shawnt113

Yes, it was plugged into the same Furman unit. Not sure what the level on the Helix out is set to, I left it there for the sound engineer to mess with (I’m good friends with the worship pastor so I can trust them with my unit), but a my normal P/W gig I run it the same way into a Quilter Labs Toneblock.

I’m sorry I wasn’t clear in this case. The church I was at uses Kempers exclusively. My chain was Guitar-> Helix instrument in->Helix 1/4†out ->Kemper input.

To the question about changing cables; the hum was consistent whether the cable was plugged into the guitar and even if you unplug the cable between the guitar and Helix from the Helix, it was a consistent volume also, regardless of the volume of the patch or master volume of the Helix. The only time it stopped was when I unplugged the cable that was run from the Helix out to the Kemper in. When I ran into the Kemper only, no hum. The issue is with the Helix, this isn’t the first time either, but I can usually get around it.

Doesn’t that only apply to the XLR out?

I’ve had my Helix for a couple of months now and while I am enjoying a lot about it there is a big, BIG problem. The thing hums. It sounds like a ground loop problem, usually if I plug it into the same outlet my amp is plugged into it goes away. Problem is that is not always an option.

Tonight I went to rehearse at a very large church in our area that I am filling in at and was nothing short of embarrassed by the hum. They use Kempers there and whoever plays just brings a pedalboard so I was using the Helix for fx only. The only time he hum stopped was when I unplugged the cord from the 1/4†out. No hum from the Kemper, just the Helix, I was plugged into the same Furman the Kemper was, which should’ve fixed the issue.

Anyone know anything about his kind of problem and a possible fix?

Thank you guys for your help this far!

Well why would ya...inferior product that it is? 😕

Not saying that it's inferior at all, when I got my AF2 it was on firmware 3.04, now it's on Quatum 8 which is equal to 28, it's been a journey to get to the level of realism it's at now. The Helix is designed amazingly, it's very well thought out, much more intuitive than the Axe Fx but if we're going to compare tone for tone the Helix just isn't there yet.

What are you guys using to power cabs for your Helix setup? I've been using a Fractal Audio Axe FX2, recently I got a Helix to give the AF2 a rest and keep it in the studio for a while. The one thing I have noticed is that when using solid state power the AF2 still sounds and feels tube, the Helix isn't giving me that same tone/feel. I have been using a Toneblock by Quilter, in the past I've used a QSC poweramp, and an ISP Stealth also, getting good results.

Does anyone here have any suggested settings to get real tube tone/feel using the Helix either direct or a solid state amp pushing a cab? I'm not expecting the Helix to get to where the Axe FX is but I would like to get it as close as possible. Thank you guys for any help you can offer.

I'll keep that in mind. Luckily where we're playing tomorrow they have a digital board so I will Sound check with my Axe FXII running direct and with my 5150iii mic'd and the soubd guy can save the settings l. I'll have a couple of hours to set up a couple of workable presets, if I can't I'll have the Axe FX already. Probably do The same for church gig on Sunday.

The fine folks @Sweetwater are gonna have me a unit out tomorrow! They didn't upgrade me for 1/2 the difference but it doesn't hurt to ask. The hard part now is getting it set up between work and the gig. For ease I think I'll just run it 4 cable method with my 5150iii head so I should just be able to get by with programming a main patch w/a chorus, flange, delay and drive ti switch in and out,and then a lead block w/drive, delay and a slight volume bump. Sunday's gig is at church for that I'd like to run direct and would need a good almost edge of break-up patch, with a drive, compressor, and a good dotted 8th delay. Anyone have any suggestions on settings? I'm afraid of hooking it to a pc right now for obvious reasons lol

I know there will always be issues with gear, especially of the digital sort. I remember when I started gigging in a new band back in 2004 with my Vetta HD, I read about so many nightmare issues with the unit dying just before or during a gig. I did have 2 issues out of it, 1 was before I ever used it live, after having it for a year or so I had to reinstall the FW on a dead boot, 2- was at an outdoor gig and I think it.really was a result of bad power supply to the stage. Either way it was only 1 real issue in probably 100 gigs. But with this being my first experience, and seeing in other posts that other people have had reliability issues it concerns me.

I bought a Helix Lt from Sweetwater, was a little concerned when the box had a slip of paper stating "this box was carefully opened and inspected by a sweetwater service professional". I hooked it up for the first time last night, it started the boot process then said rebuilding presets, it got hung on preset 898 for about 5 minutes. I rebooted it and the red/green lights over the expression pedal came on, stayed on and nothing else happened. The LCD screen never came on. I found the restore steps on L6 so I tried global reset, left it on for about 10 minutes in the screen that says will restore presets, IRs etc... restarted it, again, nothing. One time it did boot up I got to play through the first preset, but as soon as I changed preset no sound, the tuner wouldn't even read an input. I made sure the input of the tuner, and the input block both were set to guitar, not multi, not Variax or anything else.

Through the course of the night I reinstalled the most current FW, the previous FW and most current again, being a Fractal user I am well aware of corrupted/bad FW installs. All of this was to no avail. Each time the updater would say that the unit would reboot, and each time it would get stuck on the red/green lights above the expression pedal staying lit and no LCD screen. I went to bed frustrated, this morning it booted fine, still no signal, tried to reboot, got the red/green no LCD and the second time got the LCD with the moving helix symbol and nothing, giving up after 5 or more minutes of waiting.

Needless to say I cant use it for may gigs this weekend and it's going back but my concern is, how reliable is this unit going to be? When I couple that with the fact that L6 just extended the Helix Warranty that makes me wonder if there are known issues with the unit. Whats you guys opinions/experience in this?

Lots of good information here. Thank you all for the help. I think I can find ways around most every functional obstable, one thing I haven't been able to figure out is this: on my Axe FX the blocks have an auto on function that if you have it tied to an expression pedal as soon as the pedal moves the FX block comes out of bypass mode then returns to bypass mode when the controller goes back to "0". This is great as I have a mission expression pedal with the spring that I use for whammy and wah. When I take my foot off it goes back to heal down and turns off.

Does the Helix have this ability?

Also, I am sure this is covered ad nauseam but what's the sound quality in comparison to the AF 2? I've checked out several YouTube videos that are not good, the presentation or the comparison is done poorly. I like that I know 95% or better of the models in my AF 2 are better than 95% as close to the real thing. So when I dial up the amp it's the next best thing. I know it's an annoying question but, I'm curious if it has the sonic ability to replace my AF 2 all together.

So I am thinking of getting a Helix as a back up for my Fractal Axe Fx II. Ive got several recording recording projects starting next month that will carry me well into 2018. I want to be able to leave my AF2 in my home studio set up make it easy to jump into work when inspiration strikes. I play almost every weekend between my coverband and praise at church. I'm a long time Line 6 user, I still own about 5 different products so I know the quality is good yet I havent been able to find good clips of the amp models I am most interested in, but what I am really curious about are some functional things. 1st is with my current set up (Fractal controlled by Voodoo Labs GCP) which allows me to turn on/off  8 fx blocks per preset, it looks like with the Helix floor units I can only turn on or off 4 fx blocks per preset while still being able to quickly switch presets. Does anyone know of a work around? Also with my current set up I am able to use 1 expression pedal for multiple functions within the same preset, mostly I have Wah/Whammy they both are on all the time, when I move my expression pedal (Mission EP-1 w/the spring option) both blocks automatically engages and one of my switches on my GCP tells the mixer block to route the signal either to the wah or whammy. I am also able to set up X/Y amps that in most of my presets works to act like a channel switch on the modeled amp, is there an ability to do this on the Helix with out changing presets? Something else I would be interested in is running the unit in the 4 cable method, how do the floor versions perform in this way? Are there any special surprises? Lastly for now at least, what are the real reasons, if any, to get the Helix over the Helix LT?

Thanks guys for your help!!!

I had to do a clean install on my PC, so now I am in that oh so enjoyable time of reinstalling my programs. I am having an issue with Pod Farm. I use PF2 for demo work for reamping dry guitars and I also use it for the Modulation and Delay effects on my bigger projects ( I love the L6 mods). I am looking to use the latest version that is a free license with my X3 Pro. I have 2.02 installed but it tells me that it doesn't see a Pod 2 Compatible L6 device on my PC. Am I using the right version?

The transmitter for the G50's are total junk. I take care of mine and now need to replace my second one in as many years. Its the battery compartment door that keeps breaking on mine keeping the batteries from making good contact thus causing the unit to cut off. As much as I love the wireless unit thinking I need to buy something new that wont break down on me.

I have the relay 50 guitar wireless and this is the second time in two years that the body pack has gone bad on me. its the batery compartment door, it doesn't stay closed enough to keep the connection to the batteries. This is a horrible design and there is no reason that with the care I take of my gear that I should EVER have to replace the body pack much less two times in as many years.

Is there a better body pack even from another company that I can get? This is ridiculous. Thanks for any help.