Helix Native

Fretwired

fretmeister said:

fretmeister said:

Fretwired said:

guitarfishbay said:

Fretwired said:

Initial reaction .. I'm seriously underwhelmed. Who designed the user interface? I get that this is what you'd want on a hardware unit but for a DAW it's really poor. POD Farm looks way better and that's dated.

Amplitube's interface is in a different league ...

What about the tones though?

I have AT4 already and a bunch of packs from the AT3 era, but have held off on buying the newer packs (Mesa etc) waiting on Helix Native.

OK .. there's early doors .. I tried a US Small Tweed (Helix) against Amplitube's Champ and Amplitube sounded better to my ears. Caveat - I've only just got Helix whereas I've been an Amplitube user for years so I need time to play before I can give an objective view on which is better.

I think it's a shame Line 6 haven't provided any presets.

Apart from the massive amount of presets that I'm looking at, you mean?

Unless you don't get presets in the Trial version?

There are no presets in the trial version.

fretmeister

ah.

How odd. 

Fretwired

digitalscream said:

Aye...for aesthetics, it's nice to have knobs and graphics. For actual use and predictability, it's much better to have sliders.

Of course, I really wish I could see any of that right now

Not sure I agree .. I have a Fender Champ and if I call up the Fender Champ in Amplitube it pretty much reacts like my amp .. you get used to looking at the controls and where you put the volume dial to get that breakup tone .. the same with the effects and the cabs and mics. I can just pic the mic and move it or pic another mic or cab easily. You can also flick the amp around and in some packs change the valves which looks cool ... :-)

In fairness to Line 6 I can see what they've done - taken the Helix hardware interface which makes sense as a core market will be people with the Helix hardware. I just like the graphics in Amplitube.

It will all boil down to what it sounds like ...

Fretwired

Drew_TNBD said:

What's ugly about it?? It's just not skeuomorphic. But I think it looks nice and modern.

Also they had screenshots of the GUI on the early announcement pages, so you can't be too surprised!

Oh God .. the Helix fanboys are out in force .. sorry I expressed an opinion ... ;-)

This is a major change as usually I was the guy defending Line 6 as everyone else said fizzy wasp in a jar tones ... ;-)

Drew_TNBD

Fretwired said:

Drew_TNBD said:

What's ugly about it?? It's just not skeuomorphic. But I think it looks nice and modern.

Also they had screenshots of the GUI on the early announcement pages, so you can't be too surprised!

Oh God .. the Helix fanboys are out in force .. sorry I expressed an opinion ... ;-)

This is a major change as usually I was the guy defending Line 6 as everyone else said fizzy wasp in a jar tones ... ;-)

Fanboy? Nah dude. I just think that since it is not a skeuomorphic design comparing it to Amplitube 4 is apples to oranges. I like the look of both of them.

guitarfishbay

My eye finds horizontal bars harder to eyeball quickly than dials, or vertical bars, but it's not the end of the world. As noted it's in keeping with the HW 

Teetonetal

@Fretwired from the screen shot, you are on SET LIST 1  - have you looked to see if there are other lists with presets? On Helix Floor there are different lists for presets, user presets, set lists and templates? It would be really odd if L6 didn't include any on the trial version.

Though of course, all presets suck

Jonathanthomas83

But is the sound/tone representative of the Helix hardware?

guitarfishbay

Jonathanthomas83 said:

But is the sound/tone representative of the Helix hardware?

The only variable would be whatever you use to DI might sound a tiny bit different to the HW, but the modelling is supposed to be the exact same IIRC

sweepy

Downloaded and hopefully get to sit down with it tonight 

Fretwired

guitarfishbay said:

My eye finds horizontal bars harder to eyeball quickly than dials, or vertical bars, but it's not the end of the world. As noted it's in keeping with the HW 

We're guitarists .. we like thing designed in the 1950s (well some of us do). Most of my plugins have cool user interfaces .. the Helix is just pug ugly. End of ... if the plugin sounds good that's all that matters.

And I'm old school .. sliders mean nothing to me .... but if I can get a great tone in a few minutes then great.

:-)

Cabicular

Fretwired said:

guitarfishbay said:

My eye finds horizontal bars harder to eyeball quickly than dials, or vertical bars, but it's not the end of the world. As noted it's in keeping with the HW 

We're guitarists .. we like thing designed in the 1950s (well some of us do). Most of my plugins have cool user interfaces .. the Helix is just pug ugly. End of ... if the plugin sounds good that's all that matters.

And I'm old school .. sliders mean nothing to me .... but if I can get a great tone in a few minutes then great.

:-)

It has to match the hardware though and provide a common interface. In that I think it does pretty well

Fretwired

Drew_TNBD said:

Fretwired said:

Drew_TNBD said:

What's ugly about it?? It's just not skeuomorphic. But I think it looks nice and modern.

Also they had screenshots of the GUI on the early announcement pages, so you can't be too surprised!

Oh God .. the Helix fanboys are out in force .. sorry I expressed an opinion ... ;-)

This is a major change as usually I was the guy defending Line 6 as everyone else said fizzy wasp in a jar tones ... ;-)

Fanboy? Nah dude. I just think that since it is not a skeuomorphic design comparing it to Amplitube 4 is apples to oranges. I like the look of both of them.

Why? They are both amp and effects sims. They perform the same function. We are emotional beings and are drawn to things by the way they look, so the interface is important - if the Helix Native sounds ten times better than Amplitube then I will learn to use sliders, but that won't change my mind about the interface.

guitarfishbay

I can see the YT comments now... That tone sounds a bit slidery - maybe add some dial from another plugin and see if that helps it cut through.  

Jonathanthomas83

I prefer not to have cheesy looking skins with weird Pro Evolution Soccer named effects.

Grumpyrocker

Found the interface a bit fiddly. I don't mind it not looking like real amps, but the routing is awkward. I thought it was displayed better within PodFarm.

Cabicular

Fretwired said:

Drew_TNBD said:

Fretwired said:

Drew_TNBD said:

What's ugly about it?? It's just not skeuomorphic. But I think it looks nice and modern.

Also they had screenshots of the GUI on the early announcement pages, so you can't be too surprised!

Oh God .. the Helix fanboys are out in force .. sorry I expressed an opinion ... ;-)

This is a major change as usually I was the guy defending Line 6 as everyone else said fizzy wasp in a jar tones ... ;-)

Fanboy? Nah dude. I just think that since it is not a skeuomorphic design comparing it to Amplitube 4 is apples to oranges. I like the look of both of them.

Why? They are both amp and effects sims. They perform the same function. We are emotional beings and are drawn to things by the way they look, so the interface is important - if the Helix Native sounds ten times better than Amplitube then I will learn to use sliders, but that won't change my mind about the interface.

Because the amplitude interface (which I'm a big fan of btw) wouldn't work on a floor controller
It is what it is because of what it is

Drew_TNBD

Fretwired said:

Drew_TNBD said:

Fretwired said:

Drew_TNBD said:

What's ugly about it?? It's just not skeuomorphic. But I think it looks nice and modern.

Also they had screenshots of the GUI on the early announcement pages, so you can't be too surprised!

Oh God .. the Helix fanboys are out in force .. sorry I expressed an opinion ... ;-)

This is a major change as usually I was the guy defending Line 6 as everyone else said fizzy wasp in a jar tones ... ;-)

Fanboy? Nah dude. I just think that since it is not a skeuomorphic design comparing it to Amplitube 4 is apples to oranges. I like the look of both of them.

Why? They are both amp and effects sims. They perform the same function. We are emotional beings and are drawn to things by the way they look, so the interface is important - if the Helix Native sounds ten times better than Amplitube then I will learn to use sliders, but that won't change my mind about the interface.

Don't take this the wrong way, but do you know anything about design?? There are many schools of thought, but one of the chief design decisions that tends to be made early on is whether something is skeuomorphic or non-skeuomorphic - plainly speaking, does it look like a real world object, or does it not look like a real world object.

Line 6 went for non-skeuomorphic. Amplitube went for skeuomorphic. So right there you're comparing two different schools of thought as if they were the same thing when they are not.

It's like comparing breaststroke to doggy-paddle and going "well they're both forms of swimming!! My comparison counts!"

I'm not trying to change your mind about the interface. I just don't think Amplitube is a good comparison. A better comparison would be Axe-Edit for the Axe FX, or maybe the Kazrog amp modellers, since they're also fairly non-skeuomorphic.

In terms of design, I *think* on the face of it that I prefer the current Helix editor sliders, because they're big and chunky and segmented. But I've not seen a full screen capture of the Helix Native interface yet to fully make my mind up. But they've clearly gone for a non-skeuomorphic minimalist design philosophy, and they're also tying it in with the hardware. The decisions make perfect sense to me.

TimmyO

Line6.com is now down - doh!

TimmyO

...aaaand it's back