dannybuoy

I must add that I have a dimmer switch in my room, and it's only when that was on that I had a problem. The flat cables were like an antennae for the noise emanating from the coil in the dimmer. Anything with metal jack plugs were fine, so it could be a lack of shielding at the plastic jacks. In effect you would only notice it in certain rooms when listening full range (the problem was masked for so long by my tweeterless SVT210AV cabs!). But when nearly all my playing was in that room into headphones, it became a big issue!

I think you'd need an LED indicator ring around the knob to indicate the preset position, like the TC RH450/750. That design but with a blue coloured smooth circular line instead of red dots would fit the bill. Either that or motorised knobs!

They're all crap. I have a load of EBS ones going spare! I went from having a silent board, to months later after switching to using headphones that my signal chain was very noisy. Upgraded to a Cioks isolated supply, same issue. Tested every element of my chain in isolation, eventually down to testing single patch cables in a true bypass loop. The flat EBS and Warwick cables were the source of all my noise issues!

There are no hard and fast rules and plenty of overlap where high gain overdrive can sound like distortion or low gain fuzz. "distortion dumps a portion of the signal to ground from the opamp feedback loop, and overdrive doesn’t" might be true for some circuits, but it isn't a general characteristic of distortion. Not all distortions use op-amps for one!

Sounds like regular analog octave glitching then, so you’d experience the same through an amp. Most octavers are a bit dodgy below the 7th fret on the G string, that’s the kind of thing you get used to working around and simply play higher up on the neck on the lower strings to compensate! I can get pretty stable tracking on most notes all the way down to low C on the B string, it’s usually just the open notes and the G string I try to avoid!

When it wavers, do you mean it jumps up and down an octave? This is the most common form of glitching, as it can't work out which octave range you are playing in. I find it highly unlikely that your headphones are the cause, have you tried it through an amp yet? If the sound you describe is more of a pulsing sound then that might be the octaver faithfully producing a really low note that's below the audio range. The MXR might well be the best for tracking for some people. But if you read around you will see that for every octaver out there, there are a bunch of people saying it's the best tracking one they've ever used, whilst simultaneously there are another lot saying it's the worst!

All analog octavers can struggle on lower notes especially on the open strings (even an open A). Saying “you know these can go down to low E” does not mean much. Most octavers I’ve played can go to low E with no trouble, but give that same pedal to someone else and they might struggle with anything below A. The bass, strings and technique all have an influence on tracking! Try favouring the neck pickup, playing fingerstyle directly over the pickup, and roll off the tone / treble to see if that helps?

If you want distortion, I would steer towards the B3n. It has a very capable Darkglass B7K sim that is missing from the MS-60B, and the Ampeg SVT model is quite usable as a distortion too (which I couldn't say the same for the previous Zoom generation). The octaver is also much better than I remember from previous Zoom units too. It gets my seal of approval as long time pedalhead anyway, it's the first cheap multi FX that I've found satisfactory!

I’ve never even tried to get synth sounds out of my B3n! 🧐

It's worth the upgrade purely for the improved SVT and added B7K, then just add a passive Orchid or Radial DI box and you're set! But you're right, removing the DI + audio interface was a bad move. They did add a headphone amp but it suffers from headroom issues for me and keeps clipping where it shouldn't, so still using the Bighead with it.

I'd be interested in a Helix if it could sound as good as the Ampeg, Sansamp and Q-Tron models in the Zoom. In my experiments with Helix Native though, I couldn't quite get there!

If you like the OCD sound but want more low end than the UD and a clean blend, I have a COG Mini 66 for sale!

Looks 14 times better with the pickguard ON.

You won't really lose much by trying one out. They're close but different and I'm not sure which I prefer! But the Mojomojo is on the board and the Blueberry in a cupboard if that helps!

BB734A spotted in the wild on the new Smashing Pumpkins tour: https://twitter.com/CptBozoJabroni/status/1017641162998333441?s=09

The profanity filter strikes again!

😂

Have you tried using the PitchRingMod (I think that's what it was called) for an OC-2 tone? Gets closer than the legacy Octaver does I think. But there are specific settings required that I can't recall but did post somewhere in the Helix thread!

I don’t know, the a major part of why the DP-3X is such a hit is due to the fact it compresses the lows and distorts the top. I think Doug would want to compete with this particular unit and offer the same feature, that’s what I would do anyway!

There are 3 new Microtubes X units on the way, specs are a mystery but they will be digital and hopefully include most of what’s on your list!

Crazy price differential. I understand the HX has exactly the same processors, just obviously less in terms of IO, screen and knobs? If so, sounds like they could have put the amp sims in that box for no extra cost but the marketing team said no!

Indeed, since you can put a crossover anywhere in your chain, send the lows to a compressor and the highs to a guitar amp, your can turn any guitar amp into a bass amp!

Many of you Helix folk tried the Zoom B3n? I'm pretty impressed with it on the amp/dirt front, it's leaps and bounds ahead of the B3/MS-60B/B1on. I have never been able to get a pleasing fingerstyle overdrive tone out of the SVT / B15 amp models in the Helix, BIAS, or the older Zoom units. I preferred to stick with the VT Bass. I can get some great dirty amp sounds out of the B3n however! Not sure which is the most realistic of course, having never played the real actual amps, but I do know which I prefer playing through. It also has a Sansamp BDDI model, and a pretty killer envelope filter in the form of the Z-Tron, which I prefer to anything other filter I've found on the modelling front. I also prefer the phasers in the Zoom, and the analog-esque octavers are about on par with each other. Helix of course wins in plenty of other areas though, flexible routing, analog delays, custom IRs, etc. But for the main FX I use (dirt, filter, phaser), I would be happier with the underdog B3n.

Can it emulate the oscillation and pitch bending of an analog delay (i.e. crank the feedback knob and mess with the time knob to get crazy sounds)? Not many digital delays can do it, although it's one of the things that the Helix gets absolutely bang on! The Zoom B3n doesn't even attempt it, the sound cuts off when you adjust the time knob.

Just a heads up, I just picked up a B3n and downloaded the Guitar Lab software to install. Windows 10 Defender refused to run it and deleted it - I uploaded to Virustotal to scan it and looks like it could potentially be infected! I'll reach out to Zoom to see what they say...