Line 6 Helix

digitalscream

rossyamaha said:

Yep indeed it will cripple me. But I'll be an awesome cripple with all the toanz. ;-)

Take it from a cripple...not worth it

With that said, I just managed to make the perfect rig before I quit my band. Lightweight, with all the advantages and tone of a "normal" rig.

And now it's studio-only, where weight doesn't matter. Sometimes, I even manage to disappoint myself.

Digital_Igloo

I have a similar Helix Rack rig to the one above, but all my third-party pedals are in the rack, and routed through Helix's effects loops. I show up to the gig, pull Helix Control out from the front rack shelf, and go. Setup for two guitars, bass, keyboards, and vocals is no more than 5 minutes. The only cable on stage is the Ethercon from Helix Control to one of the Helix Racks.

Teetonetal

Any of you Helix owners got any recordings posted on soundcloud or the like?

fretmeister

Digital_Igloo said:

I have a similar Helix Rack rig to the one above, but all my third-party pedals are in the rack, and routed through Helix's effects loops. I show up to the gig, pull Helix Control out from the front rack shelf, and go. Setup for two guitars, bass, keyboards, and vocals is no more than 5 minutes. The only cable on stage is the Ethercon from Helix Control to one of the Helix Racks.

As soon as I get a bigger rack and a drawer I'm going to do that.

Cabicular

Everything in this

Teetonetal

@Cabicular thanks.

Cabicular

It's just a wee songwriting demo but he guitar bass and vocals were all processed via the Helix

Teetonetal

and it sounds good.

I'm really, really close to buying one.

It can process guitar, bass, vocals and acoustic (with an IR loader)

I can loop in my must have pedals (moogerfooger ringmid, chase bliss, whammy)

I can use it to record demos, amp backup, and I think I can recreate my current board on it...

and it sounds pretty good..

fretmeister

Got my Darkglass pedals in the loops now. Huge fun, especially blending then with the onboard fx.

I need a big rack and a tray. Damnit.

fretmeister

https://scontent-lhr3-1.xx.fbcdn.net/t31.0-8/13072697_10154026347043726_2903557895752003582_o.jpg

https://scontent-lhr3-1.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-xfa1/t31.0-8/13112826_10154026348368726_1053942985837924169_o.jpg

I'm getting the hang of the pathways I want and, just as importantly, managing to assign 1 controller row to each pathway so I can visualise it. The buttons aren't quite in the right order yet on each row, but I can cope for now while I'm fiddling with settings.

Damn it's good.

Cabicular

It's great
I also like the feature where you touch two buttons simultaneously to swap them
Really handy

fretmeister

I didn't know that! That's handy!

Cabicular

Where is my wisdom!!!

fretmeister

For those that care.

Top path splits to allow a clean blend with the triangle fuzz. That gets compressed to keep the same attack on the clean as the fuzz. Then into 2 loops, one is a Digitech Bass Synthwah and the other a Darkglass B7K. Then a wah (on off with EXP toe switch) then the GK amp.

Bottom path is wah first, this time it is activated by a regular button so I can decide to wah the whole lot or just the top path. Then a split for a clean blend again with the triangle fuzz but with very different settings. Then into either the GK amp or the 5150 controlled by a simple toggle.

Both paths on all the time.

It's coming together nicely. I need a rack drawer asap though!

Teetonetal

Well, my Helix journey just ended, spent a pleasant hour demoing the thing through headphones and a HRD3

So, the effects sound great, the screen is impressive, I loved the workflow. 

the amp modelling left a lot to be desired.

I decided, that Helix would have to replace sgear for me, I spend a lot of time playing through headphones at home and I really wanted helix to be great in this area, on board IR, ability to route in my stomp boxes etc.

the sound through my headphones (I took my pair) was woeful. Buzzy, thin and very strident. Anything with drive just sound like everything was being played through a nasty bridge pickup. Hated it.  Clean sims sounded great I I thought the univibe, delays and Leslie were very good.

Now, through the HRD everything sounded much better - I was attempting to turn the cab sims off and I was going direct in (which I assume is less than ideal) but everything sounded like it had a thick processed, slightly blanket covered sound. Couple of patches were very good, bu tI thought the more gainey things got, the worse it sounded. 

I reckon if you spent time with this it would sound pretty good, but after 1 hr I was just thinking £1000 is too much when it's not as fun as sgear.

I left with decidedly mix opinions and a new pedalboard.

kjdowd

Teetonetal;1054174" said:

Well, my Helix journey just ended, spent a pleasant hour demoing the thing through headphones and a HRD3

So, the effects sound great, the screen is impressive, I loved the workflow. the amp modelling left a lot to be desired.

I decided, that Helix would have to replace sgear for me, I spend a lot of time playing through headphones at home and I really wanted helix to be great in this area, on board IR, ability to route in my stomp boxes etc.

the sound through my headphones (I took my pair) was woeful. Buzzy, thin and very strident. Anything with drive just sound like everything was being played through a nasty bridge pickup. Hated it.  Clean sims sounded great I I thought the univibe, delays and Leslie were very good.

Now, through the HRD everything sounded much better - I was attempting to turn the cab sims off and I was going direct in (which I assume is less than ideal) but everything sounded like it had a thick processed, slightly blanket covered sound. Couple of patches were very good, bu tI thought the more gainey things got, the worse it sounded. 

I reckon if you spent time with this it would sound pretty good, but after 1 hr I was just thinking £1000 is too much when it's not as fun as sgear.

I left with decidedly mix opinions and a new pedalboard.

Just a couple of observations based on the above:

1. I've found 3rd party IRs or tweaking of the stock cab settings to be pretty much essential.
2. The presets aren't up to much (poss because of the above).

all my sounds are with own hammer irs and are set up from scratch and they sound fantastic. Particularly loving the soldano models. Definitely nothing thin or scratchy about the drive sounds when you get it dialled in (which can be as simple as loading an IR), even thru headphones.

With the HRD were you into the front of the amp or the effects return? I've run my helix Ito the fx return of a two rock and it sounded awesome.

fretmeister

Binning the presets is a must with any unit. No exceptions.

Amp modellers into the preamp of any guitar amp (let alone something with such an obvious voice like a Fender amp) always sound terrible.

I've not tried mine with headphones - so that does surprise me. I will try. I'm not using cab sims at all at the moment, but at some point I will want to record with it.

As mentioned up there somewhere ^ - it is amusing when someone says "The Dual Rec into the V30 cab sounds fizzy"

Yup. Just like the real thing does. That's why so many people use other pedals with it to stop bass flub, cut the fizz and give it proper mids. Why they don't pick a different speaker first is beyond me.

Teetonetal

kjdowd said:

Teetonetal;1054174" said:

Well, my Helix journey just ended, spent a pleasant hour demoing the thing through headphones and a HRD3

So, the effects sound great, the screen is impressive, I loved the workflow. the amp modelling left a lot to be desired.

I decided, that Helix would have to replace sgear for me, I spend a lot of time playing through headphones at home and I really wanted helix to be great in this area, on board IR, ability to route in my stomp boxes etc.

the sound through my headphones (I took my pair) was woeful. Buzzy, thin and very strident. Anything with drive just sound like everything was being played through a nasty bridge pickup. Hated it.  Clean sims sounded great I I thought the univibe, delays and Leslie were very good.

Now, through the HRD everything sounded much better - I was attempting to turn the cab sims off and I was going direct in (which I assume is less than ideal) but everything sounded like it had a thick processed, slightly blanket covered sound. Couple of patches were very good, bu tI thought the more gainey things got, the worse it sounded. 

I reckon if you spent time with this it would sound pretty good, but after 1 hr I was just thinking £1000 is too much when it's not as fun as sgear.

I left with decidedly mix opinions and a new pedalboard.

Just a couple of observations based on the above:

1. I've found 3rd party IRs or tweaking of the stock cab settings to be pretty much essential.
2. The presets aren't up to much (poss because of the above).

all my sounds are with own hammer irs and are set up from scratch and they sound fantastic. Particularly loving the soldano models. Definitely nothing thin or scratchy about the drive sounds when you get it dialled in (which can be as simple as loading an IR), even thru headphones.

With the HRD were you into the front of the amp or the effects return? I've run my helix Ito the fx return of a two rock and it sounded awesome.

Yup, I wouldn't be surprised if other IRs are superior, but TBH I can't be arsed to spend £1000 on something that doen't sound nearly great out of the box, when 99USD was spent on Sgear and they got their IR's and presets sot on. Poor form from Line 6 here IMO. I actually wonder if they should have concentrated on 5 awesome IRs for release, then updated slowly over time.

I was going into the normal input as that's what the shop did. As I mentioned, I appreciate that is less than ideal so I would expect going in the FX return to be better. 

I get that shop demos are hard to get a good idea of  something like this, but I don't think Line 6 have helped themselves.

Cabicular

I kind of expected that outcome from a shop demo

It took me a week or so to find my feet with the tones

Fortunatley I enjoy the interface so I was prepared to spend the time where as I wasn't so much with the FX8

Teetonetal

Cabicular said:

I kind of expected that outcome from a shop demo

It took me a week or so to find my feet with the tones

Fortunatley I enjoy the interface so I was prepared to spend the time where as I wasn't so much with the FX8

It's a big leap of faith to make.. glad it's working for you though. If you can get the sounds you need then the interface itself becomes a huge bonus.