Or diss the person starting a perfectly normal thread, or because someone brought up expression pedals for another company diss him.

Insane.

Anyways, I really like mine. It's not voodoo. And I'm certain some people prefer something else, but I've enjoyed my purchase.

Dude. Stop crying. So people (including you) talked about expression pedals? What's the problem?
It's not like you contributed anything useful to your precious thread besides "hey everyone, i like my helix!"

Traded in my floor-based digital amp modeller, and some digital FX pedals, for a Mesa Mark 5/25. It's an improvement.
My whole signal chain is now analog (how quaint), and I ain't complaining.

Yep, I traded mine in for all the amps available, cabs, mics.

They don't fit in my house, the cops are here every 5 minutes and I STILL can't get a decent tone but yea, f... digital.

Dissing Peter but praising Paul but then robbing Paul later to pay Peter......Lol

I've read and heard lots of good reports and reviews of your new boxxen.......
Discover all about its in's and out's and enjoy today's awesome new tech

Of that, you can be certain

Good vibes with the Helix

I'd rather buy the real rig than any digital interpretation of one. The money is a better investment too! Probably will increase in value if you purchase the right amp and pedals.
I have listened to some Helix vs Ax8 comparison videos and while I think a disservice is being done in the most of the testing done, both cost alot.

I'd have more faith in a KPA but even it will suffer devaluation as lets face it they are basically computers and we know how quickly they go the way of the Dinosaurs.
Buy the real stuff!

I got a POD HD for silly money and it satisfies though it does try to do alot.
Alright for late night practice but most of us can get a practice rig on our phone now!

Not sure?
I'd rather play the talk with the real deal, using the Helix and a Superstrat

That was damn good!

I recall the days of putting stomp pedals into the inserts of a mixer on mix down to find "the new sound". It was very early days for sequencers and drum machines.

Everything was recorded dry in a dead space (late 70's early 80s) to not interfere with the new digital reverbs and delays. They were the bees knees!
Re amping came into vogue for guitars.

Guitarist seemed to need their live rig to play their parts well and the practice of recording the guitarists sound came back in mode.

Later when the first POD came out it kind of revived it for little while but it wasn't anything new there had been digital FX like Yamaha half racks that did alot and were used in rigs.

The mode changes and I can see a hybrid approach where digital FX are certainly used even in live rigs.

The digital recording medium of our DAWs really does benefit from analogue recording chains.

Digital processing into digital medium is less then ideal. But lets look at the way many of us work.

The recording musician needs an engineer in a box and this where the modelers shine especially if they can also input a dry DI doing us Engineers of the joy of capturing the greatest tone in history of the universe!

When the musician strikes gold he can take what he has to a studio and reamp so long as the Dry DI is always there.

This is where any of the modelers have a place even in project studios and in budget situations as tracking devices especially if the musician uses them live. It is after all part of his sound.

Now that modelers are getting closer to the real deal in tone, sustain and feel they make great tracking tools.

They can be used to design a tone in the studio for the next big thing and on the road touring, the modeled amps and FX are swapped out for the real deal where possible.
This is being done and normal in rigs with quality outboards FX. Fractal have a niche here.
KPA has a niche in taking the musican's amp/rig sound and capturing it handy for going overseas etc or lugging less around on tour.

It is going to depend on the artist themselves as it is often their Tech who has to incorporate it and has a say.

The modelers are'nt a real threat to Techs jobs as nothing beats the real deal for the top artists.

As we come away from the Touring professional the budget is in the equation.

I can see the Helix will have it's niche market with it's routing possibilities and user interface and ease of use.

The Fractal has it's place as it's FX alone are worth the entry price.

The KPA is reverse of the others, profiled rig taken on the road.

I guess you will need all three!

I don't use a modeler for the same reason I stopped using programmable preamps - on-the-fly adjustments. My rigs are set up so that choosing a MIDI patch changes the FX AND the channel on my amp. But if the venue, or guitar I choose that night, requires tweaking the treble, I want to just turn around and tweak it - NOT scroll through menus and save programs to 63 channels and such. So my rig is kind of the best of both worlds, in that it's programmable with one toe-tap, but it uses a normal two-channel amp. I do use an A/DA speaker emulator for DI at times, and it does fine. It took some adjustment, and playing around, but it does a decent job.

I got one and it is stellar. Records well. I do admit you have to tinker a lot to get a good sound, but isn't it like that with almost any modeler? Anyway in a mix, the Helix is easy to mix in and the Fender and Vox tones are great. The high gain... well that is a niche which is hard to satisfy.

loving my Helix rack. just got around to really learning how to get (imo) great tones. i think a lot of people expected to be a plug in and go sort of device, which it is not. you really have to spend some time dialing in and trying different routing with it. i have to work equally hard making mic'd guitar tones work for me in the same way that i have to spend time making the Helix tones work. i've found that recording a DI loop and sending it to the Helix allows me to focus on dialing in/saving patches instead of going back and forth between playing and trying to dial at the same time.

download some 3rd party IR's and really spend some time EQ'ing and playing with the wet/dry ratio. compressing the DI on the way with either the 1st or 2nd block makes a big difference for me as well.


if it didn't work for you, that's unfortunate. hopefully you were able to find an alternative that fits your workflow/taste better! it is a quality unit though, and i'm excited to see what the future updates have in store.

A Deluxe Strat?

Not getting one of those strats. Everything is great mostly, but all 3 I played the frets peter'ed out up high. Please don't lecture me on setups, that is a fret job issue (I've been through it with the variax's years ago, known issue)

Also, I've never had good luck getting those really high saddle pieces ground down to where they don't make me uncomfortable ... very *****ly.

Anyways, the search is still on for that.

The Helix is terrific Just discovered using the bass stuff w/o a cabinet. As long as the drive isn't too high it records very nicely. The cabs are way too dark and muddy (and the one rosen epifini IR I have suffers from the same issue as all rosen IR's, it's too phasy)

these sound much more like Yamaha virtual circuit modeling to me than line 6 technology

This product was well under way in development by the Line6 Team b4 it was acquired by Yammie.

Go check out that info on the TGP thread created at the same time as the one on this site, which has clocked nearly 30,000 replies with over 2 million views since June 12, 2015.

thanks. to be honest, it's a comment on the sound properties. I don't really know what the causes could be.

Just in case anyone cares, and in case I'm actually following, I seriously considered the yamaha THR100.

The demos I "heard" were terrific imo. But alas, they never had one in my area and it's not easily accessible on the computer like the Helix.

I'm a direct guy. I have no way of having "amplification" in this living situation.

But at half the price, it might be prudent. Frankly, I like all the options of the footswitch and saving/FX/etc.

YMMV.

I've tried them all, if a person is a purist like me, there in one and only one current choice, Kemper!

If having all the various options (lots of choices of effects, switches, amps) is something a person is looking for, Helix or AX8 can deliver.

I agree, Line 6 really stepped up their game with the Helix. Let's face it, most people get turned off just by the name Line 6, same thing with Behringer, but they also have stepped up thier game!

To the OP, there's one thing that you have to realize, and this is a reality that no matter how bad you may want it to change, it's simply a reality, which is Just because you start a thread, it does not mean you own it, and it does not mean you can dictate what is discussed in it. You may not like the fact that people take it off into different directions, doesn't matter, you don't get to choose.

Anyone who thinks they can start a thread where that doesn't happen on Gearslutz is kidding themselves.

I hear you. But since you brought it back up, it's two people that CONTINUOUSLY fight over nonsense. Not that someone brought up another topic.

These guys have preprogrammed themselves for autorun to autoruin threads with the finesse, inaccuracy and speed of an autotune

Just because "you" are turned off by the name Line 6 doesn't mean that "most" people are.

It's one thing to have your own opinion, that's fine and great...but projecting it on everyone is simply not.

I don't understand this thread as all. Why do people keep taking out their anger issues with it?

Did you even bother to make any attempt whatsoever to read what I actually wrote?

I was not dissing on line 6, at all. If anything I was coming to their "defense"!

if you honestly don't think that a lot of guitar players out there who got turned off by the name of the company "line 6", then you are grossly out of touch!

Here's my point that I was making, of which you didn't even make any effort whatsoever to read what I had to say. My point was, companies like Line 6 are actually making a great product today! Helix being one of them! So why don't you go back and read what I wrote, before you decide to quote me on this one.

Again, I hate to ask that this be locked, but how can this have possibly turned into the hate-a-thon.

I agree with the last post. But this is insane.

Mods, just lock it. I'm tired of the "he said she said b....it"

"Thy hath the candle that singed the moths."