WickedFinger

MY discussions with L6 have shown that the cabinet IR high and lo cuts shift the speaker cabs natural roll off slope to the new settings. They said they are not hard cut offs but follow the modeled speakers natural roll off slope. I might cut at a much lower freq than most for sub sonic cut below that point but I almost never cut the high end as the guitar speaker natural roll off should be just fine, anything that needs EQ I adjust via EQ blocks or amp settings.

Some great tips going on here which is what I had hoped. To add a couple things I have been using, change the Global switch option from 8 to 10 mode and you get more possible assigns. Also Helix does not have a built in sub sonic low filter to good idea to cut that super low end as it just robs wattage and gets too unmusical. Many I think make cuts too high as I have effects that boost the low end at 80hz and sound great so if you cut at 100hz that moots that entire spectrum. IRs I have to say puzzle me, the entire sound can be just altered to squat changing mic and what not. Someone said they thought all the Helix cabs were the same sort of IR with just different mic filtering. Seems you load a supposed good one in there and presto there goes your DSP. Just to report FYI, I had been using the Mic Studio Tube Preamp model in front of my amps for a slight tube enhancement without gain or any sense of clipping and that sounds better for sure on just about any amp model. I have a GSP1101 modeler I was attempting to sell and since I am not giving it away as it is brand new basically. I love several of the Clean Tube models in that puppy which are not Fenders. I loop out to the GSP 1101 pull in that clean tube model with no cab and wow how much thicker, vibrant and tube-ish that adds to the preset tone (before the Helix amp model). \ Proud to report on everything I have been doing with loops and sends the Helix is working really well. Zero noise issues on my GSP. I use a send block to send my first in signal out to my Mel9 and my Trio unit which does not return to the Helix. I have my select drives and some high gains in another effect loop and everything is sounding great. If you have not tried the Harmonic Tremolo or Harmonic Flanger those are two very good sounding effects with a little tweaking to taste.

Well my routing out to other stuff is really what makes my sound. The preset with everything off is OK but rather bland. I have been busy taking advantage of the routing ability to completely change my premise in using the Helix. I had been using the Mic Studio Tube Preamp set on line impedance and clean for just a little tube enhance (as I mentioned in my programming tips thread). I was selling my previous GSP 1101 modeler and since I am not giving it away it looks like I will be keeping it. I love several of the Clean Tube models in that puppy so I replaced my Helix Mic Tube Preamp thing with a loop out to the GSP 1101 to bring in that clean tube amp model with the cab set on direct (no cab) and man what a difference in the tube emulation(this is before the Helix amp model. Gives it a real tube sounding treatment without gaining anything up or clipping it digitally. Marvelous really. I also now send a signal out to my Mel9 and Trio on my first block, that does not return to to the Helix but goes off to the FRFR rig. I have my select pedals on another loop for my fav drives and higher gains. So if you muted out those three loop/sends it gets pretty basic plus I have a array of different reverbs and delays w the Phase 90 and a Chorus here and there. Anyway learning to use the Helix better all the time. Just have to work on this IR thing what a bugger if your load in a really nice one it sucks up your DSP so you have to cut a bunch of effect options out. I may upload some but right now I am working on some new ones with my routing. The 1101 also affords the ability to use any of its arsenal of effects if I need anything when the DSP is running short. Anyway just bugged by all the IR stuff, I get all the recording DAW yada but it is not the way i approach the guitar as more of a player. Sometimes you go into a studio and the engineer on deck will just completely change everything and have you playing on stuff that does not work for you. I want my tones captured not completely altered which is what all the IR and mic stuff does.

I get what is being said. The problem I have with L6 is the whole POD thing, time came and went and I truly hate that thing and you could not give me one. I left L6 from my POD experience and thought I never would return, the Helix seemed a different animal; and HX seemed to be getting close to Fractal and Kemper, for the money difference anyway. The Helix is an exciting new course change for L6 but if they continue to think in POD terms I will end up getting tired of the unit and move on, once again. I was really disappointed with the HD POD Reverbs being in the Helix and the continual ridiculous premise of using state of the art modeling technology to copy a bunch of outdated cheese pedals I never liked to begin with. So now that the newness is wearing off and gee I only have 10 more payments maybe I am expecting too much and I fell for it again? Now I have to buy 3rd party IRs. I do not like the whole IR thing myself, I am not recording these days I and have no use for mics and if I wanted the sound of my amps for PA and whatnot I like the Radial JDX speaker line tap DIs. Funny thing my one Eminence loaded 4x12 sounded amazing with different amps, I needed no mic and I did not want low wattage, low efficient speaker distortion tones, All this cab stuff with mics serving as massive EQ filter blocks and what is supposed to be the sound of an amp into a cabinet, mystifies me at times. Can I just have what my amp(s) sound like coming out of my speakers without all the added yada? How about just model me a Radial JDX DI after the amp and I am fine, I can EQ from there without all this mic cab stuff which merely alters the tones so much what does it matter what amp you are trying to use or sound like, it is apparently all what the speaker IR and mic sound like. I mean seriously go from a Dynamic to a Ribbon and the sound completely changes how is that even recognizable as the same amp??? Much less the param of moving the mic across the grill position is not there and that makes a difference as well. Since I have used higher end guitar speakers for years why would I want my great amp running through that low end low wattage speaker yada now with a choice of mics to screw the sound all up so nothing really matters at all. I think we are being "Trump'ed" probably just the same basic IR EQ'ed with different "mic" EQ blocks. The day I can get payments on a Fractal, L6 is going to miss me.

EQ is relative to volume level and frequencies change in perspective. Low end takes and requires wattage so the more wattage, the lower end is more powerful and pronounced, at lower volumes using far less wattage is being generated to push the low end. That's all I can think of regarding the issue if I am understanding it correctly. (That is the very reason I hate low wattage amps, they have tired to market younger players that wattage is loudness when in fact wattage is needed for headroom, clarity and most important LOW end. The rule of physics is for every doubling of watts there is only a +3db increase in loudness potential. ) Biggest "female dog" on the Helix, is the copy of monophonic tracking octaves and pitch shifters, "glitchmasters", as I call them. There are so many relatively lower priced octave units using polyphonic tracking like the EHX TuningFork, tc Sub N Up, all the tuner pedals that detune fret steps, all polyphonic tuners like tc now under $100. For the love of whatever, if you are going to copy a Whammy pedal why would you copy the early models with the bad buffer and monophonic glitchout tracking?? The new Whammy V is true bypass and polyphonic tracking and the dual unit has the new drop tuning circuit as well! Stop the copy mimic of cheese low end effects using the state of the art modeling technology and give us some polyphonic tracking effects, who cares if they are a copy mimic of anything, just that they work!

The Helix Reverbs are all from the HD POD and a reason why not up to the potential and top shelf of the Helix, yet. If the POD can do it seems the Helix would be the same as they are the POD reverbs. If the full mix is not 100& wet I am at a loss until they HX the Reverb section.

Has anyone discovered any of these to be useful? Of the many I gone through the trouble of downloading and loading up not a one survived my initial attempts at using. Notions of editing them to work for me usually just has me taking one of my own as a Template and making one myself. Many of them were just so terrible one wonders if it was not a joke. I do believe the two chaps that sell presets know what they are doing wondering if they have put anything in the public Custom Tone area. I gave up even looking in there, thought of loading some of mine but I use external pedals and adding more routing things in mine that are only good for my rig.

FYI: L6 has informed me that the delays are indeed HX component modeled but the reverbs are pass downs from the HD POD. It is really hard for most players who have been ingrained using guitar amps for ages to get used to using a good modeler but it can and does work really well. I am sure there will be those who can never make the leap of change about like they cannot escape vintage nostalgia. Unless L6 performs a major HX redo of the effects I just may convert to using the Helix just for the amps and routing and farm out to quality pedals. Hate to build them back up again from the expense and what the Helix costs but I do dig the hell out of Strymon, Eventide, SA Nemesis, so forth. I cannot see the Helix ever really getting to that level as there is just so much adieu about the copy and mimic of vintage stuff which I never really liked when I had it. I am that way with amp models as well, I could care less about the name and copy of various amps just want what sounds good. Several of my fav tube amp models are on the GSP1101 that are not copies of any amps just optimized killer glass tube amp tones. They kill any Fender type thing to be sure. I get the hame brand thing, but really like my Tech21 PSA 1.1 I used for years was really an optimized preamp not really made to copy anything but could manifest amazing tone structures no particular amp couid do. I miss that puppy a lot. I guess what I am saying is, are we doomed to the past by the mere aspect of "modeling" which indicates we have to copy something or do we? I appreciate L6's efforts to create their own amp models and I wish they would expand on that even more.

EQ is tersely related to volume F&M demonstrates. You simply have to adjust preset levels and EQ on the gear you will be using live at performance volume. Any time the level changes the EQ changes as well. Just so you know: many gain pedals like my Seymour Duncan Palladium I have looped in has a bass EQ param adjust right at 80Hz, many pedals use low end 80Hz as the punch of the bass. Mesa always targets 750Hz as a notching point as seen in the Cali EQ and Mesa Amp models. Guitar presence controls on most amps are around 8-9KHz. I have asked L6 in an on-going attempt to understand the param adjusts exactly what is the hi and lo cut on the speaker IRs doing. True to all guitar speakers they start roll off slope around 5K and the IR is supposed to track the actual speaker response so one wonders what the hi cut is really for as above 6K or so it is probably doing nothing anyway. So if we are IR modeling a particular cab and speaker then why would you want to hi and low cut it when it is reproducing what it was intended to do. Cutting into the high end might darken things up but seems EQ and amp adjust are better tweak adjustments than killing the cabinet response. I have a hard time understanding the use of FRFR response while narrowing the frequency range of the tones. EQ on an IR is useful to notch the resonance frequency each cab has but drastically cutting the range of the cab IR seems counter-intuitive. That being said I sub sonic cut as I cannot find out if the Helix has a built in lo filter or not, I also cut ultra highs on the global but every else is flat left up to the preset to tweak the EQ per tone.

Thanks, the information is rather confusing at times or lack thereof. So are they working on HX reverbs and improved wahs? It did seem the delays were sounding very good and the reverbs a flashback to POD days which I do not want to revisit. The POD made me leave L6 the Helix brought me back. I hope there is room in the unit for more updates and we do not get hit with a whole new machine anytime soon. I would be joyed as an option just to have the amp modeling and loop routing on steroids and just farm out to pedals for select thing, that is a winner as so many have tersely different notions of what good effects or models consist. Personally, instead of the intense component copy of a rather cheesy pedal I would rather have an optimized effect with a bunch of params, We do not need the Helix to fuzz and what not and is POLYPHONIC tracking possible on the Helix platform for pitch and octave effects??? And yes this is used in many no so expensive pedals using the std 1/4" cable. The new SY300 guitar synth is the flagship while less expensive pedals like the tc electronic sub N up are light years better tracking. The same technology is used for poly tuners and most of them are <$100 now. IS it possible to algorithm that into the software? I love the Whammy V which is now true bypass and polyphonic tracking the model of the old version Whammy many are trying to use for detune is a fluke at best. Before the V they were all terrible glitch outs. The Whammy V Tuner combo also has the drop tune polyphonic feature. Soooooo possible for Helix or not?

I use a pair of 15ps for my rig and love them. Sure I could PA a small band scene but daddy likes watts, nice to have the ability if it's needed. Those speakers are designed for XLR/TRS inputs by the way. Some do not know that. Big fan of EV stuff myself. Perfect speaker for the Helix I run stereo all the time and I also have a stereo wired 4x12 w high end guitar speakers I just love, I can use either or both rigs and the sound is so deep and full for sure the best tones I have ever had. I have enormous wattage capability but just because your car goes 160 does not mean you drive it that fast. Highly recommend the BBE Sonic Maximizer on the Helix or the band PA, makes a huge difference in the sound quality. I have several for my rigs in various level versions. XLR version takes the Helix main XLR outs before they get sent out to the EV 15s, an instrument level on the 1/4's before they see the power amp. I already had them from my other rigs and I prefer having them outside the Helix rather than in a loop. The best results are getting as close to the power amp section to the speakers with nothing after it. Most importantly it is not an effect, you never have the process more than 12:00, the phase correction takes place no matter where the process level is set. The only time you can tell mine are on is when they are off and you wonder why the sound is not as good as it was.

I remember even in the rehearsal room I would be working out my sounds look down and some giant fat dude is standing on my midi 10 pin cable to my synth. Anything can happen on the road and it is usually a spill, trip or cable catch and pull that will cause the laptop to take a fall it was not meant to take. You could probably park a car on top of a Helix to an extent (but I would not recommend it). It's as bullet proof as it gets gear wise. I wish it had been around went I was packing in my three amps and two cabs plus rack. Sound was and is important to me, I did not mind hooking up the gear but a Helix rig is so ridiculously easy it has changed the whole paradigm.

Seems like a logical premise to me. The only real reason to make the amp louder is to come out of the mix for like a solo. Anything in front of the amp model gain wise, no matter what serves to increase the amp clipping and dist/gain structure. Anything after the amp model will bring the level up including effect volumes. If you want a non coloring level boost for solos to come out of the mix you would place a flat EQ with about 3-4db level increase after the amp, or controller set a switch and/or preset shapshot to increase the amp ch vol some. If using a block effect for vol gain boost be sure where you place it does not clip out anything after it. On effect levels; sometimes you need to bring the amp up to at least unity or if the amp is too loud roll back on the ch vol. In a digital platform such as the Helix, it is not analog so the notion of running everything a little hot into the next in chain does not work out because you want to avoid harsh digital clipping from overt level cascade. Digital input/output clipping is not musical and is not desirable. You need to go through your final presets making sure nothing causes unwanted digital level artifact clipping when on with everything else. If you are wanting high gain levels let the model do its thing and generate it. Most amp models can sponge and take a certain amount of front end boost or drive but one does not over hit it like you might on analog stuff. If you need more gain out of amp or want a clean amp to gain up use a distortion pedal block or loop out to a high gain pedal. Common rule of thought applies that distortion pedals or models thereof were meant for a clean amp to have distortion option, overdrives to some extend as well, but a boost or OD in front of a gained amp tightens up the response and allows less amp gain on the knob for more definition and note articulation.

Just FYi true to real amps, drive is preamp gain, and Master is effectively power amp stage drive and/or gain. Ch vol is more the volume level of the amp but also has interaction effect. By running Master low and ch vol up it hits the preamp gain more but not the power amp qualities, I tend to run my master up and overall level using the Ch vol and artful use of simple or Cali EQ if needed post stage. Of course it is all variant on what amp model and the overall tone structure you are after.

Aside from all the tech argument. May I humbly suggest using a BBE unit on the Helix and or the PA which if you position it correctly as it was designed, level no more than 12:00 the phase correction it does to the frequency range really does improve live sound and makes everything more pleasing and less fatiguing to the ear. Mine are so transparent to the overall sound you only notice when it is not there.

While I do appreciate the effort to HX component model better drives, I seldom use them and just farm out to pedals I like. The Klon is OK but if I drag out my credible Klon copy not really the same. The clean boost from a Klon is not colorless but imparts a better tone to anything that runs into it or vise-versa. While the Helix model is a nice drive thing, I find pedals to be much superior drives and there are infinite options. I want HX level delay and reverb L6, come on, stop with the POD thing, the Helix is supposed to be better, stop dumbing it down with cheese effects. A really nice add on to your chain is adding the Mic Studio Tube Preamp in front of the amp set to level 10 line impedance and gain like 4.0 to keep clean, it boosts the amp intensity and imparts a nice tube modeling enhance to the tone. Some like it after some amps as well. The least DSP use is the lowest level EQ, just increase the level (aka gain) and keep the EQ flat and that is about as colorless as it gets.

Hey, a novel idea, how about a manual that describes and details EVERY param in the effects and amp modeling?? This dumbing down age of just knob turning and not having a clue of what something does is supposed to do might be amazing for some, I like to read and when I need info and you cannot locate it or get any sort of detail as probably 90% of those working at L6 do not know either it is just contributing to the non reading, non saying of anything w substance in the twitter age of twits. I am a retired published writer need help with the manual writing?? When books die and writers cease the world will be a great deal more stupid than was imagined it could be.

Mine is a relatively new unit and both click lock into place. Makes since about the summing thing.

Not one of the models I could get anything good out of, did not have the sound I was expecting from a Supro regarding the use of Pagey or how good the pedals sound. So you have to use a Tel? Still not the early Zep sounds I always heard a Supro was used. I was expecting an amp with the pedal qualities, seemed not to work well at all. First thing I did was up the speaker from that car stereo speaker nonsense. Still was not a good sounding amp for anything I need from clean to dirt. I mean wouldn't you have to model the one Page used???? ****have to say best sound out of that model I have heard.

I bought a rack with wheels that also flip tilts the rack. Pretty handy and it was not expensive. I think maybe the 4CM is a progression as it is hard to ween off of traditional guitar amp use. Took me a while and several modeler unit experiments before I could finally jump and just use modelers and tweak on my rig solely for that resolve. Not having to deal with tubes, buying good ones, matched and binned out supposed selections and getting bad ones in the batch, plus the maintenance of adjusting bias and the overall component lifetime of what it takes to keep a tube amp operating. The Helix finally convinced me to leave my amp age behind and move towards what can only be the future of guitar. I am looking forward to what L6 can improve on the Helix like some HX quality delay and reverbs. Do wish they would make more of an effort to detail and explain EVERY param in the unit on the amps, IRs and effects. Seems every time I want to know what something actually does it is about impossible to get the info. Like the use of hum and ripple in amps, while these elements are not considered desirable for a quiet noiseless rig they are highly interactive with the amp models despite it is not very clear what they actually do and what amps benefit from high and low. Yeah I know, tweak it out, be nice to get back to playing more and spinning knobs less, information sort of helps that issue.

I know I have tried a few here and there for free which scares the bejesus out of me if I paid for them as they were just not that amazing and by tweaking on the Helix ones I seem to do just fine. I hate most of the mics and what they do to the sound but I use what gets me closest to what sounds right for me. Many of the cabs IR or otherwise never sound all that great to me. I usually find myself picking a couple favs and the mics I can stand and just use them for most of the amps. I guess its a world of the recording maven DAW chaps as I sure find it god awful easy to ruin the sound of an amp tone with the cab sim/IR or a bad mic, wish there was a better methodology. Does anyone know how Radial JDX 48DI's do it when they tap the speaker line for recording (not basic DI) do they have some sort of cab voicing or IR in the circuit, I would like something like that w no cuts and no tweaking seems much easier. I've used speaker line taps before and I got some good recordings. MIcs tend to lollipop me off more than anything.

See above. SY300 guitar synth new generation 1/4 cable, all the new drop and raise pitch tuning pedals use the new tech, all poly tuners, DIgitech Whammy V, tc electronic sub N up, Walrus Audio's new multi octave pedal, EHX Pitch Fork, a host of others. I was a bit blow away the amp modeling in the Helix was so good only to have the same copy mimic of crap pedals suffering for "effects". Hell just leave the unit as a stand alone amp modeler with the loops and assigns and I'll just farm out to pedals. Instead all this money and similar effects or copies of what the POD and M series have?

Hate to disillusion one to the GR-55 which I had for a period of time, yes it is polyphonic as each string has its own pickup and is so in the truest sense of the word more so that anything else could be. It also has harmonizers on board which work by scalar interval and key as well. The new SY300 guitar synth uses a std 1/4 cable and is polyphonic tracking, for me it put an end to the Hex pickup units. And it has to be heard to be believed, that technology on a 1/4 std cable is bloody amazing. I gave my GR-55 and Hex pickups up when the SY300 came out and when I converted to Les Paul's and no longer wanted to mount the pickup or use the bracket which interferes w the bridge and does not fit on some models of Les Paul at all. Anyway, the Helix using old pedal old school bad tracking Whammy models and what not, why??? Several new pedals using std cable are also polyphonic tracking, tc sub n up octave pedal, DIgitech Whammy V with and separate detune and ricohect pedals. EHX tuning fork, new POG is as well and a TRex as well as a Walrus Audio octave pedal, I am sure there are others I am forgetting. Several pedals like the Morpheus and Digitech pedals offer complete polyphonic dropped and raised tuning steps using a std 1/4 cable. A bit ridiculous the Helix has to copy mimic old tech pedals that are monophonic tracking glitch outs. Much less the host of poly tuners available which run under $100 now. Why? The waste of state of the art technology to copy and mimic pedals that sucked then because there was nothing else available. Makes no sense at all. Who is in charge of engineering at L6 the same POD people who insisted on that mess of bad effects they thought should be carrried on in the Helix? A few of the front end effect are new HX component modeling but the delay and reverb stuff in general a copy from the POD and M series stuff. Why? Upgrade the Helix and stop with the cheese fest of effects, if others love those old pedals then buy one and loop it in. Give the rest of us something to work with. If you are going to component model something why mess with a turd pedal. Klon and Timma are fine but a bunch of those fuzz things, really. I suppose a new modern tech fuzz would be out of the question as everyone wants what Jimi Hendrix or Gilmour used almost 50 years ago, for the simple reason there was nothing else to use. Do I really have to get a Strymon or Nemesis reverb and delay to have something advanced tech? Maybe so.

I have actually tried using the on board tuner recently and it really is dreadful. Thankful I have my PitchBlack's. One of the issues I have with the Helix is why the reach back into the past all the time? There are plenty of new tech pedals these days which do not cost that much that are polyphonic tracking and tuners than cost less than $100, the Helix with all its technology cannot do that which a $130 pedal can do?? So many octave pedals out now and the new version V Whammy which are polyphonic tracking but we have to have copies of the older crap pedals, why??? The same detune technology offered by EHX, tc, DIgitech, TRex, and also makes for the myriad of stable tuning pedals I mean Helix Engineer's WTF?

Very cool idea, can't wait to try it out. I am after that tone stuff Pagey used to do with the Leslie so musical and great sounding. I have not gotten anything I like so far. SO the amp into Leslie works out after the merging with the cab IR? As a amp without an IR sounds pretty brutal. What about the vibe which is really good in the Helix, Gimour's best tones like Breath were w a Vibe. I do have this thing for the Harmonic Tremolo which is pretty cool. Now as for modeling even more older effects, can we please for the love of your god, stop using the most advanced technology to recreate old technology? Why not just a better phaser with more tweakable options? I like the Deluxe with variable phase stages, pretty nice, a multiple or dual phaser would be great but need options, mix. panning, cross over, the more the better. I had a lot of these old pedals and really why the need to time machine everything to what used to be? Are we just not capable of creating anything new?? I guess that is why we come out with a new phone every few months. How about a newer Moog phaser instead of a 1970s pedal that really was not all that great to begin with.