Neural DSP Quad Cortex MK2

The Quad Cortex MK2 is Neural DSP's flagship floor/rack-hybrid modeler, and in a live IEM or playback rig context it functions as the entire tone engine for a guitarist who wants to leave the amp at home. It captures, processes, and routes your signal — amp models, cab sims, effects chains — all in a single unit drawing at most 30 watts. At 1.6 kg and 190 mm deep, it's physically compact enough to live in a shallow utility rack or a dedicated pedalboard-style case, though it ships as a floor unit and will need a rack tray if you're mounting it in a standard rack.

The port layout tells you how this thing actually behaves at show time: two TRS inputs give you stereo or wet-dry-wet flexibility at the front end, and the four outputs — two TRS, two XLR — mean you can split to FOH on the balanced XLR pair while feeding your in-ear mix or a personal monitor from the TRS outs simultaneously, without a splitter box in between. The USB-C handles computer-based preset management, audio interface duties during soundcheck, and firmware updates. With improved DSP headroom over the original, you're less likely to hit a processing ceiling when stacking amp captures, IR loading, and time-based effects in the same chain.

This unit belongs in a rig where the guitarist is the system integrator — someone who owns their tone chain end to end and needs one box to do the work of an amp, pedalboard, and DI combined. It earns its $1,999 price on tours where minimizing stage volume matters and consistency night-to-night is non-negotiable. It's not the right call if your workflow depends on MIDI-over-Ethernet, Dante, or AES3 connectivity — this is an analog I/O device at its core, and if your rig is already built around a digital snake or networked audio, you'll be bridging back to analog at every show.