The controls of the ENGL FX Rack
5. INPUT GAIN:
If you want to drive the input of the ENGL preamp harder or softer you may adjust
the input gain to your liking. Some single coil pickups from older or vintage guitars
may deliver low level output which can be compensated with the INPUT GAIN.
The opposite goes for a lot of heavy metal style humbuckers. If you have recorded
the DI signal too hot or if you are using other plug-ins before entering the ENGL amp
plug-in you may want to dim the input signal.
With most standard guitars you can and should leave the INPUT GAIN at 0 (zero)
though.
6. Internal POWER SOAK:
In the real world power soaks are being used to reduce the volume of a guitar pow-
er amp. This way you can crank up a (tube) guitar power amp to drive it until it
starts clipping, and still record at a volume which will protect your hearing and keep
the neighbors friendly.
A clipping tube power amp adds distortion and harmonics to the guitar amp signal
and is something most guitar players love. A fully cranked up tube guitar amp tamed
in volume with a power soak will sound different than the same amp with the master
volume turned down.
We have modeled the behavior of the ENGL tube power amp, so you may experi-
ment with different settings of the Master Volume of the amp and the internal
POWER SOAK. We recommend a setting of roughly -10dB for most scenarios.
7. PRE-AMP and POWER AMP Activation:
BYPASS PRE:
With the BYPASS PRE switch you can switch off the ENGL preamp completely,
which may be wanted if you record your own hardware (tube or solid state) guitar
preamp with the ENGL amp plug-in.
In this case you may still use the internal POWER AMP and speaker / REC CHAINS
simulation and will be able to achieve amazing results recording your guitar sounds
without using an external power amp and speaker.
Switch up: Preamp is bypassed (off), Switch down: Preamp is active (on).
BYPASS POWER AMP:
If you want to use only the distortion of the ENGL preamp you may switch the pow-
er amp simulation off. This may sound cool if you use the ENGL plug-in to distort
other signals than a guitar. For a realistic guitar recording we recommend leaving
the power amp on, as it is an integral part of the overall sound of the amp.
