gkinder

I have the Redwirez BigBox IR set, and find them quite good. Mike Scuffham selected a few choice Redwirez IRs for S-Gear, and I really trust Mike's ears a lot more than my own. There's a lot of variables that impact the IRs: recording technique, room, specific mics (not just types), exact mic positions, how much of the cabinet is captured, post processing and IR mixing, etc. But I suspect the most significant difference is the cabinets and speakers themselves. They're all different. Even different speakers of the same model in the same cabinet will sound different.

 

For example, I have IRs from a number of vendors that are close or nearly exactly modeling the 2x12 Fender closed back cabinet I have loaded with Celestion G12-65s. Just for fun I tried creating my own IR of that cabinet using Logic's Impulse Response Utility. I used two mics, an SM57 and AT4047. I then loading that IR into Helix along with similar ones from Redwirez and Celestion and setup two outputs from helix going into diffent channels of the same power amp, one with the IR block going into my FRFR, and the other with no IR or cab model going into the G12-65 cabinet. Perhaps not surprisingly my own IR was much closer to matching the actual cabinet than either the Redwirez or Celestion IRs. They all sounded good, just different.

 

So I think the point is that although speaker choice has a great impact on amp tone, its probably not productive to obsess over finding the optimal cab or IR model. Its probably better to pick one that's close enough and just play. The subtile differences won't be that apparent in a live gig situation.

Dittos....Redwirez BigBox set is a great choice...tons of quality IR's, though you can get lost in all the choices  ;)

I wouldn't mind placing my Helix on a light pedalboard, but the Pedal Train does not work for me. I have an old PT-2 lying round, so I tried to use it with the Helix, but the angle of the PT-2 made the expression pedal on the Helix cumbersome to use. The super light Free The Tone pedalboards are great, but expensive and difficult to find - I don't think they make a size that would work perfectly with the Helix anyway.

Have one of the big Temple boards....holds my Helix and a half dozen of my "never getting rid of" pedals that run into the Helix loops....run path A into a FRFR powered cab and path B into a tube amp/2x12 cab.....wall of sound and the board controlling everything is nice and neat....

https://templeboards.com/collections/trio

I can report this....Playing in a band with another guitarist....I used the Helix going into the aux in of my old Roland VGA-7. That's pretty much FRFR as far as I'm concerned. 

The other guitarist used a "normal" rig of a Peavey 5150 through a Marshal 4x12. 

 

My rig sounded real good! That is until he played along side me. His tube amp and cab were far more "present" both in rehearsal and live onstage in the band mix out front.

 

Don't get me wrong...the Helix sounded REAL good like that. But he just had more "punch" and "mojo". I have no other words to describe that.

 

Then I dragged out my DT50 and my Bogner 4x12 and ran my Helix through that. My sound suddenly was kicking his butt. It was just a different animal, and I mean that in a good way.

 

Has anyone else had that experience yet of playing in a 2 guitar band opposite a guy with a tube head and 4x12? 

As I said the Helix sounded amazing already...but for me, when I added in the tube amp and 4x12 cab THAT was when all those even numbered harmonics created by the real tubes kicked in, the sound warmed up AND at the same time got punchy as hell. 

 

I can't explain it except to say that it took away any "cold" sound of the Helix and turned each note into pure molten butter with effortless sustain and a punch and presence that was lacking before. 

I run a four cable method into my PWE EH3 tube amp with the 1/4" jacks and run the XLR outs into my Gemini 2 for the FRFR side of things...Use pathway A for the FRFR and pathway B for the tube amp....have different patches for different setups including wet/dry with the tube amp normally the dry side. 65 Amps 2x12 with a G12H30 and Celestion Gold for the PWE and then the Gemini 2 with dual FRFR speakers.....Sounds HUGE.

I'm surprised you dont care for the preamp in your delta blues....its probably the sweetest amp Peavey ever built, IMO.  I'd try a 4C method with an eq up front and/or the centaur, with splash of verb and delay in the loop....should sound fantastic....

Mark only made a pedal for himself and me. When I picked this up the other day I asked if he'd be open to making more and he said yes. I would contact him directly to see what he would charge for the build. I spent about $400 on it. Not cheap but it's essentially a two channel amp with compression in a box. These are built from plans that can be found online if you're handy with a soldering iron. https://aionelectronics.com/project/lab-series-l5-preamp/

Thank you!!!

 

FYI This is not a patch per the original OP's request but I just had this built and put into my Helix FX loop. If you're interested Mark Moore of Mark Moore Audio Solutions in Wilmington, NC is building them. You can also search online to find the DIY project for yourself. I can't speak to getting BB's sound with this. I'm more of a fan of Ty Tabor's earlier tone which used the same amp.

 

 

 

Huge BB fan here....If you don't mind me asking, what kind of coin are these running?  Went to Mark's site but there is no mention of this pedal....have a beautiful semi-hollow and would like to get close to BB's tone, though will never have that kind of soul....RIP BB!!!

I have no problem if others are happy with the G10.  In my case the area that had the most difference were very clean and brighter presets with not much in the way of drive, compression, or effects.  I'm no novice to sound production both live and in professional studios in Nashville, Memphis, and Austin for over 4 decades, so I know enough to know how to not be deceived and tp verify my perceptions.  For me it was significant enough to stick with the cable.  For others that might not be the case and if they're happy with their units more power to them.  I only pointed out my experience, and that it didn't fit my needs.

I had the G70 but recently sold it and went back to a Lava cable....everyone's ears a different but the cable sounds better to mine.  My buddy has the Shure wireless for guitar and it sounds pretty darn good...may go that direction one day if I get a wild hair :)

Sounds like a really cool rig. Which pedals though?

 

I do something similar, but not for live use. My current analog board consists of: PolyTune mini -> Morley ABY -> MonsterPiece MegaStud -> Keeley Tone Workstation -> Mission Volume Pro -> Eventide H9 -> Mesa Boogie Maverick. My Helix is running 4CM into a Mesa Mark V, and also into my DAW.

 

For live gigs (small club player here) I just use the Helix into a Traynor YGM3 or YGM4.

 

Cheers

My rig is mostly used in my studio now days.  Rebuilding the board right now but when done it will have a powered Saturnworks ABY splitter into Helix directly on one channel and the other channel into a Mission Volume Pro (good choice :)) >> (2) Wampler Tumnus OD (Centaur clones) >> Wampler Velvet Fuzz or Amptweaker Tight Fuzz Pro (haven't decided yet) >> Amptweaker Tight Drive Pro >> Empress ParaEQ into front of the PWE EH3....Strymon Timeline (delay) or Echosex2 >> Strymon Mobius (modulation) >> Red Panda Context (reverb) in EH3's loop.  The amps foot switch will also be on the board, though I pretty much live on channel two most the time.  Guitars are a Collings I35 Deluxe with Throbaks, Gibson 1958 Les Paul VOS RI, and a Fender Longboard Strat.  Have a Gibson Derek Trucks SG that I'm thinking of selling off to help pay for some of the pedals, though I may end up keeping and putting a set of Fralin P90's in it :)    Great rig when all said and done....keep telling myself I'll "never" adjust it once its done, famous last words :rolleyes:

Well I wouldn't say I think it's coming necessarily, but IMO the elephant in the otherwise wondrous Helix room is IR management.

 

Last night I spent a while setting up to check out a bunch of presets and IRs I've collected. Quite a pain.

 

You first have to figure out which IRs you currently have loaded that are used by presets you're keeping. I did that by exporting all the individual presets I want to keep, then I wrote a tool to list out all the IR slots used by any preset file in a recursive set of directories, and which preset files use them.

 

Then you need to reconcile all your IR developers' naming systems so you can know where they came from and what their original names were, then apply a 3 digit sequential prefix to them all so Helix loads them in a repeatable order. Once you've done that, you can load them in, then remap the IRs used by each preset to the new locations of any IRs you moved.

 

Not all those steps are necessary in all cases, but the bottom line is that this is way not automatic or user friendly, and it's tedious and error prone at scale.

Amen to this!!!  The IR support in Helix/Editor is pretty bad....an integrated library to sort, manage, and call IRs on the fly would be nice in addition to list set of the IRs currently in use and in which patches.... 

I'm just curious - what other pedals are you planning to build your board out with?

 

The only pedal I'm wanting for is a Rangemaster style treble booster with a variable Q setting - but even without it I've got all I need from the helix, so I just use the 'ol floorboards, no Velcro or nuthin ;-)

 

Those Temples are really cool looking though - I've been thinking of replacing my Pedaltrain analogue board for one....

 

 

Cheers!

I have a dual rig with my guitar running into an ABY splitter with one path hitting the Helix into a Mission Engineering Gemini 2 and the other path running through various pedals into a PWE Event Horizon 3 tube amp/65 Amp 2x12 cab.  Want to mount everything on one board.  Don't run other pedals into the Helix as it has good effects on its own.  There are lots of power and in/out jack options with the Temple boards and think the Helix will mount directly to it nicely.  Just put an offer in on Reverb for on the Trio 42 boards.  Not bad price wise so think I'll give it a shot...

Not sure about your specific questions but just one heads up, because i was playing around with an option in my studio of having a few external effects mounted on a board above the helix I put my unit on a pedaltrain for a few days. I found that the additional slanting the board added (above what's built into the Helix which is built at the perfect angle IMHO when placed on a flat surface) got really annoying. The expression pedal felt at a very strange contour to me and the whole thing didn't feel right with the stomp buttons and angle I was looking at the screen. May just want to sit the helix on a slanted board like the Trio ahead of time to make sure it's for you. 

Hadn't thought about that, very valid point....will do that and see how if works...don't really use the expression pedal except as a volume pedal once in a while so that probably won't be an issue but could see the extra angle potentially being problematic...looking at the wide board and planning on running my other pedals beside the Helix so it might work out....thanks for the insight!!

There have been a few posts from folks looking to mount the Helix to a pedal board.  I've been wanting to do the same.  Ran into this company over the weekend and it looks like a very viable solution for the Helix.  My only question is if removing the rubber feet from the Helix will have any affect on the unit, does anyone know the ramifications of unscrewing the feet from the Helix? Do the screws only hold the fee in place or do they also secure internal boards, etc.?  

I'm looking at the Trio 43 for my Helix and other pedals and using four of the large mounting plates for attaching the Helix....

http://templeboards.com/

http://templeboards.com/collections/trio/products/trio-43

http://templeboards.com/pages/quick-release-pedal-mounting-system

Thoughts?

So true but unfortunately "ignorance" has no issue with spreading the word at the point of a sword for all our mutual benefit either. I always try to avoid politics and religion on a technical forum but it seems the Helix inspires comments about politics, science, and faith, now and then.  Music extends from the political rally to the atheist/agnostic to the house of worship  ;)

 

I just wanted to add that I am frequently impressed with the sheer quantity and quality of heart and brains so many of the people on this forum bring. I daresay if we were all in the same local music scene many of us would be great friends despite our differences of opinion and perspective.

Well said....music is expression and does so routinely on all types of subjects....Helix thus becomes a tool of expression  ;)

Being a long student and scholar of history and a huge fan of reality: Believing in things has nothing to do with them being grounded in reality and physically real. The religious across the spectrum are the first ones to try and act as if science is a belief or requires you to accept it, it exists in contrast to whatever often delusional aspect of psychology that spins in one's mind. Think what you will, believe what you will, everything in human nature is a matter of your personal genetic markers. Nothing more, nothing less, born a with genius potential or retarded, we all are what we are and whether or not you become obsessed with some psychic communication with your imaginary friend does not give anyone the right to castigate science or non believers  because they are not wired that way. 

There have been infinite religions and 10,000 gods in the human epic, the only thing that is common amount all of them is that their believers were utterly certain they were the one and only truth and light. Those who are convinced any religion or belief construction can "save" the world or admit them to disney land after they die is as mistaken now, as they have been then. The dumbing down of our educational system towards a basis of "faith" and "belief" ideology merely assures when we need science and brilliant persons to save is from a dire crisis, they will be busy praying or lighting candles. 

 

Now let's get back to programming the Helix and playing the music we consider a gift. 

While I don't disagree with your premise, the same can be said the other way around about science zealotry.  The arrogance and closed mindedness on that side of the fence is every bit as bad as on the religious side, and just as much based on beliefs or desired outcomes.  On the dumbing down item, with the politicization of science, often pseudo-science, and the barriers to dissenting views/thought science zealots are trying to impose, i.e. global warming, it is pretty hard to throw stones at the religious side when the science side is doing the same thing. 

Would this be a good time to point out that science and religion are equal when it comes to attempting to explain the currently inexplicable?

 

Since the Renaissance scientists have been very effective at developing theories that help us understand physical reality and the 'laws' of nature.The current state of science in trying to understand physical reality comes to a frustrating halt at quantum physics and the nature of matter, energy, and quantum particles at measurements smaller than the Planck values for matter/energy, distance, and time. At that level things are random and chaotic and gravity continues to resist integration with the quantum world. But of course we don't want to accept that 'God rolls dice' or that our human understanding is inherently limited. The most popular current quantum theories for explaining these things involves a cat that is simultaneously dead and alive, with explanations involving strings, M-branes, and multiple parallel universes. By definition, none of these things are observable or testable even in theory. It's not just that we don't have the tools yet.They are theoretically speculative and not subject to proof or disproof - just like other speculative explanations involving God, Allah, Jehovah, Buddha and whatever deity we invoke.

 

Science involves theories that can at least theoretically be disproven by experiment*. Evolution is a scientific theory that has never been disproven - only supported - for several hundred years. Gravity is a highly successful theory but less robust than evolution, with Newton's theories having been modified by Einstein's relativity and the warping of spacetime. But they remain scientific theories because we can, and do, both create experiments to collect relevant data and use the theory to the benefit of humankind (evolution as it applies to medicine and food, for instance).

 

The softer meaning of 'theory' boils down to speculation and untestable belief. Examples include creationism. life after death, and the glory of martyrdom as well as string theory, M-branes, and multiple universes.

 

... and Oh, yeah - Yamaha sucks just like all big corporations. And Putin because .... well just because. And ISIS too, unless of course you support ISIS.

 

 

* Of course no theory can ever be completely proven - we can just continue to collect evidence that supports rather than disproves a theory. There always remains the possibility that the next experiment will disprove it.

WELL STATED SIR!!!!!   These religion vs science arguments always make me shake my head a bit since both types of zealots never seem to entertain the notion that BOTH may be right, to a certain extent at least.    Why can't the laws of the physical Universe, space, and time co-exist with God (or whatever word you want to put there)?  Maybe God is the ultimate scientist and physicist?  Closing one's mind to ALL possibilities certainly limits a person's perspective.....

And it's not just the music retailers, of course. Entire downtown business sectors have been and continue to be decimated by the arrival of the suburban box store malls with their Wal-Marts, Costcos, Lowe's, etc. Small retailers in any sector have difficulty staying in business. We, as consumers, could change this trend anytime we want with our shopping habits but we continue to choose lower prices, huge product selection in warehouses, reduced levels of customer service and product knowledge among sales staff, and one-stop convenience.

OR the mom & pops could do what the mom & pops in the appliance market place did and form a co-op for purchasing power in order to compete with the larger box stores.....our local mom & pop appliance store routinely kicks the big retailers in the back side on price, plus give better service, so that's where my wife and I purchase our appliances.  The store owner told me the national association is the biggest purchaser of appliances in the country and is why they don't worry about the big box stores...throwing stones at Capitalism, bigger companies, and online retailers is a cheap shot honestly.  In business you had better pay attention to trends and make adjustments IF you want to stay in business.  Putting up a good web store is not all the difficult, but you have to be a bit innovative and willing to invest. Willcut Guitars does a pretty darn good job of it, gives great service, and is where I get my guitars now. My experience is most mom & pop music stores don't invest or make smart business decisions so they have no one to blame but themselves if they don't make it.  We've lost a couple of the mom & pop music stores in our area as well and honestly it was because they didn't invest in their companies and preferred to point fingers and play the blame game.  Distribution to a ton of mom & pops IS expensive for the manufactures so they give preferred treatment to those that order in bulk, it's called a smart business move on their part, not a conspiracy against the mom & pops. 

I'm sharing this information in a couple different topic threads where folks are asking about cases...

 

I removed the 4 screws holding the rubber feet in the corners and replaced them with 4 metric screws the same size, but longer -- long enough to allow me to attached to 1/2" clear pine cleats to the bottom of the Helix (with washers). The cleats are colored flat black so they disappear. I then set everything into a pedalboard roadcase with a lift off top (see attached photo). There are wood screws with trim washers that reach up from underneath the roadcase and hold the cleats to the roadcase. 

 

If you're wondering about the Radial stereo direct box, although the XLR outs on the Helix work fine in some local active monitors I use at home, I'm getting some noise when I run them into the FOH console at one of the venues I play every week (BTW, it's not related to the 'ground lift'; it's not the typical 'ground noise'; the position of the Helix ground lift switch for the XLR outs doesn't make a difference). I found that taking the 1/4" outputs from the Helix into the Radial gives me a clean signal to this particular FOH console.

 

Hope this helps!   :)

Have the same problem with the XLR outs even going into my Mission Engineering Gemini Cab...noisy.  Switch over to the quarter inch jacks and noise goes away....too bad too as I want to run the XLR into the ME Gemini for FRFR and the quarter inch into my PWE EH3 amp/cab.

Hilarious. People complain that they want a more accurate tuner. Now they get it and it's too Jumpy. All good tuners will jump around a bit more. It was perfectly accurate before in my opinion but people and precision (though I highly doubt most can here + or - the amount built in unless they are one of the very few with pitch oerfect hearing. Did you ever pick up a players guitar who claimed their hearing was more accurate than tuners and check them? I did many times. I was setting up for a bar gig once (I was the sound tech at that time) and checked our singers guitar as all of us thought it sounded off but him. He had tuned a half step sharp. Another friend always tunes just a tad sharp. Not so much that you notice it but he actually thinks it sounds better that way. If it seems to b jumping just follow the larger of th displays like you used to. It is not changed. If you are in the green there you are close enough for live.

LOL, thought the same thing about the complaints....didn't realize 2.x had a tuner update....just checked it against my Peterson strobe tuner and the Helix tuner is spot on with the Peterson....FYI, the Peterson jumps around too...

If you're a tech/developer I'm not sure you could clear your mind of all you know in order to really appreciate how intimidating it can be for someone that is a novice.  It doesn't appear there were an overwhelming number of people that had problems with the upgrade, but there were enough that it gave me pause when I was considering whether or not to do it.  Not because I'm intimidated by the technology (I've been a commercial software developer since the '70's), but to be honest the software update process has long been a weak point at Line 6...somewhat fragmented and convoluted.  Starting back at Line 6 Monkey/License Manager days through the current model with the Updater it appears to be a lot of little pieces rather than a unified system and strategy.  The verbage (Line 6 Updater, Helix application/Helix Editor, Helix USB driver, Helix Floor/Rack, Helix Control )alone can be confusing when it's not clear what piece does what.

 

I'm sure there are a number of people that only know the unit they purchased (example Helix Floor) and this may be their very first experience with Line 6 products, modeling in general, and using a computer as part of playing guitar.  That's who you have to keep in mind when you write installation instructions.

I do a lot of customer support with our clients so very in-tune with how tech can be intimidating to folks.  Every time there is an update however we get threads like this and I go try to make the latest update blow up....haven't been successful so far.  I'm not a fan of Line 6's presentation with their update utility either, but it certainly appears pretty solid functionality wise.  A few days invested by the Line 6 developers in this area would probably make the process easier to understand and streamlined....

Just curious about this statement... Do you think the instructions listed here are unclear in any way? http://line6.com/support/topic/18284-latest-helix-firmware-201/

 

Reading through them, I'm not sure how they could be more clear... Not picking on you or anything. It's just that I've heard several people make this claim, and I just can't understand why they think the instructions aren't clear.

First off, I'm a tech/developer so the instructions are crystal clear to me.  Even if I weren't they would be crystal clear to me.  But everyone doesn't necessarily think the same way so maybe they aren't clear to some.

Having said that, I'm simply amazed how many folks seem to have problems with the Helix updates.  I've tried to make this thing crash on a number of Windows boxes without any success, call me warped but it's a developer trait trying to make crap break.  I've used everything from an old POS $400 laptop up to a brand new high end machine, can't make any of the updates fail.  Old to brand new USB ports, various USB drivers, Windows 7 to Windows 10...and they all work without fail.  I can normally make just about anything break, but haven't been able to make the Helix updates do so, Yet :)  Here is what I've done each time:  Install/update to the latest Helix utility/updater, then run the updater and have it download and install the firmware patches....it's pretty much clicking a few buttons and it works.  If you haven't installed ALL available Windows updates, I'd recommend you do that first though.....people often ignore these then wonder why they have driver and/or other issues.  Another suggestion, if you have an anti-virus/malware utility running, and you should, turn it off before you do an update....don't forget to turn it back on after you do the update. 

Now, on the other side, Line 6 really needs to make some pretty simple/intuitive adjustments to their updater, they aren't blameless with some of this stuff and I can see where a lot of frustration from many comes from.  Why do all the existing patches on someone's Helix need to be nuked by an update, and even if they do, how bloody hard is it to write a simple global backup into the updater that fires first, apply the firmware update, then offer a full restore of the owner's backed up settings, IR's, user patches, etc....what, maybe a couple of days for one developer to code and test something like this?  Pretty basic development stuff here Line 6 and doing this would relieve a lot of the frustration your customers are experiencing.   Not crazy about the Helix utility in many ways, but have to say you all have built pretty solid updaters, however your backup and restore options could use some work. 

Fix the bugs, improve the latency item, add 20-30 amps, 20-30 effects, improve some of the existing models, call it a day for the Helix....then improve the editor AFTER the aforementioned items.   AX8 doesn't hold a candle to the Helix form wise but if "more" is "better" to someone, get one because it does sound great just as the Helix does....Helix runs in a KISS mode, which is exactly what I want as I don't want to d*ck around with tech at the expense of playing music, which is what we all buy gear for in the first place, at least in theory :)

First thing.. in the 2nd page of the amp model... turn down the master volume. You are getting some of that grit there... you can decrease the bias to clean up the power amp sim a bit more too.

Just tried adjusting the bias, works great to get that last bit of grit out of the tone.  Hadn't thought about that, thanks for the tip!!!!

I've been looking for a similar sound and found that using the Helix US Deluxe normal pre-amp with a third party IR did the trick.

 

I recently bought some 3 Sigma IR's and found that their Fender 65 Twin IR opened up the sound and gave some clean high's w/o break-up compared to the built-in Deluxe cab. I haven't tried my Ownhammer IR's yet.

Did the same, clean amp settings with Redwirez IR did the trick...no breakup at all....though I did put in a "touch" of verb on my simple patch for a little more depth....

Youre arguing semantics. The bottom line is that if a company is going to release a new chip 3 months down the road, or replace a $1500 product a year down the road, they need to make that abundantly clear to people, otherwise theyre just trying to push theyre old stock off on to people. They knew it was on its way......

 

How would you feel if you bought a variax and a week later they come out with another that sounds way better,  plays way better, looks way better?  I know i wouldnt be too overjoyed. Id tend to think "man if idve known that, i would have just waited."

.

You probably should never buy another product as long as you live, especially one involving electronics...

Maybe the editor doesn't like it if you change the DPI settings in the OS from the default? Might be worth a check.

Will give that a look when I get back from my road trip....haven't had any luck so far with the few changes I've tried.....hopefully will be able to find the culprit :)