Amped vs Rustortion

Amped is a guitar amp simulation product line for playing through amp sims on a Windows or macOS computer, as a standalone program or plugin. Its modeling approach combines analog component emulation with amp learning, and the interface is arranged around amp controls and a pedalboard. Amped Roots 2.0 has four amp simulations: 5034 Fluff, 5151 Fluff, Freeman Fluff, and Mega Fluff; the 5034 Fluff is included in the free plan. Roots 2.0 also includes a noise gate, compressor, drive pedal, chorus, analog delay, and reverb. Each amp has a selected cabinet, with an IR loader and an option to bypass the cabinet section for external cabinet simulation. Amped includes a guitar tuner, and the Roots standalone program can be controlled by MIDI. Plugin formats include VST3, AU, and AAX, with AAX support limited to Mac. The free plan costs nothing; the Amped Roots 2.0 Full License is listed at €5,999 as a one-time purchase. Purchasing requires installing the plugin's free trial and using its computer-specific Request Key at checkout.

Rustortion is a free guitar and bass amp simulator written in Rust for Linux and Windows. It runs standalone with JACK or inside a DAW as a VST3 or CLAP plugin. The processing chain has 12 DSP stages, including preamp, compressor, tone stack, power amp, effects, graphic EQ, and NAM model loading. Oversampling can be set from 1x through 16x, and impulse-response cabinet simulation is available for guitar and bass. Users can save and load presets, switch them with keyboard hotkeys, record in real time, tune, shift pitch with FFT processing, and use MIDI controllers. Plugin bundles are listed for Linux x86_64, Linux aarch64, and Windows x86_64. The project is MIT-licensed, experimental, and under active development, with use at the user’s own risk. Linux requires PipeWire, JACK support, and a Rust toolchain. There is no macOS build. The interface supports English and Simplified Chinese.