spmartin

Thanks Stu. That is a valuable perspective. I also monkey around with some coding and I understand the pressures of getting something to market, then fixing it based on customer feedback. You're never going to ship perfect code, but I don't like relying on the customers, who have paid good money to be our "beta testers". I think this product should have gone through more extensive QC testing before shipping. Imagine how pissed you would be if this was happening to your USA Variax and you had a full schedule of gigs to play. But, maybe those customers get treated differently... who knows?

O.K. let me preface this with - this is just a preliminary, but very positive, report about a fix for my ghost notes. I read on another thread in this forum that some problems arose in the past with bad VDI cables, and that essentially the VDI cable is just a fancy ethernet cable. Well, I have lots of good ethernet cables around, so I hooked one up and re-flashed my guitar with the 2.0 firmware. So far I would say the ghost notes, while in alt. tunings, are gone!! I checked in about 5 alt. tunings and I am NOT hearing the ghost notes any longer! I'm going to do some more testing, but I am kinda astounded that it may actually be fixed. In my case it really seems that the VDI cable was screwing up the firmware installation. Any others with a similar experience? I will run this by Hugo at Line 6 tech support on Monday and see what his opinion is. But for now, YIPEE!!

I will get into more details late,r however, I used a regular ethernet cable and re-flashed my jTV 69 and unbelievably I think it's fixed my problem completely!

Thanks! I think I am going to re-flash my guitar's firmware using one of my ethernet cables just to find out, or rule out, the VDI cable as the cause of a problem I am having.

Thanks for noting that any network cable will work. I was wondering about that. This is not an area of expertise for me. I have a bunch of ethernet cables around. I know there are regular and crossover. Do you know which one would work/not work? Thanks in advance.

Oh, that is so strange. I recorded the guitar through a digital interface (Apogee Jam) directly into Garageband. The ghost sounds are loud and clear. This is using no magnetic pickups at all. What a mystery!! We might have to acknowledge that there is more than one phenomenon happening.

Please run the spectrum analysis!! This would be helpful to Line 6 also. I'm sure they have the equipment in house, but still. It's more proof that there is a real issue.

It's because batteries have such a high retail markup. I remember last year I had to buy little CR2032 button batteries for my dog's invisible fence collars. At Wal-mart they were sold in a 3 pack by Duracell for $5.87. I went online and found a bulk pack of 100 for... get this, less than $10 plus shipping, so under $15 total. All of the batteries were brand new and perfectly charged. Ah, the internet. I am not in any way opposed to a company making a profit, but when you know an item costs $5 to buy and you up the price by 10 times, well then you should be riding the high seas with an eye patch!

I did not mean to be dis-agreeable! I guess I was responding to the last part of your statement that had to do with fixing it by reinstalling the firmware, or rolling it back. I have not seen that work on my guitar, and have heard that it did not work for some other folks. Let's just hope it's fixed soon. Thanks for your understanding. My brain is a bit fuzzy, as it's late where I am. I should only type these when I have my full faculties available!

I only know what worked for me. Hook your guitar via the VDI cable to the USB interface, then interface to the computer. Then hook the 1/4" plug to your amp. Make sure your guitar is NOT in digital (piezo) mode. Make sure your volume knob is NOT set to off. Then confirm both lights on the USB interface are green. Now open Monkey. It should see your guitar. If it does, proceed to Part 2. If not, follow Part 1 below. Part 1. Unhook the USB cable from your computer, plug it back in. (while Monkey is running) This may force it to see it. If not, unplug your VDI cable from the interface and replug. One of those should work. If not, quit Monkey and restart it. If none of this works, call Line 6. Part 2. If the Monkey sees your guitar, choose it. Then you will see that it shows the 2.0 firmware. You can download it there, hitting the "reinstall latest firmware", or if you have downloaded the latest firmware and have it on your desktop, in the Monkey window, you can click ONCE on the 2.0 firmware line to highlight it. You will then see new options in the righthand part of the window. One of which says "install from downloaded file". I think the other option is to Rollback to a previous version of the firmware. Hope this helps. I've flashed my guitar a lot in the last few days, so this is from memory. Hope it's not more confusing than helpful. Good luck.

I beg to disagree, at least with my guitar. Today, I went back and flashed the guitar with Firmware Version 1.70. Checked and recorded all the open strings with just the magnetic pickups. That always sounds perfect, so I'm going to not include it. Then, I put it in piezo mode, tuning wheel set to "Standard" tuning. All strings sounded fine. Went then to DADGAD, Blues G, Open A. (just 3 of the now reset factory alt. tunings) All of the alternate tunings but "Standard" has screwy ghost notes on some strings. The same was exactly true when I then flashed it up to 1.81, then 2.0. I even did 2.0 twice in a row as recommended by a tech at Line 6. My thinking is that if it were a bad piezo pickup, the Standard alt. tuning setting would also display bad overtones. Also, the overtones would be consistently bad on the same strings. This does not happen. My guess is that it is probably a bad cpu board. If it was just the software (firmware) then all JTV users would be experiencing the same problems. This does not seem to be true. So, I could be totally full of s**t, but that's my current view. I do so hope Line 6 has their best minds working overtime on this. I want this guitar to work the way it was intended to!!

snhirsch and Charlie_Watt are correct. BTW, in my quest to be frugal, I began wondering where to get some backup batteries cheaper than $50 each. This one looks suspiciously like the Line 6 version. Almost identical specs, shape etc. http://goo.gl/lUTLkF I am sure they did not pay to design a proprietary battery for their guitars. Probably just found a reliable source in China, and built the guitar around it. At the price of the one linked above, I should just get it and see if it fits. No much downside if the electrical specs are correct.

One of the things I am concerned about is that I just bought a JTV-69 from Sweetwater. They have a 30 day "hassle free" return policy. If Line 6 takes their sweet time to address this question, and does not fix it,and I can not return the guitar to Sweetwater - I will not be a happy camper! They have to know this is a real problem. To be honest, the alternate tunings, and to a lesser degree, the models are why I bought this guitar. If these features are "flakey", then the guitar with just the magnetic pickups are, IMHO, not worth the $1,400 price tag. Oh well, enough a rant. I will just keep a positive attitude about it. I have found Hugo, in Line 6 support, has been very good so far.

I would call them. Maybe put in a new support ticket. I know if they do not have activity for some time, they are deleted. This quote is from their site. "Tickets that are 'assumed answered' or 'waiting on customer' will automatically close eventually unless you respond to them."

Rob - I encourage you to take your entire post above, copy it and paste it into a new Support Ticket. Then call Line 6 support - wait if you have to. Then ask for Hugo. He is attempting to solve this for me. The more input he has the better. Your description of this is good!

One of my amps is a Yamaha THR10. It has a setting on it for Acoustics. They difference in the sound of my acoustic models (JTV-69, new Firmware) is markedly better than when I have the amp set on "Clean". If you have access to an acoustic amp, rather than a reg. electric guitar amp, I think you'll notice a big positive difference with the acoustic models.

Update on my Ghost Notes with Alt. Tunings. I had a good conversation with Hugo from Line 6 last night. He was responsive, and listened to the recording I posted on SoundCloud. He acknowledged that there was a definite problem. He suggested that I reflash the guitar with the 2.0 Firmware twice in a row. Each time being careful to choose NOT to keep the current patches when it asks. I did that. No change in my problem. I also went back to the previous Firmware, installed that, then upgraded twice to the 2.0 firmware. No fix. I have updated my support ticket and Hugo has said he will "take this on". I will keep you updated as I work with him to find a fix. I will also encourage him to do a post about it here on the forum when a solution is found. That way everyone will be getting it "straight from the horses mouth".

I was on the phone with Hugo at Line 6 Tech support last evening. He said the above procedure stopped working after the 1.8 firmware update. He said the manuals have been rewritten to reflect that, but the old manual is still being distributed with guitars that are in the supply chain. So to repeat, the above procedure no longer works on guitars with recent firmware updates. All resets must be done through the Workbench.

If you like the guitar, demand that Line 6 make good on providing you a guitar that does what you paid for. That is their responsibility. I will let you know what I find out. Keep the faith!

Thanks. I seem to remember that. But as I recall, if it did not see that I had a registered JTV, it would not show the new firmware download. I may be wrong, as it was late at night and I was tired!!

I'd like to thank everyone for giving your viewpoints and suggestions. I have opened a support ticket with line 6 early (EST) on Monday, Sept 2nd. I have not heard a word from them yet. I may direct them to this thread so they can see that there are other owners with similar problems. I also purchased my guitar from Sweetwater, and they had done the latest firmware update before shipping it to me. Because I had the problem from the start (with alternate tunings), I downloaded the firmware again and re-flashed the guitar. All went smoothly, but it did nothing to resolve the problem. BTW, I had a bear of a time with the registration process at Line 6's site. I had registered my guitar the day it arrived. That registration was in their system, however, when I went to re-download the firmware, it somehow still thought that I had an unregistered guitar. So, I had to re-register it, then delete the earlier one. What's up with that? Major PITA. So, when I hear from Line 6, I will share whatever I learn here on the forum. I'm hoping that they can direct me to download a newer beta upgrade of the firmware that just magically fixes it. I would be seriously unhappy to have to send the guitar back to them after owning it for a week!!

I think it's kinda crazy to purchase a guitar and have to send it back the first week. Does not speak very highly of their Quality Control systems.

clay-man - you are so right. I've been tempted many times to pick up a used JTV, but did not for that very reason. I actually got mine from Sweetwater, and they, as you probably know, extend Line 6's warranty another full year. All parts and labor are covered. I would just need to pay shipping to and from Line 6 during the second year. I've never heard a hint of how much the CPU would cost to replace in the new Variax if you needed to buy it out of warranty. Probably pretty cheap to make, but lots of mark up on the retail end. There are some connections on that board that are not being used. I'd love to find a schematic for it, so I could see what handles what functions.

Nah, not the suing type. I just want a fix!

Well, if nothing else, I know that I am not the only one experiencing the problem. I has to be in the way the CPU is processing the signal because the ghost notes are different with various alt. tunings. If Line 6 does not have a solution to this, then they are fraudulently marketing that feature of the guitar!