Tuner

Show the tuner

On the Home screen or in the editor, press the Tuner soft-knob.

And only on the FM3: hold Tempo.

The Axe-Fx III, FM9, FM3 and VP4 display mini-tuners at several places.

Source signal for tuning

Axe-Fx III, FM9, FM3 

Let you choose the input to which the tuner listens. You can also select ALL inputs.

Axe-Fx II 

Detects signals at the front input of the Axe-Fx II, at Input 1 at the rear and in the SPDIF signal. This cannot be changed. If INPUT 1 MODE is set to LEFT ONLY in Setup, the tuner picks up the source signal at the rear left input only. If it is set to SUM L+R, the tuner picks up the source signal at the left and right rear input.

AX8 

Detects signals at the front input.

FX8 

Detects signals at the PRE input. You can change the global detector to POST input, which you'll want to do when using the FX8 in a POST-only setup.

Muting while tuning

The signal can be muted when the tuner is engaged. Muting only applies to the analog outputs. [1]

You can choose between muting the input or output. Muting the input allows delay and reverb trails to ring out when engaging the tuner.

Tuner on heel-down

The Axe-Fx III, FM9 and FM3 can automatically display the tuner when an expression pedal is at the heel down position, i.e. the value is less than 5%. The best use is to combine this with the pedal as a volume pedal, because, when you set your expression pedal to the heel down position, the tuner will automatically display.

Find the setting for this in Setup > MIDI/Remote > Other.

Flats and sharps

The DISPLAY MODE parameter lets you switch between displaying all flats, all sharps or a mixture of sharps/flats for the displayed note name.

How to tune

Use the neck pickup, hit the string with your thump, turn down the tone control. This will decrease the impact of transients and harmonics.

FRACTAL AUDIO QUOTES

---

[2] With any tuner the rule of thumb is to use the neck pickup. The "fullest volume" is not necessary.

Downtuned guitars

The DOWNTUNE parameter allows simplified tuning when tuning down one to four semitones. The display will read the natural name of the note, i.e. if tuning down one semitone, an Eb will read E. In addition any blocks that utilize pitch information will also be transposed accordingly.

Sweetened tuning

Peterson GTR Sweetend Tuning

Use the offsets below in the Tuner configuration for Peterson GTR Sweetened tuning, from the Gear Page's Strobostomp users: Do you tune your Guitar in EQU mode or GTR sweetened tuning ? discussion:

Note	Cent offset
E1	-2.3
B2	-2.1
G3	-0.4
D4	0
A5	0
E6	-2.3

BFTS Sweetened Tuning

Use the offsets below in the Tuner configuration for Buzz Feiten sweetend tunings (BFTS).

Reference

Note	Cent offset
E1	0.0
B2	+1.0
G3	-2.0
D4	-2.0
A5	-2.0
E6	-2.0

Remote control

FC-6 and FC-12 foot controllers

Fractal Audio's FC-6 and FC-12 foot controllers provide a dedicated tuner action and screen.

External switch

Scroll to TUNER CC in Setup and hit Enter. Click the switch on the footswitch that you want to assign the tuner to. Or configure it manually by assigning the tuner's MIDI CC to a switch on a MIDI controller. An external switch can also engage the tuner.

MIDI CC

The default MIDI CC for the Tuner is 15 on the Axe-Fx II, AX8 and FX8. Keep it like this to avoid issues.

The Axe-Fx III, FM9 and FM3 let you set the CC manually in Setup.

3rd-party MIDI controllers

Certain MIDI foot controllers, like the Gordius, RJM and Liquid-Foot, can show a graphical tuner display that syncs with the Fractal Audio device. This requires that you:

1. Enable real-time MIDI SysEx communication on the Axe-Fx II (Setup) by setting it to TUNER or ALL.
2. Use a suitable cable connection which allows full bi-directional MIDI communications.

To work with the Axe-Fx III, FM9 or FM3, these controllers must either implement Fractal Audio's proprietary communications protocol for those devices and act as a client, or use real-time MIDI SysEx communication (PDF).

MFC-101

The MFC-101 MIDI foot controller has a dedicated tuner command for the Axe-Fx II, when it's running in Axe-Fx Mode.

You can also program the MFC-101 to turn on the tuner by pressing a preset switch:

1. In Edit > MIDI, set IntCC00 to: CC15.
2. In Edit > Preset, scroll to the designated preset and set IntCC01 to: ON.

Troubleshooting

Slow tuner

The tuner display may be a little slow right after powering up the device.

FRACTAL AUDIO QUOTES

---

[3] There are background tasks that run after boot. The tuner GUI thread can get starved if you are using a preset with high CPU usage during this period.

Flickering Axe-Fx II display

PREVIOUS GENERATIONS

---

[4] Display flickering on the tuner is normal. Some do it more than other. It's just the nature of the display. The display uses a ping-pong buffer. One page is updated while the other is displayed. Then the pages are switched. Some flickering can occur during the page switch. The reason it is noticeable more on the tuner is that the display is updated more frequently.

Wrong tuner information when sample rate is not 48kHz

If the device is connected to a DAW which is not set to a 48kHz clock sample rate, the tuner settings may be off.

FRACTAL AUDIO QUOTES

---

[5] The Axe-Fx requires a 48 kHz clock. Anything else will screw up the calculations.

Tuner won't appear or Waiting for tuner... message

If the tuner won't appear after pressing Tuner, verify that the Tuner menu is set to display the first tab page.

Also, for third-party MIDI controllers, SEND REALTIME SYSEX must be enabled in Setup, and the Axe-Fx II, AX8 or FX8 MIDI CC must be set to its default.