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:lol:

I'm one of those Helix users who is extremely dissatisfied with the tuner, but I like the Helix o/w. I tried all the "it's you, not the tuner" tricks, but got disgusted and bought a $130 strobe tuner ( https://www.turbo-tuner.com/ ). I configured the Helix to send its tuner output to the TT, which means I have two steps to tune: 1 hold the tuner button on helix, and 2 tap the TT button. (I could leave the TT on but I don't have a AC adapter. It's not an issue, though.) The strobe display was a little weird at first, but man it's fast, stable, and insanely accurate. I use it for rehearsals and gigs. All other times I use a $10 clip-on, which is *still* better than the Helix (sorry guys).

You can do this, but you have to assign those parameters to the snapshots controller. Assuming you are on floor or rack, you can do that by pressing down on the parameter knob as you turn. That will put the value in brackets and you'll be able to change them between snapshots

Fixed my post, per pianoguyy's correction.

Thanks for that really good to hear that the 500 is worth getting and I agree I’m not going to bother with the transplant. cheers mark

You can have a single patch that includes a 1/4” out for your amp that does not include cab/mic block, and a separate XLR out for the house PA that does include cab/mic sim.

1. Models in Helix are much better sounding AND feeling than Firehawk IMO. 2. Yes you can do that, but you may find a lot of EQing involved going back and forth 3. You can still do WDW in the digital realm to FOH. IMO, stereo stuff live is kind of a waste for 90% of the audience from their perspective. 4. Helix has only one dedicated guitar input. There are returns and an aux in, but only one dedicated for guitar.

Yeah it's a massive issue. Take a look at this super blurry low res pic - I can easily see what pedals are off in it.

Yeah, I have the same problem. Sometimes need to click on stuff to see if its active. It needs to be improved. FYI, I just filled out a support ticket and reported it, and told them others have mentioned it in this forum. Maybe we'll get some traction....

The horn has a couple of purposes. First its to provide dispersion of your guitar tone so that more than just the few people that are right in front of it and right on axis get the high end. Second is to provide full range flat frequency response for other patches that say include acoustic guitar or mic inputs. Now to the high cut on cab and IR models. Although an electric guitar pickups don’t produce much above 6 kHz, and guitar speakers often reproduce even less, a distorted guitar with a mic pointed right at the speaker cone can result in substantially higher frequencies than that. Hence the fizz. This is not unusual for mic’d analog amps and cabinets. Microphone choice and placement are a real art for capturing a good electric guitar sound. And it usually takes some post EQ, compression, limiting, etc. in the recorded track to get what we’re use to hearing. Live this stuff doesn’t matter as much because its LOUD. But in headphones, or with monitor speakers at normal room volumes, it will matter a great deal. This is why you need to use high cut on Helix cab and IR blocks - to reproduce the whole signal chain.

Speirsy11, welcome to the new world!! It's crazy, huh? I can throw on a few answers and suggestions to the pile you've already received. 1. Nope, not even. However, there are two settings for the bottom row of foot-switches (FS5 - FS8): Press and hold the "View" button, on page 1/12 under the picture of the wrench is "FS Mode" and you can make it "5-8" or "ABCD." If it's in "5-8" mode, then you can assign amps, cabs and/or pedals to those foot-switches (5, 6, 7, 8) as an on/off function. If you change to the "ABCD" mode, then each press will change the preset to one of the four that are in that bank (1A, 1B, 1C, 1D). Hit the "Up/Down" foot-switches to change the banks of presets. If you need a particular order for your setlist, you can save the presets to the available folders (User 1, User 2, etc). Advantages of 5-8 vs ABCD: if you use a lot of pedals and like to kick them on and off, then 5-8 is a better option, otherwise you only can assign on/off to switches 1-4. If you change presets more than individual pedals or hate hitting the Up/Down and then a foot-switch , ABCD-mode might be a better option. Also, you can assign more than one pedal to the same switch. You can hit one switch and turn on three pedals at once or make it where hitting the switch turns one off and another on. Simply assign multiple pedals to the same switch (place arrow over device, press and hold "Enter" on 500X and turn the knob to assign the effect to a particular switch). It remembers the on'off state of each pedal when you save. When you hit the switch, it turns the effect(s) on/off as you programmed. 2. If you are using the Variax VDI (Cat 5) cable - about $30 (not a standard guitar cable), then YES; a great feature of using the Variax with the HD500X is the ability to create and store Variax settings as part of the preset and even assign amp/pedal/cab parameters to the volume and tone controls of the Variax (if you want to get really carried away!). Again, press and hold the "View" button and rock the x/y pad to the right to go to pages 7 and 8 to access the Variax parameters. You can save your settings as part of any preset. Check out the Variax Folder that is included on the 500X and walk thru the presets. Preset "12D - Right Now" is a good example. It drops to Korn-style tuning and swaps out amp/cab/effects to mimic the sound of the band. While you are there, press and hold View and go to pages 7 and 8 to see how they did it. Now, change to "8C - Rain Song." Why is there no sound? Because they send the output of this acoustic setting to FOH (front of house - PA) because acoustic sound kind of crappy thru an electric guitar amp. Check the 500X manual, starting on page 2.11 for more info and step-by-step directions. Also see pages 3.6 - 3.9 for sending parameters to the Variax volume and tone knobs. (manual is a free download from L6 if you don't have one). It's pretty cool to use. I have used it to control the "mix" level of reverbs and chorus pedals from the guitar. You can even set the amount of sweep: 0-100% or limit it from 30-55% (for example) if that' is what you need. Neat feature! By the way, you can also assign parameters to the wah/vol pedal rocker too. I've heard of some guys who put the modeled-mic distance on the rocker to move it to and from the cab for a different tone while playing. Quick note on the Variax with 500X: if you use the VDI cable, you don't need the battery in the guitar. If you have the battery in, it will use the battery and run it down. 3. There are a ton of amps/cabs/effects/microphones loaded standard on the 500X. You can purchase "model packs" from the L6 website, either in small bundles or the whole enchilada. The big combo is normally $100, but goes on sale a few times a year for around $75. Is it worth the cost? Yes! The model pack can also be loaded to multiple devices with a single purchase. I bought the big combo pack and loaded it to my 500, 500X and HD Desktop, all legal and fully authorized by Line 6. I think they allow it on up to five devices? The website details what you get in the the model packs. This was a looooong answer, but hopefully of some help. Have fun!!

Here's what I do. I put in my amp and cab/IR blocks in place, then almost at the very end of the signal chain I place a parametric EQ block. The reason I use a parametric EQ block is the slopes on the high and low cuts are much steeper than the ones on the cab or IR blocks so it makes it easier for me to hear and make adjustments. I typically start high cuts up around 12khz and work my way down until I hear what I'm after. I then work my way up on the low cut around 60Hz till I get the tightness I want on the bass. One other thing I now commonly do is the trick Jason Sadites showed in his video of doing a crossover split using two gain blocks to adjust overall levels of lows and highs. The way that's done is you add two simple gain blocks and then create a split with one on the top path and one on the lower path. Change the split type to a crossover split and I'll normally specify around 650Hz to start. This allows you to fine tune the overall sound of the lows and highs very effectively by simply adjusting the upper and lower gain blocks up or down as well as where the crossover split frequency starts. Very cool trick.

First, that chart which I've seen is somewhat a general chart of frequency ranges, but there are some other considerations. There are overtones and harmonics that come into play as well so the range can extend quite a bit byond that range at times. Also bear in mind when you look at a frequency response chart for a traditional guitar speaker, the frequency range also extends beyond that, but not all of the frequencies are projected evenly across the spectrum. The fizziness you hear would also be heard were you to put your ear up next to the center cap on most of these speakers (which I wouldn't advise doing), so that fizziness can even be heard through any FOH speaker system (which are all pretty much FRFR speakers) if you mic the center cap of a speaker. Just as the fizziness disappears if you mic further out on the cone structure with the added effect that lower frequencies will get accentuated. So even with a traditional speaker you can get rid of fizziness at the cost of a flubby bass. All of these same artifacts are duplicated in the Helix with cabs, IRs, microphones, and mic placements. The reason FRFR speakers use horns is the same reason studio FRFR speakers use tweeters. It enables the speaker to have a flatter response across the entire range of frequencies it covers and treat them all equally unlike a simple speaker. The reason for a horn in a powered FRFR speakers like an Alto, or Yamaha, or QSC is because it's designed for projection over long distances because they are, in effect, the same thing as a FOH PA speaker. They do this by conserving energy by maintaining a very controlled sound cone so that energy doesn't get wasted by sending it up into the ceiling or down into the floor, nor does it get leaked outside of the cabinet enclosure. Also higher frequencies die out faster across distances than do lower frequencies. The horn is a pretty important part in all of this. The high and low cuts are dependent on MANY factors. I have several presets that have no high or low cuts depending on the style of music, the guitar/pickups I use, the amp, cabs/IRs, mic, mic placement and mic mixes. Unless you have a pretty good understanding of speaker behaviors and particularly microphone differences, their placement and mixes, it's sometimes easier for people to compensate for such things by simply using high and low cuts. The fact is, those type of high and low cuts have been used in commercial studio recordings as far back as I can remember into the 60s and 70s. That's because even a home stereo system or car stereo will reproduce highs and lows better than what your ears would hear standing next to an amp, and those recordings are made by mic'ing a speaker, so all of the same physics apply.

I would not call what they did to the forums an improvement. It was a lateral move at best, and a step backwards in some areas.

Hi the HD500(x) is designed to work with the Variax as part of a concept called the Dream Rig. basically you can control the variax from the HD unit so you can have, say, a telecaster into a modelled amp with loads of FX on one preset, then switch something else on another preset - say a 12 string acoustic going to PA via FX send. You can even have two guitars - the magnetic pickups of the variax on one channel panned L and a modelled guitar on channel 2 panned R. There are stacks of amps and FX and you can buy some additional ones as downloads.

Realistically, I use the noise gate in the input block when there's enough gain for the hum to bother me. But that's hum being picked up by my guitar, not originating in Helix. If you think it's coming from Helix itself, that may not help.