cruisinon2

While you're waiting around for your "invitation" from Fractal, buy a Helix. With the extra $1K you'll have left over, buy a new axe. ;)

Lmao

This discussion will never go away...for proof I refer you to the fact that this thread died a year and a half ago, yet here we are. Next week there will be 3 new threads complaining about the same thing. Modelers aren't amps and can't be treated as such, and the solution is a combination things, but mostly it's EQ. However, there will never be one magical EQ curve or IR that will work for everybody. Different guitars, different rigs, different listening environments, and most importantly different definitions of what "good tone" is, make that utterly impossible. So waiting around for L6 (or anybody else for that matter) to provide a universal solution is futile. It's an impossible task that will never happen in a million years. Plenty of players have success. YouTube is awash in example after example of guys getting exceptional tones from one modeler and/or amp sim plug-in after another. It can be done. Period. The fact that you can go online and find similar complaints does not prove otherwise. All it proves is that you've got company...there are others out there who haven't figured it out yet, either. It's equally true that modeling is not everybody's cup of tea. Some just can't wrap their head around it, give it their best shot but still have no success, or simply don't want to put the time in to figure it out... and that's all OK, too. And for what it's worth, the same exact thing happens with analog gear. Some of my favorite players are Boogie guys... and I hate the damn things. Mid-range heavy, nasally, and useless... for me. But that doesn't make them pieces of $hit, incapable of generating a pleasing tone. Just means that they're not my thing. Find what works for you, and use that... whatever it is.

The in-between sizes are always hard to find in stores because not many use them...look online. https://www.sweetwater.com/c926--D_Addario--Electric_Guitar_Strings?params=eyJmYWNldCI6eyJUb3AgU3RyaW5nIEdhdWdlIjpbIi4wMDk1Il19fQ

I hate to rain on your parade, but there's really nothing in there that'll do that for you.

I've yet to have a problem with interference with mine... been using it live for about 8 months now, no issues.

That is most likely macassar ebony. It has streaks of brown in it, and at a glance the grain is similar to rosewood. The jet-black, really tight grain ebony...whatever the species is...is becoming increasingly rare and harder to get. https://www.wood-database.com/macassar-ebony/

Nope.

The JTV product line is approaching 10 years old... at this point, it is what it is. Waiting around for new features will be a long wait for a train that ain't coming. The only reason the fretboards were changed to ebony is because of recent restrictions on the international trade of various kinds of rosewood.

Not quite... the "vintage modern" necks all have truss rod access at the headstock, and nowhere else. I have 4 of them, the youngest of which is less than a year old. It's the "modern" necks that have the primary adjustment screw at the heel for making bigger adjustments, along with the "fine tune" side screw that you can access without removing the neck. Never had one of these, so I can't comment on how robust the side-adjust mechanism is. But I loathe having to remove the neck to make adjustments, and that design just seemed like asking for trouble. Can't say enough good things about the "vintage modern" necks, though. I have 3 Strat and one Tele... never had any trouble with any of them. And if you haven't already, consider going with stainless frets. Bending is effortless, and you'll wear out before they do. As for the mounting screws, 3 will line up just fine if you're buying an "in stock" neck that has already been drilled for a Strat. The remaining hole is only slightly offset...too close to drill a new one. So it will require doweling of the existing hole first, and then drilling a new one. If they're building your neck from scratch, just tell them not to drill any mounting holes, and take it to someone who knows what they're doing.

Pigs will fly before there's a Helix with a built-in wireless... and you don't want it anyway. It's just something else to fail. And when it does, you lose the brains of your rig along with it while the wireless part is off being serviced. Everything in one box looks nice on paper... not practical in the wild, though.

Any competent tech can address those set-up issues for you if you're not comfortable doing it yourself. In that respect, there's nothing particularly magical about a Variax. Fancy electronics aside, a guitar is a guitar, and they all require the same basic adjustments periodically. As for the nut, it's either properly cut or it isn't...all too often not right out of the box, even on guitars a lot more expensive that than these. Most other set-up parameters (action, relief, etc) are largely personal preference. Don't obsess over factory specs. L6 won't give them to you anyway... if you don't set it up the way you like it, all the technical wizardry inside won't matter one bit. If it isn't comfy to play, you're not gonna like it.

If you've ruled out everything else under the sun, then all you're left with is the Helix itself. Lemons happen. Open a ticket.

Generally speaking, rich folks can afford whatever that want... in triplicate, lol. ;)

Fighting over footswitches on the same device with another overly picky, tone obsessed guitar player? I'll pass... let the other guy buy his own gear.

And the rumor mill grinds into action once again... let the blind guessing and wishful thinking commence! ;)

Fair enough... and that would certainly be a compelling reason. However there's one absolute certainty that would go along with that: legions of royally pissed Helix owners who'd have to either pony up for a new unit, or forego polyphonic pitch shifting. It would be a PR nightmare... so I'm gonna vote "no" on that too.

That is exceedingly weird. You would have had to turn the individual string volumes for those two models down to zero, and then saved them to the guitar.... it's obviously having a brain fart somewhere. If it were a piezo problem you wouldn't have sound on those strings on any of the models. Try re-flashing the firmware... that's really the only thing you can try. If that doesn't fix it, then it's service ticket time.

The DSP bit wasn't L6's idea, as I recall... the old chip that ran the 500's was no longer available, so they were forced into an "upgrade". Why they chose to replace the footswitches is anybody's guess. Regardless, I wouldn't expect any changes to the Helix hardware anytime soon unless their hand is forced again. Once production is tooled-up, changing the recipe costs money. Without a compelling reason to do so, it really isn't in their be$t intere$t... and I seriously doubt that an incrementally "better" chip that wouldn't make a noticeable difference for the vast majority of users would qualify as a good enough reason. If the current "brain" becomes unavailable again, OK... otherwise, it's a waste.

There are several things to consider: 1) The diameter of the hole that the tuner sits in. 2) The position of the mounting screw on the back of the headstock. 3) Some tuners have a small post that protrudes from underneath which serves as an anchor, in lieu of a mounting screw...some older Sperzel tuners had these. This would require drilling a small hole to accommodate the post. This is less likely to be the case though, as the ones you picked clearly have a mounting screw. #2 is often a problem. Even if they otherwise fit, the position of the mounting screws is not universal... they can be anywhere. You'd have to see if the ones you want have that mounting screw in the same position as the stock ones...if the stock ones have them at all. If not, you'll be drilling and/or filling holes.

I'd say most do have studio monitors, yes... but they're not a magic bullet either. Like your stereo speakers, any pair of near- field studio monitors you pick will also have a wildly different frequency response compared to your guitar amp... you'll end up with the same mud coming out of shiny new speakers. No matter what you do, you're gonna have to EQ your way out of this problem. There's no way around that.

I wasn't talking about subtle nuances coloring the sound... this is about frequency response and fundamental design differences. There is a dramatic difference in frequency response between a guitar amp and a set of stereo speakers, with the former being MUCH narrower. A patch that you've dialed in to sound glorious through a traditional guitar speaker will sound like boiled crap through anything that even approaches FRFR. The muffled sound you describe suggests too much low end, which is exactly what I'd expect trying to use a patch that's tweaked for use with a guitar amp that is then pumped through a pair of stereo speakers instead. Guitar speakers are naturally mid-focused...low and high cuts happen by default. If you then take that tone and run it through speakers that will put out more low end by design, the result is usually a flubby mess. I suspect that most of your problem can be solved with EQ. It's unlikely that there's anything wrong with your hardware.

It got stuck...;)

This is what backups are for...

Unfortunately, that's as close to the truth as you're ever going to get. In retail environments, everything is "unknown"...