JohanSmith

and I think some people here should put in their sig-line that when they say 'dry' they don't really mean dry.

Probably a good idea, so why did you try to start with this:

I'm one of the audio engineers who has had no recent use for SPDIF, but I still have every need for high-fidelity audio processing; so now you know that not all audio engineers have SPDIF. Really, and why does it seem that way to you? I was trained here: https://ccrma.stanford.edu/ I've worked for Intel and Creative Labs. Were Stanford, Intel, and Creative Labs all mistaken to consider me an audio engineer, since I don't have SPDIF? What do you know about audio engineering that Stanford, Intel, and Creative Labs don't know?

It's like this: If you have 16-bit and 24-bit versions of the same thing, and you play them on your speakers, you probably will not hear a difference. But if you process them heavily, adding distortion and other FX, you will hear a big difference in the results. If you start with 16 bits and process it heavily, the results will include tons of noise. This is why just listening isn't always a good way to decide whether something is right for your purposes, and the math underlying the sound is important.

Something's wrong with your thinking then, but you knew that when you took a simple issue and made it your platform to give speeches about your theories on how everyone should make music.

If you really believe that, you must have missed the part where people tried to convince me a not-really-dry signal would suffice for my purposes. Here's something you didn't know about professional audio engineers: most of us don't know whether the Line 6 POD HD can send a dry signal over USB. Most of us give relatively little thought to the POD HD.

Not at all. First I was wondering if there's a straightforward way to set the POD HD to send a truly dry signal over USB. POD XT has such a way. You just tell it you want a truly dry signal from USB, and it gives it. Later I was wondering if I can get a truly dry signal out of the "dual-path capability" you described. I'm still wondering that. I'm wondering something about the numbers in the data stream. I'm not going to be able to tell just by listening. Like, you couldn't tell if an audio sample was 24 or 16 bit just by listening; but does that mean you should do everything in 16 bits when 24-bit options are readily available? Can't imagine why you're perceiving it any other way. I see things are very confused here, and I'm an audio engineer not a Woodstock concert-goer, and I get paid to engineer audio the nitpicky way.

"Truly dry" allows for A/D conversion; "truly dry" for purposes of this thread was defined in this post: http://line6.com/support/topic/7125-how-can-i-record-a-dry-signal-from-pod-hd-desktop-via-usb/?p=48862 If you look at the internet and the world in general outside this forum, you'll find people discussing truly dry digital signals without all the confusion and doublespeak appearing in this thread.

Okay. Thank you. I appreciate the truth.

If it's not TRULY dry, it won't be fine for my purposes. I'm not trying to get a signal that's good enough for what Rob or Joe is doing with their signals. I'm doing my own thing. My thing requires a truly dry signal. My thing is different from your thing. I don't want to do your thing; I want to do my thing. This didn't register last time, so I'll try it in bold this time: I'm afraid it would only be a waste of time to try to convince me that I don't really want to record a perfectly dry signal. I'll record one with one interface or another, and my only question is whether the POD HD has this capability.

Yes, I think so. They might want to look at the POD XT for ideas how to do it....

Okay. It's time I stop typing and try this. Brazzy was helpful in describing the process, but then I became alarmed by the suggestion that this method works well enough to satisfy stoned people who can't hear when a guitar is out of tune, and that wanting a truly dry signal is somehow 'nitpicking'.

I'm happy to shut down all the amps / FX if it enables a dry signal to go over USB to the computer. If that means I hear just a dry signal while monitoring / recording, that's fine with me. My only concern has been, would this send a perfectly dry signal (which S/PDIF would make easy), or just a kind-of-dry signal. In other words, will I get the same numbers in my WAV file as the guys who have S/PDIF and set their S/PDIF Output (Knob 1) to "Dry Input"? I suppose no one but Line 6 knows the answer for sure.

My computer doesn't have an S/PDIF interface. The only connection between my POD HD and computer is a USB cable, so I'm asking if the POD HD is able to send the dry signal through the USB cable.

That's what I was getting at with my earlier statement: "I'm concerned about maximizing audio quality of the recorded dry signal." I didn't mean that audio quality should matter to your listeners and you; I just meant that it matters to my listeners and me. I'm afraid it would only be a waste of time to try to convince me that I don't really want to record a perfectly dry signal. I'll record one with one interface or another, and my only question is whether the POD HD has this capability.