TONE3000 Plugin Guide

The Basics

Overview

The free, official TONE3000 Plugin and standalone app lets you play through a massive, constantly expanding library of Neural Amp Modeler (NAM) captures and impulse responses (IRs) created by the TONE3000 community. It works in every major DAW, or you can use the standalone app with no DAW required.

You can browse and load tones directly inside the plugin without downloading and managing files locally, though the plugin also supports loading local files and offline use.

Quick Start

To use the TONE3000 Plugin you need:

• A guitar or bass and a 1/4" instrument cable
• An audio interface
• Headphones or monitors
• An internet connection to load new tones (everything else works offline)
• Optional: a DAW, since the plugin also runs as a standalone app

Steps to play:

1. Download and install the plugin. Get the installer at tone3000.com/plugin/download and run it.
2. Connect your gear. Plug into a Hi-Z / instrument input (Line/Inst switch set to Inst), connect the interface over USB, and plug in your headphones or monitors.
3. Set your input level. Turn up the interface gain while playing your hardest. Aim for a healthy signal that never lights the red clip indicator.
4. Open it. In a DAW, insert TONE3000 on an instrument track and arm it. In the standalone app, pick your devices in Settings → System Settings and turn on Hear Yourself.
5. Sign in. Create a free account in the plugin. You can browse Trending signed out, but loading a tone requires an account.
6. Load a tone. Click + (Add Tone) and grab an Amp + Cab from Trending; it's complete out of the box.
7. Play and record. Works like any other amp plugin. Arm the track, hit record, play.

Latency tip: If you hear a delay between playing a note and hearing it, lower your buffer size to 128 samples. In standalone, that's Settings → System Settings → Buffer Size. In a DAW, it's in your host's audio preferences. If 128 introduces crackles or pops, step back up to 256.

Monitoring tip: Use headphones if speakers are anywhere near your pickups. High-gain tones can feed back loudly and fast.

Performance tip: The plugin runs at any sample rate but is lightest at 48 kHz. Other rates resample, which costs CPU.

Note: The TONE3000 Plugin runs NAM A2 captures (A2-Full and A2-Lite) and impulse responses (IR's). Files from the legacy NAM architecture (A1) can't be loaded.

Installation

Download TONE3000 for your platform: tone3000.com/plugin/download

macOS

Open the .pkg, follow the prompts, and choose the formats you want (Standalone, VST3, AU, CLAP, AAX). When it's done, open TONE3000 from Applications or load it in your DAW.

If your DAW was open during install, rescan plug-ins or restart it.

Windows

Run the setup .exe and follow the prompts. Choose Full to install everything, or Custom to pick from Standalone, VST3, AAX, CLAP, and factory presets.

The plugin UI needs the WebView2 runtime, which the installer handles on most machines. Use an ASIO driver with your interface for the lowest latency.

Linux

Extract the archive and run ./install.sh. This installs VST3, LV2, and CLAP plus the standalone app with a desktop entry.

The UI needs WebKitGTK. If the plugin window is black, install it for your distro (on Ubuntu/Debian: sudo apt install libwebkit2gtk-4.1-0) and reopen the plugin.

Format support

Opening the Plugin

Two ways to run TONE3000: as a standalone app with no DAW, or as a plug-in in your DAW.

Standalone app

1. Open TONE3000 from Applications (Mac), the Start menu (Windows), or your apps menu (Linux).
2. Go to Settings → System Settings and choose your input and output devices. Allow microphone/input access if your OS asks.
3. Turn on Hear Yourself to monitor through the plugin.
4. If you hear latency while playing, set Buffer Size to 128 samples. On Windows, use an ASIO driver as well.

Use headphones when monitoring with speakers nearby. Feedback gets loud fast.

In your DAW

Create or select a track, insert TONE3000 as an effect, then route your interface input to the track and arm it. In a DAW the host controls audio devices and sample rate, so you'll set those in your DAW preferences rather than inside TONE3000.

If TONE3000 doesn't appear in your plugin list, rescan plug-ins or restart the DAW.

Where to find it:

Sign in

Click the account menu or any Sign in prompt in the tone browser, then sign in or create a free account. Trending is browsable while signed out, but loading a tone always needs an account so the plugin can download the model securely.

Browse the library

Click the + (Add Tone) tile in the chain to open the in-plugin browser:

• Trending shows what's popular right now (available signed out)
• Recently used shows tones you've loaded before
• Favorites shows tones you've favorited on tone3000.com
• Created shows tones you've uploaded

Use the gear filters to narrow by type (Amp + Cab, Amp Head, Cabinet, Pedal, Outboard, Spaces, Experimental), or click Browse to open the full TONE3000 catalog.

Load a tone

Click a tone, pick a model if the pack contains several (each is a different knob snapshot), and it downloads as a block in your chain. Set Input and Output on the faceplate and play.

You can add, remove, swap, and rearrange blocks at any time from the main screen.

Import your own files

Already have NAM files or IRs on your computer? Import them in two ways:

• Right-click an empty block and select Import NAM file or IRs
• Drag and drop the files onto the chain

You can import individual models or an entire folder. A folder loads as one tone named after the folder, with one model per file (nested folders included, up to 300 models, 50 MB each). The plugin reads .nam files (A2) and IR .wav files; a mixed folder uses whichever type is in the majority. Local imports work signed out and fully offline, including switching between their models.

Pairing an Amp Head with a Cabinet

Amp Heads need a cab to sound complete. Keep the Amp Head as the first NAM block, click + again, and add a Cabinet IR. That's a custom amp and cab combination.

Learn More: What Is an Impulse Response?

Building a chain

Beginner tip: Load an Amp + Cab, nudge Bass/Middle/Treble, save a preset. You're done.

Pro tip: Build pedals → Amp Head → Cabinet → Space, EQ each block, and keep Normalize on so levels stay consistent when you swap models.

Offline Use

The plugin works offline. Anything that processes audio runs without an internet connection: your chains, presets, downloaded models, NAM captures, and IRs, even undo/redo. Files you import from your computer work offline too, including newly added local models.

The only thing that needs a connection is loading new tones or models from TONE3000.

Dial In Your Sound

Shaping Your Sound

Hover over any control and the info bar under the faceplate shows a one-line tip.

Master controls

These sit at the bottom of the window and affect your entire sound.

• Noise Gate cuts signal below the threshold, which cleans up noisy, overdriven tones. It sits at the start of the chain, before your first block, and is internally side-chained to a filtered copy of your input (roughly 80 Hz to 5 kHz), so hum can't hold it open and hiss won't trigger it. It opens instantly on pick attacks and closes as a smooth downward expander, so note tails fade instead of cutting off.
• EQ boosts or cuts bass, mids, and treble across the whole tone.
• Spread widens the stereo image in Mono mode. The Offset control sets the delay between the left and right signals, which changes perceived width. See Stereo, Spread, and Align.

Per-block controls

Click any block in the chain to open its controls.

• Model swaps between the captures in the loaded pack. Sign-in is required for TONE3000 tones; locally imported models switch without an account.
• In / Out set how much signal goes into the model and how much passes to the rest of the chain.
• Mix blends the wet (processed) signal against the dry (unprocessed) signal. Especially useful for reverbs and effects.
• EQ is a 6-band EQ with two views: Sliders for quick gain-only faders, and Curve for full parametric control of frequency, gain, and Q. Each band can be a Low Cut, Low Shelf, Bell, High Shelf, or High Cut, with up to ±15 dB of gain. Place it PRE (before the model) or post.
• Power bypasses the block without removing it.
• Swap replaces the tone in place. Remove deletes the block. Share copies a tone3000.com link for the tone.
• Normalize (when revealed in Settings) levels the block's loudness so volume stays consistent across the chain. See Normalization.
• NAM Size sets an individual block to LITE or FULL, without affecting other blocks. See NAM A2 Size.
• Info shows the tone's description, gear makes, and tags from TONE3000.
• Favorite saves the tone to your TONE3000 favorites without leaving the plugin. View on TONE3000 opens the tone in your browser.

Pro tip: Right-click a block to Copy, then right-click an empty + slot to paste a full duplicate including tone, model, and settings. Hold ⌥/Alt while dragging a block to duplicate it in place.

Mono vs Stereo

Use the Mono / Stereo control in the header:

• Mono: one chain, both outputs. Spread is available here.
• Stereo: independent Left and Right chains, with pan, solo, swap, polarity invert, branch, Align, and Balance.

Full details in Stereo, Spread, and Align below.

Presets

Load: click the preset name to open a factory or user preset. The arrows in the preset bar scroll through them. The browser lists factory and user presets separately, with a search box for finding one by name.

Save: click the save icon. A preset stores the whole rig, including chains, block settings, and master controls. Saving with the same name overwrites; a new name creates a new preset. Factory presets are read-only.

Reorder: drag user presets into a custom order. The Prev/Next arrows and MIDI preset changes follow it. To tweak a factory preset, save a copy under a new name.

Rename and Delete are available on your own presets, and New (+ icon) clears the chain and resets every control to its default, which is the fastest way to start a new signal chain from scratch.

Stereo, Spread, and Align

Three related features, each tied to a mode: dual chains and Align live in Stereo, Spread lives in Mono.

Dual chains

Switching to Stereo mode gives you two independent chains, Left and Right:

• Pan L / Pan R place each chain in the stereo field. Link the pans to mirror them.
• Solo L / Solo R isolate one chain.
• Invert L / Invert R flip one chain's polarity, which fixes chains that hollow out or cancel.
• Swap Chains exchanges Left and Right, pans included.
• Branch feeds the other chain from a point in this one. Click a branch gap between blocks to create it, and click the junction again to make the chains independent.

Common setups: the same Amp + Cab on both sides with different IRs or EQ for wide rhythm guitar; a pedal on Left only branching into a shared amp; two different amps hard-panned for a double-tracked feel.

Spread (mono to stereo width)

Spread is a stereo doubler for a mono chain. One side is your unaltered performance, the other is a slightly late, subtly drifting copy, more like a second take than a static delay.

1. Stay in Mono mode.
2. Enable Spread on the faceplate.
3. Turn Offset left or right, up to ±24 ms. The direction picks which side lags; the amount sets the delay.
4. Right-click Offset for the advanced panel: Wobble adds humanizing drift (up to ±1.2 ms), Crossover keeps lows dual-mono below its cutoff (33 to 520 Hz, default 130 Hz), Diffuse phase-decorrelates the lagged side, and a correlation light flags mono-compatibility (dim is safe, yellow is caution, red means cancellation on a mono sum).

By default, lows stay dual-mono to protect mono compatibility and keep things from going thin and phasey; turn Crossover off to double the full band and trade that safety for maximum width. There's no wet/dry mix; when Spread is on, Offset is the main musical control.

Beginner tip: A small Offset plus a little Wobble gives natural width. Watch the mono-safety light if the mix will be folded to mono.

Align (stereo time correction)

Use Align in Stereo mode when Left and Right aren't time-aligned, which happens with different IR lengths, mic distances, or processing delay.

1. Enable Align.
2. Nudge Offset toward L or R (up to ±24 ms), or click Auto Align: the plugin mutes the output for about half a second, runs an internal sweep through both chains, and dials in the correction automatically, fixing inverted polarity along the way.
3. Use Auto Balance if the two chains also differ in level.

Align has the same advanced panel as Spread (Wobble, Crossover, Diffuse, and the correlation light), with every section off by default, so Align stays purely corrective until you ask for the deck.

Align is corrective and Spread is creative. Each belongs to its own mode, so you'll never see both at once.

Advanced

Normalization

Every NAM capture loads with normalization enabled. It levels each block's output so volume stays consistent across the blocks in your chain, no matter how loud or quiet the original capture was.

Normalization is controlled per block. Turn on Per-Block Normalization in Settings → Plugin Settings to reveal an optional control on each block: look for the = icon, enabled by default. Turn it off on a block when you want that capture's true output level.

For how normalization interacts with calibration, see Calibration and Gain Staging.

Calibration and Gain Staging

NAM captures are recorded at a known input level. Calibration matches your interface or DAW level to that reference so the model responds the way the capture intended. This matters most for amp feel and how hard the virtual tubes or transistors get hit.

To enable: go to Settings → Plugin Settings, turn on Calibration, and enter the dBu level that matches your DAW's maximum digital level. Typical values are +12 dBu for pro gear and +4 dBu for semi-pro.

Captures that ship with calibration data show a gauge icon on their block and use that data by default.

Learn more about Calibration

Normalize vs. Calibration:

When calibration is actively passing true output level to the next NAM block, Normalize may show as overridden. That's intentional.

Beginner tip: Leave Normalize on and skip calibration until you care about matching a specific capture's feel.

Pro tip: Calibrate once for your interface, keep Amp Heads un-cab'd consistent across sessions, and use block In/Out for musical gain staging.

NAM A2 Size

TONE3000 loads NAM Architecture 2 (A2) models only, in two sizes:

• A2-Lite is best for tracking, big sessions, and laptops where CPU is tight. It still sounds amazing.
• A2-Full is the maximum accuracy model which is great for final tones, and critical listening.

By default, every block loads at A2-Lite, which sounds great for most applications. Each block carries its own size, so you can mix LITE and FULL blocks in the same chain.

Load new blocks as A2-Lite or A2-Full

Go to Settings → Plugin Settings → NAM A2 Size and choose A2-Lite or A2-Full. Every tone you add from then on loads at that size. Blocks already in your chain keep the size they have, so presets load exactly as you saved them.

Set the NAM size on each block

1. Go to Settings → Plugin Settings and turn on Per-Block NAM Size.
2. A LITE / FULL toggle appears on every NAM block, next to its power button.
3. Click LITE or FULL on a block to change that block only. Watch the CPU readout in the info bar as you switch.

With Per-Block NAM Size turned off, a block shows its size only when it differs from your default.

Learn more: NAM A2: The Complete Guide

Oversampling

Nonlinear amp models create harmonics. Without enough headroom above the sample rate, those harmonics alias back into the audible band.

Turn on Settings → Plugin Settings → Oversampling to run the tone chain at a higher internal rate, then filter back down:

Higher rates improve quality but use more CPU, so toggle oversampling off if you need headroom. There is no filter setting to choose: the anti-aliasing filter is fixed, and it was chosen specifically so that turning oversampling on or off never shifts your timing.

Multi-Core Processing

Multi-Core Processing (on by default, and machine-wide) spreads the heavy lifting across CPU cores: in Stereo mode the Left and Right chains process in parallel, and oversampled NAM models split their work across cores in any mode. The sound is identical, but you get more headroom on heavy rigs. Turn it off only if you hit machine quirks.

Heavy-Session Checklist

• Run the host or standalone session at 48 kHz
• Start on A2-Lite and bump to Full when printing
• Stay at 2× oversampling unless you hear aliasing on high-gain tones
• Leave Multi-Core Processing on, especially for stereo rigs and oversampled models
• Bypass unused blocks instead of leaving silent high-CPU models online

MIDI Control

Map pedals and knobs to plugin controls in Settings → Plugin Settings → MIDI Mapping. Mappings save with the plugin and work in your DAW, which is useful for stomps that toggle block power, change presets, or move faceplate knobs. Enable your devices under System Settings → MIDI Inputs, including Bluetooth MIDI.

Mapping a control

1. Open Settings → Plugin Settings → MIDI Mapping and choose a control from the list.
2. Move the knob or press the footswitch you want to use. The plugin listens for about ten seconds and maps whatever it hears.
3. You can also type a CC number directly instead of moving hardware.
4. Each mapped row has buttons to re-learn it on different hardware or remove it.

Set MIDI Channel in the same panel. It defaults to Omni, which listens on every channel.

Switching presets with MIDI

Map Previous Preset and Next Preset to two footswitches to step through your presets in order.

Program change messages also load presets directly. Each preset's PC number comes from its position in the list, so dragging presets into your own order sets the PC map to match. Turn on the PC display in the preset browser to see each preset's number.

What you can map

• Presets: Previous and Next.
• Global: Input Gain, Output Level, Output Balance.
• Noise Gate: power and threshold.
• Tone Stack: power, Bass, Mid, Treble.
• Stereo: Stereo Mode, Pan L and R, Solo L and R, Invert L and R.
• Spread and Align: power, offset, wobble, crossover, and diffuse for each.
• Blocks: power for every block slot in the chain.

Reference

Settings and Controls Reference

Main controls (always visible)

System Settings

System Settings appears in the standalone app only. In a DAW, the host owns devices, buffer size, and sample rate, so Settings opens straight to Plugin Settings.

Plugin Settings

Quick Fixes

Get Help

Ask the Community

The fastest way to get answers is to post in the community. Join the TONE3000 Discord or the Neural Amp Modeler Facebook Group. Both are active, and chances are someone has already solved what you're running into.

Email Support

For account issues or anything you'd rather not post publicly, email support@tone3000.com.

Report Issues on GitHub

Found a bug? The TONE3000 Plugin is open source, and issues are tracked on GitHub. A good report helps us fix it fast:

1. Search the existing issues first. If yours is already reported, add a comment with your details instead of opening a duplicate.
2. Click New issue and give it a specific title, like "Crackling audio in Reaper on Windows 11 at 128 samples".
3. Include your setup: OS and version, DAW and plugin format (or standalone), audio interface, buffer size, and sample rate.
4. Describe the steps to reproduce the problem, what you expected, and what happened instead.
5. Attach logs: go to Settings → Plugin Settings → Diagnostics, copy the logs, and paste them into the issue.