zooey

Just to say it, the Amplitube verbs are worse, and I love AT in general. I've found a workaround that works decently well for me providing you don't want pretty short decay. But overall, it's not what you notice most when you're listening to or playing AT, or Helix.

Ideally I'd actually measure the frequency response of the IR, then try again to match that with the built-in cab and EQ, see how that does. The AT patch isn't bad with the built-in version, but the IR one definitely sounds better to me.

Agreed that horizontal (really radial) distance from the center of the cone is an incredibly important aspect of mic-ing a guitar cab, and that adding a parameter for that would vastly improve the accuracy and usefulness of the built-in cabs. Voted and commented on that in Ideascale, hard to believe it's the first request. In the Amplitube patch thread I posted a one with the IR you made from my Amplitube patch, and my not-final-but-after-some-work built-in-cab+EQ version as an alternative. The built-in one w EQ isn't bad, but there's an undeniable thickness to the IR version that doesn't strike me as purely EQ. Can a cab IR affect more than pure frequency response and reflections, like distortion and/or compression? I thought not, but I haven't researched it.

Agreed that a reasonable next step is to reinstall the Focusrite driver, see if that makes any difference. But do I need to do that every time there's an update to the Helix driver? Why? Do I need to reinstall the Helix driver when I update the Focusrite one? You can see where this is going. The kids need to play well with others.

Frankly yes, noticed that right away. Low density, quite audible, no doubt a compromise for lower CPU usage, which all told was probably the right thing to do. For perspective, no million-dollar hardware here, but a couple of decent old hardware units, and more directly comparable, a slew of inexpensive verb plugins that kick a**.

This topic might not be welcome here, but I don't know anyone on the Fractal boards. Does anyone in the Boston area have an AX8 they'd be willing to let me check out for an hour or two, just to settle that question once and for all instead of trying to guess? PM me if so, and thanks.

Let me take another run at this. The patch I originally posted wasn't actually a good example of what I'm having a hard time doing in Helix. My bad, I wasn't in a place where I could listen to it, didn't pick a good one. So here's another Amplitube patch that's closer to what I'm after, and my best shot so far at sometime like it in Helix. Thanks again to roscoe5 for all his work, I started from there, including the IR he made from my original Amplitube patch. The AT patch file needs to be renamed to .at4p, and the Helix one to .hlx. The Helix one expects the IR from earlier in this thread in slot 82, as before. The main patch is as saved. There are some additions and alternatives too... - Just to the right of the IR, there's a cab and an EQ, which together are an alternative to the IR. It's sort of close, but not as good IMO. - In the top row are 3 optional overdrives and an EQ used as on overdrive - There's an optional chorus in the bottom row. IMO, this isn't too bad, not as good as the Amplitube version, but fairly reasonable. Among other things, it's neither as clean as the AT version when picked lightly, nor as crunchy when you hit it harder. If anyone has any thoughts an how to improve that sort of behavior in Helix, please clue me. All told, I spent I LOT of time in Helix over the weekend. I wish I could say I'm totally sold on it, but not yet. Love the UI. Used the editor a bit too, it's good, though mildly annoying in some ways. Sound-wise, it's just not as touch responsive as Amplitube, or at least I haven't figured out how to make it be so. The Leslies are awful, not that that's a huge deal. The usable overdrives are less varied than what's in AT. No idea what you could do with the industrial one that you could actually hear in a live mix. Will continue exploring, but I'm not used to spending this kind of many unless I'm totally knocked out. Mark lll extra cab less.xml zooey amp IR HX3.txt

Ever since I installed the Helix driver, Amplitube has a hard time finding the Focusrite driver I've used for years with my 2i2 and 18i20. Especially but not only when the Helix isn't plugged in, I frequently get a msg when I start AT, "the driver" failed to initialize, which one it doesn't say, and only the native Direct Sound driver appears. If I leave the Audio MIDI Settings dialog open, sometimes it figures it out, sometimes not, and AT is unusable. Sometimes quitting AT and starting it again helps, sometimes not. Right now, Helix is NOT plugged in. The AT Output device dropdown shows ASIO Helix, Focusrite, and some Guitar Rig stuff. The Input device dropdown shows the Focusrite, but it's greyed out, so I can't see what else is in it. Input and output actually work, with the Focusrite. Why is that? Is it on purpose? Has anyone run into any of this? Any ideas on how to make it more reliable?

@roscoe5, had a good long play w your setup last night. Was way brighter than my AT version here, assuming it didn't seem like that in your environment, not sure why that'd be. But the bigger problem, no fault of yours, is that is just doesn't have anything like the dynamics response of the AT Mesa patch. The Mesa thing does something seriously cool when you pick harder, feels to me like my imagination of a super high-end boutique amp. It's related to the fat but not very distorted-sounding thing, sounds like a nearly clear guitar through a nice amp when you pick softly, but lay into it a bit, and it has this wonderful bite and crunch. I get nothing like that from anything I've tried in Helix. Also, pick gently, and most patches, even clean ones, have a slight digital buzz on the top end, almost like quantization noise or something. So far I've just been in phones, which I'm sure exaggerates that -- you might not hear it in a room, certainly wouldn't in a band context, but it's there. I'll try your new version roscoe5, and keep exploring, but so far, I can't say I'm knocked out by Helix sound-wise. Ergonomics, form factor, and connectivity features are great, just wish I was in love with the actual sound.

Hey Roscoe5 (or anyone), could you share a Helix patch for working with computer software like Amplitube? Want to plug my guitar into Helix, route the signal through Amplitube and back to Helix, the listen to the final output through Helix headphone, XLR, and 1/4" outs. Might want some Helix processing before and/or after the round trip to AT. Very new to Helix routing, apparently I don't have my head around how to set that up. This seemed right me with my Helix-newb understanding: Helix upper path: guitar > Helix multi input > Helix USB 5/6 output Amplitube USB 5/6 input > Amplitube patch > USB 7/8 output Helix lower path Helix USB 7/8 input > Helix multi output Doesn't work. Listening through phones in Helix... - I get sound choosing either USB 5 or 6 input in AT - If I choose USB 8 for both left and right outputs in AT, I get sound on the right only in Helix, any other combination of USB 7 and 8 out in AT gets sound only on the left - Sound isn't processed by Amplitube at all, sounds like direct guitar, AT path settings have no effect I'm clearly missing some major concept here.

Thanks, really appreciate your work on this (and all your IRs too), will check these out when I can. Re Cleanish but fat 6 Amp Cab.at4p, the first graphic is really a part of that sound I think, so as a baseline it might not be quite right, depending on what you mean by that. Didn't quite get what Cleanish but fat 6 Amp Cab No Cab.at4p was for. Building the amp and cab IR, maybe? I'm one of the people wishing hard for a Helix Mark III, but the vast majority of Mesa wishes I've seen were for the IIc and the V, both of which I've never heard. Most of the Mesa wishers are high-gain guys, which I'm really not. Wasn't expecting it, but the Mark III is definitely my fave out of the AT Mesas. Re the Mesa Mark EQ, I wish Amplitube let you use it as an effect with other amps, but I can see Mesa not letting that happen. I bet it's got an effect on the audio besides what its frequencies and bandwidths would indicate. I think it's basically a passive EQ, like with inductors and very analog-type stuff. It'd be awesome if Helix had one :). Leaving the Mesa mojo out of it, you could make one out of a couple of parametrics. It'd be cool if Helix let you build reusable blocks that combined multiple effects, possibly with control over the placement of their combined controls in the block's pages. Put gain for each of the bands on page 1 in this case, with frequencies and Q fixed "inside", on later pages. Thanks again, looking forward to this.

Thanks for looking, and you're right on both counts, file is attached. Rename the extension back to '.at4p' to use it in Amplitube. Compatible with AT 4 only. Requires Mesa Mark III and the Mesa Recto Slant cab, everything else is standard IK stuff if I remember right (can't see from here). Cleanish but fat 6.xml

Got my Helix last Monday, and of course have been fiddling with it in my somewhat limited time. In general I'm enjoying it (may do a post on my reactions later), but there's a class of Amplitube 4 patches I really like that I haven't been able to get very close to. I've attached one. If anyone has any thoughts on how to do something like it in Helix, or better yet an actual Helix patch like it, I'd appreciate it. This patch was tailored to a G&L Ascari HB3, 3 humbuckers, no idea how it'll work for anyone else's guitar or playing, but I thought I'd ask this anyway. Also, it was done primarily in AKG 240 phones, FWIW. (The HB3 is pretty new to me. Nice guitar, but it arrived with a defective bridge PU, sounds like honky nasal crap, and I never use it. G&L will fix it when I'm ready to be without it for a while, I'm only mentioning that because this patch doesn't deal with the bridge pickup at all. I have a version of it that does for my main guitar, but that guitar is so different from anything anyone else has that I thought this one was more helpful here.) Patch uses the Mesa Mark III, and as saved is pushed enough to be a little fat and sustainy, but barely distorted. If you can imagine playing with a friend who doesn't like distorted guitars, but you still want some Mojo, it's a version of that. It has a number of more-drive options available. I really like it as saved, and with each of the various drive options. I care much more about Helix doing the patch as saved, that fat but not that distorted thing, less about the stomps and fx that are configured but off. That said, the drive options need some explanation. - The EQ in stomp A is always on - The overdrives in stomp A I use less often than other drive options, still nice though - The Crusher in stomp B is a mild thickener. I sometimes use the first EQ in stomp B with it to brighten it up slightly; that's all that EQ is for. - The second 2 EQs in stomp B are the main overdrive options, used one at a time. The first one pushes medium hard, the second one more. - The EQ-XS Fuzz-EQ chain on the right side of stomp 2 gets turned on or off as a single effect. (No controllers configured for that at this point though, or for anything else.) It's towards the more-drive end of things for me, different texture than the other options. So far in Helix, by the time I get much fatness, I hear more obvious distortion than this, as it's saved. It's much easier to find things closer to the drive options. I like playing through the Helix patches I've made so far, but I'd miss something like this if I couldn't get near it, it's one of my home bases. To be clear, I haven't gone through anywhere near all the amps, stomps, and cabs Helix has to offer. I keep just playing guitar instead of trying everything, which itself is a good sign. Still, I haven't landed on anything at all similar to this patch, thought I'd ask. @roscoe5, and any other Amplitube (ex-, maybe) users, what do you think?

I've only recently gotten a second guitar that I actually still play, while my main one was in the shop, and I built a separate bank for it in Amplitube, because Main guitar is hotter and brighter than New one. Many new-guitar patches started out as a copy of the best version of something from my main-guitar banks. Problem is that I've now tweaked some things in the new-guitar bank that I'd like to apply to the main-guitar counterpart. But dang, they still haven't implemented Preset Merge functionality. (The files are XML, so I could merge them myself with any of the text-based diff tools I have, but yuck.) So far, I've only been using my main guitar w Helix, trying to stay focused on Helix itself, but I really want the perspective of how both of them sound, and definitely want to use both in general. We'll see, thanks for the experiences.

Um, duh, thank you, guess I forgot to call Captain Obvious. As you were...

Where did you see that price? Their site shows it as €69.95, about $79, on eBay about $70. When they say it's a hard case, would you think it'd do ok in an equipment truck, like with stuff on top of it?

I imagine at least some of you use more than one guitar with Helix, which you'd like to treat differently. How are you handling that? The only options I thought of are: - Separate setlists for each one. - An EQ block at the start of all your presets, designed to match or tailor one of them to something similar to or appropriately compatible with the other, which you footswitch on or off as needed. Not great for fast preset changes, probably not practical for many people. - An external hardware EQ pedal doing the same thing. What are folks doing about this?

Quick question whose answer I think I know: On Helix itself, is there a quick way to insert a block before or after some selected block, when there's already something next to it? Far as I can tell, no, you have to move all affected blocks down one to make room first. Say for instance you want to add a noise gate as the first thing after the input block, but there are already several effect blocks starting there. You have to first move the furthest right one to the right, then the next and the next, until you've made the first slot empty. Is that the state of the art? Or is there some direct way to say, "insert this new block before (or after) the selected one"? If you can't do that on the Helix hardware, can you do it in the app? (Still trying not to use it for a while.) Thanks.

Great news! I asked in the Helix 101 thread if you could back up global settings, and was told no. Glad to learn that you can, but only from the editor, not from Helix itself (as of now anyway).

Oh well, hopefully.

Thanks Paolo, I probably will. Thinking about Glenn's everything bundle too, not sure yet. Very new to Helix, exploring...

I happened to see this in the manual: If it's setting parameters in note divisions, that's tempo sync, yes? I'm very new to Helix, and for now have intentionally not hooked it up to a computer except for firmware updates, so I haven't tried it, but that seems on the face of it like your answer, unless it's only in reference to an internal BPM setting I haven't run into, not external MIDI.

Does that organ patch use only Helix internal stuff, no Variaxe or IRs? I'm thinking about getting it, partly for education and partly because it's a cool option, but would like to know what it requires.

If you're saying that patch changes are ignored if Helix is already on that patch, so it doesn't revert it to the settings saved in the patch, that strikes me as a bug you should report. Totally wrong behavior IMO.

Just to point out, racks don't generally hover in space either. In the studio, racks are usually tipped up a bit, to point at someone sitting in a chair, but live racks are more commonly just stacked on each other and/or cabs, not tilted, and the people are higher, since they're standing up. Upshot seems like you'd want your Helix Rack almost at face height for optimal visibility. I don't want to carry something to make that happen, or have my rig be that big a deal on stage. You could put it on the floor, tipped up at you, but then you might as well save some money and get the floor version. What's cool about the floor version around waist height is that you're looking down on it, so you're seeing it pretty much face on. I know that's an oversimplification, but it still seems like the rack version doesn't automatically provide a zero-leaning-over solution either.