ozbadman

Hey guys

 

I'm not sure if this answered in the faq forum because I might not know the technical term. I just got my helix today and I'm trying to figure out my setup. I also have an axe fx 2 and I was wondering if I could use the helix as the foot switch when I want to use the axe fx, I'm sure all the fancy features wouldn't work and I'd only be able to use one or the other if it did work but just curious if anyone has any insight here :)

 

Thx

You should be able to get pretty decent AxeFX control out of the HELIX I would think. I haven't done it, but you should be able to both choose patches and turn effects on/off using the HELIX as your controller without too much effort. And, you should be able to name the HELIX patch the same name as the AxeFX2 patch so you know what you're selecting. It's not too difficult to set up either on the HELIX or the AxeFX2.

But as I said...it happened to me a couple of times per set at my gig. I wasn't using the wah when it happened on any of the times. So it's not just the wah pedal causing it.

Hey Robbie,

Did the patch you were using have a wah pedal in the chain (maybe disengaged), or no wah pedal/controller anywhere in sight?

yes....there must be a bug on some units, incl. mine....all !!! my presets sound fizzy as well...unusable, whereas other report they sound great...so i´m pretty sure, that´s a bug...just can´t understand why it takes L6 so long to tell us... 

L6 told us some weeks ago. Have you got the latest firmware?

Can we get some input from L6 on this? Do they see it as a problem? If so, is it a hardware problem? Will they need to change the circuit for future builds to fix this problem?

Just a comment rsto010,

Really nice job on trying to isolate and reproduce the problem so L6 can fix it at some time. Hopefully, soonish for all you guys affected by this. :)

Thanks guys but my question is more about the dt amp than the guitar... will I find myself wanting a better amp to match the better guitar?

The american strat is nearly three times the price of the dt. Is that too much of a difference?

The DT25 is an excellent and very versatile amp. It is in no way a "cheap" amp, and will match expensive guitars. Playing a USA strat through it will sound stellar. Mexican strat will sound OK. My USA strat sounds infinitely better than any of the Mexicans I tried, and I have no regrets. A great guitar through an OK amp can still sound great. An OK guitar through a great amp, not so much.

I'm assuming this could be fixed with a software update.

It would be nice to get a confirmation of that from L6 to set our minds at ease. L6?

Unfortunately, you can't get a neutral sound without a tweeter. A PA/FRFR system is the closest you can get to a neutral sound. You might get some great sounds out of the Junior, but they will not be neutral.

American strats are definitely better than Mexican strats. Apart from generally better hardware, the major tonal difference is that the pickups are different. Mexican strats sound OK. American strat pickups sound very different. There's a reason American strats are the norm. I would suggest just an American Standard, and you'll never be second guessing yourself as to whether you should have spent the extra $.

But I do know that if you put a pic of the Standard alongside a pic of a Pacifica, they're damn-near identical. Coincidence? Maybe, but it would be an award-winning coincidence...

I'm not really sure what point you're trying to make. L6 has said that the Variax Standard is a Pacifica variant, allowing L6 to put out a Variax at a lower price point due partially to economies of scale, and partially to lower individual component costs and sure, not paying James Tyler (but I doubt that was their main motivation). Seems like a pretty obvious business opportunity to easily marry the strengths of the two companies, and put out an entry-level Variax. DI has stated they have no current plans to discontinue the JTVs.

I think that's called "if we sell these instead we don't have to cut checks to James Tyler anymore"... ;)

That's a pretty cynical view. As DI said, it looked to me like a way of getting Variax tech into a more cost-effective product. FWIW, I will be getting one early next year as I hated the look of the JTV69, but like the feel of strats. I may use the Standard as a transplant, possible even into a Variax 700 (which is an awesomely built guitar), but I like the knob layout more than the 69 layout, so if I do, it'll make a better transplant for me. YMMV.

Yup...in all likelihood, Yamaha is just a wallet. Day-to-day ops have probably changed very little, if at all.

Except Variax Standard is clearly a collaboration of some sort, so there is some cross pollination going on. It's not totally hands-off.

Just curious, if you say it sounds great through the headphones, have you tried taking the headphone out to your monitors? Does it sound great or crap? Does it sound the same as it does if you use the outputs? I am just starting to wonder if some units have some physical problem in the output stage that hasn't been identified since we have seen a few people reporting here that their units sound crap at volume even when the headphones sound OK, whereas most report they sound fantastic.

So if somebody's over at Line 6 would get a hold of the guy give him a helix and let him make a preset pack and just start with the next firmware update change all the factory presets to his. I guarantee you wouldn't be sorry.

Well, I'm not sure you can make that guarantee. I would be VERY sorry to see Line 6 do that. As a non-metal head, every tone that guy played sounded identical to me (OK, I'm exaggerating somewhat). The presets in the HELIX have a nice blend of different styles. If you guys think this guy nails the metal tone (you guys would say tones, :)), then maybe he could put the metal presets together, but I have no interest in metal tones, so well done Line 6 for putting in a wide mix of styles in the presets.

:)

So now we have ship dates 12-18-15 this is getting worse every day, I guess it is still a ramp up problem, LOL. If it is maybe you need to find a new company to make the device because they one you have sucks. Sure eventually it will be available but thats not the point, the point is Line 6 had a product that was going to change things, hyped to the moon and announced in June. Now here we are in mid Nov and nothing but promises. It does not say much for a company that they can't give a straight answer or have all there ducks in a row and be ready for full production.

I disagree with everything you say here. Line 6 is doing exactly what any other reasonably well-run company would do and frankly, meeting expectations, which is not something they have always done in the past with product shipments. Whether that is because of them or Yamaha's influence I don't know, but I congratulate everyone at Line 6, and particularly Product Management, for their vast improvement in this area. They still need to do a bit more work on their pre-release testing and QC, but that has also improved greatly compared to days past.

Hello everyone,

 

Is it possible to record bass guitar as midi in logic pro x?

Thanks in advance for your advice  ;)

HELIX cannot do note to MIDI conversion. If you don't want to do it in your PC, you need to do as suggested above with a bass pickup and something like a Roland processor.

Bearing in mind that people often forget when using true bypass that the extra cable between their effect and the amp then causes loss of high-frequencies. See the article by Pete Cornish as to whether true bypass is really a good thing or not. Any "tone suck" is often caused by comparing the guitar plugged directly into the amp, to the same guitar and same cable, plugged into an effect, then an additional cable going from the effect to the amp. With true bypass, the capacitance of each cable contributes significantly to loss of high frequencies/sound coloration.

i´ve had the same problem...who is CS...???

there are some pretty annoying things when making presets with this unit...

will there actually be a helix edit or sthg...? that would be very nice...! when you reorganize instant access switches f.e. you have to always rename the single switches again, which really is annoying with this joystick...or you should be able to store your favourite fx together with its´ settings and be able to recall them in other presets....

CS would be Customer Service

I'm obvious biased, but Helix was meticulously engineered to maintain signal integrity all the way through. "Tone suck" is in the ear of the beholder, but we're running the same converters (well, 8-channel versions) as boxes that cost a lot more. Reports from the field in this regard have been overwhelmingly positive.

As I understand it, "tone suck" is usually caused by the difference between plugging a cable directly into a guitar, vs into an effects box. When a passive guitar is plugged directly into an amp, the circuit interacts directly with the preamp, so the capacitance of the cable becomes part of the resonant circuit along with the preamp circuit itself, and the passive pickup and volume/tone controls of the guitar. So, any device between the guitar and amp becomes a "tone changer". Devices like HELIX try to compensate by presenting a variable impedance to the guitar, then process the signal, and send the result out the device to the amp, with a low impedance output to stop further coloration. HELIX has a variable impedance input for the guitar, which should mostly compensate for this, assuming the guitarist used the same cable between the guitar and HELIX that he/she would normally use between the guitar and their guitar Amp.

Please correct me if I am wrong.

Sorry but no it is not normal and production ramp up should have taking place BEFORE the release date. Speaking of Apple products when they announce the release date it gets released that day and the last couple of times I went to get a new iPhone I got it that day. I work in the manufacturing, production workplace and yes problems do happen but we have always ramped up way before the actual ship date so as to be ready for any problem that may come down the pipe line. It just does not say too much for line6 to put out a product that from many forums was so hyped and many people were ready to buy that day now to have a possible ship date pushed back into December. I will go out on a limb and say that the December date gets pushed back into January possibly February. I would rather line6 just come out and say hey we are having production issues instead of being fed lines like it is normal for this and ramp up time, etc.

Sorry, but yes, it is extremely normal. I do not work for Line 6, but this is perfectly normal across all industries for all types of products. Your rant against Line 6 in this case is misplaced.

Here's just 1 example from Apple this year:

http://www.apple.com/pr/library/2015/06/04Apple-Watch-Arrives-in-Seven-More-Countries-June-26.html

So we were told by the end of the summer which turned into the end of Oct and some of those who pre-ordered way back in June got there unit. Now we are waiting again Guitar Center just pushed back to 12-11-15. So was Line6 not ready from a production point or are there problems with production, where was the ball dropped this is ridiculous.

This is normal for every company. No dropping of the ball. Production has ramp up times. Try being one of the first people to get an Apple product. I realise you're probably anxious like a kid at Chrsitmas to get yours, but this is bog-standard production releases of any new product for any company. And no, it's not ridiculous, it's entirely normal.

Five times here in Australia. It really is massively expensive, and no try before you buy. But Mcoffey, I'm a few days into messing with it and the potential is enormous. Recording wise I expect to get the most out of it but live, probably combined with a lightweight frfr, it will replace my entire amp and pedal rig as well as giving me instant Variax model and tuning with each song preset. If you tour the freight/hire costs alone will pay for it after a while. Sell some stuff and dive in I reckon.

Actually, only 3x even in Australia. Same as the US prices. See my maths above.

As good as Helix may be is it 5 times better than a HD 500?

That is the price difference here in Sydney is $2400 retail.

I just cant justify it. The Aussie dollar is crap right now. 71 us cents,

For USA buyers the Helix is only about twice the HD500X

CORRECTION: three times the amount

In Sydney, the HD500X is AUD$800, so in both AUS and the US, the HELIX is 3x the price of the HD500X. Pretty much the same as the US price after including currency conversion and GST: US$1500 = AUD$2400 (using 0.70 conversion rate, 10% GST).

TheRealZap may well be correct but I am wondering if there might be another way as the verbiage on the instructions from the Line6 firmware download seem to indicate that this is simply the easiest method (and definitely the one I use).  Here is what Line6 says "The easiest way to perform the update process is by installing the latest version of Line 6 Updater."

 

Can DigitaIgloo weigh in on this, is there another method other than the Line6 Updater to update the firmware?

Ahhh. Interesting. Good point.

https://www.google.com.au/search?q=usb+B+to+A+female

Yeah, but the point is I don't think Line 6 would make an update where you have to buy a special adapter a normal thing, especially for their marquee product. If they intended people to use a USB stick in the future, they would have put a socket on the Helix. MIDI is a little different since the Helix is intended to be used with MIDI. I still doubt they'll ever change from expecting users to download over the USB cable from their computer though.