lou-kash

That all said, the best solution as far as I'm concerned still is:

The original question was: And the answer is: Yes, you can. "Can." As in: "… but you don't have to."

Well, um, yes. Much like if you need a split to path B for "Effect X" only on a Stomp, obviously you cannot apply it again later in the block flow for "Effect Y" anymore. On the other hand, I, for one, rarely need a split at all, so I wouldn't be wasting anything. That said, neither would I need this very scenario as far as I can say so far. (I do use 2-channel presets though.) It's just a "proof of concept" that it's possible with the tool we have. That's all. :)

Overall size, weight and particularly modularity matter as well: For bands where I play bass guitar, usually I'm alright with just the Stomp alone. No need for a pedalboard at all. Just the Stomp, the power unit and two cables. Everything's transportable in my gig bag. For bands where I play guitar, I need an expression pedal plus additional footswitches to change snapshots and Exp1/2 – the latter not directly avaliable on my old Roland expression pedal. But my "pedalboard" – a modified metal plate 26 × 32 cm that's originally been part of an office computer shelf – must accomodate all of it, and everything must remain loose so that I can always remove the Stomp when going to play bass. Hence I opted for Disaster Area DMC.micro which is "minimalistic" but flexible enough to do what I need plus having an extra footswitch input that I use for tap tempo. Those additional analog footswitches also come from my decades old "gear archives", i.e. apart from the Stomp and the DMC.micro I'm "recycling" material that I already had since decades. As for DMC.micro vs MIDI Baby 3: DMC.micro can be programmed offline directly on the device, whereas for MIDI Baby you need an internet connection to change the settings. I definitely wanted the former. In other words, even if the Stomp XL would have been already available last year, I still would have opted for the small Stomp because of modularity. In other other words, there is no definite solution. Your mileage will vary.

Exactly that. Input L_R Switch.hlx Assign a footswitch or snapshot to flip balance B. Make sure all blocks are on path B, and at least one of them should be a mono block: (^ Using Gain blocks here only as placeholders. Use which ever blocks you like.) Turn down level of path A on Mixer block:

Frankly, I had no experience with this exact scenario yet, so I had to look up a few details in the manual… But in Logic, such a plugin is already built in, and its name is External Instrument. It's under Utilities. I won't necessarily need it for reamping because I bought Helix Native the last time it was on sale. But it will be useful while overdubbing with HX Stomp: I can automate changing snapshots a pushing footswitches during the recording process while I'll be using the Stomp for latency free hardware monitoring – while recording just the dry signal. Just tested it, it works. (Just don't pull the USB cable while the antique MIDI is doing its thing: kernel panic caused by Line 6 driver…) … see above. :)

Um… is there anything wrong with sending MIDI messages from DAW to Helix hardware?

If by "dual path" you mean two independent channels, you can:

Alright, I can't test that, lacking a Big Sur compatible computer. Perhaps it's an all new feature of the now-Big-Sur-only Garageband 10.4.2?

Well, that's amazing, indeed! Which GarageBand version? Which MacOS? Could have been an accidental oversight by the developers in one of the updates that was subsequently removed again. That happens: For example, the current version of iZotope RX8 Elements also "features" such an oversight that shouldn't be there by design, being actually an exclusive feature to the much more pricey RX8 Standard and Advanced. I, for one, can't complain about it either. :) But I won't be shocked if they eventually find out and "fix" it in a subsequent update…

What's "confusing" you here? It's the way it is.

Nothing. You'd need to rewire it to have an input and output. Then it might work as a passive volume pedal.

Um… yes: That's what you'll see if you click on the "MacOS 11 Compatibility with Line 6 Software" box at the top of every forum page. It's there for a reason. Definitely do not use Bug Sur for "mission critical" tasks roughly until at least the upcoming WWDC later this year. Provided your ProTools is fully compatible with Catalina, you should be good to go with Line 6 on Catalina as well.

Then the driver is possibly not installed properly yet? Here's what it looks like on El Capitan:

No one forces anyone to upgrade on Day One. ;) I bought a MacBook Pro "Early 2008" – the last model with the silver keyboard (how I still love it!) – a few weeks before the first "unibody" MacBooks were known to be released in October 2008, to replace a mere 3-years old PowerBook G4 that was already hopelessly obsolete by then but which I'm still keeping to run some PPC only software every now and then. The MBP ran Snow Leopard until 2019 (!) when I upgraded it to El Capitan – highest possible – after making sure all my important "obsolete" stuff will still run or is possible to convert or replace. Also: a 2TB SSD makes it fly. Partitioned to boot anything from Leopard to El Capitan. I bought a MacBook Pro Mid-2012 – the last model with a CD/DVD-R drive (how I still need it!) and matte display (how I still can't be without it!) – in 2013, also a few weeks before the first "retina" MacBooks were known to be released. It ran Mountain Lion until 2019 when I bought a 2 TB SSD drive and partitioned it from Mountain Lion (skipping Mavericks & Yosemite) to Catalina, making El Capitan the primary partition to keep it easily in full sync with the 2008 MacBook. Then I bought Helix Native last December while it was on sale combined with my HX Stomp discount, only to realize that it won't run in Logic 9. At the same time I also realized that I have the last chance to buy Logic X via Catalina before it will be Bug Sur only, so I finally upgraded to Logic X as well. That was a good move anyway because Logic 9 already has some stability issues on El Capitan, albeit manageable. I'm also slowly but steadily migrating my Adobe CS5 graphic work to the Serif Affinity suite because I won't join the Adobe CC rip-off, and while CS5 still works more or less stable on El Capitan, it won't run on Catalina. Neither will my trusty but also "obsolete" Firewire audio interfaces. Heck, M-Audio Firewire 410 works on El Capitan only thanks to user-hacked drivers, although the device is otherwise fully functional. Eventually I'll likely buy the Roland UA 1010 Octa Capture to replace the Alesis iO26 under Catalina. And most importantly, I have no plans to replace this MacBook Pro Mid-2012 anytime soon. I'd rather spend a few hundred CHF to repair it in case anything will fail. And it will, sooner or later: I already had to have the keyboard replaced a few years ago. But it's still worth it, more than having to buy any of the new MacBooks, not to speak of Hackintoshs with their own tail of problems. Or even moving to Windows; no way. Got a bunch of PCs last year from my late father who was a Windows "enthusiast", spending most of his time to keep them running in the first place, instead of doing any creative work while he still considered himself an "artist". They're waiting in storage to be thorughly inspected sometime later this year. I already shudder only thinking of having to deal with it. Love his LG display as an extension when plugging in the MacBook in my studio though. Eyesight vanishes with age, display size matters, 15" is not much… Waiting for new MacBook Pros 15/16" with Sillicon chips, wondering how those will turn out. And for how much. The current 16" "Pro" [scare quotes] is of no interest for me. The major dealbreaker with all recent MacBooks: the non-replaceable SSD drive. Need 2TB or more. Won't pay Apple's "premium" for that. But that's just me. Your mileage may vary. :) Depending on which exact 2009 model, it can run either up to El Capitan or High Sierra. If the latter, you can still do practically anything with it. In some instances you'd only need to stick with an "older" version of software. But e.g. with Logic X, for me it's not a big deal having to use v10.3.3 on El Capitan. It does all I need already. Tl;dr: No one forces anyone to upgrade on Day One. Options exist! ;)

I would wait patiently while focusing on all those other things that can already be done on M1 Macs. That would likely keep me busy enough for months to come. :D (Disclosure: Using Macs to make a living for about 90% of my income, I always painstakingly keep my previous Mac up to date and in sync as a backup, just in case my main Mac would die a sudden death. Because been there done that.)

This. My best musical investment in decades. I remember back in 1992 paying almost twice as much for a used Boss SE-50 , and it made me happy for many years to come. I was still using it until buying the Stomp last summer.

Hm, last year my El Capitan MacBook may have had a kernel panic about twice, after seven years of Mountain Lion stability. Frankly though, I often do nasty things to my Macs that kids definitely should not try at home on their dads' computers. Like running "obsolete" and "unsupported" "legacy" audio interfaces with hacked drivers. :D

Here you go: https://line6.com/support/tickets/add.html

Not by far. Usually you'd simply force quit the hanging "beachballing" app by one of quite a few methods. The "Mac screen of death" is called Kernel Panic. That won't go unnoticed when it happens. That aside… You may want to post here: https://line6.com/support/forum/90-helix-native

And that's the logical (pun not intended :) way: It's an amp simulation. In the real world, unless you have a special guitar amp with a stereo input, any other standard guitar (pre)amp will process the input signal in mono, no matter how many hard panned guitars you plug in. So the plugin just does what you would expect from a real guitar amp here. Aux bus in mono? Native in Dual Mono mode? Mono reverb loaded? Hard to tell without letting us know the details…

Update HX Edit to v3, then Stomp firmware to v3.01, and you'll have two more blocks for free.

You can't have three FX loops. FX-R has to go either on path A or on path B. It can't go after the mixer because it's mono and it would mix both paths back to mono signal. Or you'd use only one FX Loop before the Y split. Or you put your drives before the Stomp.

HX Stomp 3.0 Owner's Manual - Rev C - English.pdf, page 52

Install the Helix Driver, v.1.0.9, or if you're on El Capitan or earlier v 1.0.7. The Stomp is class compliant, i.e. it is usable without a driver, but only @ 48kHz.