cruisinon2

Amen. Ours is an instant gratification society. Give us an app, a button to push, or a pill to take, and we're off to the races...at least the one saving grace is that there is no magic shortcut for learning how to play one's instrument. Still have to do that the old fashioned way...

Consequences? It will curve your spine, and The Allies will lose the war...;) Lower impedance cans (in theory, anyway) should start to clip sooner, if the output is expecting more resistance. So if you're in the habit of cranking them to ear-splitting levels, then maybe you should look into a higher impedance set. But as I've said, I've been using a pair of 55 ohm cans (in exactly the way you describe) for years without a problem. If anything was gonna break, it would have happened long ago.

Wish I could help ya...I've been trying (and mostly failing, lol) to emulate his tone from the first couple of albums for years...tougher than a lot of other players for some reason. Perhaps something to do with those old Lab Series amps that he used back in those days. Much easier to get the Ear Candy/Dogman and later sounds... Seeing them in NYC in a couple of weeks!

Just don't spend to much on 'em...for some reason, the big retailers are still demanding $400 or more for them. You can get them for just a little more than half that price.

Been using AKG 240S cans for years. Among the best bang for the buck out there. There's not much else you can buy for $70-$80 that will perform as well. However...I just treated myself to a pair of their K701's, and wow what a difference. Neighborhood of $200 on Amazon. Amazing clarity, and given their completely open back design, the low end while still quite present, isn't overpowering. They give the POD (being as bass-heavy as it is) a little breathing room down low. I don't need to be as heavy handed with the low-cut filters and mid-focus EQ...I can leave things a little closer to what would typically "make sense" for a guitar player.

Then don't announce that you're doing it (oops...), and install what you like. If something else $h*ts the bed, put the stock ones back in. Unless you have at it like a crazed baboon on acid, no one will ever know the difference.

You get what you pay for. There's no reason that you shouldn't be able to get good tones with a decent pair of studio monitors. That being said, don't expect ANY two monitoring methods to sound the SAME with a given patch...they never will. Change the box, change the tone, now and forever, Amen...

I hear ya...that's why I saved all that $hit my Mom used to hang on the fridge from when I was a kid. That way whenever I gotta straighten somebody out, it's like "BA-BAM! How you like them apples?!?!"...;)

Well that didn't take long...I'm only half-way through my second cup of coffee. Lmao!

I've been using a 55 ohm set for years with no issues. Frankly, I don't think it's all that critical, regardless of what the spec sheet says.

And I need my hair back, and the blood pressure I was born with. Oh well...we're both bound to be disappointed. Every few years, tech dies. It is what it is. They're not likely to keep updating products a generation behind their current "flagship" device. You're far more likely to see a less expensive "Helix Light" being pitched to the POD demographic. Why? Because that will sell gear. Updating the editor for units that were sold years ago isn't going to make them any money. You might want to keep your POD for the next decade, but L6 doesn't share that vision. They want you to buy something else. You can argue all day long that things "shouldn't" be this way. But they are....

At some point you actually have to play the damn thing. You can spend the rest of your life tinkering endlessly with IR's, amp models, FX, etc etc...but to what end? You will eventually hit the point of diminishing returns. Nothing in this world just keeps getting "better" forever. In fact, the overwhelming likelihood is that you'll start to make your tones worse if you keep screwing with them.

Here's the thing...nobody can tell you what you do or don't "need". All you'll get is a bunch of other's opinions about what worked for them, which may or may not work for you. If you arbitrarily ditch a bunch of IR's on Bob from Toledo's say-so, you could easily end up tossing what would have otherwise been your favorite. I'd love a shortcut for sifting through all this stuff too...trouble is, there ain't none.

Well I suppose most of that is true...true-ish, anyway...lol. Except when it comes to headphones. There are plenty that are 20Hz-20KHz (or beyond if you belive the spec sheets), but that have nothing remotely resembling a flat response. Somewhere around here in a fairly recent thread there was a link to frequency response curves to dozens of different headphone makes and models. I was surprised at how many of those curves looked like rollercoaster schematics ...even on nice, expensive cans.

It's right next to the "free guitars for Bob" (that's me) entry. I expect about as much attention to be payed to both requests...;) Seriously though, as marvelous as it would be, the lack of that option has been griped about for years. If they were gonna do it, it would have happened already.

Factory produced, assembly line guitars invariably have fretwork that falls somewhere between "lackluster" and "pounded in by a chimpanzee with a rock". It's not just Variax guitars that suffer from this. I've seen it countless times, from numerous brands. If they're being pressed in by some guy who has to finish 250 other necks this week, attention to detail is essentially impossible...doesn't much matter how much you're paying for it. Sad, but true.

Because some guys will start to twitch if there aren't one or more little glowing tubes, and a giant box that says "Marshall" on it, somewhere in the vicinity...;) Not sure I understand what's redundant about the concept of FRFR, though....but what do I know? My name isn't Kemper.

Nothing lasts forever...and unfortunately, forever arrives a whole lot quicker than it used to. We could argue the pluses and minuses all day, but it is what it is. And while I sympathize with your plight, I wouldn't count on any more lefty Variax guitars, either. These things are niche products as it is. Most righty players don't know they exist. How many lefties could they possibly have sold? Dollar $ign$ make the$e deci$ion$...

You and I experienced the 80's very differently, then...or perhaps I've just gone blind from looking directly at too many neon green guitars. ;) That aside, don't hold your breath for any updates. The HD series is at least 5 or 6 years old at this point (or more? I forget)...with the speed at which today's tech changes, that's what's known as "ancient". If your want a new interface, you're gonna have to pony-up for a Helix.

Once upon a time, your average player had one amp...ONE!!!...and a few pedals. Now 25 isn't enough? Have we run out of actual problems? Boggles the mind...;)

If 25 amp models aren't enough to find the tone(s) you want, then 121 won't be enough either. As for what's coming and when...nobody knows but the updaters themselves, and they ain't talkin'...

Lmao...careful now. The truth is a dangerous thing. ;)

The world's first $3K+ redundancy....

Oh that's my favorite, lol...like it's a "plus". There's hardly anything that you can't have shipped to your front door at this point. If I've gone to the trouble of dragging my fat a$$ to the store, it's because I actually want to see/feel/try out an item before I purchase it. If I've already made up my mind, I can make it appear from the couch, all be myself.

And a tuna sandwich....;) The Variax is a tough sell for a lot of players as it is, even with the Std's price tag at what, $800-ish? An even tougher sell would be a $1K wireless system for that same $800 axe...they'd be lucky if they even broke even on the R&D costs. And as much as I like my JTV, adding other synth hardware and software would make it more science experiment than guitar. The more things you stuff in there, the more things there are to break. They're fragile enough as it is. Just my 2 cents...