# NPD: Strymon Iridium



## Sunny1433 (Nov 23, 2018)

Got this for my home recording and holy shit, this little box has no right to sound as good as it does. Yes, it is a "recorded guitar tone" and it doesn't replace the FEEL of a tube amp (though it does have a fair bit of feel, more than other modellers I've tried) but for recording and maybe using it direct to FOH for some gigs, it is the perfect tool. And SO EASY to set up. I don't like menus so this is definitely for me. 

I'm going to be recording more cause of this.


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## vadsy (Dec 2, 2010)

I tried one in a large venue and it sounded surprisingly good, I'm a fan.


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## Sunny1433 (Nov 23, 2018)

vadsy said:


> I tried one in a large venue and it sounded surprisingly good, I'm a fan.


Did you run it through a DI before going into the mixer?


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## vadsy (Dec 2, 2010)

yea,. just a radial DI


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## troyhead (May 23, 2014)

Sunny1433 said:


> I'm going to be recording more cause of this


Yup! That’s the primary reason I got mine, but have also used it in “silent stage” performances a number of times. 

The included IRs are okay, but I highly recommend trying some third party options. I really like the Celestion ones. I mixed an Alnico Cream 1x12 open with another Alnico Cream 2x12 closed for the “round” amp, and it sounds great!


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## Sunny1433 (Nov 23, 2018)

troyhead said:


> Yup! That’s the primary reason I got mine, but have also used it in “silent stage” performances a number of times.
> 
> The included IRs are okay, but I highly recommend trying some third party options. I really like the Celestion ones. I mixed an Alnico Cream 1x12 open with another Alnico Cream 2x12 closed for the “round” amp, and it sounds great!


That's a cool idea! This is my first foray into the modelling world but I'm getting the difference a good IR can make. Where would I find those IRs you mentioned?


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## Alex (Feb 11, 2006)

Great unit and works surprisingly well as a practice amp with headphones and adding floor pedals.


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## troyhead (May 23, 2014)

Sunny1433 said:


> Where would I find those IRs you mentioned?


Check out the link below. These are the high quality ones that the Iridium supports. You can buy individual IRs, but I went with the 5-pack for $30 so I could try a few. You pick your speaker and your cab, and that’s one selection. Included in that selection is quite a few IRs with lots of mic choices, placements, and combinations so that you can get just the tone you want. 

CelestionPlus Pick & Mix – Build Your Own IR Collection

With the Strymon Impulse Manager you can load an different IR for left and right, if you want, or you can load the same IR into both sides. If you are playing with headphones and still want to blend two IRs, I recommend two similar ones so that it doesn’t sound drastically different on each side. You can also adjust the level, treble, and bass on each side to help them balance better.

Here is more info on the Impulse Manager:
https://www.strymon.net/faq/using-strymon-impulse-manager-with-iridium/


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## Sunny1433 (Nov 23, 2018)

troyhead said:


> Check out the link below. These are the high quality ones that the Iridium supports. You can buy individual IRs, but I went with the 5-pack for $30 so I could try a few. You pick your speaker and your cab, and that’s one selection. Included in that selection is quite a few IRs with lots of mic choices, placements, and combinations so that you can get just the tone you want.
> 
> CelestionPlus Pick & Mix – Build Your Own IR Collection
> 
> ...


Thank you! Can't wait to dig into these! Could I ask you one more question? I'm curious about how you connect the iridium to your interface? I have two TS cables going out of the L and R outputs into the line level inputs of my universal audio Arrow. As for the little switch in the back, I've set it to Mono because I noticed when I set it to stereo, there was no signal from the R channel. Is that because the iridium sends out an unbalanced signal, so it's not true stereo, just dual mono? Or have I got this backwards? 

Would the stereo mode be useful only when you're going out into a stereo pedal like a volante?


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## Sunny1433 (Nov 23, 2018)

Sunny1433 said:


> Thank you! Can't wait to dig into these! Could I ask you one more question? I'm curious about how you connect the iridium to your interface? I have two TS cables going out of the L and R outputs into the line level inputs of my universal audio Arrow. As for the little switch in the back, I've set it to Mono because I noticed when I set it to stereo, there was no signal from the R channel. Is that because the iridium sends out an unbalanced signal, so it's not true stereo, just dual mono? Or have I got this backwards?
> 
> Would the stereo mode be useful only when you're going out into a stereo pedal like a volante?


Thanks so much for taking the time out to help btw


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## troyhead (May 23, 2014)

Sunny1433 said:


> I'm curious about how you connect the iridium to your interface? I have two TS cables going out of the L and R outputs into the line level inputs of my universal audio Arrow. As for the little switch in the back, I've set it to Mono because I noticed when I set it to stereo, there was no signal from the R channel. Is that because the iridium sends out an unbalanced signal, so it's not true stereo, just dual mono? Or have I got this backwards?


The Iridium is a True Stereo pedal, meaning that it takes whatever is sent in to the Left and the Right and processes them completely independently. I think the switch on the back is a little misleading. The "stereo" and "mono" choices are more about describing your input. And then "sum" doesn't care about the input and just outputs the two channels summed together in mono (but still out to both Left and Right, but exactly the same signal). So if you are not using a TRS stereo cable in but have the switch set to "Stereo", the pedal thinks you want to process the left and right sounds on their own, with the left side having your signal, and the right side being silent. If you are only inputting with a TS cable, choose "mono". With that mode you can output just L, or L+R (more on that below).



Sunny1433 said:


> Would the stereo mode be useful only when you're going out into a stereo pedal like a volante?


Again, the stereo/mono switch describes your input (unless in Sum mode). However, if you input in mono, the pedal can still output in stereo. The "Room" control adds stereo ambience even to a mono signal. Putting effects like delay & reverb after the pedal works, or you can also put them before the Iridium in stereo using a cable like this (I find this works better with clean-ish Iridium settings, unless you don't mind distorted delay & reverb). Personally, I have dirt and stereo effects before the Iridium so I can use the headphone output with the effects, and so I can also gig with the same board into a clean-ish amp with the Iridium off. The Volante sounds great in stereo (even if you don't manually pan the tape heads to one side or the other), and most other Strymon pedals also have a great stereo sound to them.

I also use the Arrow, and it sounds great. I've found the output on the Iridium to be rather low, so I use the free UA-610-B unison preamp plugin with the preamp gain and output gain turned up fairly high. Also, don't forget to use the "Link" button on the Arrow so you can control L+R together instead of two separate channels.



Sunny1433 said:


> Could I ask you one more question?


Feel free to ask anything else you want to. I like helping people get the most out of their gear.


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## Sunny1433 (Nov 23, 2018)

troyhead said:


> The Iridium is a True Stereo pedal, meaning that it takes whatever is sent in to the Left and the Right and processes them completely independently. I think the switch on the back is a little misleading. The "stereo" and "mono" choices are more about describing your input. And then "sum" doesn't care about the input and just outputs the two channels summed together in mono (but still out to both Left and Right, but exactly the same signal). So if you are not using a TRS stereo cable in but have the switch set to "Stereo", the pedal thinks you want to process the left and right sounds on their own, with the left side having your signal, and the right side being silent. If you are only inputting with a TS cable, choose "mono". With that mode you can output just L, or L+R (more on that below).
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Thank you for such a clear explanation! I also took another look at the manual in the routing section and now I understand it so much better. I don't have any stereo pedals right now, except my reverb so I'll be using it in mono but it's cool to know that the room ambiance is in stereo. Also, great tip about linking the two channels on the Arrow, I completely forgot about that feature! 

I'm gonna try and see if I can load slightly different Its in the L and R channels to possibly get a "bigger/wider" sound. I'll try the one you suggested with the "round" amp setting. 

Thanks again! And please feel free to share any recordings with the Iridium. I plan to do a cover of John Mayer's version of Ain't No Sunshine using it this weekend. Looking forward to that!


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## Sunny1433 (Nov 23, 2018)

troyhead said:


> Yup! That’s the primary reason I got mine, but have also used it in “silent stage” performances a number of times.
> 
> The included IRs are okay, but I highly recommend trying some third party options. I really like the Celestion ones. I mixed an Alnico Cream 1x12 open with another Alnico Cream 2x12 closed for the “round” amp, and it sounds great!


You were so right about this setting! Sounds great! I got a 3 pack and the third IR I got was a V type that's in my current amp. Such a cool thing to be able to mix and match these cabs.


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## troyhead (May 23, 2014)

Sunny1433 said:


> You were so right about this setting! Sounds great! I got a 3 pack and the third IR I got was a V type that's in my current amp. Such a cool thing to be able to mix and match these cabs.


Awesome, glad it worked for you! It's pretty easy to change up the sound quite drastically for very little money. You can also reassign the stock IRs to other amps. For example, I like how the 2x10 from the "round" amp sounds with the "chime" too.


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## vadsy (Dec 2, 2010)

troyhead said:


> Check out the link below. These are the high quality ones that the Iridium supports. You can buy individual IRs, but I went with the 5-pack for $30 so I could try a few. You pick your speaker and your cab, and that’s one selection. Included in that selection is quite a few IRs with lots of mic choices, placements, and combinations so that you can get just the tone you want.
> 
> CelestionPlus Pick & Mix – Build Your Own IR Collection
> 
> ...


these Celestion IR's would be the same across the board, Two Notes proprietary or Strymon Iridium, yea?


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## troyhead (May 23, 2014)

vadsy said:


> these Celestion IR's would be the same across the board, Two Notes proprietary or Strymon Iridium, yea?


I don't totally understand the question, but the standard IRs are not proprietary to a specific device. The Iridium has some specific requirements for the IRs it uses, but they are not proprietary (24-bit 96 kHz impulse response wave files of up to 500ms in length). When you buy the Celestion IRs, they have a variety of file formats you can download to match the requirements of your gear. 

I believe Two Notes gear can usually load these standard IRs as well, but Celestion also make Two Notes specific IRs that allow for parameter changes like moving the mic around the room. These would work with Two Notes gear, but not the Iridium.


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## vadsy (Dec 2, 2010)

troyhead said:


> I believe Two Notes gear can usually load these standard IRs as well, but Celestion also make Two Notes specific IRs that allow for parameter changes like moving the mic around the room. These would work with Two Notes gear, but not the Iridium.


I guess that's what I meant by proprietary, they allow for changes within WOS but I'm guessing the basic IR structure would be the same across the board.


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## troyhead (May 23, 2014)

vadsy said:


> I guess that's what I meant by proprietary, they allow for changes within WOS but I'm guessing the basic IR structure would be the same across the board.


For anyone else reading that doesn't know what we are talking about, the Wall of Sound (WOS) software for Two Notes gear lets you virtually place a microphone in the room to further customize the tone, as well as an overload parameter to simulate speaker break-up. With a typical IR, there is no further adjustment as you get what you have captured. These proprietary IRs would not work with anything but Two Notes gear.


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## Sunny1433 (Nov 23, 2018)

Has anyone tried recording an acoustic guitar through the iridium? I read on another forum that you can load an acoustic IR like the link below, disable the amp sim and basically get a good mic'ed acoustic sound through the Iridium!

Sounds like a cool way to attempt a two-way mic'ed acoustic - with one mic in the room and one running though the iridium. Could be a nice sounding stereo mix. I just can't figure out if these IRs will work with the Iridium.

Acoustic Guitar Impulse Responses - Worship Tutorials


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## Sunny1433 (Nov 23, 2018)

Recorded a few videos using the Iridium last weekend (including this comparison of the Chasetone Fuzz Fella and the King tone MiniFuzz) and man the cleans are so good! And it takes fuzz so we'll! 


__
http://instagr.am/p/CCgMgTbJ7jM/


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## imyourmutter (Nov 16, 2017)

I love the Iridium. Got mine around Christmas. It's made practice and recording a breeze! Takes my pedals great too! I love how it sounds good right out of the box and doesn't take much effort to dial in. If you can set a traditional amp, you can set the Iridium. Definitely much simpler than some other modellers.
Lives on my board full-time now.


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## Sunny1433 (Nov 23, 2018)

imyourmutter said:


> I love the Iridium. Got mine around Christmas. It's made practice and recording a breeze! Takes my pedals great too! I love how it sounds good right out of the box and doesn't take much effort to dial in. If you can set a traditional amp, you can set the Iridium. Definitely much simpler than some other modellers.
> Lives on my board full-time now.


So true! I actually record more cause I have it and I don't have to spend a lot of time setting up. I even tried using acoustic IRs with it after disabling the amp sim, And after a bit of EQ on the recorded guitar parts and that sounded pretty great. It's such a versatile bit of gear.


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