pete1975

ok,not sure if anyones still following this but here goes. last nite i had prac room to myself and tried the usual set up as explained at the beginning. I proceeded to adjust the impulse response low cut to where it wasnt too boomy and was happier,i then adjusted the high cut.....quite a bit almost down to 3.5khz....this got rid of that horrible high end thing..........almost there...........actually reduced the gain on one of the amp blocks and hey presto a nice crunchy fat rhythm tone that also sounded nice thru the cab. Now,ive been cutting 4khz with an eq block going to the real cab so i tried it on the p.a...........even better,im now getting a nice almost mastered cd guitar sound from an album but still sounding good for live stuff. So,im happy now...........so i decided using the sure sm58 id mic up my cab and see what it sounds like thru the p.a. using a real mic set up...................pretty much exactly the same sound as going direct from the helix.......i think tweaking the eq on this thing is a must and ive achieved the same sound using either methods. You gotta remember when these ir's are captured they are capturing a full range cab,that cab will never make it onto a cd with that full range eq and never thru a mic/p.a. either,theres just too much high and low end...you gotta remember these arent mastered produced impulses but raw responses that require you to adjust to your liking!!! hope this helps others cheers

i have had this before when i was using the pre-amp from my dual rectifier to a pa. and the poweramp characteristics were missing. Best solution i found was to put an amp block after your pre-amp block or send/return to real pre-amp and adjust it to zero gain and tweak from there. It definitely helps,no perfect but works pretty well,another thing you could do is use a mic pre-amp to add some warmth etc. But yeh,the Helix is definetly lacking in power amp sims...also needs to catch up with the amps aswell,so many amps out there that we need!!!!

dont get me wrong,the signal isnt being affected by something or its getting a weak signal anything like that. Its just id rather have more gain in my direct signal than whats going to my cab and i dont know how to sort that other than having a more distorted signal coming out my cab and living with it. Im guna try boosting the gain and maybe putting a compressor on the 1/4" line at the end to try and tame it a little. I love this thing i really do,on my board i have the helix,seymour duncan powerstage 170 and G50 wireless and thats it,my whole rig. Prac room has its own 4x12 cabs and most venues will be cab sharing anyway. The powerstage is amazing,full volume rig with signal to p.a.,no mics and same sound every nite....just wish i could sort my small niggle out lol

The line that contains the IR also contains a cab block,this is used only for my clean sound and the IR is bypassed when thats in use. 1/4" line gets all signal except for whats in the IR and cab line.The 1/4" line also gets an eq that has 4k cut a little so real cab has less harshness and no ear fatigue(definitely worth doing this guys) Noise gates are at proper settings,also tried bypassing these to make sure nothing was getting choked.

ok,heres my screenshot of my preset that contains snapshots for clean,heavy etc. The pic shows my heavy snapshot that has 2 amps engaged and clean amp bypassed. Hope this makes more sense guys

all the amps(whether they are on or not) run to the 1/4" line out to power amp and split off the line to an IR. The direct sound just sounds very flat and no gain. Il try and attach preset later.cheers guys

ok,so ive got my helix set up to have 2 amps blended(mesa dual and sheba) in the top 2 lines in parallel and that goes to my 1/4" line output to a powerstage 170 power amp into my cab. This is my heavy sound and sounds perfect,literally after 25 years of playing valve amps,every head there is blah blah this is the perfect sound and rig. Now,the bottom 2 lines take up effects and my clean amp (jc-120),one line goes to 1/4" out and a line coming off that goes out of send 1 to p.a. system (to save micing). Now,the sound im getting out the real cab is spot on gain wise but the sound im getting direct has very little gain,i suppose my real cab is giving me speaker distortion and edge etc. Ive tried different I.R's etc and although some sound better they dont add the distortion im getting from the real cab and my direct sound is very dull,no eq etc seems to help. Ive tried upping the gain on my amps and this helps direct but then messes up my real cab sound. Any ideas? Yeh,i could run seperate amps for live and direct but as im using 2 amps in dual and a seperate clean i cant add anymore to the chains. cheers guys

im not running the latest version (am waiting for bugs to be riddled out) so i dont have auto engage on the pedal. basically whats happening is this. i have my signal chain set up with different routing to different amp blocks etc and what i do is have all the blocks i need in the chain and engage which ones i need for what snapshot want by storing them on that snapshot. something i do is add gain block to various routes to stop certain audio going to the output,these are either engaged or controlled by each individual snaphot,i dont want these engaging when i hit the toe pedal. so all my snapshots are set up,all the correct blocks engaged when i select either snapshot,however on my lead sound if i press on the toe switch for my wah not only does the wah engage but so does certain gain blocks,a harmoniser block and others. i have never set these blocks to engage by pressing the toe switch so i need to un assign them some how. cheers

So ive made up a bunch of snapshots that i use on just one preset,it has my rhythm lead clean sound etc but when i press down expression pedal my wah turns on and so does various other stuff....how do i change this? i need just my wah on,if i go onto the blocks that are also engaging that i dont want to i cant seem to find anything that shows the exp pedal is assgined to it. Also alot of my blocks are set up to be controlled by snapshots i.e. different delay times etc ,does this have any affect on my problem? cheers

ok,so had Helix 5 months now and originally purchased to use with mesa dual rectifier head and cab using the 4cm and just for effects really. So did a few rehearsals with that set up and works great,amazingly actually,so versatile and still utilizing my valve head,ok the amp channel switching doesnt work and had to buy voodoo labs switcher but other than that its great. So,decided to give direct to p.a. a go,first practice,didnt like it,sounded odd but workable. 2nd practice,much better and was pleased (especially as i didnt have to lug head and cab about) 3rd practice,i decided to change my IR and went for a george lynch marshall 4 x12,wow what a difference,sounded huge and fat and like my amp was behind me. 4th practice,im converted,i decided to keep same signal path but add a second amp in parallel,wowzer!!!!!!dam this thing sounds almighty!!!!big fat heavy crunch!!!!!! I suppose im kinda saying stick with this thing if not happy at first,i can honestly say after using valve amps for 15 years i am actually more happy now going direct than playing a real valve amp. but.. but i love my mesa and come up with a solution,im running it still in 4cm but sending a signal off with an IR and basically using the mesas pre-amp and IR to go to p.a. at the same time. At first it sounded a little flat,no power amp dynamics adding distortion that i was getting through the cab,i didnt want to turn the gain up on the amp as it would make my real amp sound a bit to fizzy,so i added a mesa amp block with gain at zero and utilised the sag hum master etc to give me power amp dynamics...........boom i now have my mesa running in real life and the actual amp sound going to p.a. system!!!no more need for micing up and having different sound every gig!!!! I love this thing,so versatile,would highly recommend!!!!!

cool,let me know how it turns out please

amps are funny things,if you listen to an amp direct with no speaker cab it is basically a horrible harsh distorted fuzz kinda tone and if you compared to say a bugera to a vh4 you wouldnt think 'oh the vh4 sounds so much nicer and worth the 2k difference' my point being that in theory with the right IR's you should be able to recreate any amp within reason,the gain structure (the shape of the sound) isnt radically different from one amp to another.

ive tried doing it with my mesa and never got it to work,iy used to work with my boss gt-10 no problem.i have also tried the boss with a 5150 (same as 6505) and it works but jack has to be half way out. i had to get a voodoo labs amp switch control to get my mesa to work.

I just set the output to be controlled by snapshots and set the levels from there. This then leaves free a space taken up by a gain block and makes it easy to set levels quickly on the fly instead of going to the gain block to adjust (my signal chain is quite complicated with various gain blocks in various places to cut off parallel chains when i need)

Glenn,i have your acoustic pack and use it with an emg equipped esp through a mesa dual rect (4cm bypassing preamp) and simply cant believe how close it sounds!!!

if the fractals sound are 1000% times better than great but i cant personally hear any difference. So my decision come down to a couple factors,the main one being the footswitch layout on the ax8.................jesus it looks terrible,mite be great in principle but playing on a dark stage with specific cues etc it just looks cluttered.......now the helix wins hands down. Another factor was no dual amp capability, i used to use single amps but now i use dual,it sounds so thick and full and gives you the opportunity to kinda create your own custom blend,i use a dual rectifier head in real life so i based my direct sound on that but also added the bogner uber model with sag,ripple bias etc maxed to give the top end of the sound alot of sizzle but the recto holds the bottom end and crunch......you cant do that on the ax8!!!! only my opinion obviously,i think the axe fx2 probably kills the helix with the amount of parameters that can be adjust on amp models but lets face it half of us dont know what any of that stuff does lol

Can someone explain IR's to me please? I kinda understand the principle i.e i have an amp model,i load an IR after it and bam theres my signal chain. I generally stick to 1 IR which is an Ownhammer george lynch marshall 4x12 model,it sounds fantastic,for clean i use a jc-120 model with the helix jc cab option and ribbon mic,it sound exactly how i want it so not bothered about using IR for that. Now, i have seen some glenn delune amp packs that model amps that arent on the helix,how does that work? He has a cornford and replicates the tone exactly,not just the eq but the whole thing,has he used an amp thats close to the cornford and worked with that? Is the amp modelled in the IR?is that amps 'tone' just captured or the whole thing? Is it possible to model say a telecaster or strat (2 guitars that have undeniable distinct tones) using IR's and apply to that to the signal chain? I did ask the question a while back whether anything could be captured and it was kinda yes and no.

so,i have my helix set up for use through a p.a. system,i run dual amps for my heavy sound and one amp for clean. At the minute im blending the 2 heavy amps for heavy sound and using a jc-120 for cleans and running in mono to my rehearsal rooms p.a. Now at a gig i usually run through a head and cab and miked through p.a. but ive never really thought about whether im being panned to the side im standing or im just panned to both (mono). or will both my left/right signals be summed to mono and panned to my side of the stage? i have played hundreds of gigs with an amp but not direct,just want to see if its worth running the helix in stereo if im just guna be panned to the side im standing So my question is if i pan my 2 heavy amps,1 left and 1 right will it be wasted in a gig situation if im just summed to mono and panned to my side?or summed to mono and panned left and right? Something that made me think of this is metallica,both guitarists use axe fx now live and blend 2 amps for their heavy sound but at a metallica gig do they pan hetfields blended signal all to his side and same with kirk?or they both just come out left and right? I imagine it would be odd if they were panned then you wouldnt hear the left side if you were on the right in the crowd and visa versa. any thoughts? cheers

Yeh the loop you are using i.e loop 1,that block needs to be in the chain otherwise you are just outputting straight out the helix into the amps fx return

Just tried this and simple delay has minimum delay of 80ms and it sounds slap backy,tried with reverb as the pre delay goes down to 10ms i think,it kinda worked but not overly great as im not splitting the 2 amps left and right (for live) but for recordingit would work like that,but tbh i would prob just do it in the daw.

im using a dual rec in 4cm and just utilise the loop block.in my chain i place it after a wah,distortion or any other front end stuff,then after the loop block i have other effects and then the chain just goes to the output of the helix that goes to amps fx return.i dont use the individual send/return blocks,they are kind for sending signals of to say other amps or used to have 4 different inputs i.e. different guitars all plugged in at once. just incase your not familiar with 4cm here goes. guitar>helix input helix fx loop1 send>amp input amp fx loop send>helix loop 1 return helix main output>amp fx return this basically makes your amps pre-amp section the loop1 block,turn that block off and you are routed straight to the amps power section,use this if you are running an a pre-amp block.this also allows you to place fx before and after the loop1 block,very handy set up and works amazingly for me

god that sounds crunchy!!! guna try mixing this amp/pedal with a dual rectifier for the bottom end!!!

When im using my mesa dual rec in 4c method i run a branch off in the signal chain sending the preamp signal from the mesa to a p.a. system (to save micing up), i find the signal a little dry as there is no power amp dynamics in the chain so i add an amp block and like you say just dial everything flat and minimum gain,this gives me the raw pre amp signal from the mesa and a power amp simulation.i also run as normal thru the mesa to a 4 x 12 cab. this gives me a p.a signal that is consistent and i dont rely on a bad sound guy micing my cab up wrong!!i also get my normal stage sound from my amp and cab!!!

yeh true it easy to mix 2 models within the helix but im kinda still hanging onto my lovely valve amp thru a 4x12 cab lol.

also i could using a simple delay delay the model signal by the smallest amount to cover phase issues plus making it wider sounding too!!