Hardware
The rock-solid foot controller included with Guitar Rig 3 Kontrol Edition measures 15 inches wide, 9.5 inches deep, and 2.5 inches tall. Constructed primarily of black anodized metal, the Guitar Rig foot control is heavy enough to stay put and rugged enough to withstand some serious abuse.
The top of the Guitar Rig foot control features 8 stomp-worthy switches that can be assigned to any parameter within the software, such as effects, mute, tuner, tempo control, and advancing through presets. A large metal expression pedal takes up the right side of the Guitar Rig foot control, allowing you to smoothly control effects such as wah-wah and delay, or use as a volume control.
The back edge of the Guitar Rig foot control acts as a USB 2.0 audio card for your computer, including two 1/4-inch inputs (with adjustable gain control and a line impedance switch), balanced stereo 1/4-inch outputs (switchable between high and low gain), a 1/4-inch stereo headphone output (with adjustable volume), two inputs for additional expression pedals, standard MIDI input and output jacks, and a USB connection. Knowing that an inadvertent tug to the USB cable could prove disastrous, Native Instruments is clever enough to include a metal hook above the USB jack that helps the cable stay put. Unlike traditional guitar effects, the Guitar Rig foot control doesn't require batteries, since it gets all the power it needs over USB.
Performance
Native Instruments--a music software company that has built a reputation on its software emulations of grand pianos, vintage analog synthesizers, and acoustic drum kits--has applied some serious science behind creating the ultimate software for guitar nerds. Guitar Rig 3 takes advantage of several digital audio technologies, including impulse response, convolution reverb, DSP effects, and physical modeling, in order to recreate the character and qualities of speakers, tubes, and circuitry. Guitar Rig's main purpose is to act as an affordable (and often indistinguishable) pro audio tool for the complicated process of recording a guitar. This is an important distinction to make, because while the casual guitarist might find Guitar Rig 3 a suitable replacement for their practice amp, its intended purpose is to emulate what a guitar sounds like when recorded in a professional studio. To this end, Guitar Rig 3 includes settings for virtual microphone type and placement, which might baffle guitarists, but enthrall recording-savvy producers. Guitar Rig's emphasis on reproducing the recorded sound of a guitar lends the final result a polished feel that has a less dynamic character than simply cranking your amp in the garage.
On our 2Ghz Core 2 Duo Macbook, it took only a split second to switch between presets in Guitar Rig 3, which is impressive considering the processing demands and graphically rich interface.
Audio quality from the Guitar Rig foot control is professional grade, with a scalable input sample rate that ranges from 44-192kHz, at 16 or 24 bits over a Cirrus Logic A/D converter. For the purposes of rocking out at home, we were more than pleased with the audio quality coming from the Guitar Rig foot control using either the headphone connection or running the line outputs to a stereo system.
Final thoughts
While we recommend the Guitar Rig 3 Kontrol Edition as the top-tier software guitar amp on the market, it should not be purchased without checking out the downloadable software demo first. If your needs are basic, or you get overwhelmed by too many choices, Guitar Rig's depth and advanced features may feel overwhelming. There are other great (and less expensive) virtual guitar amp options available, including M-Audio's JamLab, Native Instruments' Guitar Combos, and the Line 6 PocketPod.
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