Line 6 Helix Stadium

[molul]

IMHO the main reason is pricing/marketing, therefore cost.

Feels like they didn't want to make an LT version of the flagship, at least not now, and they did it the other way around.

Looks like they are telling us that Stadium is the main product while XL is the expanded version, expanded only on the hardware side.

This would explain the "bizzarre" naming scheme.

Naming is not the strongest point in this new products line, if you ask me.

The Stadium IS the new LT, without the exp pedal as many of us wanted. An LT version of the Stadium XL (no scribble strips, less fx loops, etc) would be very difficult to sell due to the existence of the Stadium. How much would they charge for it? How could they make it not fight with the Stadium?

There must have enough differences between two adjacent models to justify the price difference. It makes sense they've dropped the scribble strips.

The Stadium XL also needed to have an expression pedal. Many of us don't want it, but probably the same amount of people want it. The product line they've come to, I think it's the best they could to give everyone something they would want.

I also don't expect a new Stomp AND Stomp XL. I'm guessing they will make a single small unit that merges those two. Less products, easier life for devs and support. If you compare the Helix family with any other brand, it's way too many SKUs.

Once you've been able to analyze the market for 10 years, you can simplify your offer in what brings more revenue. I think that discards Rack and Stomp, and not sure about Effects.

 

[Orvillain]

“Lipstick on a pig” is an old saying for something old trying to look like something new. Another one is “ mutton dressed as lamb “ which also doesn’t imply a similarity to a sheep. That’s exactly what I meant, not that the original models were a pig. Line 6 have form for constantly rereleasing old tech in a new box so it’s a perfectly valid question.

<laughs in Kemper MK2>

 

[Orvillain]

MAAAN, don't even mention it! *Way* back in the days I snagged this from the FL demo package (they had it in there as a non-protected DLL, no GUI or anything) and it was just marvellous on filter sweeping synths and what not. To this day, I haven't found anything doing the same. And I certainly wish this was available in my guitar arsenal, too.

It's genuinely a cool little plugin right!?! I loved it back in the day!

 

[Eagle]

<laughs in Kemper MK2>

Yes . I bet we see an AXE 4 soon that is 99% facelift too. There’s a product cycle with this that isn’t there with amps fortunately. The people that are happy with modelers will all buy new ones but I don’t think it will expand the market.

 

[sashimi]

One thing that a couple people have mentioned but not a lot are talking about… why no sound demos? Isn’t that was Tim Pierce was there for? I was really hoping to hear him play and get his real time reaction.

 

[Lysander]

Will there be a rack version ?

 

[Lysander]

One thing that a couple people have mentioned but not a lot are talking about… why no sound demos? Isn’t that was Tim Pierce was there for? I was really hoping to hear him play and get his real time reaction.

You'll probably get those once we hit the presale start date. I imagine a) they're still finishing firmware 1.0 and b) a livestream is not really the best vessel to demonstrate differences between OG and new Helices.

The sound clips on L6's page (https://line6.com/helix-stadium/) are all Helix Stadium and Agoura. Here's a direct link to the MP3:

https://line6.com/helix-stadium/assets/audio/STADIUM ROCK JUNE 6.mp3

 

[laxu]

I don't understand why they also removed the scribble strips from the HXS, it could have been just a 0.5" taller and have the scribble strips.
Is the HXS more akin to the og LT in the new gen?

View attachment 46509

I don't know how I missed that. Maybe because the promo videos go between shots where they show the XL footswitches that it didn't even register to me that the non-XL doesn't have the scribble strips.

@Digital Igloo How are you going to represent the footswitch states and labels? Is it a view similar to Helix LT? How do you access that?

 

[molul]

One thing that a couple people have mentioned but not a lot are talking about… why no sound demos? Isn’t that was Tim Pierce was there for? I was really hoping to hear him play and get his real time reaction.

I guess he was there mostly because his ears are trusted and he said he liked what he heard.

 

[Sascha Franck]

How are you going to represent the footswitch states and labels? Is it a view similar to Helix LT?

I'd take a bet that they'd to it that way - or very similar. I mean, they've done it successfully already with the LT (and it worked quite well, given my brief experience with an LT of another guy, in some cases I'd even prefer that over the rather small scribble strips). The only caveat being that you have to switch display modes to get there, but apart from adjusting some parameters and knowing the patch I was on, I never needed any of the flowchart stuff live.

 

[Sascha Franck]

Oh, btw, I wonder whether the units will work without fans.

 

[laxu]

I hate the promo site currently up for the Stadium. It's pure bad website design.

• It takes a long time to load and then you need to scroll to see any relevant info.
• Nobody cares about a big X and a freakin' start button.
• Nobody wants a wavy background that is what, meant to hypnotize you to buy a Helix Stadium?

I just wanted to see the product and read more about it.

I'll take this moment to also dump on Line6's entire website. The product pages for even the older Helix products are just bad. You have these clickable feature things that show some little pic and less than a paragraph of text. The freakin' close button for those sections is buried under the top header bar and only appears if you figure out you need to scroll down.

Whoever made these clearly never tested them, never thought about their usability or the information value of their content.

Also WTF do you have to sign in to download e.g firmware updates?

 

[HotRats]

Not sure about that, scribble strips are a flagship feature imho like they were in the og Helix, that makes the the smaller HXS a cut version of the HXS XL which is the flagship in this gen.
So all in all, the new flagship still has the bullshit pedal no one even uses and is still unnecessary large.

The Stadium IS the new LT, without the exp pedal as many of us wanted. An LT version of the Stadium XL (no scribble strips, less fx loops, etc) would be very difficult to sell due to the existence of the Stadium. How much would they charge for it? How could they make it not fight with the Stadium?

Yeah I agree, is the naming that is wired.
I see them as Stadium and Stadium LT but they don't want to put it that way for reasons...

 

[James Freeman]

They have until winter to un-nerf the smaller unit and include scribble strips.

 

[Lysander]

They have until winter to un-nerf the smaller unit and include scribble strips.

Hate to break your hearts, y'all, but the hardware design has been long wrapped by now if this thing ships by winter

 

[Sedaxel]

Argh...

67 mm footswitch spacing.

This means I´ll never buy a Helix Stadium. Just for the same reason I´ll never buy a QC.

 

[Eagle]

The stomp version will come in due course to reinvigorate the line when sales slow for the main units. Hopefully a rack for pro users later but I suspect that is not who this is aimed at.

 

[Sascha Franck]

Argh...

67 mm footswitch spacing.

This means I´ll never buy a Helix Stadium. Just for the same reason I´ll never buy a QC.

It's the same as on the Stomp and a tiny bit more than on the GT-1000. I own both of those and get along pretty fine. And as said before, I wear EU size 46 shoes and usually need pretty wide ones to suit my fat feet.

 

[Sedaxel]

It's the same as on the Stomp and a tiny bit more than on the GT-1000. I own both of those and get along pretty fine. And as said before, I wear EU size 46 shoes and usually need pretty wide ones to suit my fat feet.

I have aprox the same shoe size, but I´m sure I´m much clumsier than you. For me, the Stomp is cramped. Helix LT was the limit for me (70 mm). I start to feel comfortable with 72 mm (Boss MS-3).

Besides, with 400 mm long, I can see a lot of space wasted in the sides. It could have perfectly been spaced even at 75 mm, which would have been fantastic.

Even when I find these 2 units stunning, and knowing they´re going to be great (well, We still have to hear tones and proxy performance), for me the footswitch spacing is a big fail. They could´ve done it much better. Really disappointed at a personal level. I´ll see you all enjoying your awesome Stadium while keeping my eyes in other alternatives...

 

[Sascha Franck]

Btw, I actually agree that, regardless of the brand, tight switch spacing should better be avoided. I'd rather deal with 5 cm more of overall width.
I remember watching a video interview of Paul Gilbert when he also showed his pedalboard. The pedals were *very* far away from each other, you possibly could've placed an entire foot between them. He just said something along the lines that in the heat of a live gig he simply wouldn't want to maneuver his feet within a centimeter accuracy range. Absolutely right.

Still, I'm getting along with both the Stomp's and GT's spacing, so I'll be fine. The only dangerous thing being that the Stomp also provides some "press two switches simultaneously" modes (I think in both patch and snapshot mode), but I only used snapshot mode once because I instantly pressed two switches inmidst a gig and didn't even know what was happening (as I didn't think about it before). Ever since I'm back to plain switch mode.
Having said that: Anything that could be triggered by pressing two adjacent footswitches should be deactivate-able. I never ever want that functionality (unless I explicitely want it, but I can't imagine that to ever happen on a unit with that many switches to do all kinda things).