New MOTU Product: The ZBox!

[Babz]

http://www.motu.com/products/guitar/zbox

[Radiogal]

Cool. Would be nice if it had a tuner feature too..

[wabbitguy]

My guess is that it will be cheaper than a Radial Engineering JDI and it will be cheaper than a Radial JDI...

Mel

[Phil O]

My guess is that it will be cheaper than a Radial Engineering JDI and it will be cheaper than a Radial JDI...

Mel

A big selling point for the JDI is the Jensen Xformer. MOTU hasn't mentioned Jensen or even specs for that matter. For all we know it could have a Radio Shack tranny in there. Until I know what's in it, I'm not getting excited.

Wait, Radio gal and Wabbit guy in the same thread. There's gotta be a joke in this somewhere. Where's Monkey Man when you need him?

Phil

[wabbitguy]

Wait, Radio gal and Wabbit guy in the same thread. There's gotta be a joke in this somewhere. Where's Monkey Man when you need him?

Phil

Off visiting the Missing Link...

Mel

[bralston]

Cool. Would be nice if it had a tuner feature too..

DP 7.1 has a built-in tuner audio unit plug-in. And since ZBox is meant to work as a direct plug-in to one's audio interface...they probably figured you would just use the new tuner in DP 7.1.

[bralston]

My guess is that it will be cheaper than a Radial Engineering JDI and it will be cheaper than a Radial JDI...

Mel

A big selling point for the JDI is the Jensen Xformer. MOTU hasn't mentioned Jensen or even specs for that matter. For all we know it could have a Radio Shack tranny in there. Until I know what's in it, I'm not getting excited.

Wait, Radio gal and Wabbit guy in the same thread. There's gotta be a joke in this somewhere. Where's Monkey Man when you need him?

Phil

The ZBox is essentially the connection and transistor front end to a classic fender amp...without the amp. It needs no power, just sits in line between the guitar and the audio interface. Since the impedance of a guitar's pick-ups are greatly affected by what it is plugged into...the ZBox will make any guitar plugged into it respond and "pick-up" the strings in a similar manner as if they were plugged into a classic Fender Amp. (I forget which one was specifically mentioned). Then you just use your favorite Guitar amp simulation in DP (or even another 3rd party guitar amp plug-in)...and you will have not only a great sounding guitar track...but it will sound better and the response will feel better to the "live" guitarist hearing themselves back...kind of like it was plugged into a classic amp...and not DI'd into an audio interface. This is all the intent anyway.

No price was mentioned in their presentation.

[waterstrum]

It looks a little bit like this....

http://www.wavesgtr.com/html/product_interface.html

Waves did something good with this one.
I think the PRS connection was a good thing.
Really nice guitar input box.

I'm hoping the MOTU Zbox will be even better.

[daveyboy]

I wonder if it's like the Radial Design "Dragster" (http://www.tonebone.com/tb-dragster.htm) which is an impedance device that's passive. In practice it changes the tone of the guitar from bright to dark, as many DI's sound kind of bright. It's also variable as it has a rotary switch. I guess one would have to A/B the two. I also have the Waves PRS box, which is a DI but has enough gain that one doesn't need a preamp. It's a little darker than something like my Radial J48DI. The thing I use the most now for tracking DI guitar is a big old tube "Red DI" by Adesigns. It's warm sounding and when I go to re-amp the track through a real amp later the tone is similar to if I were just playing through the amp. But, I'd be interested to check out Motu's new item when it comes out. I'm so skeptical that anything is really as good as an amp after my crazy (non stop) quest for computer amp tone but am open to being proven wrong!

[buzzsmith]

Cool. Would be nice if it had a tuner feature too..

DP 7.1 has a built-in tuner audio unit plug-in. And since ZBox is meant to work as a direct plug-in to one's audio interface...they probably figured you would just use the new tuner in DP 7.1.

Did I miss something? DP 7.1?

Buzzy

Never mind: Found the thread. http://www.motunation.com/forum/viewtop ... =1&t=39909

[wabbitguy]

Cool. Would be nice if it had a tuner feature too..

DP 7.1 has a built-in tuner audio unit plug-in. And since ZBox is meant to work as a direct plug-in to one's audio interface...they probably figured you would just use the new tuner in DP 7.1.

Did I miss something? DP 7.1?

Buzzy

Only if you're not actively attending NAMM at this moment where they are demoing 7.1...

Mel

[tonester]

OK:

So what does this box do that is different from the Hi-Z input on my 828MK3? Or is it more like the Hughes and Kettner RedBox without having to have the speaker load on the circuit?

Thanks....

[mikehalloran]

MOTU has a habit of demoing products at NAMM months before release. It would surprise me if DP 7.1 is anywhere near ready for prime time.

[mongoose]

MOTU has a habit of demoing products at NAMM months before release. It would surprise me if DP 7.1 is anywhere near ready for prime time.

Get ready to be surprised, then. As discussed on the 7.1 thread elsewhere on this forum, Magic Dave told people at NAMM the update would be released next week.

[Tim]

Since the impedance of a guitar's pick-ups are greatly affected by what it is plugged into...the ZBox will make any guitar plugged into it respond and "pick-up" the strings in a similar manner as if they were plugged into a classic Fender Amp. (I forget which one was specifically mentioned).

He kept saying, "Fender Bassman", which I thought was kind of funny since almost all Fender tube guitar amps (along with Marshall, Vox, and many others) have the exact same input.