Darkglass Anagram runs three simultaneous NAM A2-Full models, HeadRush runs one per rig, and both boxes are advertised as natively NAM compatible. The phrase is doing a lot of quiet work.
Underneath it sit three different realities. Some pedals run the full architecture, some run only the lightweight embedded version, and at least one converts your file into something else before it plays.
That last group is the one to watch. TONE3000 is direct about conversion into proprietary formats degrading sound quality, which makes a converted capture a different product from a native one, whatever the marketing copy says.
Below that, the volume brands run A2-Lite. Mooer's GS1000 and GE300 families, the Hotone Ampero II series, and Nux boxes like the MG-30 and MG-400 all landed there, with street prices starting under 150 dollars.
The cheap tier exists for a concrete engineering reason. A2-Lite was built to hold steady at 50 percent load on a 600MHz ARM Cortex-M7, a chip that costs around three dollars in bulk, which is what put native NAM inside pedals that sell for less than a decent overdrive.
Valeton is the awkward case. Its GP-5, GP-200, and GP-150 reached NAM through conversion to A1-Standard rather than native playback, with native A2-Lite promised rather than shipped.
The list keeps growing either way. TONE3000 names Blackstar, Lava Music, Darkglass, HeadRush, Chaos Audio, Dimehead, and VTR Effects among the manufacturers building A2 support, and A2 itself only launched on the second of June.
So the pedals running NAM without conversion are not the same set as the pedals claiming NAM compatibility. Reading a spec sheet now means checking which of the three you are being sold.
Sonulab's Stompstation Pro and the Harley unit are also built around three concurrent full models. That is enough for a captured overdrive into a captured head into a captured cab, all running as separate neural models in one chain.
HeadRush does not play that game. One NAM file per rig is the rule, which puts it at the top of the market on capture quality and near the bottom on capture density.
At the other end, Blackstar's Beam Mini loads one full-rig capture at a time and costs 229 dollars, browsing TONE3000 through a phone app rather than a screen. The lightweight tier is not a quality dead end so much as a price decision.
HeadRush exposes the choice. The NAM block carries a Lite Mode switch, so the same capture can run as a full model when it is carrying a song or drop to the lighter version when the rig is crowded with effects.
That flexibility follows from A2 being slimmable by design, a property Steve Atkinson built into the architecture rather than something HeadRush bolted on. Most manufacturers simply have not surfaced it.
It also explains why HeadRush's arrival in the native NAM camp read differently from the announcements that came before it. Blackstar shipped the Beam Mini in May under the old A2-Nano name, Darkglass added A2-Full in the KosmOS 1.16 update in June, and the pattern by August was clear.
Blackstar has since taken the same architecture up in its own range, with the Beam Solo gaining native A2 after the Mini. On desktop, the reference point stays free, since the Gateway plugin loads both A1 and A2 files as a VST3 or AU at no cost, which is the yardstick any hardware implementation gets measured against.
Where HeadRush pulled ahead was the browsing. Anagram and Beam Mini both need a companion app or a computer to fetch captures, while Prime and Core put the search on a seven-inch touchscreen with nothing else in the room.
Where it fell behind was the ceiling. A bass player with an Anagram can stack three captured stages inside one patch, and no amount of screen size closes that gap on a HeadRush.
Underneath it sit three different realities. Some pedals run the full architecture, some run only the lightweight embedded version, and at least one converts your file into something else before it plays.
That last group is the one to watch. TONE3000 is direct about conversion into proprietary formats degrading sound quality, which makes a converted capture a different product from a native one, whatever the marketing copy says.
The tier you get tracks what you paid
The full-fat camp is small and expensive. Darkglass Anagram sits around 1,035 dollars; the Dimehead NAM Player and Sonulab Stompstation Pro sit alongside it, and HeadRush brought Prime, Core, and Flex Prime into the same tier at 999, 699, and 499 dollars.Below that, the volume brands run A2-Lite. Mooer's GS1000 and GE300 families, the Hotone Ampero II series, and Nux boxes like the MG-30 and MG-400 all landed there, with street prices starting under 150 dollars.
The cheap tier exists for a concrete engineering reason. A2-Lite was built to hold steady at 50 percent load on a 600MHz ARM Cortex-M7, a chip that costs around three dollars in bulk, which is what put native NAM inside pedals that sell for less than a decent overdrive.
Valeton is the awkward case. Its GP-5, GP-200, and GP-150 reached NAM through conversion to A1-Standard rather than native playback, with native A2-Lite promised rather than shipped.
The list keeps growing either way. TONE3000 names Blackstar, Lava Music, Darkglass, HeadRush, Chaos Audio, Dimehead, and VTR Effects among the manufacturers building A2 support, and A2 itself only launched on the second of June.
So the pedals running NAM without conversion are not the same set as the pedals claiming NAM compatibility. Reading a spec sheet now means checking which of the three you are being sold.
Instance counts separate the top of the market
Tier is only half the picture, and the half nobody publishes is how many captures a device plays at once. Anagram runs up to three simultaneous A2-Full instances on its hexacore processor at 32-bit and 48kHz.Sonulab's Stompstation Pro and the Harley unit are also built around three concurrent full models. That is enough for a captured overdrive into a captured head into a captured cab, all running as separate neural models in one chain.
HeadRush does not play that game. One NAM file per rig is the rule, which puts it at the top of the market on capture quality and near the bottom on capture density.
At the other end, Blackstar's Beam Mini loads one full-rig capture at a time and costs 229 dollars, browsing TONE3000 through a phone app rather than a screen. The lightweight tier is not a quality dead end so much as a price decision.
HeadRush is the one that lets you choose
Here is the detail the roundups miss entirely. On most of these boxes, the architecture tier was decided at the factory, and an A2-Lite pedal plays A2-Lite whether you like it or not.HeadRush exposes the choice. The NAM block carries a Lite Mode switch, so the same capture can run as a full model when it is carrying a song or drop to the lighter version when the rig is crowded with effects.
That flexibility follows from A2 being slimmable by design, a property Steve Atkinson built into the architecture rather than something HeadRush bolted on. Most manufacturers simply have not surfaced it.
It also explains why HeadRush's arrival in the native NAM camp read differently from the announcements that came before it. Blackstar shipped the Beam Mini in May under the old A2-Nano name, Darkglass added A2-Full in the KosmOS 1.16 update in June, and the pattern by August was clear.
Blackstar has since taken the same architecture up in its own range, with the Beam Solo gaining native A2 after the Mini. On desktop, the reference point stays free, since the Gateway plugin loads both A1 and A2 files as a VST3 or AU at no cost, which is the yardstick any hardware implementation gets measured against.
Where HeadRush pulled ahead was the browsing. Anagram and Beam Mini both need a companion app or a computer to fetch captures, while Prime and Core put the search on a seven-inch touchscreen with nothing else in the room.
Where it fell behind was the ceiling. A bass player with an Anagram can stack three captured stages inside one patch, and no amount of screen size closes that gap on a HeadRush.
