aleclee

Increasing master volume on the amp model might help get you some compression with minimal added dirt.

I'm sure it's exhausting.

not nearly as tiresome as snarky people who think I'm advocating for purchasing brand name stuff as opposed to reminding them about the longer term implications of going generic.

As a guy whose days are filled with implementing processes and systems to protect my organization's data, I have mixed feelings about this.  

 

On the one hand is my knee jerk reaction that more protection is better, especially if it can be made optional.  On the other hand, when I look at the risk,  I have to wonder when the protection would actually be applied.

 

What are the risks that are of concern?  The OP mentions two potential risks:

• ​Theft of IP in the form of presets
• Inappropriate modification of presets

As far as theft of presets, I'd probably be more concerned about theft of the device. First, there's no particularly easy way to offload presets without hooking a computer up to HX, running Helix Edit, and exporting a preset, setlist or bundle.  It's not like someone can shove a thumb drive in the HX, hit "export" and run away with your tonal goodies.  On the other hand, someone who made off with your Helix could, password or not, go through the presets and manually note the preset parameters even if unable to export.  If the password function were to lock down even viewing of parameter values, that would indeed be a Vista-level act of user inconvenience, further dissuading folks from actually using the feature.

 

If you're more concerned about inappropriate modification, a passcode feature would be overkill and in most cases the risk could effectively be mitigated simply by making frequent backups.  If you had your heart set on a new feature offering such protection, it could be accomplished with a write-lock feature, perhaps as a global setting.  If you want to avoid clobbering a preset, got to global features and disable write-lock.  When you're happy with things, go back and re-enable.  It's still no substitute for backups. Sometimes we make weird choices when our ears or brains are fatigued.

If you only use the mono output from the Helix, it'll sum the output to mono.

The only thing I care less about than what's on the headstock, is re-sale value. We're not talking about a Stradivarius here...Like my rides, I don't buy instruments as investments. I buy them to use, and I'm certainly not going to spend more money on something that I don't genuinely want, merely because the rest of the world has swallowed the advertising hype and decided that it's "better". Nor because it might be worth a few extra bucks if and when I choose to sell it. The ones that I end up parting with, I get whatever I get...if I make some money back, great. If not, oh well...

 

 

Good to hear.  I'm pretty tired of the poor guys who wonder why the partscaster they paid $1200 sells for a couple hundred less than a used Strat that originally cost about the same as their no-name.

For the same, if not less money, I'll get something that's almost guaranteed to be prettier than anything Fender will sell me (unless one is willing to pay exorbitant prices and go the "Custom Shop" route)

 

From what I've seen, total cost of ownership on Warmoth-casters spikes when resale time comes.  At that point, the brand matters a lot more.  I know a lot of folks say "but I'll never sell this" but eBay and Reverb might say otherwise.

Not buying it when it comes to playing guitar onstage with a band. In an environment when your ear is hearing both the original string impulse (even if only very faintly) and an amplified source, yeah, makes sense, and I've experienced it in a studio setting. But in an environment where background noise is masking your string sound, nope — don't buy it. 

 

Okay, you don't believe research by Yamaha Pro Audio and AES.  They're pretty sketchy organizations when it comes to Pro Audio know-how anyway.  :rolleyes:

 

Here's an easy way to do your own double blind experiment:: dial in a 20ms delay at 100% mix and have someone turn it on and off so you don't know the state.  If the perceptual difference is greater than standing 20' away from your speaker (probably something you have some experience with), you've confirmed my hypothesis.

Let's see that assumption stand up to a double-blind test before we get too attached to it. 

 

You might want to have googled "acoustic latency perception" before referring to my assertion as an assumption. Believe it or not, I wasn't pulling that concept out of the aether.  

https://thecrocoduckspond.wordpress.com/2015/04/02/latency-myths-and-facts-why-echo-perception-is-different/

 

If you're looking for something more quantitative, I will assume that you trust Yamaha's research:

http://www.yamahaproaudio.com/northamerica/en_us/training/selftraining/audio_quality/chapter5/05_absolute_latency/

 

If you want something more academic, you can sift through this: 

The Effects of Latency on Live Sound Monitoring

It's also valuable to bear in mind that 1ms in latency is the equivalent of standing a hair less than 1' further away from the sound source (using the average 1125 fps free air speed of sound), so even a 10-12ms total latency is only the equivalent of wandering towards the front of a stage by not even the length of your average guitar cable. 

 

 

It's really not because your brain has acoustic cues that help it compensate for time of flight that are absent when the delay is in the box.  1ms isn't gonna make a difference by itself but when the total "in the box latency" (digital wireless + Helix + whatever else is in the chain) gets above 7ms, things start to feel disconnected.  Most folks would notice 10-12 ms of latency in the box where they wouldn't notice 20ms (or even 50) in time of flight.

I'd be down with whatever if it got me in the vicinity of Andy Timmons' sound.

Also might want to check your voltage. It's less likely since you're having issues in more than one place but low voltage situations can cause a number of gremlins.

How does this relate to the last item in the FW 2.21 release notes?

What model is that he's playing?

 

 

I believe it's a Variax 700

The way I'd like block defaults implemented would be with no snapshot controllers. Just save the current state of the block and that's what gets called up.

I don't expect any firmware releases to correspond to NAMM. Hardware, yes, but a software update isn't going to be a blockbuster release anyway. At this point, I figure L6 will just release updates when they're ready.

Thanks!

I'm trying to apply EQ to some cab IRs and save as WAV files on my Mac.  I was hoping that I could just do it in MixIR2 but that doesn't appear to be the case.  It occurs to me that I might be able to import the (very short) wav file and just apply EQ and bounce it but if I do that, do you have any suggestions on how to bounce it to a 2048 sample WAV?  I think 64 ticks at 375BPM might do it but wouldn't mind advice from someone who's actually done it.

Personally, I just cut/paste block settings across presets but you could always put that request on IdeaScale.

The worst part is being so engrossed in playing that your first indication that someone wants to ask you a question is when your feel an unexpected tap on your shoulder and jump 10' into the air in initial response.

This is a big part of why I've preferred open-back headphones when playing through a modeler.

 

It's like playing while standing 30 feet away from your monitor speaker. 

 

Pipe organists in a cathedrals and big churches have to deal with it when the pipes are 150' away from the console. They basically have to concentrate on their fingers/feet and ignore (or embrace) the delayed sound coming back to them 150ms later. That leads to slower passages with lots of legato, and tempos that are related to the inverse delay time.

 

A lot of folks mistakenly compare latency to an equivalent delay of audio time of flight through the air.  Problem is that that playing through headphones, you lack the psychoacoustic cues that allow your brain to compensate for the delay.  Playing a guitar 50 feet from your speaker is no problem at all.  Try dialing in a 50ms delay in your Helix playing through headphones and see what it does to the feel relative to playing with zero added delay.

Personally, things start getting uncomfortable beyond about 7ms of latency inside the box.  If that wasn't the case, I'd have used the amp sims in my iPad a lot more.

I have a bit of a dilemma and I was hoping you could help. I'm ready to purchase the Helix Rack hardware for my studio but then read you were developing a (software) Native version—due this Spring. I'm so tempted to buy the Rack, basically 'cause I'm an impatient person, but was wondering if it was worth waiting for the software version to be released and holding off altogether on the Rack? Sure, I know I could save a $1,000.00 by waiting on the Native version but is there any advantage to owning the Hardware, over the Software?

At the risk of having my forum handle changed to "Captain Obvious", I think the key question is "What would you use the hardware for?"  

If you

• prefer working in the box
• have a low-latency interface with appropriate impedance input
• do not intend to use the Helix in a live setting

I don't see a great reason to buy the hardware.  I like the idea of recording through the Helix, capturing both wet and dry inputs.  That gives me a starting point from a tone standpoint but enables me to totally decouple the performance from the preset, optimizing the guitar sound for the mix within the preset.  Also, composite takes can be re-amped and delays/reverbs can be applied within the preset.  Once the sounds have been finalized, they can be saved back to the hardware unit for live use.

 

If your usage patterns don't particularly look like that, you may come to a very different conclusion when it comes to going software-only.

LT owners get $100 off.  They haven't yet announced anything about discounts for Pod Farm owners.

If Line 6 changed "Helix" to "Helix Editor" -- in the 2nd "Software" Column -- it would make things a lot clearer!! Doing so, would eliminate ONE of several ambiguities that commonly trips up some users.

Tripped me up

I prefer recording direct using Helix via usb as the audio interface. It eliminates a D/A and A/D conversion in the signal flow. Helix is also an extremely powerful and flexible interface with 8 in/out channels, supporting direct dry signal recording and easy hardware reamping.

 

Ditto.  Besides, with 24 bit recording, headroom is much less of an issue.

That's my backup rig.

I've been using a QSC K8 for many years, and it's served me well through an XT Live, HD500, and now Helix. It's loud enough to cut through in the pop/rock bands I've played in. I've never played with very loud drummers, but also have never even approached the K8's limits - not sure where its limits are.

 

I have a couple of K8's too. They reasonably kept up with the Dual Recto full stack used by a guy I used to play with.  When i'm willing to run in mono, my CLR gets the call.  Loud as **** and clear as most studio monitors.  Speaking of studio monitors, when playing at home (most of my playing these days), my Equator Q8s are great.

 

That said, when my last band was gigging regularly (pre-Helix), I just ran direct and just get enough of myself in my monitor mix.