What's preventing you from getting a Helix Stadium (if you really want to buy it eventually)?

[Jarick]

LOL 2022 Honda CRV. Really want a new Mach e (wont have a car payment in a couple of months), but as you say, it might be another DECADE before the honda NEEDS to be replaced.

Back to our economic message from earlier. I wonder how many (like me) are saying I will just hold on to my money incase the economy (and my job) goes tits up and I have to weather a dry spell.

If my MK1 Kemper were to die, I might well decide that an AM4 is all I need to gig with even though I can technically "afford" a Stadium.

I say this with all the love in the world to people who are hyped up over the gear - I'm not saying any of this stuff is too expensive at all but I do think there's an economic storm on the horizon that is going to be brutal. Jobs are drying up, prices have been rising quite a bit, and consumer debt is at an all time high. There's going to be a brutal tidal wave that hits and the fun times consumer products like musical gear is going to be hit really hard.

My wife's still driving her 2004 CR-V. And I'd probably still be driving our 1999 Civic if a deer hadn't jumped on it. Still, my Civic Si is already 12 years old.

I'm a little bit more fickle when it comes to modelers.

I had a same thing happen in 2019, we traded in my Honda CR-V (leased) for a used Honda minivan as we had a third kid. I downgraded to my wife's 2008 Prius which was fully paid off and ran just fine. Planned to drive that for a few years but someone rear ended me and it ended up totaled. So I ended up buying my current CR-V which was a lease return, one year newer than my old one.

All in all it ended up working out great - wife and I both bought used late model Hondas right before the Pandy (I saw this term this morning for the first time and I'm going to force it into conversation because I love it). Now both are fully paid and we need every dime of it lol.

 

[mbenigni]

I say this with all the love in the world to people who are hyped up over the gear - I'm not saying any of this stuff is too expensive at all but I do think there's an economic storm on the horizon that is going to be brutal. Jobs are drying up, prices have been rising quite a bit, and consumer debt is at an all time high. There's going to be a brutal tidal wave that hits and the fun times consumer products like musical gear is going to be hit really hard.



I had a same thing happen in 2019, we traded in my Honda CR-V (leased) for a used Honda minivan as we had a third kid. I downgraded to my wife's 2008 Prius which was fully paid off and ran just fine. Planned to drive that for a few years but someone rear ended me and it ended up totaled. So I ended up buying my current CR-V which was a lease return, one year newer than my old one.

All in all it ended up working out great - wife and I both bought used late model Hondas right before the Pandy (I saw this term this morning for the first time and I'm going to force it into conversation because I love it). Now both are fully paid and we need every dime of it lol.

Agree with regards to that impending economic storm, but I think it's going to be so much of a cluster that whether or not you bought a $2K modeler will have no bearing whatsoever. More of a "laying strips of venison on the empty carpool lane of some abandoned superhighway" kind of scene. Start filling up your bathtubs, etc. In the meantime, hug your kids and have whatever fun you can.

LOL @ "Pandy". That pandy has had a major impact on the longevity of our cars. My wife works from home and I go in two days a week, so not a lot of miles happening.

 

[mbenigni]

I’ve heard these guys still tour and occasionally do shows for the parents only where everyone gets totally shitfaced.

This sounds utterly terrifying.

The Civic Si is such a fun car to drive. I had a 1992 Prelude Si way back in the day that was also incredibly fun to drive.

Great cars.

 

[ejecta]

It all comes down to the perception by people that the older FX are of inferior quality. Which is also up to interpretation of the end user, unfortunately.

Exactly. I follow some session guys and I see older M Series pedals on thier boards all the time. Tom Bukovac out of Nashville has played on tons of records and he uses a M9. Yeah he uses inferior sounding effects to record with.

 

[JiveTurkey]

Exactly. I follow some session guys and I see older M Series pedals on thier boards all the time. Tom Bukovac out of Nashville has played on tons of records and he uses a M9. Yeah he uses inferior sounding effects to record with.

If you like the sounds; you like the sounds. Period.

 

[Boudoir Guitar]

As a fellow Honda owner, you’re going to be trying to find ways to kill that vehicle before it dies of natural causes. You may never get a new modeler again.

To further further clarify my clarification, my car brands were picked at random - I may have seen a yellow Geo Tracker in a parking lot and found myself on a 10 minutes sidebar with my Motorsport-fan kid explaining the history of Geo, what a Suzuki Samurai was, what a Yugo was, what Yaris is, blah blah blah blah…

 

[EOengineer]

Suzuki Samurai

The Behringturd of the automobile world.

 

[mikah912]

If you like the sounds; you like the sounds. Period.

I think a lot of unnecessary bickering boils down to people being binary about it when both can be true:

1. Line 6 FX are pro-grade, sound good and have been used by professionals all over the world
2. Fractal Audio and Kemper have developed a plethora of advanced reverb and delay options (not to mention stuff like rotaries) that go waaaaaay beyond the current Line 6 FX selection, and show that Line 6 still has a ways to go to be on par.

 

[Chocol8]

I feel like the vast majority of players are not shoegazers who need a plethora of advanced reverb and delay options.

 

[EOengineer]

1. Fractal Audio and Kemper have developed a plethora of advanced reverb and delay options (not to mention stuff like rotaries) that go waaaaaay beyond the current Line 6 FX selection, and show that Line 6 still has a ways to go to be on par.

I’m finding Fractal to be ahead on most of the modulation algos as well. Specifically the phasers, vibes, and flangers though I do think the increased dynamic range in stadium helped a touch with some of the analog sims.

 

[riffy]

I think my main problem is I just feel priced out of any flagship modeler or capture device.
I am probably an outlier, but I have been extremely happy with my Tonex as amp and cab
and using overdrives in front and delays and verbs after.

My needs are very basic. Showcase is totally lost on me. Even when the Stadium gets Proxy,
I can't see it being better sounding than Tonex to me. If it is, I will wait for that to trickle down
to a Stadium stomp or something.

If I ever get tired of the capture world, I would honestly be in the market for something like
the Fractal AM4.

 

[EOengineer]

I think my main problem is I just feel priced out of any flagship modeler or capture device.
I am probably an outlier, but I have been extremely happy with my Tonex as amp and cab
and using overdrives in front and delays and verbs after.

My needs are very basic. Showcase is totally lost on me. Even when the Stadium gets Proxy,
I can't see it being better sounding than Tonex to me. If it is, I will wait for that to trickle down
to a Stadium stomp or something.

If I ever get tired of the capture world, I would honestly be in the market for something like
the Fractal AM4.

One of my favorite home practice/direct setups is the OG Tonex running a good V2 Superlead or 800 cap with a couple pedals out front. I can treat it pretty much exactly how I do my actual 1959 or 2204 and it just feels right. It’s the closest I’ve ever come to having MY amps in the cans so-to-speak. You definitely aren’t alone in having awesome results there.

 

[Melodioso]

Most bizarrely, you ding Line 6 for the pricing relative to the old & new launch content when that was made clear from the jump. Or that the 16 guitar amps they chose to launch with didn't keep you from using HX models you loved?

Why would they when the HX equivalents of those 16 amps didn't either?!? It just reads like you bought the Stadium XL in spite of a bunch of reservations and hoped the honeymoon period would make you forget about all of that.

I was expecting the Agoura preamps to be included at launch with their Agoura amps relatives: that wasn't the case and wasn't clear they wouldn't be. I was expecting the Agoura modeling to blow my mind (and ears): that wasn't the case. But it just shows that the OG Helix was already very good.

What are you using for your tube power amp?

A VHT (Fryette) 2/50/2 into a Zilla cab. Using full amp models in the Stadium followed by another power amp isn't pleasing, it makes the tone harsh and rigid. I much prefer using preamps on the AM4 into the VHT power amp now.

These two observations side-by-side just make me think that the Stadium is the wrong product for you - irrespective of whether that makes it a "good" product or a "bad" one. Some folks will love working with a big touchscreen and some will say, "I'm just here to play my guitar; what's the point?" The latter should probably buy a different modeler.

It's like buying a sports car and complaining the seats are too snug, or buying a minivan and complaining it's a PITA to park. You need to buy what you want; doesn't mean the other isn't fine as is.

True, but I had to purchase the product and use it for several weeks to realize that 1) I don't care for having an iPad on my modeler and 2) I am actually not using Showcase at all. I'm still hoping that the release of preamps and additional model will make me change my mind, because I really appreciate the Line 6 ecosystem: the flagship, the stomp with less power but exact same features and native with exact same features.

In comparison, in Fractal world when you move form flagship to FM to AM4 to ICONS, you give up on some features every time.

 

[Boudoir Guitar]

I feel like the vast majority of players are not shoegazers who need a plethora of advanced reverb and delay options.

But I’m glad I have several quite different spring options, rather than just a new one and a legacy one, to work with.

 

[Chocol8]

I think my main problem is I just feel priced out of any flagship modeler or capture device.
I am probably an outlier, but I have been extremely happy with my Tonex as amp and cab
and using overdrives in front and delays and verbs after.

My needs are very basic. Showcase is totally lost on me. Even when the Stadium gets Proxy,
I can't see it being better sounding than Tonex to me. If it is, I will wait for that to trickle down
to a Stadium stomp or something.

I wouldn't let that bother you too much. I am not priced out, yet I am extremely happy with Tonex as an amp sim and pedals for effects. I prefer it to any of the flagships right now, although QC Mini is a bit appealing. What I am hoping for from Proxy isn't better sounding amp captures than Tonex V2 but extra capabilities like the ability to capture more effects and hopefully parametric captures (likely a ways down the road). I wouldn't want it on a Stomp though, not a flagship XL.

From what I am seeing though, my current thinking is that if I switch from Tonex it is more likely to be for a small NAM device as opposed to Proxy or QC, but that's definitely not what I was thinking six months ago, so who knows.

Anyway, I think with Tonex you have amp sounds and feel that are as good or better than anything out there at a price point that is incredibly affordable relative to gear prices from decades past. We are truly living in a time of the best tone per dollar (inflation adjusted) in the history of electric guitar. The flagships give you effects, flexibility and features, but you really don't need any of that to make great sounding music. Tonex already does more than people had in the "vintage" amp days, and they made shit ton of great music between the 50's and 90's.

 

[mikah912]

I’m finding Fractal to be ahead on most of the modulation algos as well. Specifically the phasers, vibes, and flangers though I do think the increased dynamic range in stadium helped a touch with some of the analog sims.

I must not be enough a mod snob, then. I have to give @2112 a lot of credit here, tho, because the way he dialed in the Trinity Chorus, 122 rotary, and Courtesan Flange just do everything I want those effects to sound like. For trem, the Harmonic trem is great too.

Also, Focus View on some of the alternative options in each of those categories is really helping me discover more variety.

But yes, with the smaller Line 6 selection, you have less chances to find one that really vibes with you personally. The wealth of Fractal algos skirts that.

 

[Chocol8]

Using full amp models in the Stadium followed by another power amp isn't pleasing,

Can you disable the speaker impedance curve? I think that's the problem, not the power amp part of the power amp modeling

 

[mikah912]

I was expecting the Agoura preamps to be included at launch with their Agoura amps relatives: that wasn't the case and wasn't clear they wouldn't be.

Just a heads up that DI explicitly stated they wouldn't be there at launch on this forum on October 2, and you could've asked him directly anytime leading up to the launch as he was a question-answering fool that whole period.

He did say in the same post they'll come "later".

 

[AlbertA]

Can you disable the speaker impedance curve? I think that's the problem, not the power amp part of the power amp modeling

You can't today.

 

[mbenigni]

The Behringturd of the automobile world.

Can we make the language-checker sub "somersault" for "samurai"?