njglover

I don't think this thread is really the place to be talking about how to intonate your guitar, but because we have been, I'm just going to say that I think (partly because the tech who helped train me also thought) that intonating with the 12th-fret harmonic is counterproductive. You don't, generally, play the harmonics for any length of time in a song. What you play is a fretted note. It is far more important that the open string and the fretted octave (12th fret) are the same pitch than that the fretted octave and the harmonic are the same pitch. In a perfect world, they would all be the same, but in the real world, the 12th-fret harmonic is all but irrelevant to intonation. I always intonate by checking the open string against the fretted octave.

To further my point, no guitar, even when "perfectly intonated," is actually going to play perfectly in tune on every fret of every string. In fact, you'd be lucky to get the exact same pitch from the same fret every time you play there because the likelihood of you applying equal pressure every time is very small. I've found that guitars with compensated nuts (like Music Man) tend to do a better job of having correct pitch over the length of the neck, but I actually felt it sounded more wrong by having it be more right. After intonating a customer's guitar, I always checked by playing a couple chords in various positions along the neck to make sure that all the chords sounded in tune, or at least as close to in tune as they can be (compensating for one chord invariably leads to another chord going out of tune). So anyway, long story short, maybe the Helix is a little jumpy, maybe it's just how you're plucking it, maybe it's both! But at the end of the day, if you can't get your guitar in tune with the Helix's tuner, it's probably not the Helix's fault. Blame physics.

I used to guitar tech professionally, so I have used a lot of different tuners, including fancy expensive Petersons (which I actually hate because that level of accuracy/precision/whatever you want to call it is annoying and just not necessary in the real world). If you want it to not jump around, there are a couple things to keep in mind with ANY high-accuracy tuner: Don't use a pick. Using a pick adds additional harmonics that will cause the indicator to fluctuate more. Tune with the guitar in playing position and do not put any pressure on the neck. If you tune with the guitar laying flat on a table with a neck rest, it will be slightly out of tune when you strap it on to play it. Similarly, if you have your hand resting on the neck, you may be applying slight pressure on the neck one way or another which will also cause the guitar to be slightly out of tune when you cease applying said pressure. Don't pluck the string hard. The harder you pluck the string, the more the pitch of the string will fluctuate as it settles down. Having said that, if you are mostly going to be plucking hard and not letting notes sustain, then it might be better to tune to a hard pluck (but it will be more difficult to do so because of the fluctuations). Remember that the ultimate objective is to play notes that SOUND in tune, not that register as exactly 432.97 Hz or whatever. Go through tuning each string until each are close enough to center, then turn the tuner off and play a couple chords. Do they sound in tune? Then you are done!

Exactly. How is one to capture the "amp in a room" tone without a microphone? If you are expecting someone to exactly model the movement of the speaker and the fluctuations of the air created by said speaker and how the speaker grill fabric (or metal) alters said vibrations and then how your specific room reflects said vibrations including how the reflections interact with each other... well, just ain't gonna happen. I doubt even a super computer has enough power to process that without crazy latency.

Yes, it can. You won't likely be able to do more than two amps with cabs at once, but if that's all you need, you're set. Still plenty of room to add FX in there, but you wouldn't likely be able to do a third amp is what I meant. Pan one to the left out, pan one to the right out. Or send one to the XLRs and the other to the 1/4" outs, or........ lots of options.

It's in the update notes. Looks like they call them Cali IV (there are three different ones, one for each channel). Cali IV Rhythm 1, Cali IV Rhythm 2, Cali IV Lead.

Snapshots is probably the biggest feature to have been added, but I'm actually really excited about the Rhythm 1 mode of the Mark IV model. It sounds just like the Fat channel on my Roadster, probably because that channel comes from the Mark I. This means I now have my clean sound from that amp, the Tweed sound (another setting I used on that amp), several great lead tone options, and the all mighty Rectifier sounds. While I would love to see the Rockerverb on there one of these days, it isn't strictly necessary. I have all the tones from my real amp now. Missing the fuzzes I use, so I still have to patch that in through the loops, but ultimately, there is zero need for me to bring a big, heavy tube amp to a gig ever again. Great job guys! PS - so far the dual harmony pitch shifter seems to be working fine for me, at least for harmonies as I use it (fifths and thirds).

What they are suggesting is that the board simply has noisy preamps, ie a lot of hiss no matter what you plug in to them. However, the less gain you add from the preamps (leave the gain knob turned down), the less noise you should have. So running the Helix at line level and turning the gain on the mixer down would result in less noise. Older/cheaper mixers tend to have noisier preamps, not much you can do about that.

I'm not selling any of them. Well, technically, I finally gave in and sold some that I never used anyway and some that were intended to become part of a MIDI-controlled pedal rig but I was still waiting on parts to be released and they aren't necessary now. Having said that, the only one I am actually still using is a Malekko Plus Ultra fuzz because it plays nice with guitar and bass, so that's just one fuzz to use with both my instruments. Helix isn't quite there on fuzz, otherwise I'd leave that at home, too. I think my Whammy DT is still better for pitch shifting and whammying, but it's not better enough for me to actually care and I can get pretty good harmonies that actually stay in key with the Helix, so whatever.

As far as FOH sound goes, the amp and cab sounds great and has no trouble being heard. For on stage volume... well, I never expected to get anything good out of stage monitors, so for the last gig I did I ran in-ears out of the headphone jack on the Helix and had no trouble hearing myself (I used a mic on the mic input to hear everyone else).

Ah, this is true. I think the snake is usually on the wrong side of the stage from me for that, but that makes more sense and I might be able to convince them. Some of the engineers around here are pretty incompetent and don't really understand things that go direct.

I feel like you guys all just play different places than I do. Everywhere I play has installed systems, no way am I going to convince them to unplug their aux sends from the power amps in the rack by the stage to feed my in-ears. And they are certainly not going to send a wire from the board to the stage just for me (nor should they, what a safety hazard). I had a hard enough time convincing an engineer to run wireless in-ears when I had them once upon a time. The beauty of this system is that it is both cheap and does not depend on an incompetent or uncooperative engineer in any way.

Would theoretically work and be better, but most of the venues around here aren't using powered monitors, so there's no way to pull it straight off the monitor. In situations where you can, and if the engineer will let you/isn't frazzled by it, that would be a great option and still nice and cheap. The mic has the additional benefit of allowing you to hear your bandmates talking on stage and the audience, though, so that way you don't feel as closed off.

Seeing as the whole idea (for me) of having the Helix was to not have to bring an actual amp to gigs, I was getting sick of needing to have an FRFR with me for monitoring and though I'd try a dumb idea: using the Helix to run my in-ears. The way I have it hooked up is the in-ears come out of the headphone out since I am running them wired and I have a cheap little omni mic plugged directly into the XLR input (the Naiant X-T, basically an older version of this: http://naiant.com/studio-electronics-products/microphones/x-o-omnidirectional-condenser-microphone/).I run the mic on its own path and set the output of that path to digital only so it doesn't come out of the XLR, which are feeding the mains, and make sure the headphone out is set on multi so I still get the mic in my in-ears. Adjust the volume of the mic, and the high/low cut to taste (or just EQ it in general) and ta-da! Cheap in-ear monitoring. And since the mic is sitting on the back of the Helix (could extend it out somewhere if desired), I can still get the engineer to just run the standard monitor so I can hear vocals or other modeled instruments. I finally tried it out at a gig two nights ago and it worked surprisingly well. I will definitely be doing this again, heard myself better than I ever have before (especially since I was playing bass with no amp, running that through the monitors would be a disaster). I suppose future improvements could be made by going wireless and feeding the transmitter from the 1/4" outputs and sending mic path to that only (or just feeding it from the board), but as a very cheap solution it works really well.

I agree with the above, but with a caveat. Generally, IRs are replacements for cabs, as mentioned above. You would use them instead of a cab or in parallel with another cab (maybe you want to blend the sounds for a specific tone or maybe you want one panned left and the other panned right). However, there are some IRs that are acoustic guitar impulses and are intended to make your electric guitar sound more like an acoustic, in which case you would probably use those by themselves with no amp or cab.

I do that all the time. What do you mean it can't read my mind? GOSH LINE 6!

Conversely, I also don't like that the Preset knob ISN'T a joystick, because then I can't switch between my setlists with that knob, which is very unintuitive to me. It seems like a completely superfluous knob.

Happens to me all the time. I do wish that it had a separate directional pad instead, way too easy to turn the knob while trying to go left or right.

Actually, the number of models had very little bearing on my purchase. This is the first modeler I have kept. I dabbled with an M9 (returned), HD500 (returned), and do have a couple of software modelers, but I have never properly owned and kept one, let alone replaced my live rig with one. I couldn't care less how many models it has as long as it has the ones I need. I'm a little disappointed that the Helix doesn't have a Rockerverb model, but I can do without it. What I need are a Twin (or similar clean tone), Tweed, Dual Rec, and some kind of Marshall or something similar. Basically every modeler ever has those or something similar. Truthfully, I think that probably covers 90% of the tones that most guitarists actually NEED, the rest are just flavors or desires. Which is fine. I'm just saying that those four cover basically every genre of music (which is why I need them).

Wouldn't surprise me, but I think it's more likely that it's because we were running a 100-watt tube amp, a 60-watt tube amp, a 1200-watt bass amp, and probably about 30 pedals between us. I believe the two powered speakers and powered subs were also running off of that. I have tripped a fuse at the house running less. The other reason for good power strips, though, is that a lot of clubs just don't have high quality power. It might be less dependable, the wiring might be older, might be more prone to surges or noise. Always a good idea to protect your gear.

Moral of that story? ALWAYS hook up through a quality surge protector/power conditioner. I fully expect a lot of bars to have really crappy power. We played at a church once and the stage had ONE outlet to hook the bass amp, two tube amps, three pedal boards, AND the PA into. Needless to say, some of the pedals ended up not working that gig. I'm kind of amazed that everything else still worked.

Yup, with you there. I am an obsessive tweaker, so the thought of comparing 20 versions of a Marshall amp is just... well, I try not to think about it. I spent hours comparing IRs to find the best one, and not just comparing them to each other, but also to a recording I made of my real rig. Ultimately I ended up with one that sounded the most like that and one that was very similar but with boosted mids and actually sounded better. I do not need to waste that amount of time on every single component in my chain. What I need is a couple of good amps that I can dial in quickly so I can start actually playing. I don't even want to have to hook it up to the computer, even if it is easier. Furthermore, I think comparing the quantity of models and the price of the two units is the wrong way to compare them. If you look at the hardware itself, of course the Helix is more expensive! It has a giant color screen plus, what, 12 smaller color screens? Each footswitch has a multicolor LED. Technologically it is miles ahead of the AX-8. I'm not saying that makes it sound/feel better, I'm just saying that the actual models are only part of the equation, and considering that the actual cost of the models decreases over time (one time investment spread out of an increasing number of units produced) and the AX-8 just uses the same models as its bigger siblings, there is no reason for it to be more expensive. Frankly, at the price point it is at, it ought to have more in the way of the hardware.

When I was still running tube amps, I always brought a complete spare set of power tubes and several spare preamp tubes to every gig. However, a lot of that was because I got the tubes either free or cheap, so the cost of having them along was minimal. Never used a single one, and even if I needed to... it's not like I can unscrew the back panel and replace it in the middle of a set. Now that I have the Helix, I do not bring a backup. I am a little paranoid that I may run into a problem one day, but I can't really afford to have a backup Helix at this point in my life, nor do I play enough gigs to justify one. I think if I was playing paying gigs every weekend (like, GOOD paying gigs) then I would want a backup, but right now music is not a source of income, so it's just not that critical. In your case, since you already have a backup, might as well bring it.

The cab takes care of the miked part, yes, but you would still be missing the power amp section if you only use the preamp. This would be basically equivalent to plugging the effects loop output of your amp into your speaker. It is not literally equivalent, since you would get basically no signal doing this in the real world, but that is what you are modeling in the Helix by using the preamp only. If it works for you, kudos, but if you want it to sound like a real piece of gear, you are going to want to use a full amp going into the cab. If it sounds boomy, you probably need to lower the bass on the amp or play with the low cut on the cab block.

If this is for direct recording purposes, ie you want it to sound like a miked guitar amp, then you would want an amp and a cab in the signal chain. Without a cab, it's going to sound like taking a direct out from a guitar head, which very few amps offer to begin with (and generally sound like crap anyway). With just preamp, you will be missing the entire power section of the amp, so not getting a lot of the feel of the amp. There may be some potential uses for those sounds, mind you, but if you want your guitar to sound like it's going through a guitar rig, you want the full amp and a cab (unless you are planning on using an IR in the box later).