We tend to think of speakers purely in terms of their nominal impedance - usually 4, 8 or 16 Ω in the guitar world - but the actual impedance will vary significantly across the whole frequency range of the speaker, with a big peak at the bottom, around the resonant frequency of the unit, somewhere between about 55 and 95 Hz, followed by a slow rise through the average value, with a gentle tip-up at the end. There are two reactive load controls on the front panel - Resonance Z and Presence Z - that between them can be used to modify the impedance curve of the load presented to the amplifier's output transformer. So far, so simple, but we are not done yet. If you were just using the TAE to get a big tube amp into its sweet spot at a lower volume, you'd plug your amp's speaker output into the TAE and then take your actual speaker signal from one of the two speaker outputs, using the front-panel Speaker Out knob to give you a continuously variable level control from nothing to everything, and all points in between. Maximum power input is spec'ed at 150 Watts, and there is a 16Ω 'safety load' in place if you forget to power up the TAE before switching on a connected amp. The reactive load that receives the speaker output of your tube amp is switchable between 4, 8 and 16 Ω settings, with a three-position power-matching switch offering a choice of 10, 50 and 100 Watts, for internal level optimisation. Physically, the TAE is a 2U black box, slightly narrower than the normal 19-inch format, but rackmountable nonetheless via the included adaptor rack ears. Anyone still thinking they are "basically the same"? Finally, and perhaps most significantly, whilst the OX offers an attenuated speaker output, the TAE feeds its post-load signal to an integral solid-state power amp to derive a speaker-level output. Where the OX's software editor requires a wireless connection, the TAE's app connects via USB. Whilst the OX's footswitch facility is, "as yet", almost entirely unimplemented, the TAE has a comprehensive footswitch option available from day one. Where the OX uses dynamically modelled speaker simulation, the TAE exclusively employs speaker impulse responses (IRs). Where the OX uses a dummy load with a single, fixed impedance curve, the TAE has a choice of 16, able to be derived from its Resonance and Presence switches. And in some ways, it is: it undoubtedly targets a similar user and fundamentally seeks to address the same issues arising out of the use of tube guitar amps, both on stage and in the studio.Īt the same time, however, it's a very different solution, based on some fundamentally different design choices. When the Boss division of Roland announced their Waza Craft Tube Amp Expander (let's call it the TAE) at Winter NAMM 2019, many people saw it as a direct challenger to Universal Audio's OX tube-amp load box and speaker simulator. Widely touted as Boss's response to UA's popular OX, the Tube Amp Expander actually offers a contrasting approach.
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