cruisinon2

Lol...it's nice to know that things haven't changed much since the last time I ventured into one of those pits of despair (gotta be at least 15 years)...the story is still amusing. I was in need of a new MIDI foot controller for whatever rack pre-amp and multi FX unit(s) I was using at the time. Walked in, told the creature behind the counter what I needed, and following the patented indignant huff and smirk, I was told "MIDI is for keyboards, man" and that such an item "didn't exist" for guitar rigs. Then I pointed to the display case 6 feet away that had 2 or 3 of them in it. Walked out, never went back. Can't imagine why they've been hemorrhaging money for years on end....

Yeah, it's not a baseball bat or a golf club, where too loose a grip will result in a skull fracture and concussion for some poor slob 30 yards away...;)

"Louisville Slugger"...;)

Ideascale is the place for suggestions/requests...the powers that be aren't gonna see it in here.

Fair enough...lord knows I haven't seen them all. I do wonder why they'd bother designing it that way, though. Just another hoop to jump through...

Nah, that shouldn't matter. I've had several combos over the years, ran the old kidney bean POD into the return on all of 'em without a problem. Anything you plug into front end without pumping a signal through will essentially be an antenna anyway...things will get noisy.

Nothing worse than an uppity bass player...just tell him you'll get somebody else to bang on "root/5th". ;)

Blasphemer!!! Must have been one of the much-touted "4 or 5 in North America" skilled enough to pull it off...;)

Do whatever you like, but given that most guitars will require adjustments a couple of times a year as the seasons change, eventually you'll have spent the price of the guitar in set-up costs. It's a silly expense. And yes, if you have at the truss rod like a chimpanzee trying to crank open a window, you'll destroy things...but since you've learned the hard way what NOT to do, adjusting it properly will be stunningly simple. Righty-tighty, lefty-loosey (as you're looking down the length of the neck from the headstock) 1/8 to 1/4 of a turn at a time, and nothing horrible is gonna happen. It's not magic.

It will depend entirely on whether or not the guy doing the work knows what he's doing...it'll either be the best thing since indoor plumbing, or a train wreck.

Not even close...and the older you get, the worse it gets, even without loud hobbies (or vocations for the pro players among us).

You can have that any time you want. Don't use cab or mic models. Amp model only into an actual amp and cabinet, or combo. Plenty of players running rigs like that.

You don't need official "specs" or an "authorized service center" for a set-up. Half of those places are really electronics/amp repair joints, and wouldn't know a guitar from a toaster. If you're not comfortable with how it plays, "specs" aren't necessarily gonna help you anyway. Fancy electronics notwithstanding, it's still a guitar, in need of exactly the same periodic adjustments as every other solid body electric guitar in the known universe. If you're not comfortable doing it yourself, then I'll assume that you've had your other guitars set up by someone you trust...take it to that guy. Have him set it up how you like it. Nothing horrible is gonna happen.

Given their steadfast refusal to divulge such innocuous info as the recommended height of the mag pickups, the only people who actually know the answer to your question one way or the other aren't terribly likely to respond...modding anything is actively discouraged by the powers that be.

Especially with things as subjective as "tone". Not to mention that one's perception can change from day to day...for any number of reasons. If I'm not playing particularly well for whatever reason, it's unlikely that I'll think my tone is "awesome"...some days guy got it, some days you don't.

It's a possibility. This is an old problem...and given that theses guitars tend to sit around for a while depending on where you buy it, "new" sometimes means "built 4 years ago".

Check your various levels before you pull out the screwdriver and the blowtorch...I suppose the return jack could be dead, but that really doesn't happen all that often, unless the amp is ancient, and "ridden hard and put away wet". ;)

I bought one of those. I've gambled $40 on dumber things. But in the end, I think it's more of a security blanket than anything else...the effect is very subtle, if there's any at all. And I find that if you put it anywhere but first thing in the chain, it provides nothing but way over the top compression...not exactly what I was looking for. And unless I deliberately drive the thing, I can hear only the slightest difference if I toggle it on and off, when playing unaccompanied. But in a mix, blindfolded with someone switching it on or off, don't know if I'd be able to hear any difference at all...and I'm as picky about my sound as the next nutty guitar player.

Perhaps, but you'll be burning a lot of extra calories to get to the same place...and you can't "undo" what you're proposing, should you f#@$ it up. A little cardboard shim is a lot less permanent and easy to adjust, if need be.

Ideascale is the place to request stuff...There hasn't even been a firmware update for Variax in quite some time now, though. I'm not holding me breath for any massive feature upgrades anytime soon...

6 of one, half dozen of the other...but for the sake of quickly and easily adjusting your volume, I don't like maxing out the master volume. You got nowhere to go but down...

The shaft inside the knob is too short. Cut a small piece of cardboard and shove it in there. Usually takes care of the problem. Been going on since day one...3 cheers for quality control.

Hmm...fair enough. I get an odd nose similar to what you're describing while rolling on the volume, but only if I'm in Workbench and tweaking stuff. Are you using a "real" amp, or POD/Helix/etc? VDI vs. 1/4" cable?

With enough tweaking, you should be able to get good tones from anything you pair the 500X with (unless we're talking about a genuine piece of crap). If you plan on only using the models (as opposed to getting your basic tone from the amp itself and using the POD only for FX) and only need the amp for power, it makes even less difference what kind of combo you choose. You could also try going with an FRFR set-up, but that's a whole other discussion.

Are you connected to Workbench when this happens, or does it happen all the time?