Hd500 Effects Loop Phase Issue

[musicplayer]

I have been racking my brain!!! I have a Crate Vintage Club 6210 and it has a parallel effects loop with a mix level on it. I have the HD500 and it sounds out of phase in the loop. I also have a B52 AT100 and a Marshall VS 8100 and the HD500 sounds great in those loops. I have tried tweaking the amp and HD500 and I either lose the effects level or get that "processed" out of phase sound. I have read that parallel loops and digital effects don't play well together. Are there any pedals to fix that? Anything I can do to the amp to fix it? 

The amp sounds great and am using the HD500 just for effects. Really frustrating. Any help would be great. 

 

Thanks

 

 

[Rewolf48]

Do you have the option to make the FX mix 100% wet?

 

The problem is that there is a delay in the HD500 - which their has to be even if only for AD and DA conversion, and when mixed with the original signal the slightly delayed signal interferes giving the "phase" problem.  If you can go 100% wet then all of the signal passes through the HD500 and this problem disappears.

 

You might try the "unofficial user guide": http://foobazaar.com/podhd/toneGuide/setup#routing and see if anything there helps

 

Technically it is comb filtering not phase because the delay is the same on all frequencies (e.g. http://www.audioholics.com/education/loudspeaker-basics/comb-filtering)

 

[this is problem that the dual paths in the HD500 can do all by itself: if you have dual amps and mix to mono then if the time delays are different on each path then the mono mix of the two amps can sound bad sometimes almost cancelling each other out - meambobbo, me and a few others had discussions about this on the old forum and the summary can be found in his guide ]

[musicplayer]

When I make the effects mix on the amp 100% wet that's where the problem lies. I don't know if I was clear, but jam using the HD500 for effects only when I play live. Recording with the amp modeling there is no issue.

 

I dial back the mix on the amp to about 2 o'clock and that balances out but I lose the levels on the effects. I have the effects 100% also. It also seems when I have an effect on the " phase" goes away but when it's off poof..... crap.

 

Thanks for the reply.

[phil_m]

It depends what "100% wet" means. In some (perhaps most even) parallel loops, even if you set the loop to 100% wet, you still have the dry signal going through the preamp to the power amp. The whole idea of a parallel effects loop is that whatever you put in the loop won't affectt the dry signal, it will just be mixed in with the dry signal. The wet/dry mix for the loop is essentially a volume knob for the signal going through the loop. So if you have it set to 100%, that just means you have the signal going through the loop at its maximum level. It's still being mixed into the dry signal.

 

The reason there's phasing is because the dry signal is still present in the HD500 in the loop. And that signal is going through the HD500's A/D converters, and because of that there's a small bit of latency being introduced. This makes it out of phase with the dry signal going through amp. Some digital effects have a "dry kill" feature that's meant to prevent this. Unfortunately, the HD500 does not.

[musicplayer]

Makes sense. Is there an A/D converter box that would fix this? Or is this amp just a lost cause?

 

Thanks

[SiCantwell]

Could you put the HD500 before the amp instead of in the loop? i.e.: Guitar -- HD500 -- Amp.

[musicplayer]

I can but I don't like the delay in front of the amp. Other effects I use sound better in the loop, to me anyway. All subjective.

[wildbillmojo]

If you have confirmed that your amp has a parallel loop then you're stuck; the only solutions are:

1. get an amp tech to modify your amp, which is generally not a complex thing to do if you know how;
2. rely only on effects in front of the amp;
3. rely only on the power stage of the amp and use your HD to provide all pre-amp sounds.

 

I've had this problem; I've got two amps, a Blackstar S1-45 and a Laney L20H.

The Blackstar has a series FX loop and MIDI channel switching so I can use the Blackstar (4) pre-amp channels OR an HD500 pre-amp or both and any effects in any order - lovely.

The Laney on the other hand has a parallel loop so I am limited to the options above; I'm still experimenting to see which of option 2 or 3 is best for me as I have no intention of mod'ing the amp.

.

 

Good luck

[musicplayer]

Just an update. I modded the amp myself from parallel to serial effects loop. Perfect. 4CM is great with it. Thanks for the help guys. 

[Rewolf48]

Just for clarity - when I said 100% Wet I was referring to a parallel FX Loop that cut the direct (Dry) signal to zero when 100% Wet.  If it meant equal levels of Dry and Wet then I would call that a 50:50 mix and it really doesn't play well with lots of effects in the loop not just digital ones.  Sorry for any confusion.