dvuksanovich

Gotcha. Thanks.

I was already aware of the default input setting issue. However, I do have a quick question to make sure I'm understanding the signal routing correctly: With input 2 set to Variax, path A panned center in the mixer, and path B muted in the mixer, do I need to move amps and effects into the post-split path A in my signal chain, or can I leave them pre-split now that I've changed the input / path settings?

OK... so turning off res, thump and decay in the cab DEP makes a huge, huge, huge difference. Suddenly my amp EQ settings actually do what they're supposed to do. I can set them to 50 to begin with and dial in the tone from there instead of using all possible settings to dial back the bass and treble monster. Still probably not as good as some of those sweet third party IRs, but good enough to continue using it instead of dropping a bunch of money on something new. I'm surprised to find (now that I can hear what the models are actually supposed to sound like) that I prefer the sound of the Hiwatt driven with Boost Comp and Line 6 Drive to achieve an 80's hard rock tone over going with one of the high gain models, but this actually works out pretty well since turning effects on and off has no lag while changing patches does have lag. Not sure how I missed the intel on the cab DEP settings over the five years or so that I've had my POD HD, since I'm always searching for ways to get better sounds out of it, but glad I finally have that worked out. Thanks, all, for your comments. I think I can easily gig with my new band using my current Hiwatt patch.

I did see some chatter in the post I linked to about lots of returns, but further down one guy said that he loaded a third party IR into the Logidy and then posted A/B clips of the JCM 800 model: https://soundcloud.com/alphadog808/original-jcm800-patchno-epsi(without EPSi) https://soundcloud.com/alphadog808/jcm800-patch-with-epsi-on(with EPSi) That's a massive difference, I think, and in a good way. Also interesting further down in that post from your signature about cranking the res level way down in the cab DEP. I'm always a bit nervous about making large changes to those settings for fear that it will make things even worse, but I will play with further reducing res and thump to see what happens (I've got them turned down a bit as it is in my current live patch). Thanks for the tips.

I've got my global EQ set to low cut at 80 Hz and high cut at 10k Hz. I'm not a sound engineer, so that seemed like a good conservative way to get rid of a lot of nasty stuff without cutting into the usable tone itself. How do you have yours set up?

In an attempt to extend the life of my HD 500 (I'm tired of the endless tweaking in a futile attempt to get rid of boomy lows and broken glass highs) I've been reading up on the possibility of bypassing the cab / mic sims in the POD and using an external cab sim. From what I've gathered through online research, the preamps and effects in the POD are good. It's the cab / mic sims that are sub par. For background: I use the POD live and have no intent of lugging a power amp and cab around to get around this problem. For recording I could get away with a software solution but for gigging that's not a possibility. It's also obvious that Line 6 will not be adding the ability to import third party cab / mic sims. I read in another thread (http://line6.com/support/topic/8559-hd500x-and-logidy-epsi/) some folks talking about using a Logidy EPSi for cab simulation. The samples posted starting about halfway down the page with the Logidy sound fantastic... nothing like I've ever heard out of my own HD 500... tight, responsive, immediate, alive. Anyone else have success with their POD HD and Logidy EPSi or with another solution... like an H&K Red Box... for live gigging? I have never heard of Logidy before and would hesitate to use an unknown brand on stage night after night. H&K is a brand I trust, though. $100 for the Red Box, or $200 for the EPSi would be way easier to swallow than $1500 for a new Helix or (cough) Fractal AX8.

I needed to match levels with some clean patches I have, and I couldn't get the clean patches to not break up above a certain level, so I turned the volume on the treadplate down. I've got a pretty powerful PA speaker that I use as a monitor at my shows, so volume is not an issue for me since I can just turn up my PA speaker. As long as the volume level doesn't change the tone of the patch I'd say go ahead and set it wherever you want to.

Sorry... I tried to save that one out of my HD500 Edit in offline mode and thought it would work. Try this one. Treadplate - Dua.zip

The file on my website is definitley an h5e file (I went and looked at it again just to make sure). If you go to the page and hover over the link to the patch you should see the complete path including the filename. I'm guessing that you've got anti-virus software that's trying to protect you from downloading a file in a non-standard format. I zipped up my new dual cab patch and have attached it here. I also zipped up my older high gain patch (from my website) and attached that as well. DualCabMesa.zip POD-HD500-High-Gain.zip

Hi meambobbo, Thanks for replying, and nice to (virutally) meet you. I tried the volume pedal approach for clean boost but don't like it as much as the effects loop solution. I don't use any external effects, so the fact that I can't use the loop for additional effects is not a big deal to me. In fact, one of the things I love about the HD500 is that it's an all-in-one solution and that I don't need any additional stuff. Definitely good advice for others who do want to use their effects loop for other things, though. FYI - I recently took another look at your site and rebuilt my patches from the ground up based on your dual-cab advice. I still can't get the SM57 on-axis to sound good, so I substituted the 87 condenser, which sounds nice and smooth on the top end with my guitar's high output pickups. The new patch sounds FANTASTIC (in fact I think it sounds better than our other guitarist's tube head and 4x12 cab), so thanks again for all the work that you did putting your site together. I tried to attach the patch to this reply but apparently I'm not allowed to upload .h5e files (which seems odd). If you're interested in hearing what someone else did with your advice I'd be happy to send it to you. Is there any other way I can contact you? Dan

I've got the QSC K8, which is surprisingly loud (even during a show) despite the fact that it only has an 8" woofer. True, it doesn't move as much air as a 10" or 12" speaker so the area on stage where I can hear myself really well is smaller than in would be with the bigger models. The one thing I don't like about the K8 is that the housing is so small that there's no angled back for turning it into a floor monitor without putting it in a stand or using this method: I'll be trying this (ingenious) solution for the first time tonight.

Hi all, I've been using my HD500 live for about two years now and I've been tweaking (and tweaking... and tweaking) my high gain patch since day one. I've read tons of online discussions (many of them right here in this forum) and guides about how to get good high gain tone out of your POD HD... like this one for example: http://foobazaar.com/podhd/toneGuide/ This guide is extremely informative, but since I'm not a sound engineer it's, frankly, a bit over my head. I've got a much simpler guide to getting an organic high gain sound (mine is dialed in to sound kind of hair-metal-ish) that I recently put up on my blog: http://www.whyisuckatguitar.com/my-line-6-pod-hd500-high-gain-patch/ Theres also a link to download the latest incarnation of the patch that I use live, straight into the PA. Multiple sound guys have told me that I've got the best direct sound they've ever heard, so I think I'm doing something right at this point. I hope this helps some folks out there in POD-land who've been having trouble with dialing in hard rock and metal tones. Dan Vuksanovich