# Bias FX 2



## narad (Mar 22, 2019)

New BIAS is out, and usual social media guitar demo simu-launch:





Loads of features, but still sounds so bad? Haven't heard Fluff sound so bad in a looong time!


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## KnightBrolaire (Mar 22, 2019)

ola sounded alright with it, but I still wouldn't waste my money on bias based off the other clips.


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## mnemonic (Mar 22, 2019)

Does anyone actually use bias? Seems like it’s always had YouTube hype but it never translated to actual users, past people using the app for practice or because they can’t afford anything better. And even then, half the people using it seem to say “yeah it sounds bad but I use it anyway.” 

There was that Bias head that I never saw anyone use, ever, as well.


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## Metropolis (Mar 22, 2019)

mnemonic said:


> Does anyone actually use bias? Seems like it’s always had YouTube hype but it never translated to actual users, past people using the app for practice or because they can’t afford anything better. And even then, half the people using it seem to say “yeah it sounds bad but I use it anyway.”
> 
> There was that Bias head that I never saw anyone use, ever, as well.



Everyone is making a commercial about Bias, and afterwards end up not using it in any situation. In my opinion even Ola can't get this thing to sound good.

I was really bummed when Epica started using Bias Heads, don't know if they still do. It was a huge downgrade in terms of tone from Dual Recto or Bogner Uberschall.


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## trem licking (Mar 22, 2019)

Bias is the worst amp sim out there by far. HARSH highs and tough to dial in... Doesnt sound real at all haha


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## cyb (Mar 22, 2019)

Bias was terrible in my experience. They are very good at somehow getting enough money to throw at youtubers to hype their shitty products though.


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## axxessdenied (Mar 22, 2019)

nope


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## Elric (Mar 22, 2019)

I love Bias. It’s not my favorite amp sim but it is up there. I have a number of matches shot from my Axe III that are stellar.... It sounds better than my HX Stomp and Helix Native, IMHO.

People have issues with their marketing and pricing which I can understand but if you know how to work it (the PG workflow is a bit different I think) it’s a great product and this upgrade really is excellent.


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## Andromalia (Mar 24, 2019)

I bought the first one out of curiosity. NEVER AGAIN.
/Merlin


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## Catalyst Collide (Mar 24, 2019)

Haven't used the new one, didn't like the old one. I feel that it's a bit overpriced. TH3 (or THU) and Fortin NTS get my vote for best on the market.


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## MaxOfMetal (Mar 24, 2019)

Bias is a fucking Greek tragedy. 

Such great ideas and concepts, but the tone seems at least a generation behind.


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## Flappydoodle (Mar 25, 2019)

I ever thought it sounded that bad. The tone matching and tone cloud are great ideas. Presets from other people 70-80% of the time sounded like shit though - way too loud, way too quiet, or some other weirdness for me. But if you did your own tone matches to album guitar stems, or a real amp, then it sounded great.

The problem is their business practice. Obviously they are straight-up paying Youtubers for promotion, but the constant paid add-ons, the lack of support etc. means I won't buy from them again. Especially frustrating when half the presets don't work because you didn't purchase extra expansion packs with whatever pedals or new amps.

Compared to NeuralDSP, who have products which sound *excellent*, and are also constantly releasing free updates with lots of features. They added a whole cab sim section to the Darkglass pedal, even though I'd happily paid for just the pedal more than a year ago. And they just added two new pedals to the Nameless Suite, along with a bunch of presets from Ola, Teemu and others. That's great support and it encourages me to buy from them in future, because I know that whatever I buy will get better. With Positive Grid, I know I'll be nickel-and-dimed for new features.


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## AkiraSpectrum (Mar 25, 2019)

I liked Bias FX 1 as a replacement for my Line 6 POD Farm. Overall I could get some pretty good tones from FX1 but after I played some other amp sims I found they were more 'authentic/real' sounding than Bias FX. 

I think what bothered me the most after comparing to other sims was Bias FX1 had a very unnatural low end attack to my ears. 

I think Positive Grid did really well in the mobile market when they first came out, but everything they've been doing since has been lacking in comparison to the competition. It also seems like the mobile (phone) market completely disappeared.

I have yet to play Bias FX2 but I haven't seen anything that will make me want to try it again. FX1 was a resource hog and crashed way too often on me. Now that I've upgraded to Line 6 Helix Native I'm pretty sure Bias FX2 doesn't have a chance.

I would like to take this opportunity to share the only good bias fx 2 demo I've seen, and maybe its just because Lari Basilio is just a killer player that I like it, lol.


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## trem licking (Apr 4, 2019)

trem licking said:


> Bias is the worst amp sim out there by far. HARSH highs and tough to dial in... Doesnt sound real at all haha



alright... I've gotta eat my own words here. Out of curiosity, i downloaded the demo of bias fx2... and holy shit they really did up their game finally! I've spent the last few hours trying out different tones and effects and this is WAY better than what it used to be. From this point on, i feel like i gotta quit hating on positive grid... at least in regards to the bias 2 software. As of now, I'd still recommend TH-U overall as an amp sim but this is now actually a viable option. should be even better once MIDI is implemented.


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## Catalyst Collide (Apr 4, 2019)

Interesting - is the demo full featured for a limited time or does it do that annoying cut out every 30 seconds thing? I was just thinking about this the other night - I had heard a couple other demos and figured I would do the same as you did. I'm a TH3 user as well, if it can compare to that the big thing that Bias has in it's favor it community.


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## StevenC (Apr 4, 2019)

trem licking said:


> alright... I've gotta eat my own words here. Out of curiosity, i downloaded the demo of bias fx2... and holy shit they really did up their game finally! I've spent the last few hours trying out different tones and effects and this is WAY better than what it used to be. From this point on, i feel like i gotta quit hating on positive grid... at least in regards to the bias 2 software. As of now, I'd still recommend TH-U overall as an amp sim but this is now actually a viable option. should be even better once MIDI is implemented.


You might even say you no longer have a bias


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## sezna (Apr 4, 2019)

I think the high gain tones can be rough and digital sounding. When I need a random tone I don't have all the gear for though, it is a good backup plan to have.

edit: also when i just wanna add some effects to my signal post recording


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## Catalyst Collide (Apr 18, 2019)

Just tried to install the demo to see how it's been improved. Downloads and installs fine, but both the plug in and stand alone version get stuck on the loading screen with no interface and no option to do anything but quit. Sent a email to their help desk, but I have low expectations since I'm not a paying customer. I'm on a Mac running Yosemite by the way (logic is my DAW). If anyone stumbles across a fix, let me know. Haven't found one yet.


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## c7spheres (Apr 18, 2019)

I really don't hear what everyone is talking about. I watched that Stevie T guy on a YouTube video titled BIAS vs AXE FX 2, so it's the older Bias and it sounds really good, and from what I heard the Axe2 doesn't sound $2,000 better for that tone. Is that video a lie or something then cause it says in the video there was no post processing etc. I don't see what is so shitty about the tone and for a couple hundred bucks certainly sounds better than stuff. What am I missing here?


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## Soya (Apr 18, 2019)

Depends if you can get that sound in your own room/setup though. I too was persuaded by bias to run an iPad rig but I never got any gain sounds I was happy with.


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## JesperX (Apr 19, 2019)

MaxOfMetal said:


> Bias is a fucking Greek tragedy.
> 
> Such great ideas and concepts, but the tone seems at least a generation behind.



The cold hard truth right here. I was really excited when I first discovered it, which then slowly faded as all of the cool functionality resulted in the sounds of ass over and over.

I’ll give 2 a shot just because I use Bias/JamUp as a quiet practice option from time to time. Almost every other sim I’ve tried sounds better though, and for recording I’ll take amp + load box every time.


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## ChugThisBoy (Apr 19, 2019)

I've had JamUp on my iPhone back then when it was more popular and I was very surprised how good it sounds. Then I've tried Bias and all the joy dissapeared


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## Metropolis (Apr 19, 2019)

c7spheres said:


> I really don't hear what everyone is talking about. I watched that Stevie T guy on a YouTube video titled BIAS vs AXE FX 2, so it's the older Bias and it sounds really good, and from what I heard the Axe2 doesn't sound $2,000 better for that tone. Is that video a lie or something then cause it says in the video there was no post processing etc. I don't see what is so shitty about the tone and for a couple hundred bucks certainly sounds better than stuff. What am I missing here?



Axe II fits in a mix much better and doesn't sound nearly as artificial or compressed, Bias just doesn't even feel good when playing. But of of course DI and hardware has it's affection in that matter, still you can't compare a mediocre software to high end hardware unit. Is it really a 2K$ difference, for some it is and some not.


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## c7spheres (Apr 19, 2019)

Metropolis said:


> Axe II fits in a mix much better and doesn't sound nearly as artificial or compressed, Bias just doesn't even feel good when playing. But of of course DI and hardware has it's affection in that matter, still you can't compare a mediocre software to high end hardware unit. Is it really a 2K$ difference, for some it is and some not.


Thank for the input. That's what I'm tryong to figure out, becuase in the mix in that Video I was talking about that sound almost identical. I doubt in a blind test anyone could hear the difference at all. So what I'm sayng is that video like a false representation or something? I understand that the feel could vary greatly based n the interface and system used and the AXE would probably feel better because of it being a dedicated hardware unit, but ultimately the Axe is just a weak computer (what like a 2gb processor or something?) with software inside. This is something almost any normal computer could do, but the value in the Axe I'm sure comes from the selected hardware interface and converters etc chosen for this application, which would possibly be rivaled, I would think with higher end third party components. I'm just trying to figure out if the Video I was watching is bullSh!t, because it seems like it is based on what I'm reading here and other users experiences, but based on that video I can't see people bias bashing or whatever for such a small difference. My guess is that the video is bs and in reality the differences between Bias and and AxeFx are far greater.


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## trem licking (Apr 19, 2019)

The thing with bias is it does not react as you would expect a real amp to react when you dial it in. Weird shit happens... As you turn up/down gain, bass, mids and treble, there is some crazy artifacting that happens. All the high gain amps are loose n farty too, they HAVE to be boosted if you want a useable tight metal sound... Not that that matters much but its something to note. Also the attack is a bit weird and plasticy compared to other sims/a real amp. I spent a few days with bias 2 and while i do think it improved a bit (especially some of the effects and cabs), the amp behavior is still strange. That being said, i think now you can dial in a useable sound where as before it was much more difficult to do so. After they implement midi it will be a cool piece of software, especially for an ipadder.

But fire up TH-U or amplitube after messin with this for awhile, and the blanket still feels like it gets lifted off your monitors a bit. Anyone thinking about buying bias fx needs to try TH-U first. Comparable features, better sound and interface and already has a simple midi setup


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## Catalyst Collide (Apr 19, 2019)

trem licking said:


> Anyone thinking about buying bias fx needs to try TH-U first. Comparable features, better sound and interface and already has a simple midi setup



Couldn't agree with you more. I'd add - when TH3 or THU goes on sale it's a much better bang for the buck (I paid $135 for the max TH3 version).

That said - let me follow up to my previous post - I finally got Bias FX 2 demo to run on my computer (it was an Mac OS thing that was easily fixed) and... I'm bummed about the demo. Not the tone per say, but how much they kneecap the demo. I could deal with the "plays annoying loud sound every 5 minutes" thing - as absolutely stupid as that is, but the fact that it's not full featured (don't get all the amps, cabs or pedals) just kills it for me. One of the things I was most interested in trying was the fuzz and ambient pedals, but they're locked. Fuzz is my dirt of choice, so not being able to give that a test run makes the whole thing pointless from an evaluation purpose. Overloud gives you a full 30 day trial with all the features. Neural DSP gives you 14 days with all the features. Bias gives you a kneecapped feature set and for the first 7 or 8 days it gives you an annoying buzz ever 5 minutes. After those days, the buzz happens every 60 or 90 seconds (can't remember, don't feel like looking it up). Not being able to try the features I'd be most interested in does not entice me to plunk down $300. PG is obviously free to decide how they want to entice users, and they seem to be doing just fine - but it doesn't work for me.

Business practices aside - from the little I played around with it I will say I think it does sound and feel a little better than Bias FX 1, but I can't say anything I heard made me feel it was better than TH3 or any of the neural stuff. I wanted to a/b it against my normal tones, but was unable to get close because of the limitations. I got some decent sounds that weren't my standards, but nothing I felt I couldn't get out of TH3. The strongest thing Bias has going for it - and as a TH3 user I'm envious - is their community of players who upload their presets. There's a lot of not so great tones, but some good ones as well - it's a quick way to get a starting point and I dig that. I hope with the TH-U integration into the Slate bundle that will start to change, but I don't think overloud makes it easy to share presets (or at least as easy as it could be). Overall, it's a pass for me - TH3 / THU is still the top of the heap for a plugin with multiple amps/pedals/cabs. If you didn't need or want all the options, then the NTS suite would be my second choice.


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