SaschaFranck

I posted this somewhere else already, seemed to have helped quite some folks: - Quit HX Edit! Don't start it again until you're finished with everything following. - Go here and download the Line 6 Updater (in case it's not installed on your machine already): https://line6.com/software/ - Also download the "Flash Memory" from there (it's the actual update). - Install the updater. - Reboot the Helix while holding down switches 6 and 12 (this will take you to safe boot mode). - Start the Line 6 Updater, select "Offline Mode" and see whether it finds your Helix. - If yes, select it and choose "local file". Point it to the Flash Memory file you've downloaded. If you are on Windows, make sure to kill the HX Edit Service running in the background (it does that even if you close the program). In case you don't know how to do that via the Task Manager, just reboot.

Absolutely. Here's a picture of my case. As said, this isn't a "made for Helix" case but one that I had been using for a plethora of other board builts already. Might look a lot less professional than it actually is, but I'm using it like that for almost decades already. All the outgoing cables are fixed by a cable tie (the power cable is around 2-3 meters) and there's absolutely no tone suck or whatsoever by the jack extension adapters (no idea what you officially call them in english), they also hold any plugs pretty tight. The USB cable is a pretty short one that I just disconnect from USB extension cable, roll it up and keep it in the case as well. At home I'm running the two 1/4 outs into a little mixer, for live one of them (I'm strictly playing mono so far) runs into a DI box and then to FOH (would love to use the XLR, saving a DI box, but as Line 6 was too greedy to slap a proper XLR out in - one that would have no issues with phantom power), the XLR out is feeding my wedge or IEM mixer. I would've loved to build a kind of patch bay in, but there's not enough space on this board - and hey, seriously, this is working 100% troublefree for years and years already, so why change anything? Anyway, this way, none of the ins/outs on the Helix ever gets touched (very rare exception: the headphone out) and the raised case edge protects the entire back of the Helix just fine, so no crazy singers will ever stomp onto my precious I/O cables. Fwiw, the Helix itself is fixed just with 6 rather small velcro strips (the board has the "loop" part glued in carpet-style), for additional safety I mounted those foam blocks, so it could't slip around (it doesn't, not even just with the velcro, but better be safe than sorry). When packing things, I slap another sheet of foam onto it and place the guitar cable, one output cable and the rolled up power cable upon that foam. That way, the screen is protected. Ah well, and while we're at it, here's the lid of that case, offering some more storage space (I'm keeping a small music stand, two spare cables and one DI box in there): Again, doesn't look too great, but it's working just fine like that since decades. Setup time is less than 5 minutes (more like 1-2).

Looks pretty much as some typical 50/60Hz cycle hum your cable is catching up. The tuner confirms that - 50Hz is roughly between a G and an Ab, hence just what your tuner is showing. What happens when you connect a guitar and turn the guitar volume down?

One most crucial thing to consider before you buy any case: Make sure you can connect everything without having to move the Helix out of the case. In case you can't, slap in a sort of patch bay. Or some short extension cables (this is what I'm doing because my case doesn't offer enough space for a patch bay). Also make sure there's some extra space. I can put all required cables into my case which is very comfortable. I also have a power extension cable with 3 outlets on my board, something I also wouldn't want to miss. Then, at least the first case (page of the second one doesn't load) is pretty expensive. That was about the price I payed for a custom pedalboard in super high quality - just that I had to drill things myself and had to do the pop rivet job (I could borrow the required tools from the case builder), but everything was perfectly pre-configured, so the entire process of slapping things together took a mere 1-2 hours. Fwiw, if I was building a case again, it'd likely be a mixer-style case. I actually have one of these (too big for the Helix), with the sides going up diagonally. That way, it's very low profile where the switches are and protecting the back just fine. Most cases are low profile all throughout, so you can connect things, but I rather prefer to keep enough space for the plugs and have everything protected nicely.

Fwiw, I've tried what you've suggested and noticed slight improvements. So it seems as if it'd be a valid overall tip. However, for me the synth block is completely useless as it doesn't offer any typical synth options (not even the most simple envelopes for amp and filter) and is not responding to input level. Without anything like that, IMO it's a poor joke. Even as a miserable keyboard player, I'm able to come up with something better easily. Sure, there's the live playing aspect, but I wouldn't touch a sound as unreliable as the Helix' synth block with a ten feet pole in a live scenario. I would absolutely love it if some company would bring something like SY-300 capabilities (or at least a fraction of it) into their top modeler, but I guess it's safe to say that Line 6 won't be that company. So far they haven't even managed to improve the filters over the legacy ones (others than adding a sensivity slider, which you can as well achieve by slapping a gain block in front of the legacy models), they still sound super harsh and digital once they open up considerably. Fwiw, offering something like input level as general modifier could adresss several of these issues at once, plus it'd introduce a whole new level of sound shaping options, but again, I think by now it's safe to say that we won't see anything like that ever coming to the Helix.

Upvoted.

Ooops, didn't know they went that low with the OD-1 (I was aware of the CE-1, but usually it's not too relevant in case you run other active things in front). Triggered by this discussion and because I already wondered about it before, I looked around a bit and found that quite some buffered bypass pedals actually seem to come with lower impedances than 1MOhm. Doesn't seem to be unusual to find something like around 500kOhm. A) Makes me wonder why we don't see anything like 500k in the Helix (the step between 1M and 230k is quite a noticeable one), b) it sort of explains why I'm usually getting along better with 220k than with 1M, as I had a 535 Cry Baby (actively buffered, too) on my pedalboards for decades. This is also why I'd like to see an option to assign an input impedance manually to whatever pedals.

I often do so at home. In case I remember, I switch the capacitive switch functionality off (even if I use it to assign switches, regardless of HX Edit in front of me - it's just a lot faster).

No. They went for something that is only possible/happening in the virtual world, namely a pedal buffering at an input impedance that doesn't exist in the real world. Sure, you could create a buffer coming with 130kOhm input impedance - but AFAIK, those don't exist (for good reasons).

In all honesty, post counts are as irrelevant as it gets. In case someone is right with his first posting, nobody with 7379932992 posts would be "more right" because of the post count. It's one of the biggest downsides of online forums, people respect regulars a lot more, even if they come up with utter nonsense (and no, I'm not refering to Phil but generally).

Btw, as a side tip: IMO, the best fuzzy tone available in the Helix comes from the Top Secret OD. The true fuzz models aren't particularly great for my ears (the one in my Amplifirebox is a lot better, they should steal it - and it doesn't even need any impedance wizardry).

That's true - but yes, it's also true that it's a bit like apples and oranges. Simply because Boss pedals introduce a typical 1MOhm impedance, hence pretty much the same as, say, an amp or most other pedals. In other words: In case you slap a Boss pedal in front of an amp, there's not much of a difference when it comes to the amps behaviour (ok, a bit, because of the active buffer, but let's not get into that). Ok, now slap a fuzz in front of your amp. A Big Muff comes with an input impedance of just 130kOhm. Now, this is all fine because that way the pedal works the best. But once you switch it off, you're back to normal (your amp input impedance). So, not only was the way the Helix did it before FW 3.x just wrong (wrong = not representing the scenario it's supposed to represent, which I think is what a modeler should do), it even had a good potential to mess with your precious amp tone because you thought it'd be nice to slap that pedal in, even if it's on bypass most of the time - and that's precisely what's not happening with Boss pedals. Whatever, before FW 3.x it was pretty much pointless to make use of the auto impedance feature, now it's at least as in the real world (fwiw, personally, I wish I could assign an individual impedance to each drive pedal).

Fwiw, anything assigned via command center brings up just that when touching the capacitive switches. Personally, I'd like to see an option that it'd bring up the target that is controlled, cycling through multiple targets in case more than one assign has been made, just as with footswitches assigned to multiple targets.

It's either you playing barefoot or the capacitive switches acting up for another reason.

Preset loading fine over here, so I'd check everything again. I've only ever seen this message once, when I had forgotten to update HX Edit.

Well, I'd rather think of it as a useful addon to finetune certain things. Just as I was swapping the stock 6L6s in my MkIV in favour of EL34s (to end up with a mix of both, which was possible as well). And maybe to just slap FX between pre- and poweramp for that little gritty extra. For my personal use case it'd likely be perfectly fine if they offered like 3-4 of the most common power amp designs, mainly to use different sorts of PA tubes. I'd rather not like to fool around with swapping individual tubes and such - that'd be quite a rabbit hole indeed.

It's still a big difference between that and being able to insert whatever unit between pre- and power amp.

Sure. For most of whatever "normal" or "utility" FX it might not make too much of a difference, but once you have an option to somewhat "dirty" up, say, a modulation effect, it might be quite worth the effort. I actually often like modulation FX to sit in front of a driven amp, but quite sometimes it's too much warble. In front of a driven/cranked power amp, it might however become just what the doctor ordered.

Well, not really. There's a pretty noticeable difference between cranking a master volume and boosting the input stage of a power amp. However, while I possibly wouldn't need dedicated power amps to feed them with super hot levels, I'd defenitely love to see them for basically two reasons: - To fool around with different pre- and poweramp combinations (which makes quite a difference). - To insert some FX between the two. The poweramp in this case might kind of "gel" things together or add some "bloom" - which I think could be pretty desirable effects.

And fwiw, just having independent power amps would be quite welcomed already. I have a Soldano SP77 preamp that sounds quite gorgeous through the power amp sim of my Amplifirebox. Can't use it as nicely with the Helix.

I would even take that a bit further. Even without going *too* much into whatever details (such as in Fractal or Bias land), I'd like to see some sort of "playground" amp model. What it could/should feature: - Independent pre- and poweramps. - Choice between various basic drive characteristics. - Pre- and post tone stack (that alone would make up for a whole new world of a difference), maybe even some inbetween tone stack options (such as on some Boogies). - Multiple drive stages (ok, we already have these on some ampe), so you could place a tone stack inbetween. In addition, all that would work a lot better with these options: - Customizable tone stacks (as in a parametric EQ). - A "consolidated" tone stack allowing you to not always see all parameters exposed. - Input level as a modifier, at least for all the amp internals (I wish there would be all sorts of modifiers all throughout the Helix, but I doubt we'll ever see that, which is as well a certain part of the reason why I will likely switch to something else). Especially the latter can do *soo* much in terms of dynamic interaction. Once you fool around with, say, Guitar Rig, you'll know how far input levels used as modifiers can take you. You can turn even the most stiff feeling amp into a dynamic monster within seconds. Now route input level to both drive and, say, a mid control (and maybe add some inversed modulation for the treble control) - and *whoosh* there's your amp which will clean up super nicely when turning down your guitar volume, regardless of the guitar used. Anyway, a custom amp would be quite some fun.

And fwiw, a Tube Screamer is indeed working best as a booster pedal, the drive itself is kinda gnarly - plus, it's always as if a part of the clean signal is still coming through. Which makes them a useful tool to boost an already driven amp.

Well, usually overdrive pedals deliver a smoother, less driven sound while distortion pedals are more agressive, producing more drive, too. Sometimes you can't even clearly distinguish the two.

Well, if it was only that, it'd render a whole plethora of drive pedals pretty much useless. As @loydall said already, there's two different approaches (and of course a mix of both). Clean pedal platform amps usually allow for a whole lot more flexibility as you can just slap another pedal onto your pedalboard, possibly giving you an entirely different sound. With amps you'd have to purchase them all, carry them around and find a way to get the required routing done. I mean, there's several MITB ("Marshall In A Box") pedals, pretty much their main goal being to work in front of a clean amp. Fwiw, I own an Egnater Goldsmith overdrive pedal. That one works particularly well in front of completely clean amps but not even remotely as well in front of any driven amps (for whatever reasons unknown to me).

Insert an EQ and control it's on/off status.