. Good to know it works with these pedals. That Dream was a dream, but I doubt I’m going to be switching anytime soon.
This works, yes, but the volume output on the ‘65 Dream was wildly lower than is reasonable. It requires nearly cranking the master to get a usable volume. This was with Shure SE215’s and Sony MD705.
It only works well with very low resistance headphones which are generally cheaper ones.
I have used Shure SE215, 315s, and Beyerdynamic DT 770’s (250 ohm). I once used a set of over ear Sennheiser’s but I don’t know the model. Never used any conventional headphones, always monitoring headphones.
The master volume does need to be high but the volume was loud enough for my liking with all these options. The 770s being my favourite.
I’ve only done this when I needed to practice in a pinch. Using a proper interface is obviously preferable. As is using speakers.
I was disappointed you didn’t spend more time trying to get the pedals in their sweet spot with the same tone . You can get the Iridium to sound a lot better than this comparing it to the dream .
Starting with the dream overdriven sort of spoilt that initial test for me 😔
Totally agree... We could have spent more time on each pedal. It was tricky... we were trying NOT to get used to each pedal before the video so it would be harder to blindly pick each one (not used to them as much this way) but there definitely are improvements to make to the approach next time. Thanks for watching!
Yes they are. The UA modelers are storming the pedal world! I’ve converted 4 friends so far haha. From Kempers, stomp and acs1’s.
haha nice!
This was a lot of fun to watch. I reckon a Dream is in my very very near future.
you and me both.
I might be the minority here but I never liked the low end on UA amp plugins which I own many, Buxom Betty, Silver Jubilee, Fuchs etc and can hear that same quality in the UAFX pedal amps. I was surprised to liked the Walrus better than the Iridium which I owned before.
I've never used the plugins from UA so can't speak there... I was also surprised to like the ACS1 more than Iridium... I really wanted Iridium to win, but I couldn't quite get there. Although - no IRs were used, but stock out of the box...no competition.
the stereo amp function on the ACS1 is awesome it really elevates the sound so much !!
a definite perk of that unit!
Yep the combo of stereo amp with Fender and Vox into headphones still makes ACS1 the winner for me, but would probably go the Dream if it had a headphone jack.
I did get everything right on guessing which is which, however having owned an ACS1 I have to say that the "getting smaller with overdrives in front" became much better after the firmware upgrades. Nevertheless I swapped it for the Dream and couldn’t be happier with the sounds I am able to get now. Really stunning pedal with lots of different sounds in it.
Good feedback. Thanks!
1- walrus eras 2- walrus iton 🐴 3- walrus mammoth 🦣
Tech 21 made one few weeks ago, but without inbuilt ir capability
The test is a little obsolete since the V2 firmware update on the ACS1 came out late 2023. The ACS1 was just ok until then but it has completely changed the pedal. UA has done a fantastic job, but people shouldn’t be making any decisions on the ACS1 based on this shootout anymore.
agreed!
Thanks for doing this. I have an ACS 1 and was considering a Ruby. But may look into the Dream now. My reason to change would be if I can delete a drive pedal from my board. I actually run my ACS1 clean and always have 1 drive on. If the UA pedals have a 1st stage drive I like I could see changing it out. Otherwise I am happy with the ACS 1 when I don’t have an amp as an option.
Now Strymon should come up with new Iridium 2.0 firmware. :)
imagine!
Recently did a a side by side with the iridium and the dream 65. Dream 65 does what they claim and does it well, but it’s a one trick pony. The iridium has more options, punch and easier to adjust. Both are great units but I ended up keeping the iridium and offing the dream 65.
Nice! Thanks for the feedback. Thats great to know. Were you using IR's for Iridium?
Anyone of these units can sound bad or good. Iridium can hang with anything else with a quality IR. And the UA still has no Marshall model
nice. Ya, we kept everything 'stock'... Still baffles me how aftermarket IR's can sound so much better than the company that spent so much time and money developing the product in the first place...
So I’m 14:26 into this video, Grant, and I’m bummed that y’all didn’t turn any knobs on the pedals. Why wouldn’t y’all try to get the best tone out of each of them, and then compare. Like, ya know… dial them in the way you would want to play them. Each of them. Then compare. Or, if #2 sounded best to your pastor, then try match that tone on the other 2 pedals.
we started by finding the best sound on each (before the vid) and then did an AB test... We were trying to keep the video as brief as possible, but will definitely keep this in mind for future!
@@GoodwoodAudio You can get better tones out of that Iridium, Grant. I believe in you! :)
Fender: don't know 1 and 3, thinking 2 was UA. Vox: 1 was UA. The dynamic thing I felt was there was more ... chest, more low end punch. Let's see how those guesses ended up ...
nice!
I own iridium, ruby, dream, helix and quad cortex. And I think the ruby and dream are the best. A bit more dynamic, if i had to just pick one then the dream is my favourite as is the real deluxe reverb amp my favourite amp.
good to know. I get so much mixed feedback. Always good to hear from people that have tried a huge range / own a huge range and have put the time in.
This is good to hear. I’m trying to choose between these exact options, and I’m leaning heavily toward getting both the ruby and the dream and calling it a day until someone makes a JC-120 pedal.
Waaaaay too much talking in this video
I didn't see the answers of the blind test, but I'm sure 1-Acs, 2-Dream and 3-Iridium. 2 is the easiest because it's the only one of this pedals that breaks much earlier and like that. It was probably at noon btw. 3 is the Iridium, much less scooped than the others, because you actually need to turn the Mid knob all the way down to get a Blackface sound. It's on the manual, but nobody seems to know and do that. And 1 is Acs, I know very little about it, but sounded very good to my ears.
I have both the Dream and Iridium btw, and I think the Dream is another level of emulation.
Nice Gus. I have to admit - I also didn't know the Blackface tip. Thanks! Ya... Dream is pretty incredible eh. Very impressive.
I like the sound of acs1 best…even in blind test…this makes me happy as I own one 😅…I was ready to be disappointed! Anyway. Thanks for the comparison..it was well done and fun to watch/listen to.
It's even better with good IR's! The David Hislop tone matched AC30 IR is unreal.
Glad to hear it! Thanks for checking it out.
@@claytonmurrayguitar how can i get that ir's??
@@skylarmobis4681 google
I recently sold my iridium to a friend, not because I didn’t like it, but so I could try the ACS1. UA sounds good, but I really like the option of different types of amps and wanted to try different amps left and right, and I definitely couldn’t afford 2 units. Additionally I need the headphone amp. This is absolutely 100% my only practicing tool. Someone suggested getting a 1/4” to 1/8” adapter. In my experience that doesn’t work. In the Iridium (haven’t confirmed with the ACS1) the headphone amp is an actual component that can amplify the sound for headphones. This is why it uses higher amperage while running with headphones. Trying to go out the standard ports with an adapter sounds very poor. I admit I could be doing it wrong. Anyway, on the fender test, I almost thought the UA was the iridium because of the amount of gain. The Vox I really had no idea between the three. I have to say though, on the Iridium and Fender I really loved the sounds I had on mine way more than what was played here. These seemed way more dark and muddy than how I set my pedals. I’m sure it was difficult to try to match but both of those pedals can be set to sound way nicer in my opinion. The dream sounded really nice, but I’m not planning on moving my ACS1 anytime soon.
Man.. I hate that I bought an ACS1 a couple of months before the UA pedals came out.. saying that the ACS1 was really good. I do find it hard to work with drive pedals
it's the way of the industry isn't it? Buy a great piece of gear... and then the next piece gets released.
If they had a headphone out I would buy one immediately.
Oh, and USB-C also.
I had the dream and it was the worts experience I ever have In a live situation, pedal sucks for reals , it’s all lies . It only sounds ok with the clean and adding regular overdrives like tube screamers
Anything else won’t sound good won’t work. I being a hard working musician for 25 years , for live no amp situations
I normally use the helix or the boss gt-1 and it sounds really good , I wanted to bring my analog board and the dream it’s just a dream , I also tried the other one call 65 something a golden color one and same it sounds terreble.
Good to know! I recently tried the Ruby live and struggled with it but really enjoyed the Dream.
I have trouble with the dream even working it stops while performing. Opened several tickets-on a pedal?!? Good grief. Think of switching to acs1 or strymon
@@ericlewis217 Im gona try that one too , yeah the dream is not real lol it was horrible .
@@ericlewis217 never heard of that before. Good to know!
I feel like the Simplifier has the best FEATURES (XLR stereo out, headphone jack, aux input, fx loop) but worst sounds unfortunately. That being said, I just ordered my dream 65 today.
agree!
Less repeated explaining please. I own the ruby. Great pedal.
Great video! Could you please tell me where you go the pedal stands from in the background? 👍
I printed them on my 3D printer. Just whipped up a quick design and made about 10 of them.
@@GoodwoodAudio they turned out really cool, nice 👍
Yakkity yak yak yak...I gave up cuz you can't get to the point.
I´m a longtime UA fanboy. but please do a tonex shootout
I love the ab test. But I wish that you had done the fender emulations and completed that first, and then going into the vox section
good thought!
Good ears! I played along and could pick out the UA units simply on the quality on the treble.
impressive!
I use the dream for recording and it sounds amazing.
Is it just me? Maybe the UA pedals spound good and have an amp-like response, but I don't think either of them sound like an actual mic'd Deluxe Reverb or Vox AC30.
Tricky to say...there are so many variables... The way I recorded them for one, but also - what's your take on a Deluxe Reverb and AC30 (rhetorical)... What mics, room, era, guitar etc... Hard to put 'one' sound on those amps.
Simple answer with the iridium is to update the IRs with modern York Audio offerings. IMHO, the ones offered in the iridium are okay, but not in the same class as YA.
not the first time I've heard this! NEed to check those out.
I use a Mark V at church. I’ve yet to work with a sound man who good enough to run in ears and if i’m using a wedge i might as well use an amp.
If a sound man can’t handle what amounts to me changing channels on my amp, he shouldn’t be running sound. Being limited to one base tone is ridiculous.
Do you only play at church?
I still prefer running amps whenever possible as well, but in ears are definitely one of the big perks to it... means I can put my amp in an iso room and crank it. Running an amp on stage (quietly) really is tricky with getting as much out of it as possible.
I don't really play anywhere at the moment! ha. It's rare these days. Getting the itch to play more again though.
@@GoodwoodAudio I'd be willing to try in ears at my current church. The regular sound man has a degree from Full sail and has a solid understanding of sound. I use the 4 cable method with an HX FX, and my amp has a footswitch with an 8-pin din. My base tones all come from the preamp of the Mark V. Thankfully, I don't have to crank it to get a decent tone. That is a lot of cabling to run into an iso room off stage. It might be better to run a reactive load and IRs. It would be nice to not be concerned with my volume. When I play bass, it's easier to worship. My only concerns are hitting the right note and following the kick drum.
I want to start a more hard rock worship team that does special events. I'm praying the right people will come along. There are not a lot of Christian musicians in the small town I live in.
A Matchless HotBox might have more color than the Ruby. Hard to Tell.
I've always wanted to get some time with one. Almost pulled the trigger a couple years ago but couldn't quite justify it. Do you have one? Worth the $?
guesses:
fender: iridium, dream, acs1
vox: ruby, acs1, iridium
nice! From memory (been a while now) I think you nailed it?!
I don’t really get the Iridium dislike. I mean, ever since it came out, it was praised as being an awesome pedal. I see it on tons of boards. Even when the Walrus Audio pedal came out, most people favoured the Iridium. Now the UAFX line comes out and all of a sudden the Iridium is crap? I feel like a lot of the flat character you are hearing on the Iridium in this demo is down to simply tweaking the eq.
fair. I don't think the Iridium is crap by any means... it's just when you hear it against the UA stuff, it highlights how much more life / feel the UA pedals have. Before they existed, that comparison wasn't available. But I still would 100% agree that if you love your Iridium, it's a great pedal! This is all just based on opinion at the end of the day... what an individual 'likes' more than something else...
What were the settings on each pedal? Were they all set to noon, or were they set to try and sound close to the same beforehand.
We spent 30 seconds on each pedal (from memory, B-roll (where might SEE the settings) was done before any actual adjustments were made... The thought being, if you can't get a useable sound on a new pedal in 30 seconds to a minute, it's not an 'amp like' unit. Doesn't need to be 'perfect' but has to be something you can dial up quickly for a gig if needed.
@@GoodwoodAudio please expand on how you setup the Iridium because I can't even fathom how you made it sound that horrible
Acs win
Over 10 minutes to finally hear the thing? wtf?
These guys... Total idiots am I right?
Lol... did they try to a/b/c them with all controls at noon or something lol... amateur hour
thats the best sound, isn't it? Everything at noon. All pedals. Always. Don't use your ears.
@Dave Davies I didn;t run everything at noon. that was just Broll shots not actual audio. Hence my sarcastic "Don't use your ears" comment... Don't have time for disrespectful people on socials who can't be constructive or at least attempt to be.
I like the sound of the Dream, but consider its options utterly woeful. Primarily, I play bass and am using the Ampeg SGT- DI. Apart from two extra blendable inputs, and a headphone out - which are all great for practice, or can be used to run your own in ears from, I can run four different 1/4” outputs, one completely dry, one with the pre-amp but no IR and one with optional IR. It also has an XLR output with the option to run IR or not.
For instance, if playing a gig that is being recorded, I can send the amped as well as a dry signal to the board and still be able to run an FRFR, a slaved amp, or my own IEM on stage.
The Dream/Ruby allow the user to send one signal to the desk and then put up with whatever signal the desk sends back through whatever monitors the place has (if they have any).
I know it’s like two years later, but I just discovered this channel after having gotten most of the UAFX amp pedals and loved the blind test. I actually guessed the dream and the ruby correctly…just because I own them. 😂 … but it was still cool to be able to guess correctly. The lead creator of these UAFX pedals put a ton of work and heart into it. I’ve watched several videos where he talks about the level of detail and the legwork they did for each individual amp, and it’s very impressive. A labor of love, I think. Will check out more of your videos. Really enjoyed this one!
I guessed the UAs only because I’ve read a complaint in a review that the Dream is alway too gainy and can’t get clean. And here the second sample was obviously gainier and than the others. And once I heard the UA in the first round, it was fairly easier to hear the same qualities in the second round.
Listening through the Fender round currently. Although I'm late to the game im interested to play it! I guessed the same answers as Tim did before they came out of his mouth so 1-ACS 2-UA 3-Iridium for the Fender round!
1-ACS 2-Iridum 3-UA for the Vox round.
Wow, pretty amazing the differences here! thanks for this video yall. Very insightful! 👏🏾
@@tkASAP well done!
anyone can help me where to buy ir's???
Check out www.davidhislop.co/impulse-responses
Thanks so much for that blind test. I'm looking for a pedal to run into a mixing board for my small home recording studio. So for that use the lack of a headphone jack is not a problem, I will use the board's jack. I've been considering the UA Dream. I was also looking at a Two Notes ReVolt Guitar Preamp Pedal. However, those are not available yet. The advantage of those are that they are a true preamp.
The two notes stuff is great as well! So many great products out there these days.
The Revolt is not getting high marks from a lot of people who have had the opportunity to use it.
@@BkBk-gy6vr I purchased both of them. The guitar version and the bass version. The Guitar one is way overloaded with treble and bite. It must have been like the SNL Cowbell skit in the development process with that. Someone kept yelling, treble, treble, we need more treble. I can manage it by pre-amping it with my Eden WTDI bass pre-amp. I use it as a compressor anyway. The bass version is better for guitar in my assessment and wonderful for bass. It doesn't have the treble problem the guitar ReVolt has. But overall I'm not as satisfied as I would have wanted to be with the two $400 distortion pedals. I have a Fender MTG Tube Distortion and I find myself going back to. It has a smoother, creamier distortion that I like. I would recommend the bass ReVolt for home recording. It brings my Danelectro 59 reissue bass to life using the clean channel. I also use it for guitar to get a nice tube-amp sound for direct to mixer DAW recording.
My guesses: Fender Round - ACS1, Dream, Iridium. Vox Round - Iridium, Ruby, ACS1
what audio interface is used?
Scarlett
cool video... ruby and dream are awesome pedals. very tube like feeling! the dream is a bit more flexible and the perfect pedal platform...
ya... I liked it more than I thought I would. Such a great unit.
@@GoodwoodAudio cool 😎 hope uafx make a plexi next ...that would be awesome! 😉
Have you guys checked out Boss IR 200?
Not yet! I need to. Any good?
@@GoodwoodAudioboss needs tweaking. I just don t hear huge differences between the current generation of sim pedals. The difference between hearing a fender deluxe in a room and a pedal through monitors will always be big. But the difference in sound QUALITY between hearing a miked up deluxe through monitors and this generation of pedal through the same monitors is very small.
I do not own any of these pedals (yet), but do own a Pod Go. I liked #1 best, #3 was close.
I do not own any of these pedals (yet), but do own a Pod Go. I liked #2 best.
I know it's been a year, but why didn't you guys throw the Woodrow in the mix/test? Do you have a separate review on that, or did you not prefer it at all? Thnx, Brent
honestly... didn't have one to test! We only had these two in the shop at the time. Still have never had a woodrow on a setup or had one come through for videos!
Great Vid guys! Thanks for putting this together, any thoughts and rehashing this video with the 2.0 ACS1 update. They say it radically changed the tone and feel of the pedal
Ive heard that as well. I haven't spent any real time with the 2.0 update though... But I've only heard good things so far!
Was it too hard to set the gain levels the same?? Damn
What about the Orange Terror Stamp? It actually has a tube preamp inside it…. Has effects loop and cab sim and speaker out…
good question. I dont have much experience with it...have tried it quickly and it wasn't for me, but to be fair I didn't go that in depth with it.
Was only interested in the Vox compare, guessed correctly. Have seen a sort of tribal thing in against UA. I've loved Strymon all along but would go with the Ruby Direct In with my Rickenbacker 325cv64. Would love to see a UA Ampeg w/Jensens and UA Hiwatt w/Fanes. The Fender I don't know. I once rented a Twin Reverb w/Altecs over one w/JBLs. I owned 3 Fender Showman heads with 15" Altecs but I didn't have much of an impression at the time.
Nice. Ya, Ruby is pretty good. Curious if UA will expand this line...
Great video. Very helpful. Thanks!