Biggest bargain I ever lucked into?

[duhvoodooman***]

Almost a year ago, MF ran a "Stupid Deal of the Day" on the Line 6 Gearbox Plug-in Silver Bundle (including a TonePort DI USB interface box) for $99. It looked like an interesting product and a great price (I think it listed for $400 at the time), and I bought one, even though I had no defined want or need for it. "Impulse buy", as they say.

Well, it's turned out to be a C-note well spent! I've had hours of fun experimenting with the various amp, cabinet and effect simulations the Line 6 software offers. The sound quality is excellent--nothing cheesy or processed-sounding about the vast majority of the output. And a few weeks back, the deal got even better....

When I bought it, I registered the software online so that I could get updates. Up until recently, this seemed to be just stuff like driver updates, bug fixes, etc. Then, back on Nov. 9, I got an e-mail advising me that, as a TonePort/Gearbox Plug-in owner, I was entitled to a free upgrade to their new "POD Farm" plug-in software platform . So I downloaded the updates, installed them and--SISTER MARY FRANCIS!--I have now got more amp & effect simulation software than you can shake a drumstick at! The original Silver Bundle had a pretty good range of amps & cabs to choose from (18 amps, 24 speaker cabs and 29 effects), but this upgrade added dozens more, as well as a slick new GUI to load & run them. And each amp and effect model has a complete set of on-screen controls to let you tweak to your heart's content.

Half of the effects I've never even heard of, and the amp models range from the expected classics from Fender, Vox and Marshall through the somewhat newer brands, like Mesa Boogie, Orange and Matchless, and on to a number of high gain modern models from names like Bogner, Diezel and ENGL. Plus there are a whole bunch of Line 6-created "synthetic" amp, cabs & effects, too. There are tons of "preset" combinations to emulate certain types of tones or even individual songs. And naturally, when you piece together a combination that you really like (or tweak a preset to your own tatses), you can save it under whatever name you want and retrieve it at any time. BTW, there are also bass amp, cab and effect simulations, as well as mic preamps included in the software. I checked the Line 6 site, and what I got for free was the POD Farm Platinum bundle, normally selling for $300!! Incredible!!

And like the late-night TV ads say, "And that's not all!!" Also included for no charge was their new Riffworks 2.0 recording software, selling for $100! I haven't even touched that yet, using the analog output of the TonePort into my sound card's line-in jack and recording with Audacity. But I'll get around to trying the RiffWorks software pretty soon, I'm sure.

Anyway, for an initial $100 invetsment, I'm now up to about $800 worth of really cool guitar-playing software! Mwa-ha-ha-ha-ha!!!