boynigel

i saw this response too late. already installed the latest version of Edit. sure enough, i can't launch it w/out doing a firmware upgrade first which will wipe everything clean. i've only got on preset that i can't live without. i suppose i can just go through each screen and take settings snapshots with my phone

that worked, thanks. however, i couldn't launch it because it says that i need to update my firmware. it is my understanding that i'll lose all my patches if i update the firmware. obviously under normal circumstances one would back up in Edit but i can't launch it because of the firmware issue. is there any way around this?

i've had my helix for about a year now and finally have some time to mess around with the editing software so i can edit and backup from my laptop. went to line6's site and did a search under downloads for the editing software but all that comes up are firmware upgrades. i want editing software. am i blind? don't see it anywhere

the fact that i'm concerned doesn't mean it's keeping me up at night, just to be clear. but it doesn't change the fact that this problem is becoming more and more common. so much so that at least one boutique amp maker, Louis Electric, uses "moisture-free PCB" as a feature/benefit/selling point with their amps. the other thing is that it is a dormant problem in that it takes time for the moisture to take its toll on the traces. it took my amp 5 years. well out of the warranty period for pretty much every manufacturer. how convenient. i think this is just the tip of the iceberg. just sayin'.

i recently learned that my amp, made by a reputable company who shall remain nameless, is toast. turns out there was moisture inside the PCB which over time rotted the traces within it. my amp tech told me this was becoming more and more commonplace, particularly from amps made using chinese pcb. he rattled off the names of 3 other brands, that shall also remain nameless, that had the same issue. after spending nearly 1500 on my Helix i'm really hoping Line6 isn't using any of the suppliers of this crappy PCB for the Helix or any of their products for that matter!

nobody?

i'd been religiously using the Pigtronix Philosopher's Tone for the past 5 years. 3 months after getting the Helix i took the pig off my board if that says anything

i want to be able to change channels in my Orange Rockerverb 50 Mkii via the Helix, but when looking through the Helix manual i saw this- "IMPORTANT! connect only to amplifiers that utilize "short-to-sleeve" foot switch inputs. Connecting to any other sort of input could cause permanent damage to both your amp and the Helix!" i have no idea if my Orange falls into this category or not. i posted this question in the Orange forums but past experience tells me it could be days before i get a response, if at all. thought there might be a better chance of getting an answer here.

the mix was the fix. i turned it up from its 50% default to 100% and all the weirdness went away. thanks!

i have everything hooked up correctly to my amp via 4cm but i wind up with a strange, hollow metallic-y sound over my core amp tone. kind of sounds like a flanger effect without a moving "sweep". this same phenomena happened when i tried using the Helix (in stand-alone) with my Eventide H9. guitar>helix in, helix send 1 to front of Orange Rockerverb amp, Amp fx loop send> helix return 1, Helix L main out > Amp fx loop return suggestions?

agreed. the only time i have a problem with "made in china" is when they charge as if it were made in USA. the (i'm assuming) made in china Atomic amp shouldn't cost $300 more than an american-made Friedman. i still may give the Friedman another shot in a couple of months. it's an easy fix for them- either fire or train the person over-tightening the screws. they were made aware of the problem and my sweetwater rep told me the problems i had caused a big "to do" at Friedman. they immediately started pulling ASM's off the line and re-inspecting them so i was told.

unless i missed it in the manual, i can't seem to find a way to up the SPDIF output volume going in to protools. i have to max out the fader in pro tools that the Helix is coming in on for it to keep up w/the other tracks volume-wise. any ideas?

beware of the Friedman ASM. i bought one and when i took the speaker grill off i noticed that the tweeter body had two huge cracks in it from some dope on the assembly line over-tightening the screws that hold it in. they also did the same thing to the regular paper-coned speaker, causing the speaker basket to warp slightly. returned mine to sweetwater for an exchange. got the new on a week later...SAME PROBLEM. returned for refund at that poing. now i'm trying to find an alternative. was considering a QSC K12. the Atomic stuff looks nice but seems way over priced. i have a feeling they're made in china too because i've emailed Atomic twice to find out and they never answer me.

OP here. I neglected to mention that I bought this from a dealer on ebay who assured me I’d be getting a brand new, factory sealed Helix. However when I finally received it, the factory seal had indeed been broken and the power cord was not secured in the box, allowing it to bounce around across the top of the unit while in transit from coast to coast. Keep in mind that the (bagged) heavy gauged power cable twist-tied together has the mass and weight of the average stompbox. Initially i was willing to look past all of this because the unit appeared to be working just fine…until the screen started glitching on me as described above. Now I’m thinking my unit was a return due to the screen glitching and possibly even something else that hasn’t reared its ugly head yet to me. I will admit that although the factory seal was broken, the unit was immaculate- not a fingerprint or scratch on it, but I’m always thinking in terms of the straw that broke the camel’s back in terms of the power cable getting bounced around over the knobs while in transit for 3K miles. Now I’m faced w/the conundrum- do I return it for a refund, or am I over-reacting and just need to try the firmware update as a forum member suggested earlier? A penny for you thoughts.

right, i get that. my problem is that an update would force me in to updating my entire pro tools rig which runs rock-solid on its current version. i've got another computer in the house that's running a newer version than OS 10.6.8. hopefully the line 6 software will install on the OS it is currently running. i tried the Line 6 Helix editor (i believe that's what it's called). is that the one i'll be looking for or is it something else. will try again after work today.

that was my go-to plan but my computer's OS is too old to run the monkey updater. can you say, "stuck"? i'd feel better if someone experienced this, updated, and the problem went away. i should mention that after experiencing this problem, even after rebooting, i went out of the house for an hour to do some things and when i came back i restarted it and played with it for about 45 minutes and couldn't get the screen to glitch. that's good and all, but i don't have confidence in it at this point.

two hours out of the box and i'm getting strange picutre noise/distortion...whatever you want to call it, when i edit effects parameters (see pic). anyone else encounter this issue? it also did it during powering up. very discouraging after waiting so long only to do this right out of the box. firmware version 1.0.0

i am considering purchasing sonic port but want to make sure it will do what i need it to do. i would like to be able to use it simultaneously with my ipod to practice along with songs while running amp sims. i read a review on Sweetwater's site that said the 1/8" stereo input defeats the guitar input. another reviewer said it depends on what guitar sim you're using. i take online reviews w/a grain of salt. any actual users here who can clarify? i also want to be sure that the 1/8" stereo in doesn't get routed thru the amp sim.

thanks for that info. the only reason i tried doing an update to begin with was that i had a long-shot hope that maybe they'd changed 1 aspect of the functionality... namely using a number value for the effects' parameters instead of those lousy horizontal bar-graph thingies. hate 'em. am i the only one that would much prefer having the parameters valued 0-99?

decided to check for updates for my m13 after using it for a year or so. currently on v2.04. i have the m13 hookey up to my computer via midi cables going into my protools mbox2 pro. i was able to do a sysex dump/backup with no problems. when i opened monkey (v1.53), it informed me that a new version was available. i clicked to update but was told: "Monkey download failed. reason: http 403- forbidden" i was told to disable popup blockers, anti-spyware, etc. none of which i have running on my intel imac os10.6.8. so now i figure the heck w/it, i'll just use my current version of monkey but when i do that it says "no devices detected", yet when i try to select a device the M13 isn't even listed. so then i select "connect to midi device" only to find that while it does list the M5 and M9, there is still no M13 to select from the devices menu. i'm stumped.