Palico

Good vid, I've never played with the POD EQs much. Now I'm glad I haven't, those don't seem to make much sense at all as how they affect the signal.

Opps missed that.

I would add one thing to your list. Make sure you could try out a amp/pedal model before buying it. It would make the amps kind of like apps.

I've worked with Para EQ before, althought not the one on the POD too much, more ones in DAWs. This is my general take on how to use them. Take a frequency (doesn't matter which one) and jack it up a lot (Gain). The idea here is not to make it sound good but to use it find what you want to boost or more than likely cut. The Q is the frequency width you hearing. On on normal EQ when you boosting say 1k you are not just boosting 1k but a bunch of other frequencies around it too. The Q controls how much you want to boost or cut it. So set a pretty small Q so you getting a pretty much just that frequency boost a whole lot. Not roll the Frequency knob around while playing something. What you looking for what frequency that mud starts becoming very pronounced. So once you find that, your singal probably sounds like muddy mess, but you know know what Frequency that you hearing. So now start widen the Q some and roll back the Gain to unitiy. Now start rolling back the gain into the negative tertorry to start removing that mud. General rule it to cut it a bit but not too much, too much will generally make the guitar sound unnatural. If you happy then you are done. If there was more than one grab another band on the EQ and do the same thing. Where a general EQ could be considered big knife for sculping the sound, the Para EQ is more like a surgial scaple for very precise EQ changes.

Really I love the POD500x as it is. Only 2 things I would like added. 1. An acoustic amp. 2. Amp foot switch (not for real amp but a foot switch to modeled amp so it feels more like working with that amp).

Yep, happens to me too but when using the POD for practice with backing tracking playing off the PC. Usualy seems to happen after a good while of practice but I've never figured out the trigger. A reboot fixes it for me too.

Not sure but 2 things to check. 1. Make sure the X3 is set as the playback speaker on the PC. 2. Make sure the volumen on the PC(usually on taskbar) is turned up.

On tube amp the tubes(valves) will give out sometimes and needs to be replaced. But it's not like it's exaclty 100 hours. I've had some last for years and others that just seem to go out after a couple of months. Usually it's not a big expense either to get a match pair to replace them with.

The 50 watts is going to be louder but I use the DT25 combo even outside I've yet to have place that it was not loud enough for. Unless you playing staidums you really don't need lot of wattage, most of the time the high wattage is needed to have headroom and as guitarist we like out tubes to break up a bit which means low wattage does this a lower volume. I was also woried about the volume as I do play clubs etc...and outside from time to time but it's yet to be problem. Plus it also has a DI out so if you need a bit more you can hook to the PA or mic it anyway.

All on the variax, I like to move my pickup selector switch around while playing so I never let the POD control it. The custom tuning was on custom 1 on the knob. Probably just a glitch but just wondering if anyone else had experienced it, had me worried a bit. Maybe one day I'll switch up to the JTV's but I like no pickups on the older Variax.

So I have my Variax 500 setup with a custom entry that tunes down a whole step for one song. Last night at rehersal I switch to Lester after praciting the song. The D and G string didn't swtich back although the rest of them did. Switch quickly to the Spank and then back to the Lester and all was fine. Rest of the night it was fine. Was wondering if anyone else has had this occur? Or if you think it's a sign on future problems developing on my guitar ?

Well you can map multiple effects to single button that is easy enough. You could also just move to completely differnt patch on the POD to switch over which is sounds close to what you want as well. I don't think it could control the amp channel for the Egnater though. Sounds like you want a midi switching floor board which you could use with the POD( taking the midi in commands) but I don't think the POD itself will function as one. Maybe someone more knowedable on midi might be able to confirm that.

I want one! Apperal on the store link doesn't work.

Yea, this is one that kind of struck me on that statement becuase I've been told that before. Only to tell the group if they don't want and electric guitarist then I'll leave, no hard feelings. Trying to make people understand how sound works can be hard work! Even with my current band which is a great group that we are actually all friends and have similar mind set; I have to tell my singer who occasionaly pays acoustic guitar to quit turning the bass up on the guitar up because I will just re-eq it out on the board if she does. I run the sound, from the stage as well. It has to sit in the Mix and it doesn't have to sound perfect when we are playing live, a little thin at the beginning when the acoustic is by itself is not huge issue. When we record I we set it where it sounds good in the mix and I'll adjust just the open parts to have a bit more full sound with an EQ plug-in.

1. No thanks. 2 & 3. Might be cool but nothing I would use. 4. Great idea would really help with volume leveling.

Reowolf48 was great post and really accureate as for the way speakers are designed. I did this same thing myself and had very similar problems. I dumped the PA speaker and when to Atomic at the time which solved those problems. That was with a X3 and I'm now with 500x and DT25 and have no intentions of going back FRFR. Maybe the sound source speaker solve these problems but I think I'll keep my guitar amps. This is a common misconception for any amplified instrument in a full band, even not using the digital stuff. If you have acoustic drum set there is only so soft that the drummer can play, and most of them guys don't play soft either. Without the drum set going any guitar amp sitting on stage is going to sound loud. If you have starting part in the song before the band comes in then it will likely be too loud. The simple answer is that is what a volume knob or a volume pedal is made for. Just turn down on that part. If you have distorted sound you like and turning down the on the guitar cleans up the signal too much then use a volume pedal in the post mode so it's after the amp. This is a great advantage of the POD units as they can do that and bring the volume down without changing the way it sounds. The secondary problem is a guitar tone that sounds good in a mix often sounds like crap alone. In the mix to cut thought you need pretty trebly tone. You need to listen to it in the Mix instead of alone. When mixing down a recording a lot of time is spent adjusting the EQ to make each instrument sit correctly and that often involves cut frequcies on a para EQ plug-in. So that each instrument sits in space. I'm gonna take a wild guess your acoustic guitarist plugs directly into the PA? If so then part of the volume thing might be truely a monitoring situation not a actual sound problem. They will hear the acoustic as wide angle disprused sound from the monitor, plus just tiny bit direct off the instrument, but if you are running full blast of the stage. So on the stage, yea you are loud because you are having to push your signal out to where the audience is and get decent mix. I'm often suprised how differnt things on stage sound vs. standing in the audience. Lastly it might be performace issue as well. If you have multiple gutiars on stage, I've found a lot of guitarist don't know how to work with other guitarist. We all practice in our rooms with our guitars and maybe a backing track. So we have this tendency to fill up the entire middle section. Generally we are pretty good a moving out of the way of the Bass and Vocals but another guitar is problem because we are playing that part. In groups were you have more than one guitar part going, may would be suprised on simple each indiviual part is. And the Truth is those little parts don't sound like much alone but when you add them together is where it works. Acoustic guitars are the worst about this, I find as they are played alot alone or with just the guitar a vocal. Being you probably are not going to get the other guitarist to change the way they play, change the way you play. If he is playing the say the full G Major chord on the third fret, I probably don't want to play the same thing. I may play the G using a D chord type of shape on the 7th fret, or maybe a barr G using the A form on the 10th fret, or maybe just a selection of the notes out of the chord. I've also had success playing the same exactly chord but picking thought the notes while the other guitarist is strumming them, which works great with a just touch of a chorus effect. Capos can add a lot intresting stuff here too. If say the acoustic is capo'ed on the 2rd fret and playing a G major shape chord, well then that is actually a A major chord. I can play that open. Or I could do something really odd like put a capo 8th fret a play D shape which is still a A major, but it's gonna be different with a capo that high!

Might be the Piezo pick. Line 6 sells replacement still. I've also heard good things about the GraphTech replacements. Then again it could be a lot of things but if it's just one string I might suspect the Piezo on that string.

If there is stereo input channel on the mixer run your left and right outputs to the input here. You might need a splitter cable for that. If you dont' have a stereo channel then use the left XLR output for the bean to a input on the mixer. Turn the mix all the way up on the POD and the gain on the mixer for that channel down real low. You might have to back off the POD output a bit because it output line level so it will be a hot signal. If you have two available channels on the mixer you can run the left to one input and the right to another then pan each those channels to the hard left or right for stereo signal on mixer for Stereo sound. While monitoring off a mixer can be a pain, I think the POD units actually sound best setup this way. Make sure to set the POD for studio direct mode.

I've used it before on a older unit (X3) to record some vocals as I didn't have a interface so I used the POD as the interface. It was not for really recording anything important just some testing/scracth tracks. Now I have dedicated 16 input interface so I don't use the either POD for that anymore.

:)

Yea, I get the allure of Amplifi and see the market for it. However; please don't forget the musicain's who could careless about [insert famuos guitarist here]'s tone. I love my Line6 gear because it gives me the tools I need in a simple fairly easy to use, not terribly expensive, and easy to transport box to that I use to create MY tone. Based on your first statement I assume that is still part of the company perspective.

I've never had any issue with like that mine's a 500 and X3 Live to interface. I do have some gear (keyboard controller) that is extremely sensive to which USB cable I use. Might try a different USB cable as a long shot.

Not sure it would really be that hard to do the transplant. I've seen it done with Strat before. Just make sure to pull the batteries let it sit for good while to discharge any caps. Then it's a matter of routing and such to make it fit. The strat I saw had regular pickup's in but they were not connected. It was done to look and feel like a strat but was really a variax under the covers. Also no VDI just standard plug and battery pack. Of course it was MIM Strat, nothing too expensive.

I Saved off the "New Tone" entry by itself as well. It comes in handy wiping individual entries of a setlist just to get mini reset when you need it too.

I assume you looking to get more input to a DAW? If you have good input levels but just don't have enough volume then turn up the headphones you listen back on.You going into mic pre-amps on the board? Or are you using the POD as input? If using an external AD or mixer board: You might try adding just a bit of gain from the board pre-amps, but you will be outputing line level from POD so be careful not to overdrive the board channel. Monitor it closely as you add gain. If using the POD as you AD converter (e.g. direct from POD to DAW): In this case the master level on the POD. is meanless, it's just headphone amp. Look into the ASIO driver and there is +18db boost option. I've found when I recorded direct I need this boost to get softer stuff up to decent gain level. I think there is option on the board itself to add gain to the amp post amp. Might try putting a EQ at the end of the effects chain on the patch and just upping the output but not changing any frequencies.