Al Krow

Depending on which effects, actually yes an audience, your band and you would notice. DSP on Helix >> Zoom and this is key to better quality emulations. It's why the high end multi-fx (Fractal etc.) have seriously impressive chips at the their core. Try a pitch shift on Zoom and you'll get an unusable latency riddled sound. Helix handles effortlessly. Similarly if you ever fancy emulating a Royal Blood layered sound - well good luck on Zoom (no chance in my experience). Helix just about manages, particularly if you make use of parallel routing (series only in Zoom). But if you're just going for simple dirt and EQ, well I agree Zoom will likely get you there and no particular need to shell out for the better quality Helix.

Just had the pleasure of dealing with Phil - sold me a mint condition pedal, for a very reasonable price, which I'm looking forward to getting to grips with over the coming months, ahead of gigs restarting (fingers crossed!) next Spring. He may have twisted my arm to purchase one of his books too 😊

Helix HX Effects would allow you to create upto128 "boards" of 6 individual "pedals" and each of these "pedals" can be switched on or left off as desired with 6 individual stomp switches. Or alternatively you could have 128 tailored patches for particular songs that you could then put in the running order of your gigs and just scroll through 32 banks of effects in blocks of 4. Or any combination in between! Parallel or series / cross over options. It also has two external parallel loops for incorporating your existing pedals as well as midi connectivity. Should keep even you out of mischief, for a while, Stew! And all that for less than £300 used. @PaulWarning how am I doing on the GAS induction front? I'm a massive fan of the Zoom pedals, as you probably already know. But Helix does take things to the next level.

And you’ve ended up with a MIJ OC2 pedal worth the best part of £100! That’s gotta be a “best buy” on a whole ‘nother level and a rate of return that would make a hedge fund manager blush 😁

That is one lovely bass! Always been tempted by NT5 Warwick Thumbs and fantastic that you managed to get one for a great price and in such good condition! If I could find one which weighed in at around 10 lbs or less I'd be champing at the bit to join you. I totally love that Warwick MEC growl - it's what led me to seeking a lighter weight substitute which I've kinda managed to get with my Ibby SR Premium basses with their Nordstrand big singles. I got mine, used, within 4 weeks of yours but complete with a cover! Frustratingly, and I suspect true for both of us, I've certainly had precious little opportunity to use it "in anger" outside of the house since then...

Aha - another potential candidate for the neo-luddite BC club! How on earth did you wangle that?! 😁

Following on from the same topic we've successfully run for the last couple of years - a chance for some useful hints and tips with Black Friday and Xmas goodies still ahead, and, of course, nothing to stop us changing our minds between now and year end. And, yes please, pics of the offending items very welcome to add unhelpful GAS for the rest of us! As with the last two years, the only "house rules" are that it's bass gear and something you bought (or at least arrived) in 2020. We can all then sign up to @bassfan's / @Sibob's Gear Abstinence Thread for 2021 with good conscience and in the knowledge we don't have a cat in hell's chance of succeeding! 😁

Just had a hugely positive experience with UPS sending a BF cab to Norway. Collected from my place within the agreed 2 hour slot on Monday afternoon and arrived safely in Norway today (Thursday) first thing. £35 courier + £20 extra for £500 insurance cover. Dunno how that compares on price, but me and the buyer were both very happy with the service.

To get the ball rolling, here's some thoughts I recently posted on another thread: There does seem to be a nice hierarchy of price and capability evolving in the current 'compact' and 'super compact' multi-fx space and you can slot in at the right level for your individual requirements: Compact DG / Neural DSP (not yet released) Fractal FM3 Boss SY 1000 Super Compact Boss GT 1000 Core Headrush Helix Stomp / HF Effects Zoom B1-4 Obviously plenty I've missed off that list (e.g. the larger Helix LT and Floor which are perhaps too big to be described as "compact", Mooer GE Series, Hotone Ampero, the older Zooms and Line 6 pedals + others) Cost / value / capability obviously won't be linear though i.e. you can pay a fair bit more for a marginal improvement, for the same reason why a £2,000 bass is never going to be 400% better than a decent £500 bass! The entry point here is a Zoom B1-4 which is around £65 to your door and, having had both, I can say that the Stomp / Helix HX Effects is definitely a big step up but certainly not a 6x better product than the Zoom. For me capability is a function of a number of factors including: DSP (which often dictates the quality of the simulated effects); the availability and quality of individual effect sims; quality and easy to use PC editing software; ease and flexibility in being able to use live - decent display, access to individual effects pedals, more rather fewer stomp switches; built in synth engine.

My least favourite thing is packing up big bass items for sale, and then the thought of sending them overseas fills me with further dread! So I had only just decided that this sale would be collection only when Stephen gets in touch and asks if I'd be preapred to get it couriered to...Norway. Ugh! However this particular experience has gone some way to exorcising a few demons on that score! Stephen organised the courier & insurance and UPS arrived within 30 mins of the start of their designated 2 hour window on Monday afternoon and the cab arrived safe and sound in Norway just 3 days later. If Carlsberg did bass cab transfers...😁 As for Stephen - he's a gent and I'd have absolutely no hesitation in dealing with him again. Fast payment, excellent coms and just a pleasure to deal with. Enjoy the cab mate - I see you'll be pairing it with a Mesa head from your previous purchase on here: you could be doing far worse!

Thanks - well that's good to know. Although at £45 it's pretty good value! Currently got my eye on the Boss EV-30 - like the idea of a dual expression pedal that could be linked to both the Helix and Boss SY-1 synth pedal, and the Boss looks pretty compact. Hopefully no issue with using it with Helix.

What particular effects are you finding it's really adding value on, Patrick?

The larger Helix pedals have expression pedals built in - are folk using separate expression pedals with the HX Effects and Stomp and, if so, what effects are you particularly finding you're using them on and which expression pedal model have you gone for?

Virtual boards of 6 pedals on Helix HX FX @stewblack - it was this earlier discussion I was reminded of when you mentioned that you "like multi fx I can play like individual pedals." At the budget end of the Helix range the HX Effects is particularly well suited to this set up.

You never been tempted by Helix HX Effects, Stew? You can easily set it up to have as multiple different boards each comprising several pedals. And, unlike the TC, they are pretty regularly available used, for sub £300.

Lol! There is clearly one conclusion from all of this. Whatever you do...

Nope - your point was about romanticising war, which was quite a leap! Or did I read that completely incorrectly? Others made the point that the parallel could be considered unhelpful , which is a fair point (albeit one I disagree with).

I beg to differ. If you actually read back it was responding to a point about shortage of personnel which has occurred at crisis points in the life of this nation before, and 2020 and 1940 are/were both crisis years for the citizens of GB. You then made a song and dance about technological superiority of equipment and planes, which really was entirely irrelevant to this thread, but I took the bait when you tried to imply that a shortage of personnel = romanticising war! (Tbf however, if you can't remember correctly what we said yesterday I take your point about not being able to remember events from 80 years ago) 😁

Agreed with your last point. However, the mods (and we have a very lovely one actively involved in this thread, as you will have observed) do seem to be ok with more "in depth" discussions from time to time ; particularly when they are conducted respectfully and don't end up becoming rabid Brexit slanging matches (there, I've said the "B" word - lol!). PS I corrected my earlier post from 80 to 75 years for obvious reasons

Entirely fair! I completely agree with your sentiment, but I don't think anyone was intending to be "banging on about the war" - merely implying that a war-time spirit (irrespective of 1940s technological superiority) could be very helpful in addressing the shortfall in personnel to administer vaccines to get us out of the current massive economic mess that lockdowns create. But @Dad3353's point on the validity of invoking a war time spirit is a very fair one, as I have just acknowledged. I'm not as pessimistic on this as your last sentence implies: Western Europe including the UK has arguably had its most peaceful 75 years since the Roman Empire. And, counterintuitively, the most divisive US president of recent times has also been the least bellicose in terms of putting US troops in harm's way across the globe. What have you heard on this - sounds good?

Appreciate it's a bit of thread de-rail, but I can't let such a blithe statement go unchallenged. A simple poem long etched on my mind: History repeats itself. Has to. No-one listens. Steve Turner There's a reason today is Remembrance Day, "Lest we Forget" and why many of us have just now observed 2 minutes silence to reflect on things long past. I guess we will need to disagree on this one.

The 8 string Stiletto is a fine instrument - really happy with mine:

Well it has "dUg Pinnick" and "12 string" in the same breath so I guess they've already made one advance sale! 😊

@Cuzzie really sorry to hear about your family loss in the first wave; that's a very high personal cost you have had to pay to this wretched virus.

I'd politely suggest, technical superiority or not, we can and should remember, with gratitude, the sacrifice others have made on our part, not least given the day today is. And it's precisely because of their sacrifice most of us in Western Europe have not had to experience anything similar since (thank God). The gentle parallel being drawn here is that a global pandemic also takes lives. Over a million so far and counting. And front line staff have literally been putting theirs on the line for our sakes. Nothing romantic about that either.