zappazapper

I'm a washed up hack and I also don't find the LT to be flimsy.

I'm not going to badmouth the OP and what he wants to do. It's not what I would do, but I'll advise him as best that I can on how to do it. IMHO he hasn't got the right gear to do what he wants to do. That's all. If he's got 8 pedals he wants to use ON TOP of what the Helix has to offer, then there are devices that will allow him to do that, but the one he's got isn't it. Maybe if it had a MIDI input. But it doesn't.

As far as I can tell there are two distinct types of loopers, with variations of each type. The first type is basically what the Helix looper is. You play something, and it plays it back until you tell it to stop. You can also play on top of the first loop and play that back, etc etc etc. The second type is where you can store dozens of pre-recorded loops for playback at will, and still play on top of them and play that back, etc etc etc. IMHO the Helix does everything it does at a world-class level, except looping. If I can buy a $150 pedal that objectively outperforms the Helix in some way, then the Helix should just stop doing it. The hardware is not capable of being a world-class looper in the same way that it is capable of being a world-class modeler, so it should stop trying to be a looper. Only people who need a looper need a looper, and if they need one they will spend $150 to get a world-class looper instead of pretending the basic-beach Helix looper will do what they want. beach =

Without knowing what specific presets you downloaded, I would imagine that they were actually in Stompbox Mode, with some footswitches assigned to Snapshots, as opposed to Snapshot Mode. Stompbox Mode is actually the most versatile mode because you can use the Command Center to assign any number of tasks to the footswitches, including calling Snapshots, or even Presets. Snapshot Mode will default to whatever mode is selected by the mode switch once a Snapshot is selected, although if I remember correctly that can be changed in preferences. But I would advise you to use Stompbox Mode and familiarize yourself with the Command Center, as it's the most versatile mode.

Ya, before I got my LT, I was looking into doing a "plugins with an amp" kind of thing and thought one of these loop switchers would be a way to do it, and I came upon these devices. I think they're intended more for the guys who have MIDI-capable pedals that need something to control them. Doesn't make sense to me, but I'm not in the music gear manufacturing industry so I can't really make a case for not including MIDI input capabilities. To be fair, I have yet to read a thread on this forum where someone is saying 4 loops isn't enough and they need a device that adds 8 more loops controlled by MIDI. I guess there's a market for it.

The looper in the Helix is the marketing department. If they were serious about a looper there'd be some sort of removable storage port. What I mean by "serious" is serious in the way they are about modeling. I don't think anybody is buying a Helix because of the looper. They should just ditch it. Anybody who needs a looper has a looper pedal. I don't even need a looper and I have a looper pedal. Nux Loop Core. Open it up and there's an SD card slot in there. Awesome looper.

His loop switcher doesn't have a MIDI input. It took skimming the entire manual for his switcher to remind me that such a thing exists. Very limited possibilities.

Your Helix floor has 4 loops that are probably more flexible than anything your loop switcher can do. And honestly, if I was going to use a loop switcher with a Helix, I would want to control everything with the Helix, not the other way around. But again, I would investigate just using the Helix.

Some things to know... From the Helix LT manual @ https://line6.com/data/6/0a020a3f18374611d5dffd3a45/application/pdf/Helix LT 3.0 Owner's Manual - Rev D - English .pdf From page 65: "Volume Knob Controls - Determines which output(s) are affected when turning the top panel VOLUME knob. For example, you may want to control the level sent from the 1/4" outputs to your stage monitor without affecting the XLR level sent to the front-of-house mixer. Or you may want to disable the VOLUME knob altogether; in this case, set it to “Digital,” at which point Helix LT’s 1/4" and XLR outs will be at unity level." "Headphones Monitor - Determines which signal(s) are heard from the PHONES output. Normally you would set this to Multi (1/4"+XLR+Digital+USB 1/2), but there may be a situation where you only want to hear what’s sent from the 1/4" or XLR outs, particularly if they are fed different signals (or band members!)" So what I might do in your situation. I'm assuming you're using a normal guitar amp with your Helix, or at least something that has a volume control of its own, so you probably don't need to also control the level of your guitar from the Helix also. So set the Volume Knob Controls to XLR, and set your Headphones Monitor to XLR also (assuming you're not also sending a signal from the XLR jacks also). On all your presets, set your main output block (probably Path 1A?) to 1/4". Just before that output block, create the EQ block that you want to use for your hi-cut, then use the ACTION button to move it down to Path 1B. Make sure the Split block is a Split-Y, and then use the ACTION button to move the Merge block down to Path 1B, which creates a separate output block for that Path. Set that output block to XLR. Now your straight signal, before the hi-cut, will go to your 1/4" jacks, and the hi-cut signal will go to your headphones, controlled by the Volume Knob. Of course, there are many variations of this technique based on whether your presets are also using Path 2 for more processing power, but that's the jist of it.

I think he's saying he wants to control the looper with incoming MIDI from an external MIDI controller. Incoming MIDI is handled at the blocks themselves, not by the Command Center.

First thing to try is probably to make sure firmware is fully updated, then factory reset and restore from backup.

I don't have any issue with your suggested distinctions whatsoever.

Well that would be ridiculous. Seriously though... I have the Behringer unit. It was the first thing that popped into my head.

The Schwartz is definitely with me...

No, you're no fun because half the fun of these updates tends to be the discussion and speculation around them, and your statement suggests it's not worth the time, or at least that you're not enjoying it. Plus, you're no fun because saying someone is no fun is fun. I'm sure you're just the right amount of fun. No worries.

You must be a lot of fun at parties...

It's not cheap, or convenient, but this would work. https://www.behringer.com/behringer/product?modelCode=P0141

Got it. Honestly, unless you're really up on what you need to do to manipulate the JSON file, it might be quicker and easier to just make a spreadsheet from scratch.

I think you're gonna get this no matter what you do if your amp settings are changing that much. The only thing I can think of is maybe a compressor after the amp with a super fast attack setting. Such a fast compressor may not even exist in the Helix roster, you might have to find a pedal that does it and put it after your Stomp.

The HXFX was designed to be the spiritual successor to the Stompbox Modeler pedals and the M-series units. They are marketed to players who get their tone from real amps and have no interest in amp models. If you want amp models, then it's not that the unit designed to not have amp models should have amp models, it's that you should buy the unit that has amp models. Most of the Helix line comes with amp models. Just the one doesn't. So don't buy that one. But all the others do. Buy one of those ones.

Theoretically, a stereo signal with both sides panned to the same location should be exactly the same as a stereo signal summed at the Left/Mono jack. So if there were stereo effects being used that would cause the unwanted frequency cancelation you mentioned, it would happen either way. There's no benefit to doing what he's doing but I can't think of any negative consequences either, other than having to connect another cable and taking up another channel on the mixer. If your friend's tone isn't cutting through, it's because his tone isn't cutting through. It shouldn't have anything to do with how he's connected to the mixer. The Helix is an incredibly powerful device with all kinds of options at your fingertips, both for getting great tone and terrible tone. Even the best amps the world has ever seen have to be adjusted to work in an ensemble situation. That tone that you thought was so great in your bedroom is often masking or being masked by someone else. Your friend has to be willing to adjust his tone to be heard properly in an ensemble situation. On the subject of hard panning. I agree that hard panning is usually not the best idea, but it's really more of a concern for doing a mixdown of a recording - things that are hard panned get reduced in volume when summed to mono, which might seem like less of a problem than I'm suggesting, except that in the real world a lot of playback systems are mono - anybody listening to your song on their phone or in a bar will probably be listening to a summed mono signal, and you'd hate for your great sounding guitar parts to be reduced in volume by 6 decibels. Also, what you'll find is that the way our ears work, the effect of the pan control has its greatest effect nearest to the center detent, and once you get to about half way to either side, pushing it further to the side doesn't really sound like it's moving it all that much. So with those two things in mind, typically things that you don't want to disappear in the mono sum are panned closer to center. By the same token, things that might make a mono sum too busy and crowded can be panned further to the sides so they come down a bit more when summed. Now, all that notwithstanding, your situation is completely different. You're playing live, and unless you're recording the master mix and releasing it publicly and it's good enough that anybody wants to listen to it, it's not likely to ever get summed to mono, so that's not an issue for you. On the other hand, panning hard in your situation might actually be the best strategy, since each speaker will effectively be acting like a separate guitar amp, and whatever elements of his tone won't be interfering with yours, at least not electronically. If I'm being honest, if I was in a similar situation to yours, I might pan the guitars hard left and right, and at any rate, I don't think that's the source of your friend's issues with being heard. However, since your friend is connected in stereo anyway, you might as well pan one of his signals closer to the center so that he gets a little bit of the stereo image, and it shouldn't sound like he's any closer to the center than your signal.

Need just one more upvote to hit 30. Help me help you!!

Maybe the solution is to start off REALLY simple and just use the Helix to sort of replicate your two pedal boards, like with just one preset for electric and one for acoustic. And then slowly add more specific presets over time. Like, even if you know what preset is perfect for Money For Nothing, if you have 10 banks of presets it's still not going to be very easy to navigate to it. If you were playing in a band that had a predetermined set list then it might make sense to have that many presets but for your situation I think you just want something minimal that will cover everything the same way your pedal board did, at least to start. The Helix offers a butt-ton of power and flexibility, but with that comes the risk of absolute disaster, and when my own band was just rehearsing, ya, I had a ton of presets that were designed to NAIL the tones on the records, but when I was confronted with the reality of having to play in front of people and not having the time to navigate 30 presets, I knew I had to simplify, and actually I'll probably just use those presets even in rehearsal from now on because it's just so much easier to deal with, and it still sounds really good.

The first thing you should think about is finding a way to do more with less presets. Snapshots are an incredibly powerful feature of the Helix that are probably not really demonstrated very well by the factory presets. I just did a 3 hour gig with a 90's Rock cover band a couple weekends ago with 4 presets, because I was able to use a combination of Snapshots, Bypass and Controller assignments, and using split blocks controlled by footswitches to give me a few different options for distortions or specific effects for specific songs for each preset. If you're new to the Helix then using factory presets as a starting point is a good way to get over the learning curve but at some point you'll want to start tweaking those presets to get more out of them. Then if you have less presets to navigate, the problem of keeping track of them isn't as big of a problem.