ILL SEA MANUALS / noamp

# NoAMPthe No Amp NAM Loader · look ma, NoAMP!

Windows 64-bit VST3 + standalone offline license

Your whole rig in one window, everything but the amp. NoAMP loads NAM captures (and cab IRs) into a full pedalboard: tuner, compressor, wah, chorus, phaser, delay, spring reverb, looper. Simple knobs (NORM) or every screw exposed (NERD) on each module.

## Quick start

1. Install. Close your DAW. Copy `NoAMP.vst3` (and any `Modules\` VST3s you want) into `C:\Program Files\Common Files\VST3`. Put `NoAMP.exe` anywhere and double-click it to play without a DAW, first run, pick your audio device and input. Rescan plugins in your DAW.
2. Get amps, the whole point. NoAMP plays `.nam` files: amp captures made with Neural Amp Modeler, the open-source project by Steven Atkinson. Thousands are free: tone3000.com (huge library, filter by amp type and gain) and tonehunt.org (community captures). Make a folder like `Documents\NAMs` and download a few.
3. Load an amp. Click Choose .nam on amp slot A and pick a capture. The ◀ ▶ arrows step through every .nam in that folder, audition a whole pack hands-free (they're MIDI-learnable). Load a second capture on slot B and pan the pair wide if you want a doubled rig.
4. Load dirt the same way. Each amp's Color slot takes a drive/fuzz/boost capture IN FRONT of that amp, click its Choose .nam, pick an overdrive or fuzz capture from the same sites (tone3000 has categories for pedals too). Color + amp captures stack exactly like a pedal into an amp.
5. Optional cab. Click IR and load a cabinet impulse response (`.wav`), many capture packs include them. Skip it if your capture is a full-rig (amp+cab) capture.
6. License. Click the license chip at the top left (next to Options) → Load license file... → pick your `noamp.illsea-license` (from your purchase or free trial at illsea.com). It sticks forever, fully offline, and every future update to NoAMP and its modules is free with it. Unlicensed, NoAMP still plays 10 minutes of full audio per session.

## NAM, Color, IR: what you're actually loading

Three kinds of file go into NoAMP. Here's what each one is, in plain terms.

Slot | What it is
--- | ---
NAM (the amp) | A .nam file is a Neural Amp Modeler capture: a computer's fingerprint of a real amp, made by recording that amp and training a tiny neural net to sound exactly like it. Load one into an amp slot and NoAMP becomes that amp. There are thousands out there, most of them free. This is the sound.
Color (the dirt, or anything) | The Color slot is a SECOND capture that runs in front of the amp, the way a pedal sits before your amp. The obvious use is a dirt box: an overdrive, fuzz, boost or distortion someone captured. But a capture is just a fingerprint of whatever made it, so Color can be any gear in the signal path: an analog reel-to-reel tape machine, a preamp or channel strip, a console, a transformer, a broken cassette deck, a weird DI. If it was captured as a `.nam`, you can stack it in front of your amp here. Think of Color as "the thing before the amp," not just "fuzz."
IR (the cab) | An Impulse Response (a `.wav`) is a snapshot of a speaker cabinet plus microphone. It's what turns a raw amp into a finished, miked-up tone. Load one on the amp's IR button. Skip it if your amp capture already includes the cab (a "full rig" capture); add one if your capture is amp-only and sounds raw or fizzy.

You don't need all three. A single amp `.nam` already sounds like a real amp. Add Color when you want dirt or flavor in front of it; add an IR when your capture needs a cab.

## Loading captures, step by step

Get the files first. The best free libraries are tone3000.com and tonehunt.org: both let you filter by amp type, gain, pedal or cab. Download a few and unzip them into a folder you'll remember, like `Documents\NAMs`. There's a fuller, screenshot-by-screenshot walkthrough at illsea.com/get-amps.

Load an amp

1. On amp A, click Choose .nam and pick a capture. That's the whole trick, you're now playing that amp.
2. The ◀ ▶ arrows next to it step through every `.nam` in the same folder, so you can audition a whole pack without reopening the file box (both arrows are MIDI-learnable, walk them with a footswitch).
3. Want two amps at once? Load a second capture on amp B and pan the two apart for a wide, doubled rig.

Load Color (dirt, or any front-of-amp gear)

1. On the same amp, find the Color row and click its Choose .nam.
2. Pick a drive / fuzz / boost capture (tone3000 has a pedals category), or any other captured gear you want up front: a tape machine, a preamp, whatever you've got.
3. Blend it with Col Mix and Col Level. It hits the amp exactly like a real pedal into a real amp.

Load a cab (IR)

1. Click the amp's IR button and pick a cabinet impulse response (a `.wav`). Lots of capture packs include them.
2. Skip it if your amp capture is already a full rig (amp + cab). Add one if the capture is amp-only and sounds raw or fizzy.

Swap or clear any of them: once something is loaded, its button becomes a little menu, Load new... replaces it and Clear unloads it. An empty amp slot reads No amp loaded; an empty Color slot reads No color loaded.

## The signal chain

`TUNER › COMPRESSOR › WAH › CHORUS › PHASER › YOUR .NAM A ‖ YOUR .NAM B › ELECTRONICS › DELAY › REVERB › LOOPER`

Every module has its own page: tuner, compressor, wah, chorus, phaser, delay, reverb, looper.

## The header

Control | What it does
--- | ---
IN knob + meter | Input trim (−24..+24 dB), the very first stage. Aim the IN meter comfortably below the top.
OUT knob + meter | Master volume; the meter reads AFTER the safety limiter. A solid RED CAP growing down from the top = the limiter is working, back off OUT (or amp Levels) until it disappears.
ENGINE | CPU/quality tier, global (default High). Remembered across sessions; presets never change it.
BPM + SYNC | One global tempo for everything synced (delay, phaser, freeze windows, looper grid). SYNC on = follow the DAW when one is rolling; otherwise the BPM knob rules. The knob greys only while a DAW is actually supplying tempo.
PRESET bar | Browse folders, ◀ ▶ step (MIDI-learnable), Save, Export/Import. NoAMP ships no factory presets, no amps, no pretending. Park your own.
Options | Top-left chip: the Skin menu lives here, load a classic Winamp `.wsz` (the bottom scope becomes the skin's own EQ windows) or unload back to the Illthy look, plus links.
License chip | Right next to Options: shows LICENSED / TRIAL (days left) / DEMO time. Click it to load a license file. See Quick start step 6.

## The amp face (shaping a loaded capture)

A NAM capture is a fixed snapshot, it has no tone knobs baked in. NoAMP gives each amp its own set, so a flat-sounding capture becomes dialable like a real amp. In NORM the face is four knobs:

Control | What it does
--- | ---
Drive | How hard the signal hits the capture (the input gain into the .nam). Up = pushes it harder, more grit on a dirty capture, more bloom on a clean one. Noon (6.00) is unity.
Bass / Mid / Treble | The amp's tone stack. At the default Amp EQ voicing these are an interactive passive stack, exactly like a real amp: they load each other, so pulling Mid down scoops the low-mids (and the scoop deepens the further you drop it), while Bass and Treble see-saw. Noon (0.500) on all three is the natural voicing, flat-ish. This is where you scoop for a modern tone or push the mids for a lead.

Flip the amp card to NERD (the NORM/NERD button, top of the card) and four tweakers appear at the lower left:

NERD control | What it does
--- | ---
Warmth | One knob of analog glue: transformer low-end bloom, a touch of power-supply sag, and body. 0% is off (bit-clean); turn it up for a fuller, rounder, more "expensive amp" feel. Reaches for polite, musical amounts, push it hard if you want obvious.
Bright | A volume-pot bright cap: adds top-end sparkle at low Drive that fades away as you turn Drive up, just like the bright cap on a real amp. Great for keeping a low-gain capture from going dull.
Amp EQ / Bypass | The EQ voicing. Amp EQ (default) is the interactive tone stack above, musical, with the real mid-scoop. Bypass takes the whole tone section out of the path, Bright and Warmth included, so the capture reaches your ears exactly as it was made.
Pre EQ | Off (default): the EQ sits AFTER the capture, like an EQ pedal after the amp. On: the EQ runs BEFORE the capture, so it shapes what actually distorts, tighter, more aggressive. A nerd's toy, flip it and listen.

Amp A and amp B are independent, dial each its own tone. Copy B (or Copy A) at the top of the card copies that amp's entire setup, EQ and all, to the other one.

## Presets (they're all yours)

NoAMP ships no factory presets, no amps, no pretending. The PRESET bar in the header is for sounds YOU build. Here's how it works:

- Save stores everything: the file paths of both amp captures, both Color captures and both cab IRs, plus every knob and switch in every module. Name it and it's parked.
- ◀ ▶ step through your saved presets (both arrows are MIDI-learnable, so a footswitch can walk them). The folder dropdown filters by folder if you organize them.
- Export / Import writes or reads a single preset file, that's how you back one up or share it.
- Presets remember your captures by file path, not by copying the audio. Keep your `.nam` and `.wav` files where they are; if you move or rename them, a recalled preset shows the name with (missing) and you just re-point it.
- A few things are global and ride OVER every preset on purpose, so a preset switch never surprises you: the ENGINE tier, the looper deck (a running loop keeps playing across a preset change), your window size/position, MIDI map, and the license.

On disk your presets are plain files in `%AppData%\IllSea\NoAMP\Presets` (paste that into the Explorer bar). Back them up, delete them, or drop a friend's preset in there, they show up next launch.

## NORM vs NERD

Every module has two faces; the little mode button shows the one you're ON, NORM = the simple view, NERD = every screw exposed. Click to flip. ELECTRONICS in NORM is just four knobs (Grit = transformer iron + supply sag, Air = presence + sheen + glow, Depth, Shush = noise filter); NERD opens the discrete six, the dirt-into-amp coupling (Cpl plus Tighten/Warmth/Give/Cpl Bite), the gate Key-HPF and the Raw Lvls switch. The two NERD switches that change the most are explained in full below.

## Capture leveling, and the RAW LVLS switch

Captures are not recorded at a consistent level. Two `.nam` files of the same amp can differ by more than 25 dB depending on how they were made, so a board that just played them back would jump in volume every time you swapped one.

So it doesn't. Every capture you load, both amps, both Color dirt slots, the fuzz and the morph voices, is measured and given a makeup gain toward a common loudness, then peak-capped so its transients stay clear of the output limiter. Dual-amp patches additionally duck −3 dB per amp so the sum of the two stays clean. That is why you can audition twenty captures in a row at a usable volume.

RAW LVLS (ELECTRONICS → NERD) turns all of that off, on every stage at once. You then hear each capture at its own untouched output level and you gain-stage by hand with the amp Level knobs and the master Out. Use it if you want the capture exactly as its author made it, or if the auto-leveling is fighting a gain structure you have already built. Expect large jumps between files.

It is a preference, not a preset value. It stays wherever you left it across preset changes and across sessions, like your MIDI map and your window size.

## CPL, the dirt-into-amp coupling

Run a dirt pedal into a real amp and the two are not independent. The pedal's output impedance and the amp's input stage load each other: some low end never makes it across, some top end is rolled off by capacitance, and when the pedal drives the amp hard the amp's first stage gives way and squashes. Stack two captures in series and none of that happens, because a capture only knows the signal it was fed, not what it is plugged into.

CPL (ELECTRONICS → NERD) inserts that missing interface between your Color dirt and your amp. It ships off, so the default signal path is unchanged. Switched on, three knobs shape it:

- Tighten, how much low end the dirt actually delivers into the amp. Up = tighter, less flub on low notes. This is the knob that fixes a fuzz that turns to mush on the bottom string.
- Warmth, the impedance and input-capacitance roll-off. Up = warmer, top end softened. Useful when a bright capture into a bright amp gets brittle.
- Give, how much the amp's input stage yields under a hot dirt signal, the soft asymmetric squash that makes a cranked amp feel like it is leaning back into you. Up = more give and more compression.
- Cpl Bite sets how firm that squash is. 1.6 is the null, the classic feel. Lower is softer and rounder, higher is harder and more abrupt.

Coupling is applied after the dirt is blended, so it colors the whole signal rather than only the distorted part. It is a real tonal change rather than a polish pass, which is why it is opt-in: turn it on deliberately when a dirt-into-amp pairing sounds correct on paper but lifeless in practice.

## Private FX, they're exclusive

Checking an effect (Verb/Dly/Cho/Phs/Wah) private on an amp CLAIMS it: that amp gets the effect and the other path loses it entirely, one engine runs, so private costs no extra CPU. Claim the same effect on both amps and each gets its own.

## Loading + clearing

Any Choose .nam button (amp or Color) and the IR button become a menu once something is loaded: Load new... replaces it, Clear fully unloads it.

## Memory

The standalone reopens at the exact window size + position you left it. Every file chooser (NAM, IR, skin, preset) starts in the folder it last loaded from. Your MIDI map persists machine-wide.

## Updates, free, forever

Your license covers every future version of NoAMP and every module in the zip. When an update ships, grab the new zip from your permanent license-email links (or illsea.com), install over the old one, done, the same license file keeps working. Nothing more to buy, ever.

## MIDI

Right-click ANY knob, fader, module switch, preset ◀ ▶, Freeze, or SYNC → MIDI Learn, then move a controller, the next CC binds. Clear mapping / Clear ALL mappings undo it. Where learn works (and the Ableton way): see tips. If your MIDI stomp device randomly stops responding until you replug it, that's Windows putting USB to sleep, fix in tips.

## Performance: the buffer + the computer

Run a 256-sample buffer at 48 kHz. That's the tested sweet spot: ~5 ms each way, tight enough to play, roomy enough for the full board, both amps, the drum deck, every device, with headroom to spare. Recording a mix where latency doesn't matter? 512 buys extra safety. 128 works on faster CPUs, but you're spending safety margin on feel.

The computer: a 4-core desktop CPU around 4 GHz (Intel i7-6700K class, 2015) or anything newer runs the whole board at 256. NoAMP spreads its heaviest work, the two amps and the drum deck, across separate CPU cores, so physical core count matters more than raw clock. Seeing more total CPU in Task Manager than a single-core plugin would show is the engine using your machine, not a problem.

Long IRs on the kit bus (room/reverb impulses on the drum deck) cost more than cab-length IRs and spike hardest at small buffers, they're built for 256 and up. Hover the I/O button any time: the tooltip shows how much of each block you're using and which module is spending it.

## Specs, tersely

Amps | 2 × NAM capture slots (WaveNet/LSTM .nam files), folder stepping, click-free swaps mid-note
Dirt | 2 × Color capture slots (pre-amp), physically-motivated dirt↔amp coupling stage w/ ADAA
Cabs | 2 × IR loaders (.wav, any length), partitioned convolution
Engine | multi-core: the amps + the drum deck render on parallel lanes; per-stage load readout in the I/O tooltip; recommended 256-sample buffer @ 48 kHz
Leveling | −18 dBFS average target, peak-capped ≤ −8 dBFS, dual-amp −3 dB comp, defeatable
Output | always-on transparent brick-wall safety limiter, post-limiter metering w/ GR readout
Tempo | one global BPM: host-sync or manual; drives delay, phaser, freeze windows, looper grid
License | offline Ed25519-signed file; zero network code in the plugin, ever
Formats | VST3 + standalone exe, Windows 64-bit, 44.1/48 kHz tested, signed by ILL SEA LLC

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