I can't speak for you, but I am sure that most guitarist actually cannot tell the difference. I've posted many threads over the years at TheGearPage, with real

I can't speak for you, but I am sure that most guitarist actually cannot tell the difference. I've posted many threads over the years at TheGearPage, with real amp recordings vs hardware/software modellers, and in nearly all cases, the guesses are just that - guesses, which fall into a 50/50 distribution. That is of course, when the guys who are purported 'experts' actually participate in the polls. Most of them tend to disappear whenever they are challenged to voice in on them. I have some lovely tube amps here, and I also own a couple of Axe-FX's, and for me, when travelling, the Axe-FX is my 'go to' purely for convenience. At gig volumes, and in a band mix, it is pretty hard for me to tell the difference, and I enjoy the tone the same. I know a lot of guitarists say that they have to have the 'feel', but for me, the 'feel' is there anyway (I usually feed my Axe-FX through the power amp stage of a real amp). I normally play fairly clean, blues/rock based stuff, and the last gig I flew across the country for, the rented backline actually had a Mesa Rectifier III for me. I've never played a Rectifier style amp before, but I had my Axe-FX, with a Fender Bassman amp model preset, through the power amp stage of the Rectifier, and it sounded amazing. The other bands were asking me how I was getting such crystal clean tones out of a 'metal' amp!