I think Peter_IK's description captures is pretty well, though I'd summarize it as:
- AmpliTube provides digital simulations of physical gear and, as such, seeks to let you control individual parameters of that gear with corresponding effects on the tone as much like as if you were using the real physical gear as possible.
- TONEX creates "snapshots" of a particular chain of physical gear and lets you reapply that "snapshot" to the signal.
So they are different things, with different approaches that perhaps ostensibly solve different problems for different people. IMO (and others may well correct me!), if you want to simulate being in a studio with access to a big pile of gear whose placement and parameters you can control, then AmpliTube seems designed for that. If you want to create a "snapshot" of a particular chain of gear or apply such a snapshot that you or someone else has created previously, then TONEX seems designed for that.
I think of TONEX being particularly attractive to people who have access to particular gear that they like but either it's not in AmpliTube
or, even if it is in AmpliTube ... Well, you want
your personal JCM 800, which you know and love
better than AmpliTube's Brit 8000
and you've already found the
perfect placement in your room, and the
perfect mic with the
perfect positioning on the absolutely
best speaker in
your favorite cab ...
but you want the convenience of going back to that
perfect tone at a moment's notice, forever, anywhere there's a computer, without the hassle of dragging all your gear around, setting it up, sound-checking, etc. and etc. .... TONEX basically lets you do that.