French company Two notes Audio Engineering have updated their flagship Reload re‑amping product — and it’s different from what everybody was expecting!
I’m sure I wasn’t alone in feeling certain that Two notes would integrate their premium tube‑amp loading and re‑amping device with their renowned speaker and mic simulation software — it would make a product that competed directly with units like UA’s OX and the Boss Tube Amp Expander. But, apparently, we were wrong. The new Reload II is still a dedicated reactive dummy load and re‑amping power amp, albeit one that ships with an included perpetual licence for Two notes’ excellent Genome Reload II Edition speaker and mic emulation software. But if you’re one of those people who is disappointed about what it doesn’t do, you certainly won’t be disappointed with what it actually does. It looks to me like Two notes have set out to make the Reload II the most complete, most versatile and, above all, best‑sounding re‑amping unit on the market. And I think they’ve succeeded...
‘Celestion Approved’
In order to work with a wide range of virtual speakers, the Reload II’s ‘Celestion approved’ impedance curve seems not to emulate one particular speaker type.Two notes refer to a “ground‑up rework” of their reactive load, described now as a “Celestion‑Approved Load Response”, seeking to replicate as closely as possible the impedance curve of a typical loudspeaker, thereby maintaining the normal tonal and dynamic response of the connected amp. With the advent of increasing numbers of devices designed for the safe loading and silent DI recording of tube amps, the term ‘impedance curve’ has gone from being something guitar players simply never thought about to being the source of seemingly never‑ending heated debate, with the role of the ‘reactive load’ at the heart of such units coming under particular scrutiny.
Nobody would dispute that having an accurately speaker‑like impedance curve is a good thing in a dummy load — that much is obvious — but there is a little more to it than that. Units like UA’s OX (and Two notes’ Captor X for that matter) have fairly ‘generic’ impedance curves, and yet nobody could argue that they aren’t capable of producing a line‑level signal that, for recording or PA purposes, sounds convincingly like a miked‑up speaker. Obviously, the dynamic modelling, or the IR and other processing, is designed to do a significant amount of the work in those cases, especially when you consider the possible need to emulate the response of a number of different speakers and mics. Indeed, it could be argued that having the exact impedance curve of, say, Greenbacks in a 4x12 may not help that much when you are trying to emulate a 1x12 JBL in an open‑back combo cab. Not only would the speakers themselves be quite different, but even the enclosure would be affecting the reflected load behaviour of the system as a whole. Logically, therefore, the ‘Celestion Approved’ tag in the Reload II undoubtedly means this reactive load’s impedance curve doesn’t emulate just one specific speaker type.
Touch & Tonality
But one area in which having the most realistically speaker‑like load certainly is a major benefit, in my experience, is when you are re‑amping the loaded‑down signal into a real guitar speaker, simply to make a loud amp quieter whilst preserving all its touch and tonality. In that scenario, with everything remaining in the analogue domain, there is no DSP correction or enhancement available to compensate for any changes in your amp’s dynamic or tonal performance. So, as a player, you really want the amp to be doing exactly what it normally does with your chosen settings, and for the speaker to sound exactly like itself. That’s what you get with the Reload II.
The Reload II has two channels of solid‑state, Class‑D power amp, capable of up to 215W RMS into 4Ω, 120W RMS into 8Ω, and 50W RMS into 16Ω. If you have a favourite 16Ω Marshall 4x12, then you’re out of luck in terms of achieving maximum level unless you are prepared to rewire it; that’s just how solid‑state power amps work. Curiously, with both channels driven into 4Ω, the maximum power output drops to 150W per channel. That’s still pretty loud though, and maybe a safety‑margin consideration in respect of the power supply?
The somewhat mysterious Mojo control, designed to deliver “high‑power feel” at low volumes. We might not know quite how it works, but it does!If you’re still a bit ‘sniffy’ about Class‑D for guitar amps, perhaps from a past negative experience, believe me: Class‑D has come a long way in the last few years. This one is as low‑noise and transparent as you could want, with the kind of ‘effortless’ power delivery that always makes you think there is plenty more in reserve. Because this isn’t a direct attenuator, but rather a design that fully loads the input then derives a line‑level signal to feed to the integral power amps, not only is the source amp consistently loaded at any output level setting, but you’ve got a full range of control of the output volume too, from everything to nothing and all points in between. Ironically, the output volume pots are actually physically detented, presumably to allow for exact channel matching, but they do have a very fine resolution to the ‘steps’ to be fair, and you have further fine level adjustment courtesy of an Amp In Level control that lets you ensure that the power amp isn’t over‑ or under‑driven. The post‑load, line‑level signal appears on a pair of rear‑panel XLRs to be recorded in your DAW for subsequent speaker‑sim processing, or sent via IR‑hosting hardware to a PA system or for real‑time monitoring.
The Reload II’s input can accept up to an impressive 200W RMS output, from either a tube or solid‑state amp, selectable for 4, 8 or 16 Ω operation, so you can run your source amp with the setting that makes it sound its best (some classic tube amps do indeed have an optimum output‑transformer setting). The integral power amp can also accept an external line‑level input, which means it can be used with an amp modeller — a role that it plays particularly well when partnered with a top‑class modeller and, as this is a stereo power amp, you can if you wish retain the full ‘stereo‑ness’ of any onboard effects.
Speaking of effects, the Reload II has a footswitchable (TS or TRS) stereo effects loop with all options covered: series/parallel, ‑10dBu/+4dBV send level; wet/dry return settings, and more. Independent, front‑panel Depth and Presence controls for each channel allow some tonal tweaking between 0dB (off) and +8dB at 75Hz and 4kHz, respectively, affecting only the power‑amp signal, not the line outputs. Each channel also has a Mojo control that Two notes describe as delivering “high‑power feel” at low‑volume settings. There’s no tech‑spec on that, but it does seem to do something — it’s subtle, but nice.
Most of my testing was done with circa‑50W guitar amps, and it was never intrusive, even for someone ‘allergic’ to fan noise in the control room.
As Good As It Gets?
The Reload II looks every bit a robust, pro‑level piece of kit. It’s rackmountable with included rack ears, or stackable with wooden end cheeks that tip the front panel up a little for amp‑top use, and has an IEC mains power connection. It is no surprise in a unit designed to accept a very high‑powered input that there is a substantial fan, but it only vents through the rear panel, with a big intake at the front, and really only gets seriously working when you start to get up to stage performance levels. Most of my testing was done with circa‑50W guitar amps, and it was never intrusive, even for someone ‘allergic’ to fan noise in the control room. The Reload II is happy being driven by tube or solid‑state amp designs — I can’t say that about all reactive‑load devices — and equally at home working with guitar or bass amps.
With wooden end cheeks the Reload II can stand atop a desk or amp, but if you prefer it can be rackmounted. Inevitably, there’s a fan on the rear, but it’s very quiet and not a distraction.
It is that not long since we reviewed Two notes’ very extensive and sophisticated Genome software so I won’t cover that ground again here. If you are using the Reload II for silent recording, you can take advantage of any speaker‑IR hosting hardware (I achieved great results from a UA OX Stomp pedal) or dial up one of the many very nice Two notes and Celestion DynIR cabs in Genome, feeding the Reload’s XLRs to an audio interface and computer setup, and dealing with whatever latency figure you can get the system down to. Given that you can have a very quiet speaker output, even from a heavily driven source amp, I often find it preferable to monitor the real speaker quietly, for zero‑latency and a bit of interaction, even if I’m not recording it. But Genome includes a serious amount of amp modelling as well as speakers, and even Two notes’ own Opus hardware unit includes power‑amp emulation alongside its IR hosting capabilities. With all that available, you might legitimately wonder if it is worth bothering with the whole tube amp and reactive load setup at all in recording applications. But when it comes to attenuating a high‑volume tube guitar amp and re‑amping it into a real guitar speaker, Two notes’ Reload II is as good as I’ve heard, and there will be plenty of potential users for whom that is their priority.
What is A ‘Reactive Load’?
Simple resistive dummy loads — basically just big, heat‑dissipating resistors — have been around for a long time, and used almost exclusively as attenuators to make tube guitar amps a bit quieter whilst still allowing their output stages to be driven into distortion. But a purely resistive load doesn’t ‘look’ remotely like a real loudspeaker as far as a tube amp’s output stage is concerned. The ‘impedance’ (which, in the most general terms, can be thought of as ‘resistance to an AC signal’) of a real moving‑coil loudspeaker has a characteristic shape along its frequency axis, exhibiting a substantial peak at the driver’s fundamental ‘resonant frequency’, flattening out in the middle, and with a general rise towards the higher frequencies, often reaching several times the nominal impedance of 4, 8 or 16Ω generally seen in guitar speakers. There’s a bit more to it than that, because there are also the effects of both the inductance and capacitance of the circuit as a whole to consider, collectively referred to as ‘reactance’. The latter, when combined with resistance, forms the overall impedance of the circuit.
Pros
- Excellent reactive dummy load.
- Transparent power amps.
- Intuitive controls.
- Comprehensive effects loop options.
- Comes with access to high‑quality cab emulations.
Cons
- No integrated speaker‑sim provision.
Summary
A simply great‑sounding re‑amping unit, probably the best I’ve heard, but the absence of integral speaker emulation may steer some people towards other products.
Information
£849 including VAT.
$1099
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