Rewolf48

I too noticed that the Acoustics were compressing/saturated since 2.0 when there appeared to be a significant volume increase. Use Workbench HD to reduce the global string volumes, and if necessary the patch volumes as the saturation can occur within the JTV - this can also be caused by using heavier string gauges.

And it is worth checking the global string volume settings in Workbench HD as the heavier strings definitely generate a stronger signal in the piezo elements. This may be stronger than expected by the Variax processor which appears to have some sort of limiter/compression in place. Reducing the global string volumes down is required eliminate this effect and to get a dynamic response again - in my case I reduced some strings down to -7db (others a bit less) before I could notice any change in the output volume. I now have the more dynamic response back again

I just put Elixir 11s on my 69 having previously only used 10s. I had to tighten the trem springs obviously to balance the trem position Acoustically it is a lot louder, but it seems to have lost dynamics and when using models there is a sort of whaa sound when strumming which I really don't like. My suspicion is that with the heavier strings and much harder contact on the peizos that the signal level into the processor is higher and that there is some compression going on. Has anybody else noticed this and did you manage to get back high dynamics, perhaps by setting the string volumes in workbench much lower?

+1 :lol: The 4x12 is dead. Or should be. Most places other than well soundproofed studios you can't use them at a volume where they work properly. A much smaller cab does the job just as well. The PA man hates them because they make it impossible for him to balance the mix because you are too loud front of house. The only point of them these days, and to be honest in the old days too was because they gave the right image on stage - do you really think that the guitarist with a wall of 8 4x12s behind him actually plugged them all in? Last time I saw Rush, or the Scorpions, or loads of other bands they had finally got away from the speakers on the stage, and were either direct with monitors (in-ears or floor - this is what your modeller is for!) or miked cab backstage somewhere so that the stage is virtually silent and the soundman can actually provide a decent mix for the audience. Rush makes not having a speaker wall a feature on recent tours - from Wikipedia: For the 1996–1997 Test for Echo Tour, Lee's side sported a fully stocked old-fashioned household refrigerator. For the 2002 Vapor Trails tour, Lee lined his side of the stage with three coin-operated Maytag dryers. Other large appliances appeared later in the same space. For visual effect they were "miked" by the sound crew, just as a real amplifier would be. Rush's crew loaded the dryers with specially-designed Rush-themed T-shirts, different from the shirts on sale to the general public. At the close of each show, Lee and Lifeson tossed these T-shirts into the audience. The dryers can be seen on the Rush in Rio DVD and the R30: 30th Anniversary World Tour DVD. For the band's R30: 30th Anniversary World Tour tour, one dryer was replaced with a rotating shelf-style vending machine. It too was fully stocked and operational during shows. The vending machine can be seen on the R30: 30th Anniversary World Tour DVD. The Snakes & Arrows Tour prominently featured three Henhouse brand rotisserie chicken ovens on stage complete with an attendant in a chef's hat and apron to "tend" the chickens during shows.[39] For the 2010–2011 Time Machine Tour, Lee's side of the stage featured a steampunk-inspired combination Time Machine and Sausage Maker, with an attendant occasionally throwing material into its feed hopper during the show. During the 2012-2013 Clockwork Angels Tour, Lee used a different steampunk device called a "Geddison" as a backdrop. This was composed of a giant old-style phonograph horn, an oversized model brain in a jar, a set of brass horns, and a working popcorn popper.

An accurate simulation - no. A "sounds ok for this part" like sound - maybe depending on how picky you are. The problem is that a typical 12 string has additional bass strings that are an octave higher, but the additional top strings are roughly in unison - how it is actually tuned depends on what you want. Some people only double some of the strings to have a 9 or 10 string for example. A bit of very short delay will simulate that second string being plucked. A Pitch Shifter can simulate the Octave higher strings - which is right for the bass strings, but is wrong for the upper strings where the extra string is close tuned to it's pair The chorus effect can simulate (sort of) the effect of two strings playing together which is right for the upper strings but wrong for the bass strings. Getting a good 12 string sound from 6 strings is very difficult. There is the idea of Nashville Tuning where the lower strings are replaced on a 6 string with thinner strings so that when double tracked with a standard 6 string is gives a 12 string effect http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nashville_tuning_(high_strung) Even JTV 12 string simulations where each string is individually processed to give a simulated double with individual levels and micro tuning variations can sound false at times, but does allow you to play with almost any variation that you may want to try.

Odd - the Roland EV-5 is TRS and works fine giving full range on the HD... as long as the range knob is set to maximum so that the Heel value = 0. Glad phil was able to help even if it was to confirm that it doesn't work.

The pedal 2 light coming on indicates that it is active. Don't know about the screen changing - did you knock a knob? What did you expect to happen? Expression 2 by default doesn't do anything - have you assigned it to control something? I use it as a master volume so I have a volume last in the chain with Exp 2 set to control volume

The HD 500 Quick start says: "15. Pedal 2 - Connect a standard expression pedal,such asthe Line 6 EX-1, and you'll be able to assign it to control the Volume, Wah or effects parameter functions." I use a Roland EV-5 which has TRS jack on a fixed lead, the EHX says that with a TRS cable it works as an expression pedal compatible with Roland, so all you need to do is plug the provided cable into the EHX and the HD 500 Pedal 2 input and it will work.

You can assign a single MIDI message to any of the foot switches and both the onboard and external expression pedals, and they don't need to be assigned to effects, so for example I have some patches where I play mainly keyboard where the pedals only send MIDI patch change or CC7 (volume). But there are limitations with the switches in the way that they behave: Program Change is fine - does what you expect Note On messages are fine - press down it sends Note On, lift foot it sends Note Off. CC - problem - at least for me. For example I would love to have and HD500 pedal send the CC for Damper/Sustain in order to reduce the number of pedals, but for CC it only has a single value per pedal - so the pedal can be set to send Sustain On (val = 127), but not Sustain Off (val = 0) when you lift off the pedal. Great if you want cacophony as every note you play on the keyboard carries on indefinitely. You can work around it to have two pedals assigned, one for sustain on and another for sustain off, but that is not exactly convenient when playing. I don't know anything about the Pedal Switch, so I looked it up. It appears that it has 10 Patches and that these can be accessed using Program Change messages - but the functionality is limited unless you are using one of their dedicated controllers. The HD will send a PC each time you change Patch (on the default channel) but unfortunately this cannot be redefined so it doesn't even offer decent integration with other L6 gear such as M9 or M16, so all you can do is define HD Pedals to send Patch Changes. From the Pedal Switch FAQ it looks like things are limited: Can I use a third-party MIDI footcontroller with Pedal Switcher? Not really. You can call up the Pedal Switcher’s presets with MIDI program change commands, but there is no way to save or modify presets without Commander

To see what is in the presets it is much easier to use HD Edit than the screen on the POD... The presets list has also changed with firmware versions - for example when the Flip Top Amp was added some bass presets appeared replacing some earlier ones and they all moved around. Assuming that you chose to overwrite the presets when you upgraded otherwise you still have the earlier presets, so you might have the presets from a much older firmware version: there is no definitive list

OK, I think I have it - at least until the next rehearsal. First the 2.0 update has boosted the volume of the Acoustics significantly; they are much louder than any other model - that is the primary reason why my carefully balanced patch was destroyed. The patch can be lowered in volume in Workbench of course. But before I did that I tweaked the individual string volumes so that they were balanced to my ears and some needed to go about half the original level - which means less chance of clipping in the JTV modelling. I also remembered somebody responding to requests for Acoustic patches with the idea of using an Amp. I initially dismissed this because surely you want EQ and Compression right? Actually want I really wanted was to be able to tweak the EQ directly using the knobs rather than having to muck about with the menus, and then it hit me. Doh! :wacko: The HD500 already has EQs that respond to the knobs - abut 25 different ones in fact. The Amp models, or more specifically the Amp Pre models with No Cab; excluding the high gain ones there are still 8 or so that are very clean when you take away the power amp and cab. So my new patch is: Marshall JTM-45 Pre: No Cab, Gain ~ 60, Tone and Presence as you like it and Vol nearly Full. Tube Comp: Thresh 90 Gain 19 Reverb for when I am the solo instrument (I have Hall) And that's it really - how can I have missed this for all the time I have had the HD500? And to those who think they want an Acoustic Amp Model...have you tried the current models Pre No Cab?

Response to the ticket - all I can say is that it really gets in the way of making a quick change to a patch with an HD500 overridden tuning: Hello,I have reproduced what you wrote up and currently seems to be the nature of the devices when they are used this way.As the tuning it part of the preset patch, when you change the model on the guitar, it retains the sound of the tuning that was set on the preset in the first place, but now you can apply it to other guitars you select on the JTV.The on odd part of this is that the tuning is retained in the audio, but the Variax Tuning page on the POD now shows 'Don't Force' which does not match what is being heard. What IS expected, though, is that if you save the settings the way they are at this point, you will be saving the preset with Variax Tuning set to 'Don't Force' so that when you exit the preset and return to it, the guitar will be in Standard tuning.Thanks for the heads up. I will let our developers know who will determine if this is intentional, and, if not, they may change in the future.Regards,Line6Hugo

Scale length - the length from bridge to nut is longer so the strings have to be a little bit tighter.

This really should be part of the upgrade process and prompted for rather than relying on the user remembering

+1 I agree with all of this - the voting and down voting especially. I get the impression that some people were down voting other peoples ideas in order to get their own higher ranked, and because it is anonymous they can do so with impunity. The most important part is that Line 6 have to be seen to be doing something with it - even if it is only getting someone to merge the duplicates and make it look like they are being reviewed. At the moment it just looks like a way of getting people to dump rants that they don't want to know about.

I want to withdraw my suggestions for an acoustic patch as I need to do some more fine tuning. I might even start by re-flashing both devices and checking the piezo settings as there is something wrong that I can't sort out. I even have a big click as I change to Acoustic patches. The "general rule" is that the Compressor always comes after initial EQ. This is so that a big signal in the unwanted part of the spectrum (removed by the EQ) doesn't control the compression amount.

You can't. The floor Pod HDs will transmit their specific PC on the default MIDI channel as it changes, but there is no way to define any other PC mapping. Which would be really useful - as would the ability to define on and off CC values for the switches. I mean you can define a Sustain On CC message to be sent when you press a switch, but you can't send Sustain Off unless you dedicate another switch to it. The things are nearly really useful MIDI controllers, but fall short on a few things - one of which is being able to define a user defined PC to be sent when the patch changes

Variax Acoustic included a Nylon model back in 2004: http://www.soundonsound.com/sos/sep04/articles/line6variax.htm

Yes through Workbench HD. There is an option to enable or disable second strings for all guitars, and to individually define second string level, octave or unison and to add cents of detune. To turn the 12 into a 6 just disable the second strings - it is a single click

That is roughly what I get, but also what I was going for (I am actually using the D12 with six strings). The first part (my roughly remembered settings - I am having a lunch break at work so I can't check) is artificial sounding, more full but without a muddy low. I am trying to get a Peizo Acoustic sound that work in a band mix; a bit like an Ovation. It is not a recording sound or intended to be, and it is not a solo acoustic guitar sound (but try switching the eq off). The second part I think sounds great as an isolated guitar, and is the sort of thing that I had before, but with electric guitar, bass, keyboards, drums and vocals also playing it was just disappears into the mix leaving just high-end "zing" coming through if the drummer is light on the cymbals. Or at least that is what I am hoping is the case - I am an amateur struggling with the technology and had accusations of it being both Muddy and Thin at the same time before - the 2.0 update destroying the original sounds meant that I had to urgently try again; I get to try it out properly tonight. I added a Hall reverb (as well as the Spring) as an optional effect to my patch last night; the spring reverb is short and dense and is filling out the guitar sound (giving it more body perhaps), the hall verb is acting more as a true reverb for those periods when I am playing by myself for an intro, it would get switched off when the other instruments come in.

Having worked on this a lot more last night I will try to help. My guess is that the EQ settings are the problem, and the raising of the gain to +10 in the mixer is overloading the reverb at certain frequencies, but not all. I can't see all the numbers (because the last two are just knobs), but I think that you have Graphic EQ settings of: 80 220 440 1.1k 2.2k -2.0 -1.5 -8.5 -8.0? +1.5? So you are cutting massively in the main range of open string frequencies.... and then making it up in the mixer. I think it is a bit unbalanced. I admit that I don't know exactly what you are after, and honestly I am fumbling about just learning this stuff (still), but I would suggest that for an acoustic in a band mix situation you: Move the EQ so that it is first in the chain, and bring the 440 and 1.1k values back up to about 0 and + 1.0 respectively, but reduce 80 to -5.0 unless you are playing solo and want the boomy low end. Tube Comp set threshold about 80 and level about 20 Mixer both paths 0 and centered Spring Verb try a little pre-delay ~15ms, tone right down to 30% and mix up to about 25% At least that is what my memory is of my latest attempts which sounded fine last night through my PA speakers, but my ears might have been a little fatigued, and the higher level of low-end cut might be because my room is boxy and the speakers are in floor monitor position on a wood floor so I might be getting the extra low-end from the room. Anyway try it as a starting point and tweak as desired (and tweak, and tweak, and tweak...)

Ok I have isolated it and can reproduce it, and I think that it is behaviour that has changed since the JTV 2.0 update. Set JTV to Standard tuning and connect to HD500 using VDI; all actions to be taken on JTV and HD500 directly - no Edit or Workbench Set up a POD HD patch (can be any, including empty) to override JTV Tuning, and save patch. JTV altered tuning can be heard. Go to different patch and come back again - JTV altered tuning can be heard Press View so that you can see the JTV Tuning page on the HD500 - it shows the saved override tuning (expected) Change the selected model on the JTV, for example go from Bridge to Neck Pickups on Lester - the HD500 now says "Don't Force", but the altered tuning can still be heard and will stick for any other model changes Save the HD500 patch - nothing has been changed on the HD500, all you have done is view the Variax Tuning page, and that was only so you could see what is happening. Go to different patch and come back again - JTV is now in Standard tuning I call this a fault because I haven't changed the HD500 patch in any way whether directly or indirectly by changing the tuning on the JTV but my altered tuning is no longer being applied. It is still saved as part of the HD500 patch and can be recovered, but I have to go the Variax Tuning page and switch it back on every time before saving to avoid nasty and embarrassing surprises. Will report it as a Fault

It is "normal" behaviour, but should it be? I would agree with the OP that a more logical procedure would be:- if the HD500 is set to a specific model then the JTV goes to that model, but if is says "Model: Don't Force" then it should go to whatever the knobs are set to...

Well I have managed to get the acoustics back into some resemblance of usable, but it was a dramatic fix - previously they were quiet even after the compressor so I had added 5bd of boost in the mixer at the end of the chain to balance the patches - this is what was causing the overloaded sound. With JTV 2.0 I had to change that to 5db of cut and move the mixer to the front to avoid overload of the EQ, and move the compression threshold up from around 30 to 90. Even then I still think I am getting clipping on the initial attack - perhaps I should try turning down the volume down in Workbench HD.

No not using Edit - directly tweaking on the HD500, VDI connected JTV knob set to Standard tuning overridden by HD500 to Drop-D and I would have switched JTV Patch (pick-up positions). I spent 20 minutes or so just trying to find the steps to reproduce this and failed. Obviously when I stopped trying to do that and decided instead be more productive and get on with getting the sound I need it happened again, twice. I did notice that if you change the Alt Tuning knob away from Standard on the JTV the HD500 will change from "Custom" to "Don't Force", and it is possible that this is what I am doing, but I think it unlikely because I normally don't play with that knob. Anyway will keep trying to consistently reproduce what is happened.