cruisinon2

What there's room for is largely irrelevant. What any of us think could, would, or should be done with the platform moving forward is likewise, irrelevant. The reality is simple...the Helix platform is more than a decade old. For a "high- tech" product, that's ancient. With the pace at which technology currently evolves, 10 years might as well be 100. People want new toys, and companies exist to make money. For proof I refer you to the poll L6 conducted, where the majority clearly indicated that they'd rather have an unfinished product in their hands today, than wait for something that's more polished, with fewer problems. Personally I think that's asinine, but I digress... No company will keep devoting resources to pumping out free udates for units that were sold 10+ years ago, forever. There's no money in it...yesterday's sales don't help today's bottom line. Business is business.

I have no inside knowledge to share, but if I were a betting man, I wouldn't count on much more new stuff for the OG Helix at this point. We might get the occasional crumb, but the new platform is gonna get most of the attention and priority going forward. It's the nature of the beast... product life cycles are what they are.

New platforms always have growing pains, and it's the early adopters who have to suffer through it. Bugs that didn't get discovered during beta testing are basically a guarantee... doesn't mean it's "junk", though. Personally, I never invest in the "latest and greatest" the moment it's released, for exactly this reason, lol... let somebody else get cranky because their $2K+ new toy has some kinks to iron out. Wait it out, then buy. But that's just me...ymmv. I know most folks voted "give it to us now", but sometimes you gotta be careful what you ask for. Imho, releasing a less than finished product is just asking for problems... maybe it's me.

Lmao... resurrecting a 10+ year old thread to pimp a gambling app. Bravo! ;)

Harrumph! I love a good forum storm-off...;)

Something isn't grounded properly. When you touch the strings, you're "closing the circuit", so to speak... that's why the hum goes away. All anyone can do from afar is guess...a loose solder joint somewhere is often the culprit.

What advertisement?

Yes, that's true. It's also true that the JTV's debuted years before Yamaha bought L6. After the acquisition, they tried continuing the Variax line with the Standards (which is really just a Pacifica with Variax guts, but I digress), but they didn't move enough of them. It's a different ballgame now...L6 isn't holding the purse strings anymore, and if Yamaha is not convinced that a product will sell in large enough numbers, they're not throwing money at a complete redesign. It costs a small fortune to bring a product like the Variax to market, and the projected return on investment has to be substantial, or it won't even be considered.

Well anything is possible, but don't hold your breath... because in all likelihood, it ain't happening. While the Variax still has an extremely devoted cult following, that's also it's problem. It's a niche product, which the masses never embraced in numbers big enough for Yamaha to care about. Much of the guitar playing world doesn't even know it exists, and that is why they ultimately killed it. Giant multinational corporations are only interested in moving large numbers of units, not satisfying a miniscule percentage of the guitar market.

Dogs barking can't fly without umbrella.

See above... no company on earth is ever going to provide lifetime support for anything that you buy. Might as well get used to it.

1) This is a user forum... nobody who could actually grant your request is ever gonna see this. 2) You're asking for an update to a platform that was mothballed years ago...it ain't happening.

Open a service ticket and see what they tell you.

You'll know when they say "Here it is"... L6 has been rolling that way since day one.

Beyond keeping different patches for each guitar, the only real solution would be using one or more EQ blocks within a patch that you toggle on or off depending on which guitar you're using.