phil_m

No. It won't even affect the sound from the pickups if you want my opinion.

I'm glad you go it to work for you, but I've got to say, I've never had any issue with iTunes recognizing MP3s that I didn't buy or rip through iTunes. I have plenty of files from third party sources that are in my iTunes library, including ones that I've made myself. As long as the MP3 is tagged properly, iTunes will see it.

Yeah, you can stream audio from any app through the Amplifi. It's like any other BT speaker in that regard. It's just that if you're playing audio with another app, you don't have the automatuc tone matching capability in the Amplifi app. You can always manually search for any tone, though.

The Amplifi app is looking at the library for the native Apple "Music" app. It's the app that you sync with iTunes. One thing to be aware of is that if you're using iTunes Match, you may see a lot of songs in your library in the Music app, but if those songs aren't actually downloaded onto your device, the Amplifi app won't be able to play them or do automatic tone matching with them.

That's the way it works on the Amplifi products, and that's the way Firehawk works as well. You have three "wildcard" blocks that can be any drive, mod, delay or filter you want, but other blocks are fixed. Of course, you can still select the type of reverb and wah you want, and there is some flexibility in where they can be in the chain. Regarding the M9, yes, you can have 6 delays in a scene if you want, but only three of them can be active at any given time. You could have three active delays in a preset on the Firehawk as well, it's just that you don't have the same sort of scene functionality that the M9 has. But on the M9, if you were using three delays, that's all you could have. On the Firehawk you still have reverb, wah and volume pedal. Plus you have the effects loop if you want more effects in a preset.

What are you trying to do with it, exactly, and where do you have it in your signal chain. First of all, it's a monophonic shifter, for the most party. Depending on the interval, you could some polyphonic stuff. It also wants to be early in the chain. You might want to put a compressor or noise gate before it, but other than that, it should be in front of everything else. Also, it's a model of the Whammy pedal, so it was really made to do the pitch bending effects the Whammy is known for while being controlled by an expression pedal.

Well, the mic sims aren't active in those modes. You may hear a click when you select a different mic, but the mic sims themselves aren't affecting your tone. Also, you may want to try leaving the cab sim on - that really what those output modes are designed to compensate for.

What are you connecting the HD500 to? If you select either of the Power Amp output modes, that will turn off the mic sim, well mostly. I believe they use a very flat reference mic for that mode.

Yep, someone wrote a book about this (not about the POD, of course, but about being overwhelmed by options) called The Paradox of Choice. Basically, the more options we have to choose from, the more likely it is that we will experience regret, i.e., buyer's remorse, after making a choice. It's easy to get caught up in the cycle of always second guessing yourself and trying find a more perfect option. Guitar players are funny that way, because when you actually listen to many of the guitar tones in a lot of classic recording, they really aren't that spectacular. Sure, there are some great ones, but many of them are pretty simple, and a lot them would probably be ridiculed as really bad if people put them up as examples on different forums today.

Yes, it's called an ABY switch... :) You would use the same pedal for taking two guitars into one input as you would splitting one output to go to two sources.

That's a bit like ordering a hamburger and saying its biggest problem is that it isn't a cheeseburger, isn't it? Sure it would be nice if someone gave you some free cheese, but that rarely happens in this world... ;)

Nothing happens. The phantom power voltage is applied to pins 2 and 3 in an XLR connection and it's +48V in reference to pin 1, the ground. Things like dynamic mics and other XLR connection that don't require phantom power have no electrical connection between the ground and the other pins, so the voltage is simply not seen.

Well, hopefully this is something that can be addressed with a firmware update. I know when the HD500 was first released, the gap in changing from one preset to another was an issue, too. They were able to make it much smaller with a firmware update.

It doesn't say anything in particular when you do the reset. The one thing you should notice is that is starts up on patch 1A of the first setlist.

Are you talking about the on-board pedal? Its' taper is actually more like an audio taper. The external pedal's taper is dependent on the taper of whatever pedal you use. The Line 6 EX-1 is linear, I believe.

Well, the dropout shouldn't be anywhere near a second... I echo Silverhead's comment - are you attached to your computer when doing this? There will be a longer than normal delay when changing patches then. Otherwise, it's pretty fast. You're not using one of the DT amps are you? That's the other thing I could think of. If you're going to a different topology with a patch change, that can cause a longer delay. EDIT: I went back and read your first post, and it appears that perhaps you're switching presets on the HD500X via MIDI. I have read of people having issues with a delay like this with some MIDI gear.

Regarding the preset switching, can you explain a little more what you mean by crackle? A small interruption is expected, but there shouldn't be any crackles or pops. I suppose if you are changing presets while you are in the middle of playing, it could be pretty abrupt. But you shouldn't be getting any extraneous artifacts.

Looking at the list here, maybe the opto would be more common: http://carlscustomamps.com/types-of-tremolos-in-tube-amps/

Fender has used both types of tremolo in different amps throughout the years, although I think the bias trem is the more common. The opto trem will give you a harder sounding trem with more pronounced cut off. As far as where it should go in the signal chain, technically, it happens in the power section of the amp (at least bias trem does), but you can't really do that on the POD. I'd say it really depends on how you want to sound. With the Fender amps on the HD, I actually like running all my effect before the amp model, but you can certainly put modulation and time-based effects after the amp model as well. The funny thing to me about Fender and tremolo is that on the amps themselves they call tremolo "vibrato", but then they have a "tremolo" arm on their guitars, which, technically, is really vibrato (altering the pitch).

The amps that have "Line 6" in their name were ported over from the XT/X3, and Line 6 didn't offer those options in the XT. Beyond that, these models are actually purely Line 6 creations, so I don't think there was really anyway for them to add those parameters in. The other amp that doesn't include those parameters is the Pete Anderson Custom. It was ported over from the 2.0 series, so again, they just didn't model those parameters when they originally shot the amp.

Well, first off, the Firehawk isn't really meant to be a successor or upgrade to the 500 or 500X. Really, in most ways, the HD PODs are still more advanced in terms of signal routing and flexibility. The Firehawk is really meant to a product that offers a simplified user experience. To address your specific question: 1) Maybe. It wouldn't be all the model packs, though, as some of the amps in the new model packs are already in the Firehawk. 2) I'm not really sure what you're saying here. Are you trying to use the Firehawk as your soundcard? You're saying you're not getting the system sounds from the PC? Are you sure it's set up as the default soundcard? 3) Nope, no dual tones. 4) Can't really comment on that one. 5) I don't believe Firehawk is going to see Monkey support. I think there will a separate USB utility similar to what Amplifi uses for updates.

If you're connected to BT while switching presets, yes, there will be a lag. This is because the BT has to sync the hardware with the app. BT is simply not a high speed connection, so there's no way around. If you're not connected to the app, though, and just switching presets on the hardware itself, it should be a lot faster.

Now that I'm thinking about it, there is another way you could hook up two guitar to the Firehawk. If you're not using the FX loop, you could use FX return as an input. I was just looking at the app, and you can move the FX loop block so that it's early in the chain. The only drawback is that you can't put it first in the chain. It has to be after the noise gate and wah, but if you're using an acoustic, that wouldn't really matter. So you could set it up that your patches for the acoustic have FX loop on, and your other ones don't. Like I mentioned, though, that would only work if you're not using the FX loop for something else.

Well, I never owned the Firehawk, but looking at the app and the manual, I don't really see how it could work any differently than what I've said. There's no where to select different inputs for different tones. So, that just my interpretation of the information I have available to me right now. Also, it's how earlier Line 6 products with similar inputs worked - the XT Live, for example, worked that way. As far as the 500X's inputs, it actually has 4 physical inputs - guitar, aux, mic, and Variax (technically, you could actually use the FX returns as inputs, too). You can assign them however you want for each patch (or you can set them globally, too). You can have guitar, aux, and variax all active at the same time if you wish. You can't have mic active with the other inputs for the same tone path, though. But, basically, you have a lot more flexibility with the 500X when it comes to inputs.

I don't see any picture in your post. Are you sure the pedal isn't working and just doesn't need to be calibrated? http://line6.com/support/page/kb/_/pod/pod-hd500-hd500x/pod-hd500xhd500-pedal-calibration-r161