rvroberts

I see your problem! No one can guarantee that the Helix - floor or rack - will make you as happy as the Kemper. If you had the Kemper head with the built in amp, I'd just use the HX FX as an effects unit and patch changer in front of the Kemper - then you'd have all the smarts like snapshots and still get your tone from the Kemper. That you need a power amp and speakers starts to make this a messy setup for live. I like the Helix floor - I don't see why anyone wants the rack except if it's built in a studio setup. But the floor is instead of the Kemper - you would need to try it for enough time to get past the initial learning curve - not so much the learning curve of programming - that's pretty simple if you have experience with amps and pedals - but the EQ that's needed to get it sounding good. And I'd really suggest that the DT50 is a bad choice for that - you plug your Kemper into that?? i suspect you are EQing around a setup that is not really doing your Kemper justice - but then maybe it's the limitations of that system you like? after all, low and high cuts are the first thing you do with an FRFR system - the DT50 might be doing that for free! To make the Helix sing, you need a good FRFR system. You then need to EQ it with suitable low and high cuts and potentially some mid kick depending on your speakers. When you got that happening, you would know if you could live with the Helix or not. I personally can - but I'm not you. Try to find someone who has musical tastes that aren't a million miles from yours and who uses a Helix and get them to work with you to get some sounds - then you can make an informed decision. Don't stuff around with the HD500 and the HX Stomp - it's just getting into more mess and less clear path to your sound. If nothing sounds as good as your Kemper (even if you have to run it through the DT50!} then get the HX FX and use it to control everything else through snapshots and midi.

Have you considered that you can run the looper into the front of the Helix or after the helix? You don't have to put it in a loop. The loop might work well for you though if you wanted to use it in some patches live.

Well you need to connect them side by side and check - cause one's faulty if you have that kind of difference.

I'd bet the tiny variation in AtoD and D to A is so slight you wouldn't notice without test gear. And the digital stuff in the middle - 100% exact. Get more variation changing your cables.

I'm surprised no-one has suggested the obvious. If you are planning FRFR in the future, or thinking a lot of recording, the Helix is a good choice. However, if you plan on using it for FX with the amp, and want to keep using an amp, the HXFX is the better choice. It's all the effects without the amps and cabs.

Your alto 312 is FRFR - think of it as the PA. Your Helix is putting out full range too. But a guitar stack doesn't. Typically you have serious cut below 100hz and above 5KHz. That is what you need - not only will your bottom end tighten right up (you might find you can put back some bottoms in your amp for example), but the smoothness of your distorted sounds will improve out of sight. You can do that with Global EQ or in the cuts in the speaker simulation (or IR). Although doing it per patch gives you the option to tweak those for each patch, I'm yet to be convinced a general global EQ as described above isn't a 95% fix for everything. Then patch EQ is just fine tuning. 12inch guitar speakers have no resemblance to the 12 in your Alto - it's a full range speaker, not a guitar speaker. The EQ I'm suggestion sounds fine out to FOH too.

Hi Macnevine, As I understand it, you can't do what you want exactly. The video above is for the rack not the floor unit. This pedal model acts exactly as the onboard expression pedal on the floor but for the rack. So (and you might not notice it if you don't actually stand on it because it's very heavy and needs a bit of body weight) the onboard expression unit is the one with a toe switch. So if you want it to work just like a typical Wah, the onboard pedal will do this - just put a wah in you chain and by default, using the toe switch will activate the wah. Obviously in a patch where you don't need wah, it can be anything else you want. That means you need another expression pedal to take over the job of volume pedal. (somehow, someone must have thought that not having volume control when using wah was a reasonable compromise!?!) There are 2 line 6 Helix compatible Mission pedals - just to confuse everyone - one is designed for the rack - as above, the other is a general expression pedal. But it doesn't do the toe switch. No problem for volume - a bit counter intuitive for wah. Some would maintain that some of the older heavy duty Volume pedals are actually nicer for volume anyhow (acting as an expression pedal in Helix land).

I'm not going to tell you anything regarding midi and HX Stomp. I use the full Helix floorboard - but I did see this very interesting video -

Hi birwood62, You can get great produced marshall sounds with the Helix - which is not exactly the same as standing in front of a 4x12. To begin with the Helix is reproducing a Mic'ed cab - so you get the sound of the mic'ed amp not the sound (and hit) of a 4x12. If you got to have exactly that to be happy, try the power cab - that's it's reason for being - https://line6.com/powercab/ But if you could be happy in the studio hearing a great mic'ed and produced amp wound up through big studio monitors (compression, reverb etc) then you can get that! The first port of call would generally be some IRs of cabs like the ones you know - Ownhammer or Celestion IRs might make you more happy. Then you need to adjust the high and low cuts - depends on how the IR was made, but generally in the studio you need some savage EQ before that mic sounds like we all immagine a Marshall in the room. Drastic high and low cuts are common, regularly right down to say 5K in the high end and maybe 80-100Hz in the lows. Remember that what you hear through the system you have at the moment is what you will hear out of FOH. If you need a Marshall "up your lollipop" to feel good - check the power cab - and if that doesn't do it for you, you aren't going to get happiness out of any modeller.

1 - yes! If you are getting any drive or "amp sound" from your amp and speakers, then it will sound very different. Delay before an overdriven amp adds distortion to the delay. You might or might not want that. Adding delay after the effects and preamp gives a cleaner delay - again depends what you are after. Delay at the end of the chain after everything is like a studio delay - that's the cleanest and the most 3D if you use stereo. But why ask - just try it! That's the beauty of this type of device. But if you want to make educated guesses, think about how this works in the real world - the only place you get delay after the mic is in the studio or if the Front of house guy adds it. Bit ambient sounds are generally as far down the chain as you can put them - blended organic delay might well be in front of the amp. 2 - both left and right are balanced - if you use a TRS cable - you can go out in true stereo into a PA or a pair of powered speakers. There are diagrams for that on page 7 of the manual. You will have balanced all the way if you have a balanced cable with balanced connectors on either end - and of cause, your target device takes a balanced signal. 3. most people would put their volume pedal at the end of the chain so the sound doesn't change, just the volume. A volume pedal at the start is almost exactly the same as the volume on your guitar - any drive will clean up before the volume starts to go down. All your drive pedals should normally go in front of the amp - if you are using an amp sim in the HX stomp - you either go into OD pedal then HX stomp or use a send and return - considering the limitations of HX Stomp - the first case id probably better. 4 - there are no rules - but conventional sounds will be achieved conventionally. If you are running your HX Stomp into a guitar amp - you should have bought the HXFX in my opinion. Yes, you can use it as a cheaper but more limited FX device - but the questions you are asking sounds like that's not what you want to do? Don't run amp sims into the front of a guitar amp (well it might work as an overdrive....)

it will control volume if you put a volume block in your effects chain.

Oh, I'm not saying another modeller will work with your amp - just that a Headrush or a Boss GTX1000 might leave you the extra dollars to buy say the Headrush FRFR unit, and that would be way better than the Helix into the front of a Marshall. Maybe not as good as the Helix into top FRFR - but a better compromise. If you love your amp, the HXFX should give you a lot of sounds - especially if you run it close to clean and let the HXFX do all the drive sounds. The various EQs available will let you get half way to a Fenderish/Vox/.... sound.

No. Well you could use it for effects, but you would then buy HXFX - the effects only version. There is absolutely no sense in running an amp sim into an amp - you might find a preamp makes a good drive pedal - but that's not the same thing. If you want the flexibility of being able to change from a Fender to a Marshall - you got to go FRFR - so if you are struggling with the cost of the Helix think about the Stomp - maybe - or get another modeller - it will be better - as far as flexibility goes.

Hey Andy Simmons, Have you experience of using this unit? It does look like it's a good part of the puzzle - I'm sure I'm not the only one looking for a cost effective backup to the Helix, and the stomp as it is is just a little too hard to work with live I think - even accepting more stripped down processing. You still got separate power etc - so it's back to a pedal board configuration..........

If you could create something that gave the live player preset up/down and also added another foot switch (or more) so that it brought the Stomp closer to being a good backup for a full Helix (obviously with significantly reduced DSP) at a combined cost that was clearly removed from the LT - you would have a winner. It would also offer a kind of Helix mini for the budget strapped - which the stomp is at least one foot switch away from being. I do wonder about the stomp - it almost answers a question - but it's just a tiny bit too limited. The link above looks interesting and I realise you can connect a extra switch and expression pedal to the existing unit. All together and nicely mounted and powered on a board, it looks like what I'm asking for, But if you could do that neatly plug and play - then you'd have an attractive product. (price dependant!)

Unfortunately the answer isn't simple. First are you using high and low cuts? You almost certainly need them to feed a PA or FRFR speaker. Secondly, tone is highly volume dependant. So unfortunately you can't finalise a sound unless you are auditioning it at around the volume you expect to be using it. You will almost certainly have too much bottom and top if you set it up at low volume and then play a fair bit louder. So you need something similar to the environment you are playing in. If you go out to PA, FRFR should give you a decent guide, but only at stage levels. So settings up sounds at low level will need significant EQ and balancing of effects at gig level to get what sounded good quiet to work loud.

Yes, does sound like hardware to me - just check your power - try yo use a different circuit. different cable if you can too - If on improvement - I'd bet hardware.

Well you might describe that as a "dry" sound - but most of us wouldn't! I just put up a Interstate Zed - pulled the drive down to around 3 - using the default cab and it started to be in the ballpark - I pulled the bass down and then stuck a Cali EQ in front of the amp - but that part was to make my Strat sound a bit more Tele. So you will need to make your Drive so that it's got just that bit of bite - I needed to pull the Bass down a fair bit too. Then you can clearly hear compression on the notes - so I stuck a compressor - I used the Kinky Comp - but some of the others might squash your Tele better - I'm doing this quick and dirty. Then I can hear what is almost slapback echo - so I put a Simple Delay after the cab - time maybe 200ms Mix to taste - say 20% It's already getting close for me. You're playing a Tele - playing around with that should get closer. I have standard High and low cuts too - but we haven't discussed your rig, so I can't comment on how that should be set for your system.

have you watched the videos https://line6.com/hx-effects/videos and this one talks about setting up a flow. You need a send block in a flow to send.

No - In the HX FX you create an effects path. You connect a distortion to a chorus for example. If you want to then send that somewhere using the send and return loop, you need to put a send as the next block in that effects chain (in the interface). When you select that send block, you have to assign the particular send to the send socket on the chassis - same with return. If you just plug into the send and return without a send and return in your path nothing is sent to the send socket.

Have you tried superglue on a match stick or tooth pick? - the screw above sounds like a good try too.

No - and i've checked it. Are there any other possible explanations - have you reversed the cables? It's the easiest way to be sure it's the Helix. If it is your Helix, you have a problem that should be checked.

Yes, it's a bit of a strange beast - just a little too limited to be much use to most of us.

Sorry, don't understand your problem. You can do all of the above. Let's use the HXFX as the master - you have say a compressor, a couple of overdrives, then a send (at instrument level) - you plug that into the input of your Kemper - then you bring the Kemper back with a return block, add delay or whatever, and feed to your HRHR system - should work fine. Are you not seeing that you need to assign sends and returns - the HXFX has send and return jacks on the chassis, but they don't do anything till you place a send in your effects chain - is this what you aren't getting? Then you send at whatever point in the chain you like and return wherever you like - so putting stereo effects after the amp return is simple. Obviously when you place a send, you need to send the level the device you are sending to expects for it to sound correct.

Why not use the Edit software? I'm old too - I edit on a computer - always - its better I think given the choice. I sit at a desk, with a computer - it plays music for me (via USB through the Helix) - can't imagine wanting to bend down and do it on the unit! I copy patches back and forward from the computer to the Helix all the time - it's a way better way to work and it also means I've got neatly arranged (that bit's up to you!) backups of everything.