Vox Tonelab LE

The pedal itself has a number of knobs on it, which make it fairly quick and easy to edit. The downside is that there is no way of knowing what values any parameter is set to until you turn its knob, because the display only shows the parameter you are currently tweaking. When you turn a knob, that parameter automatically jumps to the point where the knob is, so you can get some pretty awkward jumps in sound (i.e. if you flip to preset with gain at 2, and your knob gain is left on 8 from the last time you turned it, it will jump to 8 instnatly when you turn it, instead of the preferred behavior where it will wait until your knob reaches its original setting--there is, however an "original setting" indicator on the screen, so that helps a lot).

That being said, the PC editor is the best I have ever used. If you have a MIDI interface, this is definitely a much better, quicker way to edit sounds, as you can see everything all at once. It is a very intuitive piece of software, and is the main reason I give it a 10. Basically, I build my sounds on the PC, dump them to the pedal, and then get away from the PC.

As far as the manual goes, I haven't needed to use it. I guess that says enough in itself.

There are some important settings you have to understand before you start. There is a selectable output type (Amp 1-3, Line 1-2), and if you don't set it properly, it will sound like garbage. I go through a P.A., so my recommended setting is Line 2. This one cranks up the output gain, which was clipping the pedal, so I had to adjust that (I use DiMarzio Evo pickups, which are extremely hot). Also, you need pay attention to which cabinet model you are using. It's easy to ignore it/forget about it, but if you use the Soldano amp model through a Bassman cabinet, yeah, it's going to sound awful. Consult the manual.

Now:
The sound quality is outstanding. I have tried every amp sim under the sun, and still own most of them. I'm a junkie, what can I say? But this pedal had some stiff competition coming in. I am pitting it against NI Guitar Rig 3, IK Amplitube 2 (and JHE), Waves GTR, Line 6 Gearbox/Pod, Alien Connections Revalver MkII, and tons of great freeware solutions, and this one rocks them all. The tube really does help. Sure, it seems gimmicky and silly, but there is a separate control for tube gain, and man does it saturate when you crank it!

It's not quite as instantly gratifying as some of the others--you kind of have to learn what works for each amp, and what settings it can handle. It takes a little bit of time. You also have to learn to balance out your tube gain and channel gain knobs to not clip the output of the virtual amp. You should DEFINITELY read the notes (in the manual and in the PC editor) they include for each amp, as they tell you how to get the most out of them. I am particularly fond of the AC30 models, the Plexi, and the Soldano. All very nice sounding.

I am not much of an effect guy, so my opinion on those is limited. I am really more interested in just having a nice sounding amp without having schlep around a half-stack or a laptop. That being said, the effects are nice. I still use a couple of my own pedals in front, but I would have no hesitation using only the Tonelab LE and nothing else.

I would gig without a backup, but I tend to live in a "best-case scenario" kind of world, so I may not be the best person to listen to on that. The unit is solid metal. Nothing flimsy about it. Hasn't failed me yet, although I have read some stuff about the expression pedal going "floppy". Hasn't happened to me. I am satisfied with its reliability, but I haven't really owned it long enough to give a proper opinion on it.

Haven't had to deal with them, so no opinion.

I play a little bit of everything. I do metal on my own (for which the Soldano model is almost perfect), and classic rocky-kind of stuff with my band (for which the Plexi or AC30's keep my happy), and this pedal does it all with somewhat ease.

I have been playing for twelve years, and I own all kinds of other crap. I buy stuff and sell all the time. I just like to try everything to make sure I am well informed. I am currently trying to sell my tube half-stack. No, the Tonelab cannot fully replace a real tube amp, but the difference is seriously minimal.

If I lost it, I would definitely get another. No hesitation.

I love pretty much everything about it. I have no complaints worth mentioning.

I give it a 10 overall. Any complaints I have about it are small and pointless. For $400, this thing is perfect. No need for a heavy tube amp or a laptop to run PC amp sims. Just take your pedal and cables, and you're ready to go.

Beats a POD with no questions asked. POD's are nice, yes. But the Tonelab LE is much warmer, punchier, and more responsive to your playing. The main issue with most amp sims is the high gain stuff gets too fizzy. Tonelab can do it. It takes some tweaking, but you can get some pretty serious distortion, without even resorting to the pedals.

Just look on YouTube for Tonelab LE. There are all sorts of idiots "demoing" the Tonelab LE. Really, all they're doing is shredding with the Soldano head set to sound like Van Halen, but whatever. If you're YouTubing for anything on Tonelab, look for the Korean guy. He gives a good demo. Everyone else is just more interested in showing how many notes they can play in a second.

I played around a lot with this pedal i am quite a techy and it sounded great through my headphones when i was playing around with it, i want to go straight into my loop station and then to the pa. i got some presets setup pretty easy...

the tuner is stupid to work though

i use a vintage peavey amp and lots of guitars and i have a pod, i dont like the pod though, its great for recording but through a pa or amp it sucks and unfortunely this thing did too. i did a rehearsal and it sounded crap through a pa my bass player said it wasnt good either. next rehearsal i used my trusty amp and i got back to sounding **** hot agian with all my pedals. its funny when you got a full band the verbs and delays just dont cut through and the overdrive just forget it.

its very clean though

no, i wouldnt purely cause i want to take it back

no thanks

ive played 20 years and i dont claim to have a good idea of sound, im not a purist but i just thought it sounded ****. better than the pod and great for recording im sure but i wouldnt use it live, even though my amp weighs a ton ive never heard a better sound.

that wah wah is stupid too, you cant have an overdrive and a wah at the same time, you can have an overdriven amp and a wah but i like to have clean then overdrive and then overdrive and wah.

It`s easy to get a good sound out of it. It`more difficult to get a great sound out of it. You have to tweak for a while. First get rid of al the factory patches. They are really overdone like always. Editing patches is not a problem. The manual is ok.

I use it direct over a PA system using Ln1 output. Guitars are a Les Paul Custom and a Ibanez JS1000. It`s not noisy. Here is the secret to get great tone. Don`t use tons of gain. Whit this unit less is more. Take for great leads the us modern amp with the comp stompbox. Keep the gain below 3 to avoid sizzling and digital sounds. Tweak the eq to match your guitar and amp and you have a nice tone with lots of sustain. And no noise. And yes, also very good metalsounds. The effects in this unit are good to use. But al depends on good tweaking. Take your time and don`t overdo it.

This unit does a 130 gigs a year and it has never let me down. I never gig without a backup. Something can always happen. I can drop my beer in it or so.

Never dealt with them

I play several kinds of music playing in a coverband. If it was stolen i would get another one. (have 2 already). For me this is the way to play. I can get many sounds without it sounding digital. Some tips. Use black 2x12 + vox ac30 sim for clean sounds and usmodern + ukt75 for distorted sounds. Keep the gain low to avoid hiss and digital noise.

Ok, its probabilly best if I just tell of the bad points for this unit because it will help potential buyers decide more than the good points.

Things I found slightly annoying:
- In order to start the tuner in mute mode, a pedal has to be held down for around 2 seconds, this gets kind of annoying if I wanted to tune quickly.
- There are two stomp switches for switching the bank up and down which are located directlu above other stomp switches that are used for effects etc. I find that sometimes I accidentally press the lower ones rather than the bank ones I'm aiming for
- I have heard that the tube/valve is hard to replace but havnt done it myself

Other than those points above the unit is very easy to use, the menu's took a while to learn (couple of hours) but now that I know them its great!
Much easier to use than the likes of the Line6 PodXT which I also have

Sounds quality is excellent, the tube/valve in there really makes a difference.

Nothing more to be said, its just pure brilliance!!

I have had it only 3 days now but it looks very sturdy and reliable in its metal casing.

And yes, I would use it in a gig without a backup, definiely!

I'm not going to give this catagory a score though because I've only have it 3 days.

Havnt dealt with them yet so dont really know

I would rate this a definite 10 because of the excellent sound quality, rugged construction.

It definitely is fantastic value for money considering Line6 have other units that sound nowhere near as good for more money

It does require some study of the manual to edit but not bad.

Love the effects, great sounds when it worked.

I have had it in the shop longer than I have owned it.

The worst, One part has been on order from the factory for a 6wks, my warrany will expire by the time it get the pedal back

Nice great sounding pedal, However a nightmare to get it worked on and the customers service is BAD. You would think for 400bucks it should work longer than 50days. No exchange program so my pedal has been in the shop for 3 months and counting!

How easy is it to get a good sound out of it?:
I think it is very easy. I had some problems in the very beginning, but I learned really fast, as this multieffect is really easy to understand.

How is the manual for it (if there is one)?:
The manual is very easy and... it is not many things to explain. Everything is clear from the very beginning, according to my opinion.

Are certain effects (distortion, chorus, ...) very good? Very bad?:
I have read pretty many reviews of the Tonelab LE saying that it is impossible to get a "metal-sound" out from it. Either the ones who wrote those reviews are really incompetent, or else they havent even used a Tonelab LE. After a couple of minutes I managed to get the most brutal, deep Death Metal distortion-sound. No problem.
Except metal-sounds it is very easy to get... all the types of sound that you need. And they are really clean too. The best pedal ever made! ;)

Is it noisy? On what settings?:
It gives a little noice when using high gain, but you cant find any amp/multieffect that isnt. I think thats gives a little extra charm to the music, when you hear some noice between the riffs...

Defenitly. This is a very stable thing. 100% made of steel. Really heavy, and it wont move on stage if you by mistake would touch it. Its almost stuck to the floor.

Best multieffect ever made. What else is there to say?

It is very easy to get a good sound from this one. Very much more simple generally than other effects, like Pod or Boss GT-8, as an example. The manual is very clear and easy too.

Some people say that it is impossible to get good metalsounds out of this one. But I dont agree about that. If you just take your time, using your skills, to set the sound - it is defenitely NOT impossible to get metalsounds.

Otherwhise the sound is very clean, and it defenitely sound professional. This would sound very well as well in the rehearsalroom as in the studio, I think (even if lined).

It is a heavy, steel-built thing. And that is very good. If you compare this one to Boss GT-8, this feels more stable, as the GT-8 is very plastig. The GT-8 is all black to. This have more lights, and different colors om some of the buttons, which makes them easier to find, if it is very dark...

My best multieffect. It can be used to the most professional things. But if your in a huge band as a guitarplayer, that's going to tour all over the worls, needing millions of different sounds - then you might go for custom made pedals. But this is defenitely the best there is to get, for this price!

SOunds are decent right out of the box. Pretty easy to use. Took about an hour to get the gist of it when I first bought it.

Effects are all generally good. THe fizz on the distortion drives me nuts, though,. I've used a Line 6 Pod before this, and the Tone Lab is probably the best amp modeler I've found. That said, I am not crazy about the direct sound of any amp modeler when recording. If you have the space to do it, you are still better off mic'ing your amp, and playing with the controls, and this can give you a lotof flexibility when plugged into your amp like any other efect pedal. WHen used this way, you can turn the cabinet sounds on and off, experiment with just the effects, flip through the amp models, etc. My favorite setting for rock is the 4 x 10 Tweed, with the fat distortion and the cabinet turned off, with an sm57 in front of the cabinet. The guitar and amp just sings. SO I use mine as kind of a high end effect like Chandler TUbe Overdrive with a loit more flexibility. I still contend that this is the best direct recording box out there, but I am of the opiniopn now that I'm not crazy about any of them. A Mic'd amp is still the way to go , in my opinion. However, this box gives you a great sound and a lot of tools to use, but like anything, takes some work and experimentation to find your sound. Used the way they intended, still sounds kind of artificial to me. Used in combo with a good amp, you can get a lot of great sounds out of this. CHeck out my web page on Garageband., http://www.garageband.com, and search under Chuck Mott, most song were recorded using it direct, the latest, Watching her Dance, was a mic'd amp with a with the LE.

Never had a problem with it, have owned it six months now.

Never had to talk with them.

I have played in various bands, country, rock, experimented with jazz, you can use this for any style and find a good useable sound. I've been playing about thirty years, gigged quite a bit, but never with the Vox. I'm more in recording now. I think if it were lost or stolen,I'd first experiment with some good pedals,but I have a strong suspicion I'd just return to the Vox. WHat do I love about it? The flexibility, the number of effets, the tone when mic'd after some hefty experimentation. WHat do I hate? The fizz sound in the distortion. Like any other amp modeler, the fact that it doesn't come close enough to a mic'd amp for my taste. Then agan, buying just three of these amps would cost you thousands. When micing my amp, I find the sounds often sound less artificial with the cabinets turned off, but that is a matter of taste, I suppose. ANything I wish it had? I experimented with Guitar RIg (BTW, I still prefer the amp and Vox to this most excellent software), and I like that you can combine amps, you can't do that with the Vox. DOes it help me make music. ABsolutely. Am I happy I bought it? Yes.

I didn't need the instructions to get started listening to presets and isolating individual effects and tweaking them, so it's pretty basic (which is good) if you're used to multi fx at all. Once you go deeper the manual was pretty easy to understand.

This is where I had a problem. I couldn't wait to get this thing away from my amp. After reading so many glowing reviews I couldn't believe how bad the presets sounded through my amp.

I was really buying this hoping I could just use effect patches in front of my amp and the amp models would be a bonus if they sounded good. I initially tried the output setting in "amp 1" which was muddy beyond belief, I tried the other amp modes an eventually found the "line 1" setting to sound best. Go figure.

I turned off all the effects/models to hear the individual effects on there own, and the sounded o.k., not bad but nothing great. As soon as I started mixing a number of effects together the sound went south. I had hiss an some real digital sounds. After hours of tweaking (the board, not me) at best I was able to get some sounds that were decent that I would play with. I'm sorry, but for $400 somthing should make me go "wow!" within the first hour, and nothing ever made me say that. There was no sound that was better out of this than I was already getting with my amp an a few pedals.

Now that I've bashed this unit hard, here's the good. Unlike many other multi FX the basic tone of my guitar remained the same which is a big step up. The biggest problem was indeed my own fault, these modelers really work better direct into a PA or a flat response/full range amp and I was playing through a Fender Hot Rod, which really has it's own characteristics. When I played through an OLD Roland 10 watt practice amp, which has NO sound of it's own, the LE really made that little amp sound big, so it did it's job there. I found some good overdrive sounds with it through the Roland.....but I'm not about to start using that as my main amp.

I returned it after one weekend.

I have no use for this as it didn't get any great sounds for me. IF you have an amp that you already really like I'd spend the $400 on some quality dedicated pedals to help shape the sound, or save up for a quality rack system.

BUT, if you are in a situation where you play direct through a P.A., or into a computer or recording this could be the ticket. that's why I had to give this unit at least a 7 on overall because it should be if you use it where it works best. The fact that it has line out settings so it will be compatible with different amps is a joke an implies it should work well with them, and with the three amps I tried it on it only improved the sound out of the cheap one.

I own thousands of dollars worth of Line6 gear. I was in the market for a something like the PodXT Live unit - then I went and tried one. It was overly complex with lots of screens and menus, and it looked like it was made cheaply.

The VOX Tonelab LE was very nice, and extremely easy to use. The nice big chicken-head knobs make this unit a breeze to learn. This is a very musician-friendly device...it feels and behaves like an amp under my foot (as opposed to having to learn a bunch of sterile, digital, techno-geek, computer-related nonsense).

One of the things I really don't like about Line6's gear is that I have to spend a week getting rid of the horrible sounding, effect-drenched presets and customize it to my liking - not an easy task considering the bit-head menu editing stunts you have to know. In sharp contrast, I was really surprised at how good the presets sounded on the Vox Tonelab LE. In fact, I just rearranged them numerically so that I could access them in the order that I wanted without making any modifications to them. What a refreshing change!

The knobs are laid out very well, and interfacing with this device is very intuitive. I'm very impressed. I like being able to grab big knobs, set it the way I want to, and then hit 'save'. Wow what a nice change!

I didn't honestly notice it at the store because of all the background noise that other people were making. When I got the unit home, I plugged my headphones into it and was shocked. I couldn't put my guitar down. I've heard people make comments before about modeled amps, and how some sound better than others. To me, they all sounded the same and I thought folks were just posturing and being religious about their gear. Now I know differently - the Tonelab LE sounds better.

As I flipped through the presets on the Tonelab LE I noticed something...(remember, I've been used to Line6 gear)... The amp models are amazing. They have a smoothness to them that I really didn't expect. I don't feel like I'm describing it very well, but all of the amp models, even the slightly overdriven amp models just sound so musical. I know there's an onboard tube in the unit, maybe that's where it's coming from - I don't know. I don't really care...all I know is that I have never had such an amazing tool and it's bringing out a tasteful, musical tone that I haven't ever had before.

Again, I was going out to buy the PodXT Live unit - then I tried one. It looked like it was made cheaply, with the same cheap plastic components that are on my FBV4 (Line6) foot pedal (which is just a dumb controller footpedal for the Line6 Spider amps). I was disappointed with my FBV4 because the pedals feel cheap, and the wah/expression pedal has a lame switching mechanism (cheap cheap cheap) so I surely didn't want the PodXT Live because it looks like the same cheap clunky components were used.

The Vox Tonelab LE was set up in the store for a demo, so I took it for a spin. I immediately noticed the nice shiny metal switches and felt more comfortable with the higher quality of the board itself. My goal is to use this live every weekend, so I don't like spending money on something like this if it feels cheap - the Tonelab LE is built like a brick *&%$-house. VERY NICE!!

Haven't had to deal with them.

I would say this, the PodXT Live is "Quantity", while the Tonelab LE is "Quality". In other words, the PodXT live is going to give you a gazillion amp models (many of which will never get used), and the Tonelab LE will give you 16 EXTREMELY high quality ones that you will use all the time - in a sturdy road-worthy package.