Red light spells Danger?

[TV-OD]

Hi Stupid Question here, I have read red light means digital clipping, if the RED light keeps coming on and sometimes staying on will it do any damage to the Powercab? or is it like the Yamaha speakers where the amp compresses the input to bring the signal down?

 

Cheers Roy

 

 

[soundmodeler]

Did you ever get an answer to your question? My Powercab clips whenever it gets a little loud, which is often. This worries me b/c I've read that repeated clipping can destroy the speaker voice coils. 

 

I'd like to know how to play through the Powercab at high volume without clipping. Or, at the very least, to prevent clipping without having to play at a whisper. If you've learned anything - or if anyone has any suggestions - I'm all ears. Thanks.

[phil_m]

The red light indicates clipping at the converter. It won’t damage anything. It just means you’re getting close to clipping and you would keep on making the input signal louder, you’ll start hearing digital clipping, which doesn’t sound good at all.

 

I guess I shouldn’t say it’s totally impossible to damage the speaker, as a prolonged clipped signal could possibly damage the speaker, but it seems like a relatively low risk thing to me. As far as getting the loudest signal to the PC; if you have a PC+, you need to make sure you have the preset volume in the PC+ set high enough. For some reason, the default preset levels all are pretty low. You can add up to 30dB or so in some of the presets.

[soundmodeler]

Thanks. This puts my mind at rest. 

[KentIverson]

No, don’t rest your mind. I don’t know the signal path of the unit but forcing a transducer to reproduce square waves and harsh clipping is the fastest way to overheat a coil and risk it melting down. Perhaps line6 has implemented some protection but I don’t know of this.

 

check your gain-staging and fix the problem. You are probably sending the PC a signal that is far too high. 

[soundmodeler]

Thanks for chiming in. I asked LIne 6 customer support if I should be concerned about the high frequency of a (red) clipping signal and they told me not to worry. Here's what they said:

 

"In regards to the PowerCab clipping indicator, this will not damage the amplifier. The Cab was designed for full monitoring so you can ensure your signal is as clear as possible."

 

This remark is a little ambiguous - the second sentence doesn't (to my mind) explain why the first sentence is true, which seems to be customer support's intention. But perhaps I'm missing something. 

 

I don't think that I'm sending a signal that's too high . No matter how little db or gain I'm using, or even how low the volume is (except when it's whisper soft), the clipping indicator goes red if I strike the guitar strings with some force. Curiously, I don't usually don't hear any distortion when the PC clips, except of course when I'm really overdriven. 

 

 

[phil_m]

You wouldn’t want the light to constantly be red or red a majority of the time, but if you hit it occasionally, it’s generally nothing to worry about.

[soundmodeler]

Thanks, Phil_m. Unfortunately, the red light does go on a majority of the time. The PC+ sounds fine, however, so the situation has me puzzled. 

[waymda]

I've found the PC+ red light clipping occurs a lot earlier than 0db in my DAW.

 

I want to set my presets so they don't clip, even when in a boosted mode.

 

Running the 3 note generator into a volume gain block, with no other changes I'm seeing:

• 9.6dB gain on the block is causing the LED to flicker into red occasionally (sine wave with osc so sure)
• DAW (Studio One) via USB is showing -6.15 peak dB on the input chanels
• 10.6dB gain on the block sets the LED to solid red (prior to that was increasingly solid)
• DAW is showing -5.14 peak DB

That suggests red still leaves some input headroom (assuming > 0dB peak = digital distortion).

 

I think I'll go through my presets and set them a bit less hot - I'd been aiming for -6dB peak in the DAW, with a 0 through 6dB boost available for solos, ensuring none hit 0dB peak.  I've not heard any distortion to date, but..........