Boss GT-1000 (and possibly other things Boss...)

[Sascha Franck]

Ok, soundcheck done. 2+ hours to waste, so here's a short resume:

This setup very, very likely is a keeper, no way around it. Yes, I can already tell.
The best news possibly being, that in a stage/live context, the clean transparent amp of the GT will likely be just absolutely fine, the natural OD seems to work nicely to add some hairy bits, too, so I can save all the DSP juice of the Stomp for dirt stuff. Will also make organisation quite a bit easier and leave me with a free "just in case" FX loop.
Also, the fact that I can alter amp, drive, delay and reverb mix settings globally already paid off. Adjusted things in seconds (and so far I'm not even using any tablet remote control), not a single "save" process required (I obviously saved the slightly altered Stomp preset when soundcheck was done).
And then add to all this that the FOH guy said he hardly ever gets such a nice and clean guitar signal.

Really, I can't remember the last time something regarding my rig went *that* well.
In case no unforseeable issues show up, all my efforts are justified already.

Yeah, reads every bit like honeymoon, hyperbole and what not. But rest assured, after all the dissapointing stuff I went through (see last pages of this thread), I didn't expect things to come out *this* well at all.

 

[Sascha Franck]

And fwiw, no, this is not qualifying as an overly complexed setup at all, not even without being mounted in a proper case (which will happen next week):

 

[ian_dissonance]

And fwiw, no, this is not qualifying as an overly complexed setup at all, not even without being mounted in a proper case (which will happen next week):
View attachment 33098

That is way bigger and way more possible points of failure than just having a Helix LT.

 

[Sascha Franck]

That is way bigger and way more possible points of failure than just having a Helix LT.

A) It'll be way less wide when mounted on my board.
B) It's offering such an amount of valuable options the Helix could not even start to dream of.
C) There's very little room for failure - and, as if that wasn't good enough already, redundancy is built-in (in case something happens, I could play any gig with just the GT or the Stomp).

 

[ian_dissonance]

A) It'll be way less wide when mounted on my board.
B) It's offering such an amount of valuable options the Helix could not even start to dream of.

What besides global blocks?

 

[Sascha Franck]

What besides global blocks?

Gapless patch switching. Delay/reverb spillover. Great visibility. Great hardware quality (at least regarding the GT). No issues with phantom power. Smaller form factor (should I use just the GT). Smaller form factor on my board (hence more room for fun devices). Really nice sounding FX (sure, the HX ones are really nice, too, but for whatever reason, I'm getting them dialed in faster on the GT).
That's quite a lot of reasons already.

 

[metallica86]

Gapless patch switching. Delay/reverb spillover. Great visibility. Great hardware quality (at least regarding the GT). No issues with phantom power. Smaller form factor (should I use just the GT). Smaller form factor on my board (hence more room for fun devices). Really nice sounding FX (sure, the HX ones are really nice, too, but for whatever reason, I'm getting them dialed in faster on the GT).
That's quite a lot of reasons already.

Is Helix also have gapless for Snapshot? And also delay reverb spillover?

 

[Sascha Franck]

Ok, back from the gig. Went absolutely great (no, not fantastic, but that wasn't to be expected due to several things, most of them not related to my rig). Defenitely the best "first gig with a new setup" experience in the last several years. Add to this it's been a telephone band, no rehearsals, random tunes and what not - hence exactly why I wanted a global block functionality so bad.
The Stomp patch I used at first wasn't ideal as it got a tad honky (clean Lonestar channel), so I switched to a similar patch using the Princess and things were just nice (possibly still one of the best pedal platform amps in the HX series). For the next gig of this kind I'll prepare the Grammatico GSG, though. And once it's getting dirtier, I will use the 2203 or Voltage.

Anyhow, as said, I will defenitely not need to use something external for cleans. The Transparent amp model I was using may need a little EQ-ing, though, but just to suit my taste for cleans better, it's defenitely very usable as is, with the Natural OD in front there's just the right amount of hair for some chunkier rhythm guitars.
Whatever, this leaves plenty of room to fool around with the Stomp.

Oh btw, the wah (standard Cry Baby) is just fine, too, used it quite a bit (I only wish the EXP pedal would remember it's switch state when switching patches).

But that's not even all. For most of the second set I switched to another bank I had prepared, same organisation but no Stomp for dirt stuff, just the internal amps. Used the X-Crunch and again the Natural OD for "more" (and my usual pre-compressor, post-EQ and some delay switching for leads). And what could I possibly say? It wasn't half as bad as I had expected. In fact, it's been perfectly fine for this gig. I was happy to go back to the Stomp bank for the third set, though.

As you might've guessed already, I'm pretty happy with how things turned out - and not only because it all started so miserably but especially as this will defenitely become my main rig. And it'll only get better once it's neatly organized on a board and when things can be controlled via TouchOSC.

 

[Sascha Franck]

Is Helix also have gapless for Snapshot? And also delay reverb spillover?

Yes, as long as you stay within one patch, all switching is gapless and delays/reverbs will nicely spill over.
However, all that is gone once you switch patches (unless you're willing to sacrifice half of the Floors/LTs/Racks CPU power - in that case you could activate it).

 

[Sascha Franck]

Such a goldilocks device:

Try that with your Helix Floor...

 

[the-trooper]

Try that with your Helix Floor...

LT?

 

[Sascha Franck]

LT?

 

[Sascha Franck]

Fwiw, even the Floor would somehow fit in. But you don't want to do that to your bag, your back, the guitar on the other side (more weight in case of a fall). I tried back then.

 

[ian_dissonance]

Such a goldilocks device:

View attachment 33158

Try that with your Helix Floor...

Ta-Da!

 

[Sascha Franck]

Ta-Da! View attachment 33161

And where exactly does my guitar fit in that bag?

 

[Sascha Franck]

Preliminary layout (tested everything before outside of the board), this should absolutely rule for me:

Wooden strips need to be sawn to fit things better and I need a new PSU, though, so things aren't cabled up yet (cabling is amazingly easy compared to my loopswitcher board). MS-50 is sitting in the second GT loop, I'm sure it'll be useful at one point in time (used it more often than I thought I would on the old board), really a neat swiss army knife (and some FX sound really decent, so I may as well use it just as an additional reverb here and there).

Biggest issue, believe it or don't: The Stomp's power connector. I have no idea who had the idea to make this the *only* more or less widely used pedal with a barrel plug and an inner plugsize of 2.5mm (rather than just using the standard 2.1mm), but regardless of whom it was, he/she needs to change his/her medication.
Now, I do have several of these plugs readily soldered onto adapter cables, but none of them is angled - and I'm having a hard time finding an angled plug of that stupid format (unless it's from some dubious chinese maker on Amazon, will probably need 3 weeks to arrive and fall out on first contact as the plug will be too short...), so in case someone knows a decent one, I'm all ears.
In case this proves to be a great rig, I'll build a new board for it, making dedicated measurements and using something not requiring an L-lid (which this one does, the L wasting some space).

And fwiw, the GT will be easy enough to pull out, all cables will provide enough leeway to pull it out some centimeters and do the plugging. It's fixed by a wooden piece in the back to make sure it doesn't slide around in that direction and it'll be secured on top with a thick piece of foam, so the lid will hold it down suffienciently (and before you call that an unprofessional solution, it's one that worked for me over decades, I always had units that I wanted to pull of their respective pedalboards every now and then).

Whatever, in case the new PSU will work great, this should possibly be a most amazing setup providing at least all basic tones I could ever dream of (minus a fuzz, but I will likely order a VS Audio Pandora Fuzz & Boost more or less soon, which will then replace the Magus).

Super excited already...

 

[TubeStack]

I really liked the GT1000 when I had it for 4cm use. Agree that its form factor is pretty much perfect.

 

[Sascha Franck]

I really liked the GT1000 when I had it for 4cm use.

Many people complain about it being tone sucker, so that was something I was afraid about when slapping the Stomp into its FX loop - but while you may certainly be able to detect some "alterations" (because I'm absolutely not sure whether it's all that bad), for me it certainly doesn't do enough harm (if at all) to be up in arms.

 

[Sascha Franck]

Quoting myself:

Biggest issue, believe it or don't: The Stomp's power connector. I have no idea who had the idea to make this the *only* more or less widely used pedal with a barrel plug and an inner plugsize of 2.5mm (rather than just using the standard 2.1mm), but regardless of whom it was, he/she needs to change his/her medication.
Now, I do have several of these plugs readily soldered onto adapter cables, but none of them is angled - and I'm having a hard time finding an angled plug of that stupid format (unless it's from some dubious chinese maker on Amazon, will probably need 3 weeks to arrive and fall out on first contact as the plug will be too short...), so in case someone knows a decent one, I'm all ears.

Issue solved. Found an angled adapter straight at Thomann, great!

 

[ian_dissonance]

And where exactly does my guitar fit in that bag?

Fair point, is that a double gig bag? I probably wouldn’t put a guitar in a soft case with a bunch of loose shit anyways.

RE: Line 6 power bricks. They’ve been making goofy-ass decisions on size/shape/barrel diameter since at least the HD series. Those long adapters with the plugs angled wrong for literally any situation? Demote that guy to janitor. (Unless it’s DI, lol)