boynigel

appears to be more Variax-oriented, not for run of the mill piezos. i'll try digging around

From the guy in the video linked below, go to 6:45: "Here's a piezo into a 3 sigma Audio Taylor IR. I’ve found them to be as good or better than my Taylor 414CE-R running direct [ES2]." https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WfRc2F8H0uc&t=405s Does anyone have any tips for getting some decent faux-acoustic tones via a piezo pickup into an acoustic IR loaded into the Helix, like the guy in the video? I have a few acoustic IR’s that I’ve tried in my LT and they all sound dull and plastic-y, no matter where I move the sliders on all the available IR parameters. Unless there’s been a quantum leap of improvement in piezo pickups since the time my 2008 Parker Nitefly’s piezo was designed, and the piezo in this guy’s PRS? That said, my Parker’s piezo does NOT sound dull on its own, it’s all happening post-IR. My signal chain: Piezo into LT, then into IR, out to ProTools, out of my Mackie HR824’s. Tried adding a clean amp block to see if it improved anything, but it didn’t.

Longtime owner of an LT here. Live, I use it solely for effects, and to control my Suhr PT15IR. Up until now it’s been enough to do everything I need, but things may be changing. My new band has a few songs (and growing) that have acoustic intros and/or breaks, so I’m considering using my Parker Fly’s piezo system, and upgrading to a Floor for the added I/O that can hopefully make this happen (and hopefully tame the pesky piezo quackyness via an acoustic IR and EQ’ing, etc). The idea is to do it all within one unit, and not have to get into buying a dedicated acoustic preamp/stompbox, an A/B switcher, etc…and of course having snapshots for bringing my piezo in/out of the chain would be huge. My LT’s I/O is tapped as I’m also using an Eventide H90 in its effects loop. I would imagine it would be no problem for the Floor to receive/process my Piezo pickup in addition to my regular output, no? I’m also guessing I can send the Piezo’s signal out of the Helix via any available output jack? As far as inputting the piezo signal, would I just use an available FX loop In jack for the piezo, or something else? Most importantly, are there any cautionary tales in using this kind of setup from anyone who’s done it?

My amp's a Suhr PT15IR, so i'm going to assume its spec'd for pedals. it doesn't specify in the PT's manual, it only says, "tube-driven, buffered"

I'm using my LT solely for effects and controlling my amp via 4CM. Is this one of those "just use your ears" settings, or is one more ideal as far as selecting Line or Instrument for the Send/Return jacks. Manual doesn't really say (specific to 4CM), so i'm inclined to stick with Instrument level setting unless there's some good reason to switch to Line that i'm unaware of.

not to mention, it could be argued that due to all the updates (some quite major), helix is technically more like, 2-4 years old...as are QC and others.

i can't wrap my head around needing "hundreds" of IR's...and then auditioning through them. i hate when people say this, so i'm saying it with a bit of reluctance, but here goes- Just PLAY.

Unless i'm missing it somewhere, i don't see anywhere in the manual where it says what the ideal setting is for the big volume knob in a scenario where you're using it solely for effects via 4CM (and amp channel switcher). I've just been setting it to the max setting, but wonder how others set theirs who might be using it in the same scenario, and why they went with something other than diming the knob.

huh? i thought Digital Igloo himself said retailers would start taking preorders around June 25th? I'd also be curious to know if the distance between all the foot switches stayed the same (hopefully).

Even if it's through a youtube video, i wouldn't mind hearing side by side comparisons of Agoura vs OG Helix models. I'm sure the usual suspects on youtube will get 'em well before the general public.

Same. I'm going to wait for a more realized version, especially since these days 90% of the time my LT is used solely for effects and controlling my Suhr PT15. Hopefully the price doesn't go up in that time. Helix prices stayed pretty stable over its run, so there's that.

at approximately 4:24, Eric says, "you can train better models". What exactly does he mean by that?

Old habits die hard, which means i've been keeping my Helix LT's big volume knob at noon for assumed unity gain. I think i recall reading more than once though that many people dime their big volume knob, although i can't recall if there's any good sonic reason for doing it this way or not. is there some benefit i'm unaware of? To me, turning up the Helix volume knob means having to turn my tube amp down to compensate, which is never ideal w/tube amps. still curious though if there is some good reason to have it maxed out.

yes, delays/h90 after amp block. as far as lowering the amp Ch Vol, i use those same amps (and settings) on my other presets, some of which have waaaayyy, more post-amp blocks than the presets giving me trouble, yet i have no clipping noises on them. I'll still give your suggestion a try, but that means those presets that i lower the Ch Vol on will be more quiet than all my other presets...unless i can make up for it by adding volume via the output setting (the circle that comes at the end of the chain) without re-introducing the clipping sound. if that doesn't work, then i guess i'd have to lower ALL my presets' volumes so that they match the ones that i lowered the volume on due to clipping.\ perceived volume matching is such a PIA, hopefully i won't have to get into that as i finally got all the levels good between all the presets only recently.

I have 26 presets for my band and I’m noticing that on 5 of them I’m hearing some clipping noises, like an input is being hit too hard somewhere when I dig in to notes. Clean sounds seem to be the biggest culprit which makes sense as they’re going to have more spikey transients, unlike overdriven tones. FWIW, I have the LT’s guitar input set for Auto, and this has never given me a problem. I also went through every block, particularly delays, that have headroom parameters and turned them way up. This eliminated, or at the very least minimized the clipping noises. For the most part, I can live w/the clipping as it’s pretty faint, and I know there’s no way I’ll hear it when all the other instruments are playing along, but in a perfect world I’d like NO clipping. The one preset that it’s totally unacceptable on uses an effects loop block that goes out to an Eventide H90. The effects loop block isn’t clipping, nor is the H90…at least according to their visual meters. I was able to get rid of the clipping by lowering the fx loop block’s send down to -5.0 db, but naturally this creates the new problem of loss of volume, so I raise the Return level up by the same amount and then I’m back to square one. I do use a 2nd effects loop block that runs an always-on J Rockett Airchild compressor, set very subtly…and gives me no grief on other presets. And again, as soon as I bypass the FX loop block that goes to the H90, the clipping is gone. I’ve been running the effects loop in/outs as Instrument on both the LT and the H90, and experimented with switching them to Line, or having one set to Line and the other set to Instrument with no luck their either. Also worth mentioning- every Amp and Speaker block is pretty much the same from preset to preset, so it’s not like I’m jumping around between amps/cabs with different outputs/characteristics. Any other tips/advice to figure out what’s causing this?