8,720
edits
Changes
m
I like to lower it until the clipping is gone. I don't adjust the gain parameter for the profile on the fly(I use the guitar's volume knob instead), so I don't need to worry about balancing the volume of clean vs. distorted within the same rig. If you do want to change therig's Gain parameter, such as by an expression pedal or MIDI, then you should check both for input clipping (as explained above) as well as using Clean Sense to level the volume between the rig with gain at 0 vs. 4. If these things are in contention, you'll have to make a compromise.
→Clean Sense
Clean Sense controls the volume balance between low and high gain settings for a particular rig. The KPA has a somewhat unusual way of handling a clean tone, which can be confusing. The KPA can only capture a profile at a certain gain setting but allows editing the gain on the resulting rig, all the way from completely clean to fully-saturated, mushy distortion. To do this, each amp profile contains a kind of parallel pair of clean and distorted profiles. From about 4 and below on the Gain knob, the profiles are blended inversely, and these can have a radically different volume level depending on how hot the pickups you use are. Clean Sense can be adjusted to make these roughly equal.
''Note: Clean Sense should not be used to try to volume-level different rigs (use the Volume Knob instead), and it does not impact changes in gain other than changing the Gain setting on the KPA. If for instance you are using a volume pedal or using the guitar's volume knob, Clean Sense will not affect the sound.''
Many people get (rightfully) very confused about this setting and clipping. At gain settings above ~4, this setting has absolutely no effect on the tone. If you're sure you're getting input clipping in a distorted tone, adjusting here won't help anything - you will want to make sure the distortion you think is input clipping is not output clipping or the profile itself or a rogue setting on a Distortion effect (or a strange combination of multiple distortions). Some of the distortion effects will distort slightly even with Gain at 0%.
The way I like to set Clean Sense is to take a clean profile I actually use, set the Gain all the way to 0 if it's saved at like 1-2, then strum about as hard as I ever would with the bridge humbucker active. With Clean Sense set dead center (0 db), I usually get clipping(I use high-output pickups). First I'm going to turn down Volume to make sure the clipping is occurring at the Input, not Output - the Output LED should be completely green, not red. You may have to turn up Master or your external monitorto hear the tone clearly. Then I like to lower Clean Sense until the clipping is gone.
=== Distortion Sense ===