Digital Igloo (Eric Klein, YGG)

Hmm Grilled Halloumi burgers.

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Hi Eric! first of all thanks for this space to consult about helix with people who work at Helix, that is priceless! I ask you about the factory presets. I actively participate in several Spanish-speaking Facebook Whatsapp groups (we are more than 5,000 people) and something we all agree on is that the Helix, unlike competing products, as it comes from the factory, the sound is not "good" ( in fact when we update nobody claims for the factory presets). You have to sit for hours experimenting and many are frustrated and end up looking for another product that doesn't sound better, but the factory sounds attract them, and they don't end up knowing the true sound of the Helix. I myself created a youtube channel a few months ago for groups on face, whatsapp... explaining how to understand what each knob of an amp does and make the helix "sound better", to encourage them and to understand that they have a product Incredible, but it is not "plug and play". I make amazing sounds with my HX Stomp, but it took me 2 years of analysis! Thank you very much for this amazing product! and I hope to collaborate as a user and disseminator of helix
 
Perrymusica said:
Hi Eric! first of all thanks for this space to consult about helix with people who work at Helix, that is priceless! I ask you about the factory presets. I actively participate in several Spanish-speaking Facebook Whatsapp groups (we are more than 5,000 people) and something we all agree on is that the Helix, unlike competing products, as it comes from the factory, the sound is not "good" ( in fact when we update nobody claims for the factory presets). You have to sit for hours experimenting and many are frustrated and end up looking for another product that doesn't sound better, but the factory sounds attract them, and they don't end up knowing the true sound of the Helix. I myself created a youtube channel a few months ago for groups on face, whatsapp... explaining how to understand what each knob of an amp does and make the helix "sound better", to encourage them and to understand that they have a product Incredible, but it is not "plug and play". I make amazing sounds with my HX Stomp, but it took me 2 years of analysis! Thank you very much for this amazing product! and I hope to collaborate as a user and disseminator of helix
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I would like to check out some of your videos. PM me a link or post one of them in the proper place like the thread in Helix Discussions. Welcome to The Gear Forum.
 
Perrymusica said:
Hi Eric! first of all thanks for this space to consult about helix with people who work at Helix, that is priceless! I ask you about the factory presets. I actively participate in several Spanish-speaking Facebook Whatsapp groups (we are more than 5,000 people) and something we all agree on is that the Helix, unlike competing products, as it comes from the factory, the sound is not "good" ( in fact when we update nobody claims for the factory presets). You have to sit for hours experimenting and many are frustrated and end up looking for another product that doesn't sound better, but the factory sounds attract them, and they don't end up knowing the true sound of the Helix. I myself created a youtube channel a few months ago for groups on face, whatsapp... explaining how to understand what each knob of an amp does and make the helix "sound better", to encourage them and to understand that they have a product Incredible, but it is not "plug and play". I make amazing sounds with my HX Stomp, but it took me 2 years of analysis! Thank you very much for this amazing product! and I hope to collaborate as a user and disseminator of helix
Click to expand...
I've spoken about this before but yeaaaah... we screwed up years ago.

The very first Helix firmware (1.0) had a bug where every mic—regardless of what the preset looked like—was an SM57. That meant every preset designed with a non-57 mic sounded really harsh and s#!‡‡y.

So we should fix that, yeah? Except our Factory Preset banks can be overwritten by user presets, so an update can't overwrite any presets. The trick is to perform a factory reset, which will replace/update/fix the factory presets, except restoring from a backup to get your presets back will also restore the older, broken factory presets. There's another trick where you can export setlists, perform a factory reset, and then import the setlists back into non-factory setlist locations, but almost no one does that.

So even though we're at 3.60, a ton of people still have FACTORY 1 and FACTORY 2 presets from 1.0, with 57s, older Hybrid cabs, no compensation for increased oversampling, and other things that make them hot garbage. And even if someone updates and factory resets a brand new Helix to get the 3.60 presets, the common notion of "Helix presets are hot garbage" remains stuck in one's craw, despite many long term users raving about how great the newer ones sound.

The bigger yet less tangible thing is all about context. Pull up any random 3.60 factory preset and unless you use the same instrument with the same pickup configuration and play in the same style and at the same tempo (through the same playback system! Oh jeez, the #$%@& PLAYBACK SYSTEM) as the original preset author, it's never gonna sound dialed in. We can prove this: Popular YouTube guitarists have given us presets that we've added to the factory bundle and as an experiment, we didn't credit them. People hated them just as bad as any other factory preset. However, those same presets were offered as a download below the YT video, and people raved about them. Why? Because they could SEE the instrument brand/model, pickup configuration, chord forms, playing style, playing dynamics, tempo, etc. Context is what made the presets good, not the presets themselves.

Here's how people reacted to the exact same presets:
  • Firmware X.XX (preset curator anonymous)—"These presets suck!"
  • Firmware X.XX (preset curator credited in the Release Notes)—"Oh, I like that guy. Yeah, these presets are pretty cool, but they require quite a bit of tweaking."
  • YouTube video download where people can see and hear them in context—"These presets are fantastic! Why aren't all of Helix's presets this good?!"
Oh, and All. Presets. Suck.©
 
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Fwiw, you folks (and any decent modeler company for that matter) should've come up with a series of "dialing in" videos. Not the longwinded ones content creators need to do to actually earn money but very short and precise ones. There's a severe lack of any such videos for pretty much any modeler.
Something such as: "Let's get a typical MOR rock rhythm sound out of the 2204 Mod and then let's add a lead variation". Cover some tricks ("how to make this work with your guitar") but otherwise keep it as short as possible. 3-5 minutes, done. Create a neat library of such videos.
Could easily be expanded. "How to sound like XYZ". "How to have ambient fun" (parts 1 to 20771).
That would've made plenty of presets superfluous. Hence they wouldn't suck, either.
It's too late now, though.
 
Digital Igloo said:
He hablado de esto antes, pero sí... la cagamos hace años.

El primer firmware de Helix (1.0) tenía un error en el que cada micrófono, independientemente de cómo se viera el preajuste, era un SM57. Eso significaba que cada ajuste preestablecido diseñado con un micrófono que no fuera 57 sonaba realmente duro y s#!‡‡y.

Así que deberíamos arreglar eso, ¿sí? Excepto que nuestros bancos de ajustes preestablecidos de fábrica pueden ser sobrescritos por los ajustes preestablecidos del usuario, por lo que una actualización no puede sobrescribir ningún ajuste preestablecido. El truco consiste en realizar un restablecimiento de fábrica, que reemplazará/actualizará/reparará los ajustes preestablecidos de fábrica, excepto que restaurar desde una copia de seguridad para recuperar sus ajustes preestablecidos también restaurará los ajustes preestablecidos de fábrica más antiguos y rotos. Hay otro truco en el que puede exportar listas de configuración, realizar un restablecimiento de fábrica y luego importar las listas de configuración nuevamente a ubicaciones de lista de configuración que no son de fábrica, pero casi nadie hace eso.

Entonces, aunque estamos en 3.60, mucha gente todavía tiene preajustes FACTORY 1 y FACTORY 2 de 1.0, con 57s, cabinas híbridas más antiguas, sin compensación por el aumento del sobremuestreo y otras cosas que los convierten en basura caliente. E incluso si alguien actualiza y restablece de fábrica un nuevo Helix para obtener los ajustes preestablecidos 3.60, la noción común de "los ajustes preestablecidos de Helix son basura caliente" permanece atascado en el buche, a pesar de que muchos usuarios a largo plazo deliran sobre lo bien que suenan los más nuevos.

Lo más grande pero menos tangible tiene que ver con el contexto. Abra cualquier preajuste de fábrica 3.60 aleatorio y, a menos que use el mismo instrumento con la misma configuración de pastillas y toque con el mismo estilo y al mismo tempo que el autor del preajuste original, nunca sonará marcado. Podemos probar esto: YouTube popular los guitarristas nos han dado presets que hemos agregado al paquete de fábrica y, como experimento, no les damos crédito. La gente los odiaba tanto como cualquier otro preset de fábrica. Sin embargo, esos mismos ajustes preestablecidos se ofrecieron como descarga debajo del video de YT, y la gente se entusiasmó con ellos. ¿Por qué? Porque podían VER la marca/modelo del instrumento, la configuración de las pastillas, las formas de los acordes, el estilo de tocar, la dinámica de tocar, el tempo, etc. El contexto es lo que hizo que los ajustes preestablecidos fueran buenos, no los ajustes preestablecidos en sí mismos.

Así es como la gente reaccionó exactamente a los mismos ajustes preestablecidos :
  • Firmware X.XX (curador de ajustes preestablecidos anónimo): "¡Estos ajustes preestablecidos apestan!"
  • Firmware X.XX (curador de ajustes preestablecidos acreditado en las Notas de la versión): "Oh, me gusta ese tipo. Sí, estos ajustes preestablecidos son bastante geniales, pero requieren algunos ajustes".
  • Descarga de video de YouTube donde las personas pueden verlos y escucharlos en contexto: "¡Estos ajustes preestablecidos son fantásticos! ¿Por qué no todos los ajustes preestablecidos de Helix son tan buenos?"
Ah, y todo. Preajustes. Chupar. ©
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Ok, entiendo el punto. Cada preset depende de cada guitarra, micrófonos e incluso la forma de tocar. ¡Muchas gracias por tu tiempo Eric! ¡¡Se lo agradezco mucho!!
 
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Sascha Franck said:
Fwiw, you folks (and any decent modeler company for that matter) should've come up with a series of "dialing in" videos. Not the longwinded ones content creators need to do to actually earn money but very short and precise ones. There's a severe lack of any such videos for pretty much any modeler.
Something such as: "Let's get a typical MOR rock rhythm sound out of the 2204 Mod and then let's add a lead variation". Cover some tricks ("how to make this work with your guitar") but otherwise keep it as short as possible. 3-5 minutes, done. Create a neat library of such videos.
Could easily be expanded. "How to sound like XYZ". "How to have ambient fun" (parts 1 to 20771).
That would've made plenty of presets superfluous. Hence they wouldn't suck, either.
It's too late now, though.
Click to expand...
Here, here, and here. And if those links don't have what you're looking for, our Product Specialist team has even done 1-on-1 Skype lessons with users. For free. On whatever they want to know.
 
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Digital Igloo said:
...The bigger yet less tangible thing is all about context....instrument brand/model, pickup configuration, chord forms, playing style, playing dynamics, tempo, etc. Context is what made the presets good, not the presets themselves.
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Definitely something to that. A 'game' I like playing is to adjust my playing to exploit some factory or Customtone preset. That doesn't work for every preset a guy might come across (I have a limited guitar collection and not much desire/facility for playing certain types of music). But sometimes you get some surprising results when you go in thinking, 'I want to see just how much I can get out of this preset,' rather than, 'I want this preset to make me sound good.'
 
Mooselake said:
Definitely something to that. A 'game' I like playing is to adjust my playing to exploit some factory or Customtone preset. That doesn't work for every preset a guy might come across (I have a limited guitar collection and not much desire/facility for playing certain types of music). But sometimes you get some surprising results when you go in thinking, 'I want to see just how much I can get out of this preset,' rather than, 'I want this preset to make me sound good.'
Click to expand...
No joke, we've had something like the following exchange happen more than once:

Line 6er #1
[Playing a Strat] Oof. This preset's pretty rough. Please tell me this isn't in the latest factory bundle.

Line 6er #2
It is.

Line 6er #1
How? It's TERRIBLE. Who made this one?

Line 6er #2
[Checking] Huh. Looks like you did, a month ago. With a Les Paul.

Line 6er #1
...​
 
Digital Igloo said:
So we should fix that, yeah? Except our Factory Preset banks can be overwritten by user presets, so an update can't overwrite any presets. The trick is to perform a factory reset, which will replace/update/fix the factory presets, except restoring from a backup to get your presets back will also restore the older, broken factory presets. There's another trick where you can export setlists, perform a factory reset, and then import the setlists back into non-factory setlist locations, but almost no one does that.
Click to expand...

Has L6 ever considered reworking this for newer firmware releases? I reckon the effort is not trivial, but it only needs to be done once so Helix gets separate factory preset banks.
 
Hi Eric! Is there any possibility that Helix incorporates the technology of dynamic cabs (not a static IR) like Celestion SpeakerMix Pro, Two notes or Boss AIRD...?
 
Perrymusica said:
Hi Eric! Is there any possibility that Helix incorporates the technology of dynamic cabs (not a static IR) like Celestion SpeakerMix Pro, Two notes or Boss AIRD...?
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AFAIK, Two notes' "DynIR" is just a marketing term for baking multiple IRs into a single cab selection; I don't think they respond to input level (but I could be wrong). Not sure how BOSS' AIRD cabs work, but FWIU they sound like our old Hybrid cabs with additional logic for speaker impedance. Celestion's SpeakerMix Pro is certainly unique; maybe there's something there. However, I doubt we'll be reinventing our cab engine again so soon.
 
Digital Igloo said:
AFAIK, Two notes' "DynIR" is just a marketing term for baking multiple IRs into a single cab selection; I don't think they respond to input level (but I could be wrong). Not sure how BOSS' AIRD cabs work, but FWIU they sound like our old Hybrid cabs with additional logic for speaker impedance. Celestion's SpeakerMix Pro is certainly unique; maybe there's something there. However, I doubt we'll be reinventing our cab engine again so soon.
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IMO things like Celestion SpeakerMix Pro don't sound any better than typical IR loaders and using well-made IRs, whichever ones you prefer. So far any claims of "dynamic IRs" have amounted to nothing relevant.
 
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