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nhoven

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Everything posted by nhoven

  1. Yes. None of the controls of the helix matter. Not the input gate, and not the output attenuation of the path output. Edit: To me it seems like the noise is being produced in the analog domain after the D/A converter. So maybe it's "by design"? Is it the "normal" noise floor of the helix, which is being amplified by the huge amount of gain of the channel? That's why I asked for other amp users' experience... I can't really imagine the Helix's signal noise ratio is so... let's call it low that it gets cooked by a hot tube preamp. On the other hand, the primary design is for use with lower gain preamps (daw, FRFR systems), so I might as well be out of luck. Would like to know for sure. For reference, it's a hot rodded 2203-design, so it has four gain stages, DC-coupled cathode follower, tonestack. There's always the possibility to use the Helix preamps, but that was not my goal. I love my tube amps :(
  2. Thanks for your reply, but no, the issue is not a ground loop. Sorry I didn't make this clearer in my first post. I do a few Palmer isolation transformers and know how to use them, and the issue is the same with and without one. I've attached another, better audio clip. What I'm talking about is this: Connecting Helix introduces some nasty hiss, as you can here while I'm connecting and disconnecting the guitar cable from the amp multiple times. This hiss is really loud, and while it may not matter in a metal context, it matters in the context that I play, because in short breaks I can't kill that noise with the volume pedal. I would have to use an external pedal or noise gate, which really sucks :) . Again, sorry for the confusion, I might have ben a bit overly tired when posting this morning ;) . noise.wav
  3. Hi there, first of all, happy new year to everyone. I'm having big issues with my Helix using it together with my tube amps. I got my Helix a few weeks ago, the plan was for it to replace my big a** FX rack. I wanted to use the Helix for FX only (in four cable method) while getting my base tone from my 3-Channel Tube Amp(s). That plan failed for now, because in the current state it's unusable. When connecting the Helix to my Amps, a giant noise floor gets added. It can be barely heard using the first (clean) channel of my amps, but when using the 3rd (high gain) channel of the amps, the noise is so loud it makes the setup almost unplayable. I have made a few tests in my home just now, with the following basic setup: A fresh, empty preset in Helix, all outputs set to instrument level, and a volume pedal block added before the output of path 1A. No volume control in the Helix, be it in the input of the path, volume pedal block, the output of the path, or the big knob has any influence of the level of the noise. Both stage amps I own show the same behaviour, so it is very unlikely to be a fault in one of the amps. Both amps are custom hand wired amps that I designed and built myself (before you ask, yes, I am qualified for that, and the amps are built to a very high standard, not some kind of botch jobs :) ), so no use asking for the amps' brand. Both amps have been on the road with me, playing reliably for the past years and working flawlessly with my, in terms of noise grounding etc. far more complex, rack system. Or so I thought... Anyway. I am beginning to suspect that my Helix unit is faulty. Before I go through the hassle of returning the unit I wanted to ask if anyone here maybe has had similar experiences running the Helix together with a high gain tube (pre-)amp. I have attached a sample of the noise. I quickly recorded it with my mobile, as I don't have a recording setup at home. In the sample you can hear the change in noise level when I plug the Helix into the amp's input jack. I held the mobile right in front of the speaker cabinet. First you hear some buzzing from the amp with nothing connected, then the click when I plug the guitar cable into the helix, and then I plug the other end of the cable into the amp's frontend. The amp was switched to its high gain channel, master volume set a little lower than stage volume. No guitar was connected to the input of Helix. As you can hear, the increase in noise is really huge. Any help or suggestions are highly appreciated, I'm really frustrated. Thanks, Nils Edit: deleted sound sample to avoid further confusion.
  4. FIY, I filed a ticket for the issue. Problem was confirmed by the support, fix slated for next release.
  5. Sorry, forgot to mention. I have set it to discard. I tend to modify my sound somewhat while playing, and I'd love to use the snashots in the same way as I did my last MIDI rig, the snapshots being fixed sounds for certain moments in a song where I want to avoid tap dancing, but smaller changes I like to do "on the fly".
  6. Sorry to warm this up, but I'm experiencing the same bug with a brand new Helix, which was updated to 2.30 when it came out of the box. I have posted the issue in the bug report thread, but I just now found this thread describing my very same problem. If I understand the first post correctly, my Helix with 2.30 behaves a little different. MY Helix does send MIDI data with the snapshot change, and as long as I never touch the actual CC toggle in stomp mode, everything is fine. Things get bugged if I use the CC toggle stomp switch; in your example, switching from the snapshot with the lead sound to clean works (and back), but if I manually turn off lead via the stomp switch, lead gets turned back on when you change to the clean snapshot. So it seems Helix doesn't look at the actual saved state (value) of the CC toggle in the snapshot. it seems to compare the snapshots, "see" that it needs to toggle the CC from one snapshot to the next and will send the opposite value it no matter what without checking the actual state. In other words, it always inverts from one snapshot to another instead of sending at the saved value. Helix really needs to send the saved value. Every time. No matter what. Everything else is dangrous and makes controlling devices like the Gizmo or, in my case, a MIDI enabled amp, unusable. Just sticking to snapshots is a mediocre solution at best, because it essentially renders CC toggle stomp switches useless - you could use instant messages for that. I do have some situations where I am in one snapshot, flick (in my case) the CC toggle for the master on my amp and then switch to the next snapshot where this toggle needs to stay on (which it doesn't at the moment, it gets turned off, because it was saved in a different state between the two snapshots). The only other solution would be to "waste" another snapshot just for this one button change (which on some presets would push me to more than four, and I'm running Helix in 4 Snapshot / 4 Stomp mode...). Have you found any solutions, and did you file a ticket? I'm going to do that tonight, I hope something comes out of it. I really need that feature to be able to use the Helix as full time replacement for my rack as intended. Thanks, Nils
  7. Hi, sorry for the really long post by a really new newbie, but I think i came across a somewhat severe bug in the latest firmware concerning CC toggles on footswitches. I use Helix with a tube head that is controlled by three CC toggles to change its states. I use helix in 4 snap/4 stomp mode and have set snapshot edits to discard. The state of the CC toggle footswitch and the assigned CC toggle is handled very inconsistently across snapshots. I just recreated this problem with an empty preset and a single CC toggle assigned to a footswitch, and I confirmed the problem monitoring the MIDI output of Helix with MIDI-OX. Steps to recreate: - in the command center, assign a CC toggle to a footswitch. I used CC# 0 on MIDI-channel 1, dim value 0, lit value 127, but this happens on other channels with other values, too. - save two snapshots, on with the switch off (dim), the second one with the switch engaged (lit). - after saving snapshot 2, call up snapshot 1. Helix sends the correct CC value (0 to CC#0 on channel 1) and dims the switch. - call snapshot 2, Helix sends 127 to CC#0 on channel 1 and lights the switch. - call snapshot 1 again. Helix again sends 0 to CC#0 and dims the switch. - engage the switch in stomp mode. Helix sends 127 to CC#0 and lights the switch. This is where it gets inconsistent: - recall snpshot 2. Helix keeps the lit state of the switch, but incorrectly sends 0 to CC#0 instead of either resending 127 or doing nothing. From this point on, the polarity of the CC toggle is inverted: - Disengaging the switch in this state dims the LED and sends a value of 127. Engaging the switch, Helix sends CC value 0 and lights the led. From there, if I go back to snapshot 1, Helix dims the led, but sends CC value 127. Sadly, there is more. In the above scenario, save a third snapshot, again with the switch disengaged, i.e. identical to snapshot 1. Make sure snapshot 1 is the default for loading the preset. - engage the switch, Helix lights the led and sends CC value 127. - call snapshot 3 (the identical one). Helix dims the led, but ignores the CC and sends nothing. On top of that, this cannot be fixed by sending the correct CC values through the instant messages, because the CC toggle of the switch is sent after the instant messages. In the above scenario I added the instant message cc#0 value 0 to snapshots 1 and 3, and value 127 to snapshot 2. - recall the preset, Helix loads snapshot 1 and sends CC#0 value 0 twice. - call snapshot 2, Helix sends CC#value 127 twice. - again call snapshot 1. Helix sends CC#0 value 0 twice. Engage the switch. Helix sends CC#0 value 127 once. - call snapshot 2. Helix sends CC#0 value 127 (the instant message) followed by cc#0 value 0, the "inverted" toggle. This is a pretty big deal breaker for communicating with external MIDI gear that listens to CC toggles making it pretty impossible to use CC toggles in stomp mode between snapshots. I hope this can be fixed soon, or maybe somebody has a solution I didn't think of. I have no idea if this behaviour occurs in earlier firmwares, since I got my Helix last tuesday and immediately updated the firmware to 2.30 before starting to work with it. Thanks for listening, Nils
  8. Hi there, brand new Helix owner here, got it on tuesday. Loving it so far, very nice piece of hardware. I bought the Helix to replace my 10HE FX rack containing a mixture of Pedals and 19" gear, because it's getting too heavy and cumbersome and takes up too much space everywhere (including my car). For now planning to use the Helix for FX only through my midi controllable 3-channel tube head in four cable method (which is working great, took me only a few seconds, no level issues, no hum). My amp head is controlled by three CC toggles, which I have assigned to three footswitches. While rebuilding my setups I came across a preset where I needed to have one of the toggles on a momentary footswitch, like I had on my old midi board. Looking through the command center I could not find the option to change the footswitch assigned to the CC toggle from latching to toggle. Am I missing some trick or hack, am I blind and can't find it, or is this just not possible? Thanks!
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