Any reason to keep my Helix Rack

John_A

I'm very unlikely to ever gig again, have an incoming iMac Pro and Helix Native, what do I gain from keeping the rack?

WiresDreamDisasters

Depends on how you like to track. If you're a "high buffer sizes so I can get as many plugins into my session as possible" kind of guy, then the rack may still be useful because then you don't need to monitor your guitar through the daw with the large amount of latency that a high buffer gives you.

John_A

My sessions are usually pretty simple, EZDrummer, bass a couple or 3 guitars, a smattering of keys and 2 or 3 vocals.  I'm hoping with the new iMac I'll be able to track live with Native.  Suppose my best bet is see how it goes

Voxsupertwin

I've used an iMac with Logic Pro for ages and also my Line 6 Helix floor.....I find having my guitar and bass sounds all sorted in the Helix makes the on screen work much easier.....

https://i.imgur.com/DC4VWVJ.jpg

Cirrus

I've been wondering the same thing, and still am toying with the idea of selling.

But... the UI is pretty damn good on the physical helix imo. And Drew's quite right about the latency thing. Sometimes I can be a bit chaotic and think of an overdub I want to do halfway through a serious mix, and not having to worry about disassembling the mix-in progress to play a few chords over a section of song is a nice workflow thing.

Also, there's quite a lot of room between being quite confident that you'll never gig again, and knowing that you'll never need to make guitary noises without having to rely on a computer - jam sessions, one off things here and there etc...

TTBZ

I'd probably keep it. I always find with plugins I have a tendency to mess with the settings too much after tracking. For my own sanity and to actually get shit done I think it's better to "bake in" the sound and treat it like a mic'd up amp. And it's nice to be able to disconnect from the computer.

Roland

Do you need the space? Do you need the money? If not then why sell?

Roland

Alternatively, there are lots of people here who’d like one.

John_A

Roland said:

Do you need the space? Do you need the money? If not then why sell?

Could do without the clutter and the wires. I’ll see how I get on using native and defer the decision;)

longshins

I’d keep it, there’s something to be said for committing to a tone rather than tracking then losing inspiration by faffing with plugins.

UnclePsychosis

Box it up, put it in the wardrobe for a bit, see if you miss it. 

octatonic

John_A said:

I'm very unlikely to ever gig again, have an incoming iMac Pro and Helix Native, what do I gain from keeping the rack?

I have a similarly powerful Mac.
I would always prefer to capture from hardware- fewer system resources, more predictable latency.

John_A

UnclePsychosis said:

Box it up, put it in the wardrobe for a bit, see if you miss it. 

That's the plan - well I'm just going to switch it off

octatonic said:

John_A said:

I'm very unlikely to ever gig again, have an incoming iMac Pro and Helix Native, what do I gain from keeping the rack?

I have a similarly powerful Mac.
I would always prefer to capture from hardware- fewer system resources, more predictable latency.

Makes sense, I'll see how I get on

John_A

Well after a couple of weeks using Native, I’m sold, more than enough cpu for anything I want to do, the rack is going up for sale

BDJohnston

I think you should sell it... I'll give you $100, lol. Seriously, if you're like me, you will be all over the place with gear.  You might find something glitchy with the software at times, or your computer will crash and it will take a week or two to get everything going again with a new computer... or you may want to jam at someone's house and will need to cart your rack unit, etc. I used my AxeFx II for quite a while (more for cabs than anything) and now I don't use it... still hanging onto it, as I may decide to use it for delay, reverb, etc. (currently using the Mooer Ocean Machine, but the reverb footswitch is glitchy).

BDJohnston

By the way, what I love about computers is the use of soft synths (I only have a bit of stuff from Native Instruments) and my keyboard controller... awesomely weird and unique stuff. I have a midi converter somewhere in my studio, so that I can use my guitar, but it's only monophonic.