Line 6 Helix - next gen guitarist's wet dream..?

    If anyone is so inclined, an internet search will bring up schematics for older Line 6 Variax units. You could determine the pinout from that. Also there are schematics available for Line 6 modelers that should have the Variax connections as well.

    It's also about the digital audio coding, isn't it? I've always assumed that the VDI guitar signal isn't a standard one such as AES/EBU or S/PDIF.



    Guenter, I really appreciate your concerns. It's purely a money thing.


    The acoustic sounds are good enough for the mix, IMHO, and the sitar and other "exotic" guitars could be handy. There are also the semi-acou jazz guitars, which I reckon sound OK, as well as the strat, tele and Les Paul "approximations". Oh, and one can use the mag pickups too. Things like the resonator add value too, IMHO.


    That said, a Luke, a Tele and an LP have been on my wish list for decades. A high-end acoustic isn't even on the radar, but obviously one day I'll get one. I've been extremely ill and have skipped tens of thousands of meals to buy what I have; high-end stuff is not an option most of the time. I got lucky by finding a fretted MM bass at the porn shop, and have only managed to buy one other "proper" guitar so far - the fretless version of the MM bass, which took around 6 years to save for.


    One day... I can't wait, and never stop dreaming! Thank you again for your advice.


    FWIW, I don't know what all the OT fuss was about; IMHO, discussion as to the validity of Variax guitars in various contexts is directly relevant as the arguments have been about price vs quality, precisely the same as for the Helix... and they're from the same company. If this was the "OT" issue mentioned previously, I personally would argue that Guenter was "right on the money", so to speak.


    Quote from Quitty

    Both of you, it seems, aren't exactly at the heart of the value for money range, Herr Haas and Monkey_Man.
    Your gear is needlessly pricey. His gear is unreliable. There's a reason why extremities have earned a bad reputation.


    I believe the name of the game here is 'close enough'.
    Let's face it, even the Profiler isn't 100% spot-on with every amp - but it's close enough even for connoisseurs and people who's livelihood depends on it.
    The Variax models do a great job of being 'close enough' if you're not willing to go on stage with an armada of vintage instruments, haul a truck full of gear to every session or invest tens of thousands of dollars in gear just so you could have an archetypal Fender or Gibson sound in the studio.


    The HD broke about as much as it had fixed. Let's hope the Helix fares better - i still go to shows, you know. I'd really like them to sound good.


    Right on, Quitty.


    As I implied, I bought what I could afford. I don't like crap any more than the next guy. Probably a whole lot less, actually.


    Quote from burningyen

    I would pay $200 for an adapter that lets my KPA control Variax settings. Never going to happen, I know, but that's how valuable that feature is to me, at least.


    Same here. Would be extremely handy.


    Quote from burningyen

    I'm dreaming of a small box that accepts the Variax' VDI cable and connects to the KPA's Ethernet and Input jacks.


    Me too.


    Quote from Guitartone

    Plugging a Variax into a Kemper is blasphemy. :)


    Agreed!


    I'll go wash my mouth out with soap now.

    LOL! I will have to wash mine too...


    About the Helix now. What is the most important thing in an amps and FXs digital device? The tone!!!


    So, for now, we just can speculate. And we only know that it's a Line 6 gear and it will cost more than twice their last generation devices. And there is a lot of lights and screens that make it look cool. But, still, the tone???


    I'm afraid guys that we will have to wait in august to know what this thing really worth...

    Sorry for the OT rant.


    All this talk about the Variax and making a converter has gotten me a bit curious. So I got out the X3 Live schematic, and here is some info on the Variax 1.0 interface.


    The signals to and from the Variax do not look too complicated. There are two differential signals (pins 1 and 8 driven by a line from the uC named VDI_MIDI_TXD. Pin 6 drives VDI_MIDI RXD through a voltage divider and a few gates.


    Pins 3 and 7 drive a RS422 level translator, which outputs a signal VDI1_AES_RXD that goes straight to the uC.


    Pin 4 is +8v, and pin 5 is ground.


    That's it. So perhaps the Variax merely has a midi interface and an AES/EBU digital output, along with power and ground? That would actually not be too difficult to work with, as long as Line 6 didn't do any screwy coding on the AES signal return or use nonstandard data rates. You could whip up some simple interface electronics and use various analyzers to check the signal protocol and midi commands, and a converter box might be as simple as a few signal level translation chips, an AES to analog converter, and a few midi jacks. I'd probably give a converter a shot if I had a Variax.


    EDIT: After a bit more thought, there is a possibility that if the Variax output is indeed AES digital, the output of the RS422 IC in the converter could be level shifted and plugged into the SPDIF input of the Kemper. You could then use the SPDIF as the input to the Kemper and keep all of the Variax signal generation in the digital domain. That would be cool.

    Edited once, last by MKB ().

    Like 1

    I'm terrible with electronics, so from my perspective, MKB, you're a freakin' genius!


    I and I'm sure many others would be all over this thing like white on rice or a cheap suit should someone put one to market. Considering the hoards of V'axe guitars out there (there are quite a few), it could make sense commercially.


    The bottom line, of course, is that heaps of users would really appreciate not having to run L6 gear in order to be able to take advantage of the VDI protocol.

    Quote from Pick909

    LOL! I will have to wash mine too...
    About the Helix now. What is the most important thing in an amps and FXs digital device? The tone!!!
    So, for now, we just can speculate. And we only know that it's a Line 6 gear and it will cost more than twice their last generation devices. And there is a lot of lights and screens that make it look cool. But, still, the tone???
    I'm afraid guys that we will have to wait in august to know what this thing really worth...


    I agree that tone is the most important thing. And I agree that we won't know much about that until August (or whenever Helix actually ships.) But I disagree that all we have on balance are screens that "make it look cool". That completely ignores the flexible internal and FX loop routing, flexible pedal assignments, vocal effects, etc. which some players (particularly in live contexts) are likely to find useful.

    Quote from mbenigni


    I agree that tone is the most important thing. And I agree that we won't know much about that until August (or whenever Helix actually ships.) But I disagree that all we have on balance are screens that "make it look cool". That completely ignores the flexible internal and FX loop routing, flexible pedal assignments, vocal effects, etc. which some players (particularly in live contexts) are likely to find useful.



    I agree!
    To be fair, I expect something really better than the Pod HD! Maybe REALLY good!
    But the amp tones have to be there at this price!!! It has to be comparable to high end devices!
    Don't forget that $1499.00 is really close to the price of a Kemper unpowered head. I would never pay this money for just an upgraded Pod HD, even with a lot more of three colors ice cream! ;)


    Do you remember the Line 6 Spider Valve pre-order promotion?... Ok yamaha is in the portrait now so we'll see! :)

    Quote from Pick909


    Don't forget that $1499.00 is really close to the price of a Kemper unpowered head. I would never pay this money for just an upgraded Pod HD, even with a lot more of three colors ice cream! ;)


    We're definitely on the same page here. (I keep listening to Top Jimi's latest JTM45 profiles and going back and forth: "There's no way the Helix will be able to cop this tone... please let the Helix sound like this..." and repeat LOL.)


    But as for the price comparison, you have to bear in mind that a) the Helix can be had for significantly less than the street price of $1500 if you're resourceful, and b) you need to compare it with the cost of an unpowered Kemper + a really capable floorboard. In Kemper land that can put you close to $2500. So it's not really apples to apples. Realistically, the Kemper is more costly, and we presume its superiority in tone warrants that cost. If nothing else, the Kemper will always have the edge by way of allowing the user to determine how it sounds, by creating or acquiring new profiles.


    Quote from Pick909

    Do you remember the Line 6 Spider Valve pre-order promotion?... Ok yamaha is in the portrait now so we'll see! :)


    LOL I actually never saw that promotion. I did briefly own the head version of that amp - I bumped into it in a store, mentioned it to my wife in passing, and in an impulsive, newly-wed, coolest-wife-in-the-world moment, she snuck out and bought it for me! Imagine how bad I felt having to bring it back... All I really remember about that amp was how frighteningly loud it was when you were dialing through the unpredictable presets. I think I chipped a couple of teeth. :O

    Quote from mbenigni


    LOL I actually never saw that promotion. I did briefly own the head version of that amp - I bumped into it in a store, mentioned it to my wife in passing, and in an impulsive, newly-wed, coolest-wife-in-the-world moment, she snuck out and bought it for me! Imagine how bad I felt having to bring it back...


    Please inform us, when you get divorced and such a woman is on the market again.
    Thanks!

    Quote from MathiasUlrick

    Okay nevermind they have rack unit already.


    I think they're going to need to do something about the pricing though. Rack plus footcontroller runs an extra $500, and there's very little additional functionality over the all-in-one unit.


    I hear you about spills, though. Last year I built a nice little pedalboard, all analog stomp boxes, meticulously wired - many hours and many hundreds of dollars - and knocked my own damn Guinness on top of it during the first song of our first show. (Luckily that stuff is pretty beer-proof, but what a mess.) There's going to have to be a "no drinks on the stage" policy if I ever gig with the Helix.

    Quote from mbenigni


    I think they're going to need to do something about the pricing though. Rack plus footcontroller runs an extra $500, and there's very little additional functionality over the all-in-one unit.


    I hear you about spills, though. Last year I built a nice little pedalboard, all analog stomp boxes, meticulously wired - many hours and many hundreds of dollars - and knocked my own damn Guinness on top of it during the first song of our first show. (Luckily that stuff is pretty beer-proof, but what a mess.) There's going to have to be a "no drinks on the stage" policy if I ever gig with the Helix.


    What a nightmare - this is one of the reasons I think Boss pedals are so popular - relatively cheap - sound decent and pretty resistant to most things a gig will throw at you.


    Can you imagine spilling beer over a board with a load of high end Eventide or Strymon pedals? Doesn't bear thinking about.

    Quote

    What a nightmare...


    And no one to blame but myself. I'm pretty good at keeping track of my feet, and I never lose track of a Guinness LOL, but I let my guitar cable get away from me.


    Worst part is getting needlessly distracted at the top of the set and feeling like you've already let the rest of the band down. So you soldier on, in spite of n% of CPU cycles spent adding up the cost of pedals in the back of your head. ;)

    I like the microphone placement options. Something like that would be great in the Kemper. I feel that the 'room' sound is sometimes missing slightly when going for clean stuff, like the famous Hendrix stuff.


    I do doubt that this can compete with the core guitar sound that the Kemper produces.

    Quote from PhilUK84

    I like the microphone placement options. Something like that would be great in the Kemper. I feel that the 'room' sound is sometimes missing slightly when going for clean stuff, like the famous Hendrix stuff.


    I do doubt that this can compete with the core guitar sound that the Kemper produces.


    Well, the Kemper is not a modeler but a profiler so the mic placement is done at the time a specific profile was made. So if you want different mic placements you have to make (or use) different profiles. But the ''space'' effect can, more or less, reproduce the room effect especially if you use headphone.

    As far as cab and mic modeling, variety is only good as the sounds it produces. The Pod HD had plenty of classic cab and mic options and a bunch of parameters to tweak the sound. But in the end most of them were rubbish. The KPA restored my faith in digital cab/mic emulation.


    The user uploaded IRs probably wont have mic placement options. If they do, im curious to see if its just some filtering, or they do something more advanced. Im doubting the accuracy of such emulations

    Who needs many options for cab and mic modelling? Just think back: how many amps did we play and how many effects did we use?


    Nobody needs 200 amps and another 1.000 effects and options, that's just confusing. Actually many guitarists don't use digital gear like KPA or Helix, because it's quite complicated to use. Once you have an overview it's easier, but in the beginning it can be confusing. The advantage of any tube-amp: plug in in and play.


    I've recently seen Roxette's guitarist Christoffer Lundquist with an amazing guitar-sound. What's the secret behind it? He played 2 KPAs (1 spare), profiled his 2 favourite amps, used his old floorboard (with mainly Strymons on it) and played excellent guitars (vintage Epiphone, Gibson 175, Les Pauls ect.), that's it.


    Actually he used the KPAs just for replacing his tube-amps, the rest stayed the same and like I said, his guitar-sound was absolutely brilliant.

    ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
    first name: Guenter / family name: Haas / www.guenterhaas.de

    Like 2

    This makes a lot of sense and is exactly how I was using my KPA in the beginning. Eventually though I realised that I could 'make do' without my pedals and board, so I simplified even further by getting the Remote and a couple of expression pedals. Now my live rig is easy and quick to set up, soundcheck and troubleshoot! ;)