Kilrahi

Whatever it is you feel you're hearing, it is not digital clipping. Especially in regards to the Master volumes being set at 10. The amps that have their Masters set at 10 never had Master volume knobs in the first place, so if you lower them you're changing the true sound of the modelled amp and making it behave in a way that would have been impossible in the real world. That's not to say you can't do it - it might even sound good. Whatever the case though, that is not at all what digital clipping is.

So what exactly is the Stomp outputting to? Just the PA? Which output(s) is it using?

1. No. To have a stereo sound come out of the Stomp, you need the final block to be a stereo block. If your final block is not stereo (such as an amp block or a IR) then the signal will be summed to mono. To have a stereo sound, you would need the final block to be stereo (such as reverb, etc.) AND feed that stereo sound into one speaker with a left channel, and the right output be fed into another speaker for the right channel. 2. Ummm . . . no . . . but I'll admit I have a hard time picturing what you're trying to do here. What would be the purpose of doing this? Just to have two very different amp sounds? It might be better for me to wrap my head around what you're doing if you describe the whole signal chain. For example, when you say "reverb stereo output" or "returning one of my reverbs" are you referring to the Stomp's reverbs or a separate reverb pedal?

Good points. There WILL come a point where all of this audio improvement is just snake oil. Our ears are pretty garbage in the grand scheme of things. In my opinion, we hit that a bit BEFORE Helix, but I could be wrong. How much better Fractal factually is, and how much of that fact we can actually perceive with our garbage ears, is up for debate I guess.

And it's totally awesome it allows that feature. Maybe someday I'l find myself using them more. For now, I only use a 3rd party IR 5% of the time, if that. Options are always a win though.

They're not required though. To be honest, I was just fine using an HX Stomp (6 blocks) for most of my presets and I was perfectly happy. Most of the time when I'm just fiddling around, all I grab is a dual amp block. Guitarists are fickle never happy people. We've all been or met people who own a million drive pedals, or are constantly selling old tube amps and buying new ones, claiming they've found "nirvana" only to then need a new nirvana 12 months later. Guitarists are endless tweakers. That's the strength of Helix, not a weakness. it allows us to come up with a million permutations of sounds without spending a million dollars to do it, and it allows us to come up with signal chains with would be too big a pain in the lollipop in the real world. Codamedia's excellent advice should be a reason to buy it, not to stay away.

I dunno. I still prefer his way because I'd rather keep all the control possible in one place and retain the most functionality. He's still got an unused FX return. Connect the acoustic to it, use snapshots to switch between two guitars in a preset, or if each preset is too complex I guess switch patches, but he'd have to do that anyway.

It is great advice as a whole, but I'm curious, what was the step(s) you were missing out on? You're clearly very knowledgable in your own right.

I award you 1,000 points for using one of my favorite quotes of all time in a guitar related post.

I've done all sorts of things with it, but generally you want it really early in the chain, if not at the very start. If you stick it to far at the end then you're doubling things like reverb trails and in my opinion it gets really muddy. Where you're trying to double a lead tone I'd probably start at the front of the chain and then if you're not satisfied slowly move it back. Most of the time when I use it it's to create a subtle effect in the background, so I've experimented a lot with putting it on its own path (B) and then adding effects to it to my liking, but it's always as more of a supporting role.

I've seen many preferred approaches. Me, when I need more than one guitar sound I like the "Double Tank" effect which was designed explicitly for that purpose. Some aren't happy with it though, but I like it. Give it a try first.

Do NOT use the 800mA port. That is for AC power and you risk frying your Stomp, or at least giving it some nasty hiccups. All you need is one port (the 500), the L6 adaptor, and the polarity reversal cable, and you're set. Works great. (Also, yes, it can output much more than the port states, so 300 works fine for 350 - as long as your total pedals don't go over the grand total possible).

I always completely cranked it, and it worked great.

If you purchase the Fbv 3 foot controller separately yes, it does.

I guarantee a modern high quality FRFR can be tweaked to sound just as low fi as an archaic guitar speaker.

How can you claim your experience and make statements like the above with a straight face?

Nobody has ever brought this subject up before. After this many years, I don't think we should start now.

No. The best way is to purchase the DAW plugin Helix Native. You can open Helix patches in there, trim them down, and then export them to the Stomp.

It kind of depends on what you intend to use them for. A lot of us buy the FRFR systems for a multitude of options. So, for example, when practicing we want to jam to the real song coming out of the same speaker, and so we want a wider range than what a guitar amp would do. Or we want to plug in acoustic guitar into it which needs a wider range than an electric. Or you plan on running all types of instruments through it. The one I use has a frequency response of 50Hz to 20 kHz.

There's no doubt a way to get things to work with Audacity, but I have to admit I don't have a clue how that one works. What I can say is that Reaper's free trial worked right out of the box for me. So . . . you might want to give that free program a try? Or an Audacity user can chime in . . .

Well for that question I don't have an easy answer. Because you want to split up the bass signal and keep them split up there's no easy way for your bass player to hear it through monitors since no where in the signal path do you recombine them. At least, none that I can see. If you want it that complex you'd be better off having your bass player buy their own LT. An expensive proposition for a bass player, to be sure, but something has to give. Either budget or the complexity of the routing has to give somewhere.

Yes.

It's a good idea to try the stock IRs first before you decide they're garbage. I own a closetful of IRs. I almost never touch them. Some people swear they're the bee's knees. If you have money to burn, buy some of the big names and see if you fall in love. However, with the Stomp, if you can get by with just the stock cabs it will always be a plus because of the 6 block limitation.

You could get a program that mimics an IOS phone . . . assuming Mac has any. Seriously though, it's not happening. Time to make do with what we got.

I think a lot of us are with you on this, but I can't dismiss the fact that there are "amp in the room" people who have tried all of these things and it still doesn't work for them. I have to accept, though, that I'm wired differently than a lot of those guys. For example, WHY do they need all high frequencies to ALWAYS be nerfed? Just because traditionally guitar cabs sucked with highs doesn't mean that once we figure out how to have them we keep them toast. I think it's just that they're used to them being toast. If we'd started out with full range speakers instead of the limited range cabs of the 50's, I have to assume we'd largely use fuller range guitar sounds in our modern era. Yet, those frequencies often weird out old school players . . . so they get cut. I EVEN CUT THEM SO THEY DON'T lollipop ABOUT MY TONE, BUT THERE'S TIMES I THINK THEY SOUNDED BETTER THAT WAY. We all have our preferences on how things should sound, and I guess there's just no getting around that. I've never found an FRFR that sounded like a tube amp in the room . . . so if you can hear that difference, and you vastly prefer the tube, an FRFR just won't do it no matter how hard you try.