Digital_Igloo

If you don't like the splice (which is part of the original RE-201 Space Echo and gets worse as the tape and heads age), set it to 0.0. Gone.

It's there; the current path cannot accommodate it DSP-wise, so it cannot be added. If a model is in the middle of the list, but cannot be accommodated, it's grayed out and skipped over. If a model is at the end of the list, however, there's nothing beyond it to skip to, so it'll appear as if it's disappeared. I'll see if we can't display disabled items at the end of lists to a future update. In the meantime, route Path 1 to Path 2 and you'll be able to add Clawthorn on Path 2. That particular model is very DSP-intensive.

Actually, expect to see all sorts of MI products' pricing begin to rise. Overseas manufacturing is seeing huge cost hikes.

If we're predictable, we've failed.

Updated thread to 2.30 (released Nov 21, 2017).

Missed this earlier post. There actually is a precedent. Helix Rack was announced at $1499 and Helix Control at $499. Months later when they finally shipped, we dropped the prices to $1399 and $399, respectively, as parts and labor for those particular SKUs ended up lower than expected.

I'll say it—USB on Macs can be weird. Helix hated my mid-2012 MacBook Pro for a long time and it was the only Mac in the building (out of dozens) that didn't play nice. Likewise, my Apogee Symphony despises my mid-2010 Mac Pro tower and my MacBook Pro and categorically refuses to be updated via either. A good friend can't get his 2014 MacBook Pro to talk to his Focusrite interface (although it talks to mine just fine) and another friend is having issues with a PreSonus box (same). Sometimes the only way to figure out what's happening is to get the entire rig in house and run our USB sniffer and tools on it. Sometimes it's a conflicting driver, out-of-spec USB cable, wonky USB port, other USB device in the system, bad RAM, inconsistent power, or gremlins. For some reason, Macs seem to be more susceptible to these. However, we're very close to releasing Helix firmware 2.30 which does include USB improvements as well as HX Edit, which is a new-from-the-ground-up editor. With luck, one or both of these will mitigate your specific issues.

The team is building and deploying two or more updates per day now, so we're getting there.

Logic and MainStage can map MIDI CCs to all sorts of functions via the Key Command menu, but there are almost 10,000 commands (!!!), so any attempt to map Helix's 10 stomp switches to a comprehensive set (beyond the requisite MCC commands, for which there is a template—8 TEMPLATES > DAW Remote) would be futile. That said, we have plans to add more robust DAW control complete with DAW-specific templates sometime next year.

Wait, what? I COULD'VE GOTTEN BEER OUT OF THIS?!

A couple things to try: From your Novation controller, connect ONLY a 5-pin MIDI DIN cable from its MIDI OUT to Helix's MIDI IN. Do not connect a USB cable to either it or Helix. (Some keyboards automatically repurpose their MIDI ports as a computer interface when connected to a Mac or PC via USB) Make sure the Novation is transmitting on Helix's MIDI base channel (Global Settings > MIDI/Tempo > Knob 1). The default is channel 1

There's no indentation for the treadle; you can insert Helix however you want. That picture just represents how we do it here.

Will be fixed in the next rev. Thanks!

We're shooting for November. And then hopefully another update shortly after NAMM in January. A big portion of the would-be-January update might be a bit... controversial. Many will love it, some will give us the ol' side eye. I've mentioned this before, but the reason things are taking so long has nothing to do with anyone sitting on their hands. A large portion of the Helix architecture (now called "Helix Core") has been receiving a massive rewrite, which lets us accomplish certain things: Update Helix Floor, Helix Rack/Control, Helix LT, Helix Native, and HX Edit (new upcoming editor) all at the same time Improve performance across the board Remove hindrances from the old Helix architecture that precluded us from supporting certain features Share models, features, and other code across multiple SKUs faster, resulting in more efficient development (and hopefully, more frequent updates) Script certain time-consuming testing procedures Build new hardware products around Helix Core that would've previously required entirely new architectures I suppose if some dude owned Helix Floor and nothing else, he might say "Boo! I shouldn't have to wait because of the other boxes and software!" It's important to understand that all this work puts Line 6 in a better position to keep improving all Helix SKUs for the foreseeable future. I'd post here more often if I didn't have to read yet another "When's the next firmware?!" thread. ;) And the occasional followup complaints that my marginally snarky banter somehow undermines customer concern. Certain other forums have zero problems playing along. Loudness controls on home and car stereos (and full amps like Vetta) made sense, as the systems were generally closed; that is, the manufacturer sort of knew how loud the system would be and how that control would compensate playback within said system. With something like Helix, it has no idea what volume you're actually playing at. The Volume knob could be set to 10% but be connected to a wall of Marshalls, all cranked. Or it could be set at 100% and run into a computer with tiny bookshelf speakers turned up to barely nothing. The only way to truly compensate for Fletcher-Munson is to know exactly what the volume in the room is, which means adding a boundary microphone to the top panel—and even then, there's a good chance Helix's panel will be receiving a notably different volume and frequency response than the location of your ears.

Because what your ear hears six feet away from a cabinet is VERY different from what a mic hears at 1" away from the driver. This can't be stressed enough: the line outs of any full modeling signal path (that is, preamp > power amp > cabinet > mic) represents a recorded tone, NOT an amp-in-the-room tone. You can, of course, utilize only a portion of the modeling signal path and use it with a real cabinet to scratch that amp-in-the-room tone. Modeling is never an all or nothing proposition. When recording and mixing with other instruments, the engineer will often high cut and low cut the guitar tracks.

There's nothing to fix. You can set the Guitar In's impedance manually, have it automatically change to match the first block on path 1A, assign its value to a footswitch, assign its value to a snapshot, and/or assign its value to a preset. The only thing Helix doesn't do is dynamically go down the line of 32 blocks and compensate for every possible combination of block bypasses, which, as we've discussed, would slow preset switching and cause minor audible clicks every time certain blocks are turned on and off.

Probably just a sales thing—TigerSHARCs weren't utilized as often. The new dual-core Griffins are in practice about 1.9x the power of the fastest non-TigerSHARC SHARC, but spanning the cores incurs additional latency, so throughput delay would be twice that of Helix or AX8. Maybe Fractal will switch to TI DSPs (or a combination of TI DSPs and FPGAs) for the AxeFX III? I have no idea. As with everything, it follows the law of diminishing returns. There's no point in charging another $1000 for chips that might be—in practice—another 20% faster, and then only for those users who push their presets to the DSP limit anyway. As of this writing, I can't think of a single instance where someone maintained Helix was underpowered after understanding how the two paths/DSPs and dynamic DSP allocation work. I'll admit we were more transparent when there wasn't another company paying close attention to everything we do and say (not Fractal or Kemper).

Yep, Meris is king and Angelo is an absolute mad scientist. And a super cool guy—loved working with him back in the day. It was a big enough deal asking people to jump from $500 to $1500 for Line 6's flagship processor. Jumping from $500 to $2000-2500 would've been a bridge too far—yes, the TigerSHARCs are that expensive (no, we wouldn't have gotten a measurably better deal on them than Fractal). Besides, we were able to accomplish everything we set out to with the two 450MHz SHARCs, and the HX platform still has tons of room for more stuff. Things may appear to have slowed down a bit, but we're working on overdrive—not only on new models and features (some of which won't make the 2.30 cutoff), but new toys as well. It's an exciting time to be at Line 6.

Meris' Mercury 7 is the one to beat these days. The thing is sick. Also made by ex-Line 6ers.

I would be interested in hearing what people might like Helix's Command Center to accomplish that it currently doesn't. My personal wish list is dozens of items long; just trying to rationalize them to the team...

Sennheiser HD600.

Yes, it's doable, but it would have to be connected to a Mac or PC, as there's not really a clean and elegant way to add direct iOS support.

As pbatts mentioned, there's no such thing as an empty snapshot. As soon as you select one that hasn't been previously selected, it copies and pastes the snapshot you came from.

Ah, yes. Helix will do 4-Cable Method, 7-Cable Method (2 amps in stereo), 10-Cable Method (Wet-Dry-Wet), and even 13-Cable Method (why not?). 8 TEMPLATES > 02A 4-Cable Method is set up for this automatically. Each of the stock Cab blocks (or the Cab portion of an Amp+Cab block) can have the mic, mic, distance, and Early Reflections tweaked, even in real time. Yossarian1156's comment about amp-in-the-room is really important tho'. If Helix doesn't sound like you expect through PA speakers, there's a 90% chance it's... the fact that you're using PA speakers. FRFR can never nail the feel of a roaring tube amp, but that's due to physics, not technology. Helix has zero control over the playback system one uses to hear it, and therefore, should never be blamed for not sounding like a real amp in the room.

1) Helix will be getting better reverbs. Yes, you can insert your HOF into one (or two, for stereo) effects loops. It can be placed anywhere on one of Helix's four signal paths, assigned to a footswitch, custom labeled, and the LED custom colored to make it seem like it's built in. 2) Depends on what you mean by "sidechain." Yes, a lot of effects can be placed wherever you want, but there's no sidechain in the way that a compressor's detector circuit can be side chained from a different input or something. 3) I'm biased here, so I'll defer to other users.