clay-man

I know. I apologize, but at the same time I'm kind of serious. We shouldn't be complaining to bring back 1.9 to replace 2.0 if it's actually accurate. I think it's been mentioned that the 2 & 4 positions are literally bugged out and that they're trying to fix it. I don't understand why they haven't fixed it yet.

Thank you, exactly. It's not just filtering the strings through pickups, but asking to change the strings entirely as well. Steel modeling Nylon will never be spot on, but they can try. It might be why we don't have one honestly, because they might think it's a waste of time to give us something that might come out to be way off. It's hard to explain, but modeling a pickup is easy because all you need to do is make an algorithm that normalizes piezo input to what absolute raw string input would be, and then base that on algorithms of what frequency coloring the pickup they're modeling does to the raw sound of the strings. Making Steel sound like Nylon is a whole different story. It's like asking a guitar to sound exactly like a violin.

No one have a ghost equipped Gen1 Variax they can record playing hard on the LP setting for me?

I like Roland's guitar synth stuff, but I always thought using a GK pickup for modeling might be a little lacking. I'm not sure how good it is, but I know that magnetic pickups aren't really as good as getting as flat and wide of a frequency response as piezos. I always thought that's why Line6 used piezos, because they're ideal for modeling since it's good at monitoring your guitar strings whole than just getting 1 nice sounding mid range frequency of your strings that most magnetics do. I could be wrong, I don't know, maybe you can make a magnetic pickup be that broad, I mean they do have magnetic acoustic pickups.

It could have been EQed. The difference between the new acoustics and old acoustics is that the old one still had a very piezo sound but added the body and ralism of an acoustic guitar, while the new acoustics aim more for an even more mic'd up sound.

Has a lot of high end and sounds more raw, I'd say with the pre-HD acoustics, like 1.7 or something.

So if the 2.0 spank model sounds more like a strat, then honestly you people shouldn't complain so hard about it. I understand what you guys are saying, but like I said, make presets to give it the characteristics of a 1.9 strat. Like I said, they're trying to get as accurate as possible on the guitar they're modeling, not making a strat-inspired sound that people end up thinking sounds better than a real strat. Honestly it's kind of hilarious, as this is implying that something that's trying to be a strat actually sounds better than a real strat. Maybe that's true to some extent to us, but like I said, that's not the point of the Variax. Workbench gives you incredible flexibility to play with, so you guys can achieve a 1.9 Strat with the HD firmware somehow. I'm sure if you tried, it could sound even more amazing than the 1.9 strat, since it has more response than the non HD variax. Just keep playing with Workbench, I'm sure you'll get it.

What is the general complaint, that it's less like a strat than 1.9 is, or that people just like 1.9 better just because they think it sounds better? If it's more accurate than 1.9, then I think people just need to make their own workbench patches to compensate the loss of any stuff they thought 1.9 offered. I suggest you guys push L6 for another strat body to use in workbench if it concerns you that much.

I hate how the JTV I'd get is so specific. 69s maple. Makes getting deals like this harder.

Have any of the people who hate the 2.0 strat have played a real strat?

Variax was never about feeling like something, it's about sounding multiple things through 1 guitar. The idea of wanting the guitar to feel like the guitar you're playing is science fiction fantasy. We're not that far into the future.

Yeah but Zap said it was poorly done before. I'm hoping that 10 years into the future from then would help make it better though.

Any way you can fast record yourself playing the LP model hard?

Thanks. Their description of the ghost pickups says it has "natural compression to eliminate the quacking of a piezo" Perhaps lowering the string volume helps, but I've tried that with my normal pickups and can't really get rid of the strat-esque quacking no matter how low I set them. Like I said, sounds good on a tele and strat, sounds bad on an LP.

Well now that I think of it, they did make resonators which were pretty impressive. The thing they did with those like the sitar is use an attack filter which made it sound like a sitar, and for the banjo they made a decay envelope to make it sound like banjo. I'm sure if they put some thought into it they can recreate the nuances of a nylon. It's not going to be spot on but I'm sure they can get pretty close this time around.

The problem is that you're changing the string itself, which is the core of where your tone comes from, in fact, it is your tone in it's rawest form. modeling pickups and bodies are much easier because it's recreating algorithms to make the piezos act like your string is going through mags and a specific guitar body. Nylon string is asking to change the characteristics of the string itself, not just asking it to go through a pickup/body filter. It'll be more difficult, and honestly probably won't be as stunningly accurate as the current models, unless Line 6 manage to do some magic stuff in the programming.

Your 700 gets none of that quacky attack with the graphtech? I love the Variax, but it's been a thing that's been bugging me lately.

Radiohead bear. So that's part of the piezo quack? I heard Graphtech Ghosts kill the piezo quack. I might look into buying them but I'm not sure how I'd install them.

600. I'm not sure if it's a quack, but it just starts to sound too bright when I play loud. It fits the tele and strat sound, but definitely not the LP sound or other warm guitar models. First guitar is the Variax in LP bridge. Second guitar after the long pause is my SG. The Variax sounds a bit quacky when I play hard. http://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/21663288/Music/playhard.mp3

Thanks for the info. Man, a great guitar, just that crappy plastic nut that ruins it... I'm really glad they stepped it up on the JTVs.

Mine is in pretty good condition. Did the tuning get better when you added a new nut? I can't do bends and use the tremolo without going out of tune. I don't use trems that much but I was hoping I could get back into using it to express my playing more. I've seen techniques where the strat user does a bend and hits the trem to get in back in tune, but I personally find that really stupid and to be an interruption when playing. I just want it to be in tune whether using bends or the trem, but for now, I just stretch my strings until bends don't make the strings go out of tune. I'm thinking about a TUSQ, but I don't know what size to get.

That is pretty badass. Are the designs modified by him or did he commission Line 6 to do them?

That's what I've done, but I'm wondering if the LR baggs piezos are also attributing to the snappy strat-ish sound on the LP models. When I play hard on my SG, it has the same characteristics as not playing hard, but louder and compressed. On the Variax, it gets snappy and almost sounds like a luke warm strat when I play hard. I was wondering if that's also considered a quack, or if it's just when the piezo output is so loud that it makes a distorting weird sound. I know what you're talking about, trust me, I've had that problem, and yes, backing off the string volume in workbench made it go away. I'm wondering if 1) The bright, snappy sound is a limitation from using piezos or 2) That's how a LP is supposed to sound and my SG is weird. I know an SG is a bit different, but it's very similar. I don't have a LP, but I don't remember them doing that either. I'm a type of person who likes to play hard when the notes call for it, but I suppose I have to adjust when using a Variax. Not too bad with distortion, but without sounds kinda weird.

Would you say $475 (shipping included) with the bag, workbench interface, power supply, planet waves cable and VDI a decent price? Other Ebay listings of the 600 seem to be around there when they have all the stuff. The only complaint I have in terms of playability is the plastic nut catching my strings and rendering the tremolo useless.

I don't think gauge will be too much of an issue unless it's so thick that it does just that. The piezos are designed to accept different gauges, but how big the notch is is the limit of what gauge you can use before it doesn't fit. 11's seemed to fit just fine, however, I am using a 600, which uses entirely different piezos.