WickedFinger

Just so you kids know, the Master volume induces power amp modeling, ch vol is the loudness of the amp in general. Just saying, power amp is often the balls and "power" of the amp. Holding down the master on a real amp and driving the ch vols makes for more preamp gain on the Helix model it does not. If one is not willing to tweak anything than why have the best tweaking options at your feet. Most be one of those close enough-plug in and play chaps. If anyone has played for any length of time running a preset through its paces and does not opt to just sweeten the pot a little bit then what can I say. To each his own.

It's more sad a $1500 unit has the worst pedal copies possible. If I cannot use them I do not use them. Don't give me something called a Whammy or an Octave pedal that glitches all over the place. That little Ricochet pedal has the guts of the Whammy V polyphonic tracking and it does not glitch at all. I like quality and the best and if anything does not measure up I drop it. Guitar is not a budget hobby unless you wish to sound like a teenager in the bedroom with your low budget gear. Not my thing, I get what I want at least where financing is possible to pay for it. I cannot and would not drop $2500 for a Fractal but had it been available for the payments I got with the Helix I would have a Fractal flagship right now. Who knows mid next year is a long way off.

Sorry kids if it offends the POD M crowd but I am really only interested in the Helix for the routing, amp models, switch controller assigns and naming, hybrid cabs and IR ability. I had a Whammy V before I sold it to help pay for the Helix and I have missed it all the while, The copies of earlier version Whammy and Octave pedals in the Helix are just glitch out nightmares for me. Even at $100 (tuners) the polyphonic tracking ability using a std cable is everywhere, what were they thinking when they did the Helix? $1500 and you give me a version 1 Whammy and octave pedals I hated before I could afford better ones? I will gradually incorporate more and better high end pedals for the effects I need and want, and never give a care to what the Helix has or more has NOT. That being said there is nothing wrong with several of the HX component modeled effects but in general this level of effects cannot compete with the better pedals available these days. If you are on a budget and must use the Helix as a stand alone unit then you can make due with what is in there. I simply do not and I will continue to upgrade my sounds and tones even if it means losing the Helix altogether if they do not step up the update quality. I am using the delays and reverbs which are OK, the reverbs being POD copied-which I find excruciating, delays are pretty good but if I can migrate to Strymon and Eventide I certainly will. It is not about money for me. Anyone concerned about money has picked a really bad, feed the alligator hobby. I just sold a brand new unit I had just paid for when I decided to get the Helix took a huge loss on it, about like the HD POD I had which I took a loss to drop it. I am OK w the Helix right now as I see potential here for major updating and growth. If it keeps turning into another POD version I will let it go and move on. If I had to do it over again I think I would have kept some of the pedals I sold off and try that Blu Amp unit w a board. I never considered getting the Helix as a replace all multi unit, I've been bit by that one a few times. I just wanted the best amp modeling I could get at that price level. Helix delivers on that while I am narrowing down to maybe a hand full of amps I use and that respond well with pedals. I did not need 100 assorted amps just a handful that sound amazing.

I got like 128 of free IRs from all over the place, number of tones I liked the sound of ZIP. Most are done with a 57 and I hate that bright sound. At least with the hybrids in the Helix I can use the mic I like. I know many gate the Helix cabs but I have learned to get good sound from them or at least the few I use. EQ is a subjective thing and all, but note sometime how the Mesa V notch is usually used on the Cali EQ. They cut 750Hz as that is usually low mid mud. Many of my gain pedals boost low end at 80Hz and the BBE processes at 50Hz so cutting low and cutting the high end makes the guitar very narrow mid range sounding. Not my cup of tea really. I have been getting great tones out of usual chain of events. Does anyone know which IRs to buy that are not just a bunch of SM57 stuff and the Helix is capable of using? No IRs I have tried can change the mic. What is the deal with the SM57 anyway, Shure created the 57 for vocals and the SM58 for instrument mic'ing. Yet its always a 57 everywhere, I do not like that sound. I have come to hate the whole IR thing what a pain. Did L6 really intend for the hybrid cabs in the Helix to sound bad, or, is it just many adjust everything badly or perhaps use the good old 57 to have a nice mid range, no bass, tinny cab sound.

I run stereo feeds on my TS 1/4 outs to my FRFR rig and stereo XLR feeds to my power amp rig. I also have a line out loop send that goes out to my Mel9 and Trio (to the FRFR rig) but does not return to the Helix.Helix is made to use all sorts of outs at the same time, there are multiple USB as well.

I use Chrome all the time on Windows 10 no issues ever.

Modeling the version V Whammy with polyphonic tracking would have been much better than the early Whammy glitchout and bad octave pedals. This placed in one of the loops eliminates the problem. Modeling old tech pedals is a ridiculous nostalgia that forces high end modeling tech to sound bad.

Ask L6, they told me. The Helix is low impedance 12 ohm for fidelity issues, and the 8x rule of thumb is audiophile savvy. Hi impedance can jacks do not sound very good. The Helix is lower impedance than the POD. The POD always sounded bad in headphones to me but using the outboard mixer headphone feed does OK same w the Helix. I do not like the sound right off the Helix in cans. I use a little Mackie mixer in my rig to convert my other chains from unbalanced TS to balanced XLR out to my EV FRFR system. If I run feeds from the Helix to it the headphone jack on the mixer sounds much better than right out of the Helix jack. My normal feeds from the Helix are stereo XLR into my power amp rig. For headphones I prefer to tap an outboard feed rather than the Helix which breaks up and distorts pretty easily.

Sounding better I think. I would try backing off the amp gain some and use a cleaner drive, boost or gain block in front of the amp to get the gain level and more tighter response/ Also guitar, pickups, it all makes a chemistry. That is why I switched over to Les Paul's just more range of styles and tones over a one trick pony that does one thing well. Another hint is on high gains many prefer just dialing down the Presence to zero and yeah it's all cab and mic from there. I have loaded 128 Custom IRs in my Helix yesterday. You know how many I like or could use? ONE. I realize many blow horns about all the various IRs one needs to buy and if I could actually try some I might believe it. Found one from "GuitarHack" that sounds pretty good near the edge of the speaker thing. Shame there is no adjust on the Helix hybrids for mic position as mid towards the edge sounds better to me. Hard for me to find a high gain amp I am really crazy over. I have a few I rigged up but I do not use them a lot. Truthfully I prefer a cleaner amp that sounds good with pedals. One thing I can tell you in all this is that recording guys view things differently than ones looking for the best live sound which is what I drive for. It is certain no matter what, pleasing all of their ear wiring is impossible and true as well while some tones might be novel for recording tracks in a song mix, live they blow. I hear a lot of live bands trying to get a metal sound and most fail utterly which is why the tone style gets so much hate. I go for massive punch your face low end and a low mid 750Hz scoop of about 3-4db. Presence down, do not choke off the high end out of the cab or cut off the low end too much, cut sub sonics, let the speaker cab oddly enough do as it was designed. Use artful EQ to clear up any mud or tame overt highs not the cab cuts. Anyway, that is my 2 cents. I would offer you some of my presets but they would not work for you as I use a lot of routing and external pedals. Try a BBE positioned and set right it helps live sound a lot. The transmission quality of sample sounds does not always do well as my PC does not have massive 15" FRFR or 12" speakers to really hear anything as it should be. I can tell you in many decades playing, the tweak for tone never ends and is never good enough for any length of time. The infinite options in the Helix can have you getting brain melt trying to constantly get a better amp and whatnot. I try to find a few I can use and save my mad scientist stuff for limited experimentation. You can end up noodling for hours and never really playing which was degrading my chops for a couple months getting the Helix. I have tried to get back into more playing and less tinkering.

I have both a pair of EV 15's FRFR and a custom loaded stereo wired 4x12 w Eminence Man O War guitar speakers. Personally I am a live sound guy could not give a flip what is used to make recordings EQ, and compress into a mix. Just not my thing, recoding is all fine and good but been there done that with hundreds of hours of stuff NO one is ever going to listen to, including me. I like that 4x12 and I am plumbed to run both but I prefer what the Eminence are doing. By the time you get done cutting the EQ down to suit on an FRFR system one wonders why one needs the extended range when nothing occupies that space. Sub sonics are a terrible thing and ultra high shrill top end. These Eminence speakers run frequency range of 80Hz to 5kHz before inducing roll off. Many times recording mavens cut their cabs and what not way more than than and run it into an FRFR rig. Not that the FRFR sounds bad but the poo poo on higher end guitar speakers is badly placed. A good recipe for getting a bad live sound is following what recording cats do. Things change from headphones to live sound rigs, just a fact of physics. You can never tweak in right unless you sound check the real rig. Every room is different and if the sound guy does not know to properly master EQ a room using pink noise and a Spectrum Analyzer, then he is just one of those do by ear cats which is about like pretending science is hoax. What killed your sound is the difference in speakers, environment, and placement no doubt. Personally I hate headphones and I use some higher end Byerdynamics, does OK but not like my live rig, once that air starts moving and reacting everything has to be tweaked.

The sample is not all that bad really. A little tweaking, for my tastes trim some of the higher shrill end and and some bass punch. I hear no real tuning issue myself. If a person is not playing guitar at a basic pro level where you have your intonation properly set then one does not need high end gear. Suggestions: I would put a MIC Studio Tube PreAmp 4.0 gain, 10.0 on "line" impedance in front of the amp and a Cali (Mesa V) after it. Boost the 80Hz cut at 750Hz adjust high end to taste the classic V is never a bad thing on high gain. Mesa V curve notch at 750Hz, but do not overtly adjust in either direction. Since most speakers start roll off at 5KHz you can trim back the cab settings to roll off around there, nothing less than 5K for my tastes, You can set your Global EQ which I keep mine pretty flat low end roll off below 50Hz, High end about 12K. Adjust that Cali until you get the low end punch and depth, notching at 750Hz helps to remove some of the not so great low mids (which is why Mesa chose 750). IRs are a matter of taste, if I could find one I actually liked I would not be so leery of buying some. It's not that the cab hybrids in the Helix are bad, I can get some good tones out of them but it is all mic and settings to be sure. I really like the Coles Ribbon 4038 myself, maybe not everyone's cup of tea but I like the warmth and high end cut it adds. Something I suggest and I way say this not in regard to having a trimmed down easy haul rig, which tone is my goal. I 'd set up anything to improve my tone to where it just made you want to play, which brings me to my constant rack units I am never without. My BBE Sonic Maximizers, These are phase correction units which nothing else. no matter what nit claims otherwise, are duly tested, analyzed and work. Set knobs around 12:00 no more, this is not an "effect". The unit will boost slightly at 50Hzand 5KHz so adjust the process knobs accordingly, the phase time lag correction (see BBE specs) occurs at any setting of the knobs. Truly makes a world of difference to the punch clarity and dynamics of the tone. Really does sound similar to removing a blanket off your speakers. I first learned of using a BBE on guitar from Dave Mustaine. They work, I have 3 units in various models in my rack, XLR and 1/4 std, not used on the same feeds but for different chains, (never stack the unit or run one side into the other). They are to be placed as close as possible, nothing after them to the power amp section of whatever you are using. I use a power amp and I run the Helix XLR outs into the BBE then into the power amp. The only time you will notice the BBE is when it is off or not in line, the overall enhancement just improves the frequency issues inherent in all speakers due to physics. I cannot tell when mine are on as I am so used to the sound but if not there, man, something is not right.

First off if you are going to go Fractal, get the flagship unit not the lesser unit or you will regret not pushing the money a little more. If I could have made payments on a Fractal I would have gone that way but not the smaller unit. The Helix is in place at its cost level just as it is at least 3x better than a f reakin' POD so to is the Fractal another step up. Honestly, if I were to have the choices I made all over again, the times I opted to dump my pedals for the latest greatest multi unit I would opt for something like the Blu Amp and just use pedals. Digital effects just do not have the same feel, sound, organic, meatloaf, wolf howl, that analog does. Maybe never will. I have the same issues with amp modeling, never happy, never satisfied. if you are just after convenience and small, easy setup haul and rig then you cannot care that much about tone anyway. I am not a POD person nor would I ever care to use the Helix as a stand alone do everything unit. I like pedals and top shelf pedals are of a quality no multi unit is ever going to really match or out perform. Let's face it are they really going to copy mimic a Strymon quality delay or reverb in one of these units, I doubt if they can. Would probably eat up all the DSP just doing that. The Engl is your best bet for high gain on the models, artful tweaking is the name of the game in the Helix. Personally, I would just as soon use a great sounding clean amp and use a pedal high gain. But you can get the Engl to render a pretty damn good amp high gain of which I am picky over. Little tricks you pick up or hear. like using the MIC Studio Tube Preamp model set to 4.0 gain, 10.0 line impedance, in front of and/or in back of various amps helps add a little tube sound to the digital without distortion or clipping. When running a high gain amp one keeps the amp distortion backed off a little and use an OD to increase the amp gain. I've played through and had amps that were not worth a crap and at times we are too hard measured against amp modelers but the true test of a modeler is not the clean or high gain but the mid level of gain just to breakup where the true test of a model does or does not cut it. Few models can render a good sound in that range.

That my friend is the most accurate and dead on observation that it is possible to state. Digital rules in the DDL time based arena with delays and reverbs and modulation has greatly improved but besting a higher end analog pedal, not by the hair of my chinney, chin, chin. The only thing I can appreciate about the Phase90 copy is no longer having that buffer. And yeah still just not quite there, their Vibe is pretty good, amazing for a Digital, but I have a hard time really finding a use for it as I stopped playing Strats a couple years ago. If find the Flangers dreadful and that Dynamix typical of a POD M series thing which is not really usable. A great pedal is like this, as soon as you turn it on something decent comes out and you do not have to tweak for hours to find something magical or perhaps not at all. I have resolved to farm out to better pedals and just leave the effects alone. The delays and reverbs would be an asset but only if they HX the reverbs and for the love of god, why, always must we model some old circuit pedal and copy that? Anyone ever hear of Strymon or Eventide?

Moral of the story is use the PC/Mac editor as much as possible. I've been trying to use my panel stuff less but man it is hard, just so easy to reach down and adjust or use the mode edit thing which I need to practice more on how to do that on the fly.

PODs are also really nice if you attach a hook and use it for a boat anchor. Hard to go wrong with Tech21, very underrated stuff. I used a PSA 1.1 preamp for years and god do I miss that thing, analog that sounds and feels like tubes. Pretty amazing really. If they weren't so much and I was so stuck with the Helix I would not have gone this route. I have no use for a POD as I do not own a boat.

Personally I dislike all old style classic compressors, too overt for me. I do not use them a lot in the Helix but either the LA or Deluxe most likely further down the chain, Compression has limited uses, usually as a peak limiting device or on cleaner acoustic tones, high gain already creates compression. Adding a compressor to a high gain amp or pedal is tremendous overkill. Compression kills the dynamic range of the guitar, just what it does. Exactly why the better units have a blend control to bring in the dry mix. Nothing sounds as good as my Wampler compressor did or the Keeley compressors, the Pro model Keeley is pretty wicked. As for all the EHX, Boss, Ross, MXR and what not you can have 'em. Most use the Dyna Comp circuit including the Wampler but that pedal is very transparent or you can adjust it to be abrupt if you like. I would not buy, or "not" buy the Helix for effect reasons. Pedals are always going to be better, maybe not as convenient or easy to haul and setup. But tone wise, feel, range of dynamics and so on, I'll take pedals. If you think anything in the Helix HX delay models gets anywhere near the quality of a Strymon or Eventide then you probably love Boss and EHX stuff anyway. I hope the Helix does not turn into just another POD version but it is well on its way, most of the pitch, octave and whammy stuff is as bad as the old glitch out monophonic pedals they copied. So many pedals now have polyphonic tracking on std 1/4 cable tech, tuners, octave pedals, detune pedals and so on. A $145 Digitech Ricochet kills anything in the Helix. Far as I am concerned trash the front end effort to copy and mimic pedals, spend the time on amps and cab improvements, and not necessarily more but better quality, upgrade the delays, reverbs and if you can't upgrade the modulation I am just glad to farm out to better pedals than force myself to have to use what it is the unit. Helix is a great unit but after the newness wears off you realize it is not perfect and if you are tone freak never satisfied for long with the same thing, the beauty of pedals is the change out to something different. The Helix is amp modeling and cab IRs, effects are just icing on the cake but at times not a very good icing. If your're into that whole POD or M thing of the effects in those then buy one, if you ruin the Helix by making it just another POD so many higher end users will walk away from Line6 like I did for years. Seems I am on the line of doing that again as I hate the whole POD thing, been there, done that, daddy moved on.

I've had several versions of the Mistress FL. Helix is nothing like it. Back in the day the Mistress was the only Flanger that would self oscillate in a musical way, most note worthy example I can recall is Robin Trower's Somebody's Calling and I saw him do it live. He used two Flangers one set to do the cool oscillation flange and another for tamer std use. I find the flangers, phasers, in particular in the Helix greatly lacking, The Deluxe Phaser is pretty good but the issue is probably digital, used to be digital could not compete with analog on modulation. It's getting better the Vibe and Chorus are pretty good but others just lack the depth and organic analog tone. The continued need to copy old technology pedals using the highest modeling technology seems a study in anti-logic. Why not model a state of the art pedal if you have to "model" something. Maybe thought might be given to render Strymon level effects, Eventide, Source Audio Nemesis, maybe create a Flanger and a Phaser with enough tweaks to get musical stuff out of it than worry over copy mimic of some pedal that was never really all that great. IS anything wrong with creating something that is not a copy mimic of something else?? Maybe modeling by its nature is just flawed concept of using cutting edge technology to sound old??? Nostalgia is what it is, a memory of things which seem far better than they used to really be. I'll tell you if I could do it all over again I think I would go BluAmp and stay with the pedals I like. I hate the POD concept and all the really crap effects it has. If the Helix cannot be on another shelf I would just soon take the loss and sell it.

The Helix is a very low impedance headphone out level. Ideally audiophiles say that headphones up to 8x the impedance of the output are good. The Helix is like 12ohm. I too was always troubled by headphone sound and I use high end ByerDynamics. I found that tapping the headphone out off my little mixer I use offers a much better sound so you might try using a headphone amp off the Helix they are not much. My little Mackie Mixer I use to convert my other rigs unbalanced to balanced was like $60 I think. Anyway nothing I have ever used sounded good to me out of the headphone jack except for my GR-55 synth when I had that.

That has been my worst night mare wondering what the lifetime of that knob and contacts would be. I think I have a foot switch that is not working well. Only got 10 more payments, wweeeeeeeeeee...

Just looking for ones I have not really given a shot yet or maybe someone has good luck with the tones. Curious what ones users like the most. I guess my biggest thing is I need better IRs. Like buying presets I am leery what I will get, as truly all the free IRs I have collected are not great. Worried if I drop the bucks I'll wish I had not. I hear good things about Ownhammer but it's a grey area for me, I never messed w IRs before my GSP1101 or the Helix. I am trying to figure out the best models that respond well w pedals. I really cannot see the Helix as a do all stand alone unit for me and if they load in all those POD M things it is a waste of space for me. I would love to have just a modeler preamp with the loops and routing and just farm out for effects. Give me a cool Strymon or Eventide over all other stuff any day. I would have kept the Atomic Amp if it had all the loop and routing ability of the Helix but one loop ain't gonna do it.

I am finding the Hi Watt seems to play with external pedals very well and has a good clean sound, anyone have any other ideas? I am finding the option thing to be getting overwhelming and want to try and use just a few amps as standards. So far for cleans I like the Mesa cln channel, the Shiva w gain dwn, Plexi at times, Soldano cln channel anyone have any other ideas? High gains I like the Engl the best I think, 2204mod, and a few others but I am more interested in cleaner amps that sound good with external drive pedals.

I have that on my DVR. will check it out again. The only song that gets me on that album though is Reaper, I would love to have heard Don do Godzilla live. So really how tall is that chap? I think he is shorter than Peter Frampton but none the less he casts a long shadow, I like how Buck's solos depart from the std expected riffing a lot. I have to admit I never thought of rolling down the gain on the Engl maybe a lot of tones in other amps that we normally just goto for gain levels. I got a couple nice tips from the video. I've been using the Mesa Cali EQ a lot but I noticed he keeps boost on band two 220hz I think to flat. Would like to see the second page of the amp settings, got the first. The Global EQ I think he said was off but it was at flat 0.0 db with some q adjust not sure if that does anything. I just use it to cut the sub sonics and the ultra high end. I also rather use an EQ to trim the cab if needed as I like the response to be close to what the speaker is rated. Personally I have fallen in love with the Shiva with the gain down, marvelous tones you can get in that one. Have to mess with the Engl. It has come to me over not liking the on board gain stuff much that it was intended to sound right driving the amp and not so much by itself.

I find it useful to create some starter template blanks I can copy and have a clean slate to work with. That way you have some basic things you use without starting over every time. Clearing all blocks is easy enough but many times I want to keep certain effects I use and their settings. What I would like is a way to change the default settings on effects and amps etc to what the user would set them rather than the factory defaults many if which are OK but the amps in particular I have to really mess with. Be nice to be able to store your own defaults for various amps.

Probably done this, but have you completely reloaded 2.01 firmware again and reset globals? Be sure to back up everything beforehand of course. Did that to mine the other day as really computers need a redo now and then. I get distorted clipping on cleans using my EMG LP if I do not roll it back but on high gains no issues. I do find some cabs have weird response and noise so the reload seems to have helped me. I did hear of someone getting crappy sounds and reset everything and it fixed it. Just resetting what is in the unit will not fix it. You have to redo the firmware install completely. First thing L6 is going to say is reload 2.01 if that doesn't fix it you have some eternal component failure. I assume as well you have the outputs 1/4 and XLR set to correct impedance. Also look for bad cable run, sometimes a cable can do weird stuff even if it looks OK externally.

So was he in that recent live rendering of Agents of Fortune?? I do not recall seeing him. Only one I know is Dharma who is a first rate guitarist. I was wondering who the cat is that sings some and holds a guitar and seems like he cannot play or is it they want Don/Buck to handle the main tones?? Love that guys lead tone and technique. Jetter Purple Drive and Amptweaker Tight Drive, plus the amps of course. The song writing talent on Don't Fear the Reaper is just amazing, the stops, the dynamic return to refrain, hugely effective song writing. "Love of two is one, here but now they're gone The door was opened and the wind appeared The candles blew and then disappeared The curtains flew and he appeared...." That's been stuck in my head for ages.