Line 6 Helix Stadium Talk

[Orvillain]

(For the record, I don’t think “golden ears” is always a pejorative term, but can be)

I think on guitar forums, it is always a pejorative.

 

[ian_dissonance]

I know I have some high end loss, but I’ve not been tested. I definitely don’t have these:

View attachment 57196

(For the record, I don’t think “golden ears” is always a pejorative term, but can be)

For sure, I’ve used it just as often to describe someone with a keen ability as well as someone who is always talking out of their ass. I think less-so here, but a lot of audio production forums and other gear forums have a lot of minimally experienced making big claims about what they can and can’t notice with no sauce to back it up. My favorite are the “I’ve worked on some big records, you’d be surprised” guys who can’t/won’t show you any work. Fuck if I even cleaned the floors during the recording of a platinum record I’d tell people which one, lol.

 

[paisleywookiee]

I think on guitar forums, it is always a pejorative.

Then you sir don’t have golden ears. Surely not that large, either.

 

[Orvillain]

For sure, I’ve used it just as often to describe someone with a keen ability as well as someone who is always talking out of their ass. I think less-so here, but a lot of audio production forums and other gear forums have a lot of minimally experienced making big claims about what they can and can’t notice with no sauce to back it up. My favorite are the “I’ve worked on some big records, you’d be surprised” guys who can’t/won’t show you any work. Fuck if I even cleaned the floors during the recording of a platinum record I’d tell people which one, lol.

I stood in the original Sound City and smelled the Weezer air, once.

 

[paisleywookiee]

I stood in the original Sound City and smelled the Weezer air, once.

Rivers’ residual burrito cloud?

 

[Dez]

 

[MIJLOVER]

Honestly a really good idea for anyone trying to wrap their head around the amp. From the few minutes I’ve played with the Stadium IIC+, L6 seemed to nail all the knob and switch interaction. You can pretty much treat the model just like the real amp.

https://mesa-boogie.imgix.net/135420-MarkIICplus_241127.pdf

That used to be a guilty pleasure of mine in my late teens and early twenties, think I read every manual there was - even though I only ever owned the 4X10 combo they made. I was always just so fascinated by their stuff but always ended up playing through various Marshall amps instead.

All this talk about lack of high end on the stadium, almost cost me my hearing. Whoever said it couldn’t get nastily bright was lying to me - my ears are dead now from the ice pick

My no 1 issue with the Stadium right now is that it’s been keeping me up past my bedtime three days in a row

 

[ian_dissonance]

Are we all listening to the same thing? Or have we redefined the word “clearly”?

I don’t know if “clearly” would be word I used, but it’s not NOT there. I didn’t guess which was which because to me they sound like they could be two different versions of the same amp, couldn’t imagine how it would matter in any applicable context.

 

[Sascha Franck]

they sound like they could be two different versions of the same amp

Which they actually are (unless L6 and FAS are sharing their hardware amps).

 

[MirrorProfiles]

Are we all listening to the same thing? Or have we redefined the word “clearly”?

If several people can all hear it on soundcloud in a single pass then it’s clear enough? Several people mentioned the top end as the main difference - either a difference can be heard or it can’t.

As I said already, I think whether it matters or not is open to debate, and a subjective matter for each individual. However, there is no debate that Agoura sounds less bright in your examples, or any of the others that have been posted.

 

[EOengineer]

I don’t know if “clearly” would be word I used, but it’s not NOT there. I didn’t guess which was which because to me they sound like they could be two different versions of the same amp.

This is certainly possible. The L6 model could be the reissue. The Fractal IIC+ is definitely not the reissue and may not be simul class.

The reissue does have snubber caps Gibson added to stop oscillation due to them fucking up the grounding on the reverb. There’s a YouTuber that recently discovered and fixed the issue on his reissue and it made a difference for the better IMO.

EDIT: added source for the reissue grounding claim. I think the relevant part is around 9:00.

 

[Sascha Franck]

Tag knows tone.

 

[ian_dissonance]

This is certainly possible. The L6 model could be the reissue. The Fractal IIC+ is definitely not the reissue and may not be simul class.

The reissue does have snubber caps Gibson added to stop oscillation due to them fucking up the grounding. There’s a YouTuber that recently discovered and fixed the issue on his reissue and it made a difference for the better IMO.

I don’t know what any of that means but I believe you.

 

[mikah912]

If several people can all hear it on soundcloud in a single pass then it’s clear enough? Several people mentioned the top end as the main difference - either a difference can be heard or it can’t.

As I said already, I think whether it matters or not is open to debate, and a subjective matter for each individual. However, there is no debate that Agoura sounds less bright in your examples, or any of the others that have been posted.

To the smallest degree. I can hear it in the SoundCloud clip, but it's subtle.

Since we don't know the nature of each of the actual Mark IICs modeled by Line 6 or Fractal, there isn't anywhere near enough information for declarative statements on the nature of the modeling of either platform.

Again, not saying that there ISN'T a systemic rolloff of high end with Agoura at this juncture. I don't dismiss you, @Orvillain, @Deadpan and whoever else observing what you have. That's definitely data, and I think they're looking into it. At the very least, I think they are in the case of the 5153.

It's an interesting discussion, but I'm seeing a lot of conclusions when I want to see more data points.

 

[sashimi]

I'm not going to bother to post my compare of that amp. I'm hearing it here as spot on between platforms with the same exact settings. But my hearing is obviously compromised.

Spoiler:

Post up some A/B clips of the same model at different settings and see which one is more “accurate”

 

[ian_dissonance]

I'm not going to bother to post my compare of that amp. I'm hearing it here as spot on between platforms with the same exact settings. But my hearing is obviously compromised.

Sounds good is good. I wouldn’t even think about the differences if people weren’t pointing them out. To my middling ear on moderate headphones it’s more of a noise component than something of value to the tone (imo, ymmv yadda yadda).

 

[mikah912]

I'm not going to bother to post my compare of that amp. I'm hearing it here as spot on between platforms with the same exact settings. But my hearing is obviously compromised.

It may be dead on. It may not.

I do like the HX version better of both the blue and red channels, however.

 

[Deadpan]

I'm not going to bother to post my compare of that amp. I'm hearing it here as spot on between platforms with the same exact settings. But my hearing is obviously compromised.

Where do you have the master set?

 

[sashimi]

That won't help if the cause is that their anti-aliasing filters are cutting too many high frequencies in their new Agoura circuit topologies - for example.

Problem is.... you change that, and you literally change everyone's presets, and everyone will complain because they're used to the way it sounds. Cliff experiences this all the time too. He improves something, and people get annoyed because their sounds changed.

This should've been caught by an alpha tester IMHO. But the problem you have is, lots of modelling people haven't used real amplifiers for decades at this point. They've forgotten what they're supposed to sound like.

Aren’t you jumping to conclusions though, assuming this is an anti aliasing filtering or modeling accuracy problem and not just two different amps being modeled? The difference between the two clips is so minute that it could easily just be the difference between two examples of the exact same amp, due to component value inconsistencies, right? Or even just slightly different tone settings or variations in pot values? Why assume that this is a problem with the way Line 6 is modeling the amps? Don’t you think they already did tons of listening tests to make sure the model perfectly matches the source amp?

To sit there with no way to reference the source amp and say that they did something wrong just doesn’t add up to me. Everyone knows even two examples of the exact same guitar/amp/microphone etc can and will sound slightly different, which is why I kind of roll my eyes at the whole modeling accuracy obsession at this point.

 

[Deadpan]

3.5 on both

I need to try a higher setting.