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Line 6 Helix
Base theme by DesignModo & ported to Powered by Vanilla by Chris Ireland, modified by the "theFB" team.
Comments
Try to paste the URL in the image box on here, then press space. That works on iPhone
OK here we go - a few shots of GarageBand and then a few of Cubasis :
Garageband has limitations - in particular you can't record more than one track of audio at once, nor really do much powerful with it once recorded, so proper iOS DAWs are worth a look.
I like Cubasis on iOS (although I use Logic on the laptop - go figure)
The main thing that might have you grrrrrr-ing at the screen when it doesn't work as you expect threw me for AGES - and that's having your headphones plugged in to the iPad at the same time as the Camera Connection Kit.
for some reason, when both are plugged in (or indeed when both have BEEN plugged in but you then remove the headphones) the iPad doesn't see the CCK's USB/Helix inputs - the headphone mic seems to override and distract it.
Shut Garageband/DAW down, unplug devices, plug the CCK connection back in and it'll be available as the audio source.
I presume (!) that if you were to use vanilla headphones (rather than ones with a headset mic built in) then this shouldn't be an issue, but I've not tested it.
One last thing, I'd recommend monitoring via Helix (either main outs or headphones) and if you do that then set DAW outputs to USB1+2 and turn DAW/Garageband monitoring off.
With my iPad Air 1 the latency is actually very low however I monitor, but monitoring on Helix is tightest.
We were playing in Fenwick the night before and it was 3 am by the time we got back so we needed the recovery time to do the Bawl. Then we got held up on the M8 as there was a bad accident
I'll catch you next time
A couple of years ago I convinced myself that moving away from my Rocktron Utopia G300 was a good idea. It sounded great live and most importantly, allowed me to map the on-board expression pedal to any 3 parameters. I used this to increase gain, mids and delay time which gave me a seamless morph from rhythm to lead. However, the only downside for me was that the amp sounds were good, but not modelled. Whilst the tones were based on Marshall, Rectifiers and Tweeds for example, I couldn’t add to this. The effects order was also fixed, so for rock music it was more than adequate, but for other styles it was a little limited.
So I moved to a pedal board, with individual pedals and power units and a million patch leads and whilst it sounded lovely, I had to learn to tap dance and I lost that wonderful morphing ability that my live usage had come to rely on. I amassed quite a collection of pedals which worked wonderfully with my amp, but then I had to gig in a venue where amp space was impossibly small. I had to create a new board for this sort of situation where going straight to the desk was the only solution. I bought the AMT SS11-a and a Torpedo CAB which are excellent and allowed good sounds for DI to desk, but having 2 boards was excessive and took up space at home. It also meant that I either doubled up on some pedals, or had to go through the hassle of deconstructing one board to make up the other depending on the venue. Screw that. Life's too short.
The number of pedals at this point also exceeded that which was really necessary. Some of these pedals have not really ever been put through their paces. In short, I got complete paralysis through clutter, deciding which to keep and which to sell and knowing that I had to eventually put the boards together properly in terms of cabling etc. Brain mush ensued.
The Helix has been sitting at the back of my mind since it was released. All of the advantages of the high quality multi-fx options, coupled with the variety of amps and the all important parameter changes through the use of an expression pedal. The bonus of its interface, access to some pedals that I like but don't own, frequent updates, great routing options and the ability to keep the H9s and a couple of pedals that have real merit to me is a pleasant aside. That it will easily be funded through the pedal sales just makes it the right decision overall.
So I guess for me, my brain has always been in this multi-fx sphere and the distraction of pedals made me deal with kit that I didn’t wholly bond with. That I can still use my Lonestar and Hedgehog is also brilliant when the opportunities allow.
So @DougCoda has kindly relieved me of my cash and I have a Helix in-bound. The pedal purge shall begin shortly and I’m quite looking forward to decluttering. I still have a board for acoustic gigging with a Boomerang looper, SY300 and other bits so I’m not completely turning my back on pedals, but I feel a ‘calmness’ now I’ve made this decision. Onwards!!
My music:- https://soundcloud.com/hubobulous
I a/b d it with the Fryettes and although they were better it was borderline
im seriously considering taking the Marshall 9100 out of the rack and replacing it with this
9100's have their own gravity
the only tweaks I made were to the reverb and setting the delay time
no eq, nothing
Sounded great and worryingly has now got me contemplating doing (buying) something really silly
oh stereo how we missed you...
View my feedback at www.thefretboard.co.uk/discussion/comment/1201922
@TimmyO ;many thanks for the detailed description. I'd not usually use garagaband on the ipad but a mate has airplayed me some projects to put guitar on, so nice to know I can use the Helix when I get it.
I've had the same issue with the apple headphones with the built in mic and tend to use small cans when recording instead to avoid that issue, it stumped me at first as well.
Anyway, thanks again
I'm the only guitarist so I have a lot of space but it does make a massive difference to me
If I want to use the helix as an interface, and run it out to studio monitors; is there any specific requirements I need to look out for?
edit: price range £200, happy to get used.
Also I think I'm happy enough to stick with my Orange Rockerverb. I've talked about using the Helix in 4-cable-method with the 5150III 50-watt head quite a bit, but I've never really talked about my Orange Rockerverb MKIII.
Well I'm happy to report that it works really well. No tone suck, channel switching works, and using the snapshot parameter automation I can roll back the volume on the gain channel to create several different levels of distortion.
So what I'm thinking tonight is I'll do something like this:
Snapshot 1: Clean channel + delays + reverbs
Snapshot 2: Clean channel + delays + reverbs + a distortion to crunch things up a bit
Snapshot 3: Drive channel with the FX send reduced to give me a crunchy rhythm tone
Snapshot 4: Drive channel with the FX send cranked and maybe a gain block activated too to give me a high-gain rhythm and lead tone
Snapshots 5-8 would be song specific ones. The built in expression pedal would always be assigned to an input volume pedal for swells. Expression pedal 3 would be song specific morphing stuff that I started working on a week or so ago.
Part of me does wonder about picking up another Big Sky for those huge ambient reverb washes, but I think at a gig setting up 4-cable method + expression pedal + Big Sky power + audio cables into the Helix ... it would just take too long. And I don't have the luxury of setting it all up in a pedalboard box because I need to be able to carry it on the tube, so need things to be lightweight and portable.
Thoughts on that later point appreciated!
200 is not a lot TBH but KRK Yamaha or Genelec are all decent brands
I'm not a big fan of the M-Audio ones . They are Bass crazy
The Nano fits quite nicely across the top of the helix.. Wouldn't take much to put a hinge in...
For the sake of just creating patches at home, then tweaking them through PA later, and doing very rough mixes for band demo/scratch tapes (to be properly recorded later in studio by someone that knows what they're doing). Maybe I'd be better off just getting a decent set of headphones...
Personally I'd just not worry about it and use whatever gives a vibe that works for the parts. I generally think it is better to go all one way or all another (so either multi, or separates)... incorporating pedals in the loops might be 'easy' but it's not as easy, reliable, or compact as just using the Helix. You're going to get annoyed carrying extra stuff, unless you're going to get 2 and leave one at the rehearsal space permanently... at that point you might as well get the LT instead and leave that at rehearsal