Helix Native, high z vs increase gain staging

[th365thli]

Hey all,

 

This might be a dumb question, but I was playing around with Helix Native and my Focusrite 18i20 audio interface. I know Line 6 says to use high z input, so I hit the 'inst' button. I turn the gain knob all the way down to 0, as any higher and I get unwanted hiss. 

 

However, when I don't turn on high z input, I can just turn the gain knob to up a 1/3 of the way and I feel like it does the same thing. Is there a difference between changing the impendance (make the input listen to instrument level) vs just upping the gain on the input? Helix Native seems to like both fine. 

[SaschaFranck]

Let me put it that way: There might be situations when the differences might become very obvious - when they aren't in other situations. Usually, when fooling around with the volume knob of your guitar, the difference might be very very noticeable, way in favour of a true high-z input. Similar things go for certain drive pedal types, most notably of the fuzzy kind. But then, in case you like the sound as is, why not just do it that way? However, I'm wondering about the way your high-z input behaves. If done properly, such an input should be able to deal with any typical guitar signal just fine.

 

Fwiw, in case you're using active pickups, you can basically use whatever you like, they're throwing out a low impedance signal already. Same goes for any active (or non true bypass) pedal in front of your interface.

[rd2rk]

The Instrument setting on the 18i20 input works fine with regular pickups. As Sascha said, if you're using actives it doesn't much matter. You may even need the Input Pad with actives.

[th365thli]

6 hours ago, SaschaFranck said:

Let me put it that way: There might be situations when the differences might become very obvious - when they aren't in other situations. Usually, when fooling around with the volume knob of your guitar, the difference might be very very noticeable, way in favour of a true high-z input. Similar things go for certain drive pedal types, most notably of the fuzzy kind. But then, in case you like the sound as is, why not just do it that way? However, I'm wondering about the way your high-z input behaves. If done properly, such an input should be able to deal with any typical guitar signal just fine.

 

Fwiw, in case you're using active pickups, you can basically use whatever you like, they're throwing out a low impedance signal already. Same goes for any active (or non true bypass) pedal in front of your interface.

 

Hmm, when I play the volume knob of my guitar is usually all the way up, and I'm using pretty hot passive pickups (Dimarzio Pandemoniums). It's the focusrite scarlett 18i20, a pretty popular interface I would assume the high z input isn't anything special. From the manual:

 

"When INST is selected, the gain range and input impedance are altered (relative to LINE), and the input is made unbalanced. This optimises it for the direct connection of instruments (usually via a 2-pole (TS) jack plug)."

 

13 minutes ago, rd2rk said:

The Instrument setting on the 18i20 input works fine with regular pickups. As Sascha said, if you're using actives it doesn't much matter. You may even need the Input Pad with actives.

 

So, no I'm not using actives, but I'm using hot passives. And the question isn't about if my instrument setting is faulty. I know it works well, I was just wondering what the difference was between using it versus just upping the gain on the input?

 

And is there any feasible situation to

use instrument setting with pad? To my knowledge "inst" ups the gain, while "pad" decreases it, so don't they kind of cancel each other out? 

[rd2rk]

1 minute ago, th365thli said:

 

Hmm, when I play the volume knob of my guitar is usually all the way up, and I'm using pretty hot passive pickups (Dimarzio Pandemoniums). It's the focusrite scarlett 18i20, a pretty popular interface I would assume the high z input isn't anything special. From the manual:

 

"When INST is selected, the gain range and input impedance are altered (relative to LINE), and the input is made unbalanced. This optimises it for the direct connection of instruments (usually via a 2-pole (TS) jack plug)."

 

 

So, no I'm not using actives, but I'm using hot passives. And the question isn't about if my instrument setting is faulty. I know it works well, I was just wondering what the difference was between using it versus just upping the gain on the input?

 

And is there any feasible situation to

use instrument setting with pad? To my knowledge "inst" ups the gain, while "pad" decreases it, so don't they kind of cancel each other out? 

 

Impedance determines how the pickips are "loaded" if you're connected by cable (not wireless). The input impedance of the first first effect the signal hits determines the pickup load. Some effects are designed to sound best with the pickups loaded relative to their input impedance. It's complicated, LONG threads here and on TGP.

 

Input LEVEL is just how hot the input signal is. Too hot it overloads the AI's preamps.

 

IOW, different animals. Do what sounds best to you.

[rd2rk]

What I said about the first effect determining pickup loading applies to REAL effects, Helix hardware, etc. Your pickups using plugins like Native are always going to be loaded by the AI input, which is effectively the first effect, and will be 1M. Certain FX, as Sascha said, won't sound "authentic" with the pickups loaded at 1M.

[th365thli]

9 minutes ago, rd2rk said:

 

Impedance determines how the pickips are "loaded" if you're connected by cable (not wireless). The input impedance of the first first effect the signal hits determines the pickup load. Some effects are designed to sound best with the pickups loaded relative to their input impedance. It's complicated, LONG threads here and on TGP.

 

Input LEVEL is just how hot the input signal is. Too hot it overloads the AI's preamps.

 

Awesome, thanks for the response! I'll try searching for those threads. Even a "yes there's a difference but it's complicated" answer is good enough, just wanted to get started on a deep dive into the topic.

12 minutes ago, rd2rk said:

IOW, different animals. Do what sounds best to you.

"

Sounds good to me.Just for kicks, it turns out for this particular preset I created I actually like the high gain line level sound better. Sounds more controlled and less noise. Go figure. 

[th365thli]

12 minutes ago, rd2rk said:

What I said about the first effect determining pickup loading applies to REAL effects, Helix hardware, etc. Your pickups using plugins like Native are always going to be loaded by the AI input, which is effectively the first effect, and will be 1M. Certain FX, as Sascha said, won't sound "authentic" with the pickups loaded at 1M.

 

Got it, obviously with hardware (such as the Helix I shipped off to be repaired), this is moot since I'd be using the rack's guitar input which is an instrument level, high dynamic range input. 

 

I found this thread where a Line 6 dev chimed in about Helix Native:

https://www.thegearpage.net/board/index.php?threads/helix-native-plug-in.1786588/page-113#post-25887560

"Your audio interface should have a 1M Ohm instrument level input, preferably with no volume control.This will help ensure you end up with the right input level"

 

That part was interesting to me, especially the "no volume control part". I assume "no volume control" is equivalent to using a high z input with gain set to 0 (if there is gain control). This corresponds to my experience, where upping the gain on any high z input raises the noise floor too much and creates nasty hiss. 

[SaschaFranck]

I have no idea why it would necessarily be a benefit to have a high-z input without volume control. IMO and from my experience, it doesn't matter. And I still prefer to get a great leveled signal into my DAW, even if it was just for the waveform visibility aspect. In case there's too much level going into my modeling plugin of choice, there's plenty of ways to trim the signal down a bit. Some plugins (Helix Native included, but also true for Amplitube, Guitar Rig, etc.) have their own dedicated input trim control.

Besides, out of the interfaces I owned during the last 2 decades (quite some...), not a single one had a high-z input without gain control. No idea what the L6 dude is refering to.

[th365thli]

55 minutes ago, SaschaFranck said:

I have no idea why it would necessarily be a benefit to have a high-z input without volume control. IMO and from my experience, it doesn't matter. And I still prefer to get a great leveled signal into my DAW, even if it was just for the waveform visibility aspect. In case there's too much level going into my modeling plugin of choice, there's plenty of ways to trim the signal down a bit. Some plugins (Helix Native included, but also true for Amplitube, Guitar Rig, etc.) have their own dedicated input trim control.

Besides, out of the interfaces I owned during the last 2 decades (quite some...), not a single one had a high-z input without gain control. No idea what the L6 dude is refering to.

 

For sure. In the end I guess it's back to it depends. The preset I'm using is heavily distorted and very sensitive to input gain. Any increase in the input gain with high z on just overloads it. And I"m pretty happy with my waveform visibility. But that of course is just one scenario with a myriad of variables.

 

One thing to note that is I'm applying HXN to the input of the track (infx) vs (fx) which records only the dry input but applies the effects while monitoring (this is using Reaper). With (infx), the altered guitar input gets printed with nice sized waveforms. With (fx), only the dry input gets printed but you can monitor the effects (and still record it with record output selected). With (fx), the waveform is very small as it's just representing the DI guitar. I suppose I can adjust the DI guitar gain, while simultaneously lowering the input in HXN as you alluded to. Like people have said, many ways to skin a cat.