Cab-Lab

Cab-Lab

• Cab-Lab is an IR mixing and tools utility for the Axe-Fx, by Fractal Audio.
• Available for purchase here.

Cab-Lab: product information

• Create new cab sounds for your Axe-Fx II by mixing up to eight User Cab Impulse Response ("IR") files with Cab-Lab.
• The Axe-Fx II Cab Simulator uses Impulse Response (“IR”) technology to reproduce the tone of a real speaker, including the microphone(s) used to capture it. With over 100 onboard “Factory” cabs representing the most popular speaker types, the unit has tremendous sonic potential right out of the box. An additional 100 “User” Cab memory slots allow you to load your own IRs, effectively giving the Axe-Fx II a limitless range of cab tones. The built-in ability of the Axe-Fx II to capture IRs—including Tone Matches—plus the release of “Cab IR Packs” from Fractal Audio Systems and 3rd party companies like OwnHammer and RedWirez, has helped to propel user cabs to the forefront of guitar tone conversations everywhere, with IR Mixing taking center stage. Just as an artist, producer or engineer would create a guitar tone using a blend of signal from multiple microphones on one or more speakers, some of the best available cabinet IRs are mixes of IRs captured from different sound sources. Individual speaker mic IRs for the Axe-Fx II have been available for years, but you’ve been limited in ways to mix these “in the box.”
• Now, Cab-Lab allows you to combine up to eight IRs in the same way a studio mixer allows you to combine the parallel signals from multiple microphones on a guitar speaker cab. You might blend the big tone of a ribbon on the cone with some sizzle from a close condenser and bring in a bit of large diaphragm for color, or combine the different colors of two favorite 4x12 cabinets in to a single, new hybrid cabinet IR. You just load the individual IRs, set levels using faders, audition the result, and save it to the Axe-Fx II or your computer when you’ve found your sound.
• Cab-Lab is easy to use and connects directly to your Axe-Fx II via USB. All results can be sent to the Scratch Pad for auditioning, saved more permanently to one of the 100 User Cab memory slots, or saved as a SysEx file on your computer. Cab-Lab processes IRs in full 2048 sample “high” resolution.
• The program can even combine IRs in series, allowing you, for example, to “print” the sound of a Tone Match IR onto a Cab IR so the Tone Matching block can be removed from the grid to save CPU power.

Cab-Lab: related topics in Axe-Fx II Owner's Manual

• 5.2.1 User Cabs
• 16.3 Loading User Cab IRs

Cab-Lab: connecting

• Connect Cab-Lab to the Axe-Fx II to be able to send IRs and mixed IRs to the Axe-Fx. You need to install USB drivers first (USB connectivity).

Cab-Lab: UltraRes IRs

• To mix UltraRes IRs, you need the .IR version of an IR. See UltraRes.

Cab-Lab: user forum

• Visit the User Cabs and IRs forum.