So - will I regret it if I buy a Helix?

guitarfishbay

Well I look forward to the next thread, will I regret it if I buy another Helix

simonk

Good for you, hope you've made the right decision.

I'm glad I didn't give up on mine. Anyone using theirs like this? (Must be honest, this has just blown my mind a little bit... using your Helix as your personal IEM system).

gearaddict

guitarfishbay said:

Well I look forward to the next thread, will I regret it if I buy another Helix

Yeah, that'll probably happen

siraxeman

Ya tight wad....you'll only get your money back that's all. 

John_A

gearaddict said:

Well, it has gone back. Sorry all but tbh it's probably a huge relief all round.

Thanks all for answering all my stupid helix related questions over the last few weeks!

FFS

gearaddict

John_A said:

gearaddict said:

Well, it has gone back. Sorry all but tbh it's probably a huge relief all round.

Thanks all for answering all my stupid helix related questions over the last few weeks!

FFS

Yeah, you'll love this...after pulling out my valve amps and pedals yesterday and struggling with cables and excessive volume for a few hours I am kind of regretting getting rid...

guitarfishbay

Best thread ever

siraxeman

gearaddict said:

John_A said:

gearaddict said:

Well, it has gone back. Sorry all but tbh it's probably a huge relief all round.

Thanks all for answering all my stupid helix related questions over the last few weeks!

FFS

Yeah, you'll love this...after pulling out my valve amps and pedals yesterday and struggling with cables and excessive volume for a few hours I am kind of regretting getting rid...

Nah, you're not really....if so go get it back. I'm sure the shop will let you. They might look at you a bit funny and shake their heads in disbelief, but they'll be glad you saw sense.

gearaddict

guitarfishbay said:

Best thread ever

You're more than welcome. I'm glad you find my mental illness entertaining

guitarfishbay

gearaddict said:

guitarfishbay said:

Best thread ever

You're more than welcome. I'm glad you find my mental illness entertaining

I go through this before buying anything myself. Generally I don't return because I've watched/listened to every demo available and most threads on various forums before I buy lol...

Thankfully I'm pretty sorted for gear these days and am mostly buying software, which you can usually demo for free.

Except when you're over efficient and activate more demos than you have time to try out like I did with a couple of Amplitube amp models recently lol... that was a surprise when I went to go try demo something and it said demo expired... do'h

gearaddict

guitarfishbay said:

Best thread ever

Bit of an update...got it back again.

Do your worst.

Jonathanthomas83

What made you miss it and change your mind?

John_A

gearaddict said:

guitarfishbay said:

Best thread ever

Bit of an update...got it back again.

Do your worst.

Leave me out of it this time;)

smigeon

simonk said:

Good for you, hope you've made the right decision.

I'm glad I didn't give up on mine. Anyone using theirs like this? (Must be honest, this has just blown my mind a little bit... using your Helix as your personal IEM system).

@simonk I just watched that video - looks fantastic. As I understand it, the guy's patch manages to achieve all of the following IEM wizardry without any additional mixers, headphone amps etc, using only the Helix:

1. sending both his guitar and vocal to both the main FOH mixer and to the Helix headphone socket for IEM, but with independent mixes and processing for both guitar and vocal (e.g. reverb on IEM vocal but no reverb on vocal sent to FOH)
2. independently panning the monitored guitar and vocal in the stereo IEM mix; and also adjusting their relative volumes using the foot controller so that, e.g., pushing the toe end makes the IEM vocal louder and the IEM guitar quieter, and pushing the heel does the opposite (neat!)
3. plugging a stereo band monitor feed from the main mixer into the Helix and adding this to the IEM mix.

I don't have a Helix, but I'm wondering if the Helix would have enough I/O ports etc., to do the following **in addition to the above**:

1. accept a "boundary mic" as a fourth input: This would be to add some ambient stage sound into the IEM mix to reduce the "IEM isolation" effect (it would need to be added to the IEM mix without also sending it to FOH), and
2. as well as sending the guitar output to FOH and to the IEMs, send it also to an FRFR monitor or normal guitar amp on the stage so the rest of the band can hear the guitar (I'm assuming they are not necessarily using IEMs, and that they can't afford be totally dependent on a possibly incompetent sound guy putting enough guitar through the stage wedges).

These last two things seem to require an additional mic input and guitar output - does the Helix have enough I/O hardware?? 

If the Helix could achieve all of the above, it seems like it would be capable of doing pretty much all that the little IEM box that @danny1969 has designed (this was discussed recently in another thread). 

That said, I think I personally still have at least one foot in the luddite camp that prefers to use a good valve amp for the traditional on-stage guitar playing experience - so I'd still probably go for Danny's box over the Helix. Cheaper, too!

Teetonetal

gearaddict said:

guitarfishbay said:

Best thread ever

Bit of an update...got it back again.

Do your worst.

It's not too surprising. I don't think helix is an instant win piece of gear. But what it does is suck you in to possibilities. Forget all the superfluous feel nonsense. The thing is a creative tour de force. It's an enabler. 

Plug in, switch on and make some music and quit worrying about it!

gearaddict

Jonathanthomas83 said:

What made you miss it and change your mind?

Partly the faff of setting up the pedalboard and valve amp setup again. My son plays drums and with the helix it was just so easy to get a decent tone at the right volume and play along with him. When I went back to the traditional setup it all became a bit tricky. Things like pops when engaging effects because I don't have buffers in the right place as well...it's all just a bit of a mission.

If I'm honest, a large part of it was realising the prices seem to have gone up by 300 quid since I got mine so even if I decide to sell it down the line it probably won't be too much of a hit, so it's worth giving it a good long go...I hadn't had a chance to try it with the band yet so I felt I at least needed to do that.

When I plugged it all back in it sounded a lot shitter than I remembered...after a while I realised I had the output on line rather than instrument - when I changed it back, normality was restored.

I'm not bothering with 4CM this time. That was just a bit of a rabbit hole of A/B-ing real pre-amps against modelled ones and tbh I'm happy that the helix ones are up to the job so why bother. Just going straight to power amp -> cab. I think I'll look at picking up either an Alto TS210 or a Yamaha DXR10 (probably whichever comes up as a good deal first!). I'm keen to give that a go.

peteri

Glad you're sticking with it - I've gone through the same sort of journey - some tips which made a big difference to me:

1. Setting the input impedance to 1Mohm (taking it off auto)

2. Making sure only the inputs/outputs I selected were in the chain

3. Removing the volume knob from the control path, basically set it to control something else

4. For all drive sounds having a studio compressor at the front.

Then the big thing was realising that the drive numbers/characteristics don't correlate that accurately to the real thing - so keeping the drive level down as low as I could and still get the sound I wanted, keep the sag level quite high (I use a lot of preamps instead of pedals), and watch the master volume control.

All the above kept it feeling alive and 'real'.

I use it in front of a Carr Combo (no effects loop), sounds absolutely amazing. And also on headphones at night.

What has completely impressed me is I'm running a King of Tone and MXR Phaser in front of the Helix and a Flint in the loop - and all works just as I'd expect on a good amp, that's amazing

gearaddict

Thanks for the tips...I'll try those.

I've never used a compressor in real life. Never been quite sure what they were for I know they even out the dynamics and give a kind of slightly percussive feel to things but I'd always associated them more with stratty cleaner sounds rather than the stuff I do which is more classic rock or higher gain. But I see people do use them a lot in these modelling units so I'll give it a go.

Jonathanthomas83

Good luck with it, mate :-)

Jonathanthomas83

peteri said:

Glad you're sticking with it - I've gone through the same sort of journey - some tips which made a big difference to me:

1. Setting the input impedance to 1Mohm (taking it off auto)

I've been toying with this stuff too, what is your reasoning for doing it? What's it doing for you? Interested.