ozbadman

Sure, in situations like this, luthiers wouldn't be able to fix an issue like that. A local electronics guy could probably determine the problem, and tell you it needs to go back to the manufacturer. Yes, that could be a problem, but I think it's more the exception than the rule and even if the replacement doesn't work, there's really no way you could have made the situation worse, unless you broke a knob or something, but that's true of any guitar repair. Exactly. Whether it's a luthier, doctor or mechanic, once he says "yeah, not sure", it's time to go to the next guy. My only point is that a lot of things can in fact be fixed by your local luthier, including variax things. Here's the quote from the OP: Notice he doesn't say his luthier doesn't understand, he says "if my luthier doesn't understand". He was looking for feedback on whether he can take this problem to his luthier. He was worried that being a variax, the pots may be complicated. And they are, but only in the sense they are special parts. And yes, he can go to his luthier first. It's a simple fix. If his luthier looks at it says he can't fix it then that is the time to take it to an authorised service center (or local electronics guy). Agreed, and it's really not very different to taking your prized Fender/PRS/LP to him with a broken pot. As long as you also give him the replacement part. I see, and I think that is a great point, which people probably would not have thought of. But apart from that, I think people should feel quite OK with taking their Variax to a luthier or electronics guy if necessary and when he says "no idea", then it's time to call Line 6. I think it's important that people are not afraid to do that.

Sorry clay-man, but I can't agree with you here. I'm an electronics guy and I am always working on things I have never seen before. A lot of them are fixable, some are not. But I know my limitations, and I know when to say "you need to send this back to the manufacturer". Any decent luthier should be capable of doing normal guitar electronics, including complete wiring of pickups, switches, and controls. Now, the Variax is a different beast, but the local "authorised service center" is simply going to do board level replacements as well, not component level replacements. The one advantage I see with an "authorised service center" is that the work will probably be guaranteed. At a board level, the Variax is no more complicated than a standard guitar. The parts are hard to get, but not hard to solder, and no one, not even Line 6 head-office, is replacing components on boards. Not worth the time and effort. Just bin it, and put in the new board. In this particular instance, the OP just has a faulty pot. Dead simple to replace. The problem is that Variax pots are non-standard. But, the part is available, and also dead simple to replace. Sure, in an ideal world these would go back to a local authorised service center, at not too high a cost, but for some people, that is simply not practical and as I say, if you have a decent local luthier, they really can't make the situation worse, and often will make it better.

Really interesting. Always learning. Thanks very much for posting that H. Oz.

It usually means something like harsh overtones, caused by digital artifacts. That is, caused by consequences of the processing itself. For me, it's like fingernails scraped along an old-school chalkboard added to the original sound you're trying to get. At a guess, maybe it's high-order (treble) odd harmonics? Anyway, it's a mildly annoying sound, which I hear much more in Boss gear than I do Line 6 gear.

Interesting. I found it nigh on impossible to get good clean tones out of the AxeFX. Same problem with the Boss stuff. Always sounds digital to me, which is less of an issue for metal. And I look at all the youtube vides of the AxeFX, and they're almost always metal players. I know lots of the metal guys used to complain on here about getting metal tones out of the HD series, but that was also partly because they didn't feel enough metal amps had been modelled. I haven't tried any of the model packs yet, so that could completely change my position, and maybe I need to spend some more time with the Axe again, but I'm O/S. YMMV. :) RE: your level matching comment: Are you saying you could get clean tones you liked, but not at a volume you liked?

To reiterate, the pots on the JTVs are non-standard pots. So, that leaves you with three options in order of expense: 1) Open it up yourself/your local electronics guy and see if cleaning/loose wires is the problem. 2) Try to get a replacement part from Line 6 or a distributor and have that fitted by your local electronics guy. 3) Authorised service center. It looks like these may be the parts you need: http://www.fullcompass.com/product/450983.html

My 2cents, I too have both the AxeFX2 and the HD500/DT25. They're different beasts. Just because the AxeFX is 4 times the price, everyone assumes it is better, and they'll get better tones. To the OP, and anybody else, sure, if you can't get the tones you want out of 1 piece of gear (in this case, the HD500), then you gotta keep looking. But, I would say, don't assume the next piece of gear is going to necessarily be your holy grail, just because it is expensive. I bought both the AxeFX and the HD500 because they're better at different things, for my purposes. To make a gross generalisation, I would say the AxeFX is better at metal, and the HD500 is better at rock/pop/blues/clean. YMMV. But, while Paul McCartney was a great melody writer, he also wrote some pretty good lyrics, and John Lennon wrote some pretty good melodies. The best solution I would say is if you can, don't sell the old gear until you've tried the new gear, unless you're really, really sure you're never going to be happy with the old gear. Of course, one does not always have the finances to do it in that order. And to all, I hope we find the tones we're looking for, wherever we can, with whatever gear we can.

I too infinitely prefer the build quality of my Japanese 700 to my Korean JTV59. I would like the new electronics though. The new Variax Standard is a possibility, and should be easier to fit to a Real Strat if you want to go the transplant route.

My 700 is as silent as a church mouse. No whistling, even with my HD500 and DT25.

Thanks guys. Interesting.

Awesome. Yes, that was the thread I was looking for. Thanks hurghanico. Here's a quote from Digital_Igloo that was in that thread, that may prove useful to people not happy with the sound of the CABS by default.

Ahhh. I think you're right. I think it was the cab-resonance. The post was really interesting but I can't seem to find it.

I haven't tried this yet as I'm overseas with a snowblower, but a lot of people have talked about the CAB modelling. There was a recent post from someone at Line 6 that said something to the effect of setting the DEP parameter I think to 0% may be a good idea for a lot of situations. I realise I have described this very poorly, but I can't find the original post. If someone knows where it is, please post the link here. Anyway, it sounded like that could be a very useful choice for getting around one of the issues that a lot of people have with the PODs.

These should be a direct replacement: http://www.allparts.com/TK-0938-010-Gotoh-3X3-Locking-Tuners-Chrome_p_4705.html I previously bought this (older) model: Gotoh 3X3 Locking Keys Gold - TK-0937-002 Personally, I found the machine heads looked a little small compared to the size of the JTV head for my liking.

Not to confuse you again, but you can't just say .wav file as it's not as simple as that. A .wav file is just a time-domain sampling of an audio signal. So, the normal thing to do with a .wav file is play it in an audio player as it is usually just a sound recording, or song, or audio track. So, if you just said ".wav" file, most people would think you would play it. However, in the context of Impulse Responses, you wouldn't just play it. It is the time domain recording of the output of the system being modelled, if the input signal is an Impulse (infinitely high, zero width signal, area 1 - basically, an impulse is a special signal that contains all frequencies, which is why it's useful). By playing an Impulse into a system, the Time Domain response that comes out allows us to get the frequency response of the system. That is, the transfer function of the system. Once we have that, we can take any normal input signal, like a guitar, and feed it through our digital model of the system and it will theoretically sound identical to putting it through the actual system (assuming perfect reproduction). A 3rd party IR is a recording of a particular system (cabinet, microphone, room, etc. any signal path basically) such that it can be modelled (well, reproduced) accurately digitally. You don't directly play these .wav files, you use them. As noted above, in the context of guitars, 3rd party IRs usually refer to sampled cabs + mics (since you can't sample a cab without a mic).

Maybe. Maybe not. I've seen some pretty strange stuff in my days. Sometimes Engineers (BTW, I'm an Engineer) have a purity about what they're building and can't stand the thought of not doing it "right", forgetting the business imperative. And sometimes, they get so focussed on trying to solve the problem as they see it that they completely overlook the simple solutions. In any case, I'm very happy with my HD500, but I confess I use an external EQ since % means nothing to me. And I congratulate you DI for your active involvement on these forums and most specifically, not being afraid to write like a human being rather than a corporate drone. The world is slowly being turned beige by corporations afraid of their employees expressing opinions and I'm encouraged that Line 6 seems to recognise that companies are better when their people are allowed to be people, and are not afraid they will go off-script (or even better, are not even given a script). Nice one, and thank you. Now, to not continue down the rabbit hole, when's my new Variax Acoustic available for purchase? :) Cheers, David.

Stu, Great post. All ideas/perspectives I agree with and presented with some righteous rage, ranting and humour all rolled into one. Nice one! David. ps: I know Digital Igloo has commented before on how the EQ values in Hz/dB are hard and would require architectural changes, but my view is just store a lookup table before the final display. No comms changes. A perfect Engineering solution? No. A perfect business solution? Yes.

Definitely intended for room tweaking/fletcher-munsen curve adjustment. Looking forward to being able to set up killer patches in my bedroom, and at a gig be able to dial in the global myself such that the sound of all my patches is much closer to the sound I was hearing in the bedroom.

A good part of what you are paying for with the US JTVs is the build quality. The Korean JTVs are similar to the PRS SE series, whereas the US JTVs are closer to a real PRS. My Korean JTV59 is nowhere near the build quality of my Japanese Variax 700, or my USA Strat Deluxe.

Actually, I think the lefty's have got a much better chance now that Yamaha own Line 6. They have a lefty Pacifica, and the new Standard business model would be more likely to work for Lefty's. I think you have a decent chance of having a lefty Standard by the end of the year (they'd need a new board to be manufactured, as well as the pots/switches reversed so there's some work to be done) but my opinion is worth what you paid for it.

+1

Just a side-note, the new variax standard will be much more readily transplantable than the 69s, as you don't need rerouting for the top-hat knob. Yep, it looks like a pacifica, but a cheaper price-point if you want to transplant, and much easier to do so.

Thank you, thank you, thank you Yamaha/Line 6. THIS is the Variax mk 2 I was waiting for. I have a JTV59, but I'm really more a strat guy. I couldn't stand the look of the JTV69, plus the build quality of these Korean guitars was not up to scratch for me. This new variax is exactly the aesthetic I was looking for, at a good price. Hopefully it will be Japanese manufactured, but I somehow doubt it. Maybe Indonesia or Korea, but I trust Yamaha to have the money to get them made well. Even my $99 fender 3/4 is a really well made instrument.

From what I understand, Line 6's new release is a tiara that scans your brain in realtime and plays the music you hear in your head. Interestingly, it still doesn't help people who are tone deaf. And in truth, because they're a modelling company, it actually plays the music you hear in your head as if it was in the head of the person standing next to you. Because it is actively engaged with your DNA, it's was supposed to be called the double-helix, but you can't trademark DNA, so they had to reduce it to helix.

Definitely a brutal story. Hopefully when you get it back they'll have fixed it properly. I would ask them for a free 1 year extension to your warranty under the circumstances. I think you've just been unlucky, and Line 6 was pretty understanding about these things in the past. Not sure how that would play out now they're part of Yamaha.