eenymason

Hi Clay Man as a past 600 user, I can feel your pain. I used the lot - on my 1970 strat I used to be able to get away with using graphite on the nut (it had a brass nut, and it was pretty good), then the last refret it had the nut replaced with a graphtech one. No tuning problems! I got the 600 as I was a trem user, and tried everything to remedy the problem to no avail. It doesn't matter so much about the nut (I replaced the nut with a graphtech Tusq-X or whatever - easy enough to do, just sand it down on the underside so it's the same height as the one you're replacing). The problem is the poor quality metal where the bridge pivots on it's two posts - mine had badly worn and no way was it ever gonna return to zero. This gave me the next dilemma - replace the trem or transplant the guts into another body? I believe the original strat trem with six screws securing it to the body is far superior to the commonly found two post system for tuning stability, and this is supported by my resultant transplants (one from a 300, one from a 600) into a couple of cheap ($100 each from pawn shops) SX Vintage series strat copies, with the Graphtech Ghost saddles, and Tusq-X nut installed, giving me as close to perfect tuning as I've ever had, even with heavy trem use. A bit of work there, but if you're handy with tools, it's totally do-able. Now will the real Fiesta Red Strat please step forward?

thanks Zap, that was my intention, but I wondered if the online registration was the trigger for the warranty's beginning, and how long I could stretch it. Silly me....

Hi those in the know.... I just took advantage of the cheap pricing on the declining stocks of the now sadly deleted from production HD500. It's intended to be a backup unit for the one I use weekly in a working band. So the question is, can I simply go online when I first need to use it (assuming the other one WILL falter at some time) and register it and warranty starts from there? Or has the 12 month warranty started ticking from the moment it left the supplier's door? Anyone know how these things work? Really? cheers from a Line 6 deviant, uh I mean devotee....

Sorry for delayed response - no internet for a while in another house. I already tried different cables, no change. I finally got it to work though - in workbench it kept giving me two connections - one for the HD500 and one for a variax 300/600. I kept ignoring the HD500 connection, and clicked the variax each time - no dice. Then I clicked on the HD500, and then the variax and it finally played ball for me. Dunno what that was about, but anyways.... we have liftoff. Having installed the graphtech ghost saddles I had to reduce the individual string volumes to .70 (70%) and they output pretty much the same as the 600 I also use.

Hi fellow dedicated vax users, anyone experienced this problem? I just recently transplanted the guts of my vax 300 into a strat clone body. An SX Traditional series - Alder body, decent neck now it's been worked over, complete with slotted tuning pegs. A steal for a hundred bucks :D A bit of a painful process, mainly cos I replaced the L R Baggs piezos with Ghost saddles and I struggled to find the cause of low signal on some strings (turned out it was an earth problem, not my PCB soldering as I had thought). Anyways, I have tried to connect it to workbench to adjust the output level (the Ghosts are definitely a bit hotter than the Baggs originals). Problem is workbench won't recognise any variax is connected even though it's clearly running in the HD500 I am connecting through, and Monkey also recognises it. Same situation when I connect the Vax600 I have also - workbench doesn't recognise any vax connected. I have tried different leads, and everything is up to date according to Monkey. Am I missing something here - it wouldn't be the first time.... cheers.

Thanks for confirmation - and sorry for delayed response - I dozed off for awhile there.....

Hi Vax users, I understand with JTV variaxes, it's possible to "lock" the guitar's tone within a patch on HD500, or whatever you use controlling presets for the variax, if you want to use the guitar's tone control for example to blend two amps in a dual amp patch. I have figured out how to do this, and am having some success. Got a killer blend of Blackface Double and Class A-15 for REM's The One I Love, but my problem is this - I have the BF vol on the tone at max and the Class A vol on the tone at min, and mostly I can swing between the clean/dirty sweet spots, but when the guitar's tone drops into boxiness territory closer to min on the tone, the Class A sounds like lollipope. Can I "lock" the guitar's tone on Variax 600 or can it only be done on the JTV? Searching the forum has been fruitless, so any help would be greatly appreciated. cheers!

Thanks to all for chipping in.... Quizzed the ebayer whether they were an "authorised reseller" after quoting the Line 6 site on buying from ebay... Reply: "That policy does not apply to international sales." Soooooo, what WOULD it be referring too then?!?!?! Quizzed the local line 6 service centre if they would cover a unit bought via ebay from the good ol USofA... "Hi Ian. Unfortunately the warranty is limited to the country from where it was purchased. " Thanks to StephenSLR for the local cheaper price link! The stupid thing is my current pod has been ticking along just nicely thank you for several years now without so much as a glitch, so the idea of buying one as a backup and it just sitting in it's box for years not being used, regardless of warranty coverage.....

Hi learned HD users, I am in need of a backup for my HD500 which I use in a duo setup, gigging a couple of nights a week. Of all possibilities (looking at options up to and including the HD500), I figure I may as well just buy another 500, as I use patches with all manner of alt tunings on my variax, (preset in the HD500) and any other pedal would lead to a complete nightmare if the 500 let me down even if for just one night. So, second hand in Australia, they're around $500AUD. New via ebay I can get one for just over that, with free delivery. But I've read that warranty is only valid in the country of purchase. From the Line 6 support pages: ( http://line6.com/support/docs/DOC-4838 ) Q: Do I get a warranty if I bought a unit from Ebay? A: If you purchase a unit on Ebay, you do so at your own risk. Line 6 honors warranties from authorized retailers only. How do I find whether an ebay seller is an authorised retailer, or are we to assume that everyone selling Line 6 gear on ebay is dodgy??? Anyone?

I settled on D'Addario 10-52 for my Strat years ago, and continue with them today on my variax. I get 4 gigs out of them, tho in the summer months, thery're starting to rust by the 4th. I clean em with tea tree oil after every gig. Recently tried a set of elixirs, but broke an E string on the second gig (which I replaced with an Ernie Ball) and took em off after another couple of gigs, as I figured I didn't want to risk more on-stage breakages. Definitely not value for money, tho I'd consider em on my acoustic which I don't pick up that much - they'd last for ages on there!!! As an aside - does anyone notice tonal change on old vs new strings on a variax??? I bet there's negligible difference unlike using mag pups?!

Thanks to everyone for the helpful info.... @clay-man: glad to hear the new piezo did the trick for you - I should be able to make time tomorrow to do the same (fingers crossed it'll do the trick). I WOULD seriously consider the JTV, but the only one which I find remotely desirable (looks wise) is the 59, but I am a Fender fan and can't imagine the neck would be to my liking. The others just look positively ugly (IMHO), so the only option for me is a transplant into a strat clone body (SX Traditional Series - alder body, a tweakable neck complete with traditional slotted tuning keys). I plan to build a sexy reliced Fiesta Red as my main guitar. By "ghost system", do you mean the graph-techs? @TheRealZap: My 600 still works like the first time I got it too, though the frets are needing attention. I figure I'll just use the neck from the 300 and shape it closer to my real Strat's neck like I did with the 600, and swap em over when it's time. By that time it'll be my backup anyway.

Hi fellow vax users, in buying my second variax (a 300 intended for a xplant) I found it to have an issue (no signal output from the 1/4" output) which I figured to be a jackplate problem. When playing live, I connect to my HD500 using a variax cable, and use the 1/4" out to go to Vocalist Live 3 for (ahem) assisting my vocal accuracy. My main vax is a 600, so the 300 remained on it's guitar stand unused (apart from the rare string breakage moment) for ages, while I awaited a replacement jackplate. This took 3 months via my line 6 service agent in Sydney. I finally replaced that, and now I have an intermittent problem with output signal, even when I can tune it using my pod HD500, on selecting a patch from my gig set-list, I have no audible signal on the first E and B strings. I have connected it to workbench, and it SEEMS to wake up the signal failure problem and it corrects itself. Sometimes this takes a couple of connection and software start-ups, as there still seems to be a connectivity issue even with the new jackplate - workbench mentions switching off and re-connecting, as the connection has been interrupted. This seems to happen regardless of which of lead I use (I have three good ones). After replacing the jackplate, I also ordered 3 replacement piezos (one as a spare), as this issue reared it's ugly head. As I was going to change the piezos over, I noticed the E piezo had come free from it's solder, so I just re-soldered it. I looked at the B string solder which appeared ok, but I re-soldered that also, thinking it COULD be a bad joint. I guess the next step is to install those piezos and see if that fixes the issue, but these ones onboard DO work - just not straight away. Also to my ears, the 300 doesn't appear to sound the same as the 600 - it just seems to be lacking something, like lower output or whatever. On Saturday I connected to workbench and did a firmware re-installation, which appears to have done nothing to correct my problem. So I just can't figure why it shows signal in the HD500 and allows me to tune those two strings, yet I have no audible output when a patch is selected. Whether it's the workbench connection, or I have the 300 connected long enough for the problem to adjust it's fly in order to feel comfortable with being seen AND heard in public - I'm a wee bit flummoxed here. So has ANYONE experience this oddity and had it sorted? Maybe I'll be ordering those Graph-tech saddles and doing a transplant, but if there are underlying issues with the main-board, or something else, maybe I'll be wasting my time and money....

My local Line 6 service agent in Sydney has been most helpful, however... relevent to this question is my experience with supply of parts, specifically jackplates. It took 3 months to get a couple of jackplates delivered to Australia (I WAS told it would take 5-6 weeks) and upon delivery, I found the new jackplates being supplied for all electric variaxes (obviously being made for the Tyler versions) are in fact slightly different and a wee bit of hammer and chisel work was required in order to make it fit into my 300. Maybe no big problem, but the info coming down the line (they knew the model it was being ordered for), was zero regarding any difference in the new jackplate. That is until I ranted a bit in their general direction regarding the tardy supply, and the obvious structural difference. It seems piezos are plentiful, as they should be I guess. However with a current problem with mine, I am seriously considering digging deep, and grabbing some Graphtechs - it seems they are a vast improvement on the Baggs variety. As a post-script, the local agent did offer to do the jackplate replacement for me, including pick up and delivery via courier, but I figured it'd take far less time and energy for me to do the job myself. It WAS in parts on my desk after all, so the sooner I cleaned it up the better....