Clipping on default amp settings (with single coil on strato)

[mmiche]

Dear all,

I do not understand what I am missing.

On many (many) default amp settings I get horrible distortion/digital clipping.

For example, the default Stone Age 185 is truly terrible.
I use a fender stratocaster, with single coil pickups.

Max volume on guitar + default settings = horrible distortion

with the pad on, distortion gets reduced, but not that much.

The only "real" solution is to keep my guitar under around 5 (however, pots have non-linear effects on tone, so I do not want to do this).
Alternatively, I have to lower the master volume of the amp (that comes default to 10.0*) to around 5.0, but I cannot understand how the default setup would get so much clipping with single coils.
Edit: Likewise, if the amp drive is over 5.0 it gets clipped. A setup that does not give clipping is pad + Drive 5.0 + MV 5.0.

My setup is simply:
Guitar -> Helix LT -> DT880 headphones attached to the phone output.

The phone monitor is only on 1/4, and the helix output is set only on 1/4

Is this "expected behavior"? Are there things I should check carefully? (On my real amp, guitar volume is perfect)
On other (simulated) amps, the situation is better (not so much on many pedals tho')

Thank you for your help, I wish I could understand how to tame this,
Michele

* it is reported many time that for amps that do not have MV (like the Stone age 185) this should be capped at 10 to be neutral... doesnt seem to work very well in this case

Edited July 8, 2023 by mmiche
clarifying

[rd2rk]

What are you listening to it through?

 

I ran a LP through the EH185 (Pad OFF) into the poweramp on my Catalyst, a PC212+ and my Rokit 6 monitors.

The Rokits were harsher sounding than the others, but nothing approaching digital clipping.

If this is happening on ALL Helix amps, then try a Factory Reset. That should fix it if it's a Helix problem.

 

If not, then can you record what you're hearing and attach a clip?

[mmiche]

This is a recording of the Stone Age (default settings) first very light pick, and then harder. (no other blocks added)

I listen with headphones (DT880), but the digital recording is the same.

It does not occur on every amp, and I have the latest firmware

 

Thanks
Michele

[mmiche]

Default Whowatt recorded, same input, sounds fine

[rd2rk]

That's the way Stone Age sounds. That is NOT digital clipping.

Turn down the Drive if you want it cleaner, but it never gets perfectly clean.

That's its charm. Here's a link to some info about the original EH-185:

 

’39 Gibson EH-185 | Vintage Guitar® magazine

 

I'm guessing here, but L6 probably modeled the Mic Input.

 

The default speaker it's paired with (new speaker cabs) is the 1x12 Grammatico. Sounds awful IMO.

Try it with the Legacy 1x12 Field Coil. Sounds WAY better, more like it's described in the linked article.

 

There's a lot of good speakers that didn't make it into the first release of the new cabs. The 1x12 Field coil is one, and I hope it makes it into the next update.

It makes all the difference to how this amp sounds.

[mmiche]

On 7/9/2023 at 9:14 AM, rd2rk said:

That's the way Stone Age sounds. That is NOT digital clipping.

Turn down the Drive if you want it cleaner, but it never gets perfectly clean.

That's its charm. Here's a link to some info about the original EH-185:

 

’39 Gibson EH-185 | Vintage Guitar® magazine

 

I'm guessing here, but L6 probably modeled the Mic Input.

 

The default speaker it's paired with (new speaker cabs) is the 1x12 Grammatico. Sounds awful IMO.

Try it with the Legacy 1x12 Field Coil. Sounds WAY better, more like it's described in the linked article.

 

There's a lot of good speakers that didn't make it into the first release of the new cabs. The 1x12 Field coil is one, and I hope it makes it into the next update.

It makes all the difference to how this amp sounds.

I think I can hear high frequency "clipping", not only the awful distortion. The two overlap so it's a bit difficult to distinguish. (However, the "bad" sounding comes mostly from the distortion, not really the clipping)

I tried to put the mid to 0, treble 10 (it should be transparent), bass 10 (who knows how this was modeled exactly), presence 0, and the sounds gets extremely better.
I wonder if maybe there is some bug with the mids? (control not present in the original amp)

Thanks,
Michele

[rd2rk]

On 7/9/2023 at 1:30 AM, mmiche said:

I think I can hear high frequency "clipping", not only the awful distortion. The two overlap so it's a bit difficult to distinguish. (However, the "bad" sounding comes mostly from the distortion, not really the clipping)

I tried to put the mid to 0, treble 10 (it should be transparent), bass 10 (who knows how this was modeled exactly), presence 0, and the sounds gets extremely better.
I wonder if maybe there is some bug with the mids? (control not present in the original amp)

Thanks,
Michele

 

Did you try changing the speaker as I suggested?

[mmiche]

On 7/9/2023 at 6:04 PM, rd2rk said:

 

Did you try changing the speaker as I suggested?

Yes, I think it's still quite bad, (default settings for both, no other things on the chain etc.) I've attached a recording.

I am attaching also stoneage + 1x12 US cab + no mids. I think this sounds quite nice, however I still hear those cracking sounds.
Are those cracking sounds something different from digital clipping? Are they actually this "fizz" people talk about?


Thanks again
Michele

[bh220570]

I have exactly the same problem.

Most factory patches sound fuzzy since a few weeks.

Ultimately, it would be a hardware or software issue ?

I'm surprised not to see more comments on this.

I'm sorry for not offering a solution.

[rd2rk]

I think that what you're hearing is a very accurate model of a 1939 amplifier.

Attached is an A/B type preset.

FS10 (might be different on your LT) toggles the Stone Age and Who Watt.

FS11 toggles the 1x12 Field Coil and 1x12 Grammatico.

On the Stone Age I've reduced the GAIN to 2.

All of the distortion and "crackling" that I heard with the GAIN at its default setting is gone.

Michelle.hlx

[PaulTBaker]

couple of things....

1. for me, the only cab that I can get a good sound (to me anyway) is the 1x15 Ampeg B-15.   All the other ones (all of them, even the new ones) sound to metalic like to me.  Especially through the headphones.  I run though the PC+212 and PC+112 as well as through a behringer XR18 going through two ZLX's.

 

2. the high cut will get rid of what I think you are hearing as digital clipping.  In some cases I cut as low as 4k... normally around 6-8k.

 

so you could try the Ampeg cab and/or cut some highs.  You can do it in the Cab settings (this is a more gradual cut) or add a Parametric EQ towards the end of your chain and just use the high and low cuts. (thank you Jason Sadites)

[rd2rk]

On 7/10/2023 at 3:52 AM, bh220570 said:

I have exactly the same problem.

Most factory patches sound fuzzy since a few weeks.

Ultimately, it would be a hardware or software issue ?

I'm surprised not to see more comments on this.

I'm sorry for not offering a solution.

 

Many have commented, here and elsewhere, that the factory amp settings incorporate way too much gain up front and too high MASTER VOLUME settings.

If you turn down either or both of these and the problem goes away (as I attempted to demonstrate with the preset I attached above) then the problem is not the HW or the FW, it's the settings applied and how they respond to your pickups and playing technique.

 

If you've tried the above remedies without success and are totally convinced that there's a HW or SW/FW problem, do the following:

 

After backing up your custom presets, reinstall the FW BEING VERY CAREFUL TO FOLLOW ALL INSTRUCTIONS!

Part of those instructions is to perform a Factory Reset AFTER the FW installation.

Before restoring your presets (you can restore the Global Settings separately), test the amps that seemed to be problematic, keeping in mind the GAIN/MASTER adjustments I talked about. 

 

If you still have the problem you can either:

 

Open a Support Ticket (recommended).

 

OR

 

Sell your Helix and try something else.

 

I've had mine since 2016 and do not have this problem with either low output Strat SC's or high output HB's, nor do I have either of the other commonly cited problems, inability to get a truly pristine CLEAN tone or "The high gain amps don't CHUG!".

 

 

 

 

[mmiche]

On 7/12/2023 at 5:59 PM, rd2rk said:

On 7/10/2023 at 11:52 AM, bh220570 said:

I have exactly the same problem.

Most factory patches sound fuzzy since a few weeks.

Ultimately, it would be a hardware or software issue ?

I'm surprised not to see more comments on this.

I'm sorry for not offering a solution.

Many have commented, here and elsewhere, that the factory amp settings incorporate way too much gain up front and too high MASTER VOLUME settings.

If you turn down either or both of these and the problem goes away (as I attempted to demonstrate with the preset I attached above) then the problem is not the HW or the FW, it's the settings applied and how they respond to your pickups and playing technique.

 

As far as I am concerned, lowering MV works well, and I am able to get nice sounds. Some other amps default settings are immediately quite good, as an example Whowatt gives really clean tones (but also mostly fender). Others requires work.

The problem is that the description of how to set amps is (as an example) "if the amp has no MV then 10.0 means it's transparent", then... that can't be the case. And it becomes quite difficult to understand how to get a nice tone, as you have no idea if you are doing something wrong, if it's supposed to sound like this, if your guitar is clipping and so on.

I'm happy with my helix, but things like this make life difficult for no reason. BTW, if there would be an offset of 5.0 on the MV, then that would be a FW problem :)

I'll try your patches asap, been quite busy at work.

Michele

[rd2rk]

On 7/12/2023 at 1:17 PM, mmiche said:

"if the amp has no MV then 10.0 means it's transparent"

 

The point of "modeling" is to get an accurate representation of the real amp.

If the real amp has no MV and 10 = the real amp, then if you lower the MV then you no longer have an accurate representation of the real amp.

The fact is, some NMV amps, ITRW, start to distort at really low settings. For instance, a Fender Deluxe Reverb is well into distortion by around 5 on the dial and at that point is also about as loud as it gets (pretty loud!). Beyond 5 it doesn't really get a lot louder, just more distorted. The EH-185, if modeled using the MIC channel as I suspect, is all about GAIN. In 1939 guitarists didn't really play all that loud with Big Bands and wanted their sounds to be as clean as possible. Putting the guitar into the MIC channel caused a distorted sound that blues guys liked.

OTOH, amps like the HiWatt at 100 watts were designed to be really clean and also REALLY LOUD, so you can crank both the GAIN and the MASTER and it'll still be relatively clean.