BigRedX

Unless Line6 have added MIDI-triggered filters and gates I'm happy with what I have already.

1 hour ago, Naigewron said:

 

When the update starts, you're forced to make a backup  Did you reload that backup after the update was done?

 

That's how you're supposed to get your settings back after every update.

IME it makes no difference to the global settings whether I do a wipe and restore or not. Neither way has reinstated them for me. All it appears to do is add another 30 minutes onto what is already and overlong process, and the last time I did a complete wipe and restore on my Helix, it insisted on rebuilding all my Presets for a third time when I next powered up the device.

Reminded me to install the 3.8 firmware as I don't have anything important coming up for over a week.

Getting a better computer since I did the last update hasn't made the process any quicker and 94-100% appears to take as long as 0-93%.

The HX edit link to release notes doesn't work either. 

Edit: And yet again my Global setting have reverted to the factory defaults. It does say in the release notes that there is a problem with Apple M-series computers regarding this, but it also affected Intel Macs on previous updates. Hopefully this will be fixed soon, because it's very annoying and I don't always remember to change everything to my preferences until I find that something isn't working as I expected it to.

And... Every time I load up Logic I get a message saying that the Line6 44.1kHz Core Audio Driver will not be compatible with future versions of Mac OS. I've just checked on the Line6 website and the installed version 1.5 driver is now almost 4 years old. I'm still on Sonoma, but contemplating upgrading to Sequoia just before next version of Mac OS is released. Does anyone know if the 1.5 driver works with Sequoia?

13 hours ago, Wombat said:

the NUX only have a 2hr (ish) battery life before needing to be charged in the case.

Not my experience at all. My band has 3 hour practice sessions where the NUX system is running continuously for at least 2 and half hours with status lights still on green by the end of the session.

According to the Burns Website the scale length is 25.5" which IME is a bit short for a decent bass tone.

Also the Burns neck for their standard Bass VIs is a bit on the narrow side (although not as bad as Fender/Squier) and you would definitely want it wider for the additional octave strings. Confusingly the website says it's 55m in the description which would probably be about right, but only 49mm in the specifications. Plus a 55mm wide nut would result in a near parallel string path unless the pickups and bridge had been modified for increased string spacing all the way. It's alll very confusing. The Barracuda Bass VI had standard guitar width pickups and bridge which wasn't great.

I'd certainly be interested in one of these with a 30" scale length and a suitably wide neck, and overall string spacing.

The band in question had a very dense sound and the two guitarists would want to hear an on-stage mix that sounded as close to the recording as possible. OtOH I was quite happy so long as I could hear the drums so I could tell I was in time and the vocals so I knew where I was in the song. Being able to take the bass guitar out of the foldback certainly helped with the on-stage clarity for the other members.

When I was still using my RCF FRFR I'd often position it at the front of the stage but "firing" across so that the rest of the band also got the benefit.

8 hours ago, Dad3353 said:

The lower temperature was an easy-to-establish 'zero', the freezing point of water.

0°F is actually the freezing point of brine, not water.

The other two members of my band are almost a foot taller than me. Even glam rock platform boots wouldn't get me up to a comparable height. The only band photo we have where our heads are all level is one where I am standing on a step and the other two have crouched down slightly...

Could be re-titled 20 reasons not to play in a pub covers band.

Playing in originals bands I've only encountered two of them. The late payment with numerous ignored requests for the money, that was eventually honoured about a year after the gig. The promotor in question had a reputation for being bad at paying and we are unlikely to do another gig for them. Also the load-in/out in the rain or, in the case of the UK, snow. Doubly awful if you are a band with any kind of image that involves hairspray.

All the others make me glad that I don't play in those kinds of bands to that kind of an audience.

The Terrortones used deps on numerous occasions when we were going through our seemingly endless cycle of replacement guitarists and drummers, so that we didn't have to cancel important and/or lucrative gigs.

Deps for originals bands come with their own set of problems. Our main one was getting the replacements to dress appropriately. While we didn't expect them to get leathered up (although it would have been great if they had) even a simple instruction like "wear black, no obvious band or brand logos and no trainers for guitarists" appeared to be difficult to follow.

The other problem was that we would have to change the set so that we had decent recordings of all the songs for the dep to learn which often meant dredging up back catalogue that we hadn't played live for ages and consequently we only knew the songs slightly better than the dep.

On the whole while the deps were mostly competent, only one of them had the right vibe musically and we eventually offered him a permanent place in the band. The rest made us glad to get the proper band member back playing drums or guitar. One drummer in particular managed to mess up playing our single, which was our best-known and most popular song. Therefore when we got an unexpected encore we decided to play it again to make up for getting wrong in the set. Then he managed to mess it up a second time in a different way!

I was even dep'd for one very important gig that was doubled booked with the covers band I was also in at the time. I had to lend my replacement a 5-string bass so that he could play all the songs and he had several rehearsals with the rest of the band. I've seen video of a couple of songs from the gig and it seems that he spent most of the set with his back to the audience. I vowed that wouldn't happen again and was one of the many reasons why I quit playing in the covers band.

Wall Warts are fine for pedals so long as they can be mounted on a pedal board and never touched again.

The problem that I have with is that the low voltage plug is non-locking and the cable easily damaged compared with an IEC connecter cable.

I wouldn't make the case a snug fit. 

If you look at the equivalent ABS rack cases there is built-in air space all around the actual space for the rack units.

The last time I built a wooden rack case I used 2" PAR batons for the bracing. This was mainly because the case was 14U high, but it had the added advantage is giving an extra air space all around the equipment for the air to circulate. 

For your two units you probably don't need this much, but since it looks like a permanent installation rather than a carry case, I'd add as much extra width as you have room for and try and get at least a 5mm air gap top and bottom.

We donated a load of art (paintings and limited edition prints) which didn't fit the decor any more and which we didn't have room to store, to a local charity shop. The following week a couple of them turned up on the site of the local auction house and subsequently sold for a few hundred pounds each. I sometimes feel a bit guilty about some of the stuff we off-load on the charity shops, so I'm glad they were able to make some decent money this time.

1 hour ago, Owen said:

I bought a new Mac Mini M4 last week. It has bricked itself within 2 days. I will not be worrying about plugins for a bit.

As someone who is considering buying a mini as a general purpose back-up computer what happened?

On 30/05/2025 at 11:32, WinterMute said:

Logic/Abelton are perfectly capable platforms without a ruck of 3rd party soft-synths.

Most of my synth parts are created using the Retro synth plug-in. If I need more control over the sound than I can get with that, then ES2 or Alchemy will definitely do what I want. All of these come as part of the Logic Pro install. No need for any 3rd party synths at all.

The "adaptor" shown in the OP is to allow the use of an external PSU fitted with a Euro plug. Unless it offers some way of locking the PSU in place by more than just the plug pins it is technically against trading standards for it to have been supplied for use in the UK.

IMO external PSUs are the bane of the audio equipment world and ones that require adaptors doubly so.

1 hour ago, Greg Edwards69 said:

That doesn't sound right at all if he/she was just performing a software update.

 

Tell them to download the Line 6 Updater and try again. This is different to doing it through HX Edit. More of a nuclear option! I've had to do this once when HX Edit's update process failed, due to my laptop going to sleep partway through.

If they still don't have luck, then they should raise a support ticket directly with Line 6 who will walk them through several resolution options.

This.

We have two Manchester gigs coming up later this year.

Last time I played in Manchester after we'd finished our set we went to another pub just around the corner to see the band who we'd supported in Nottingham a few days earlier play.

6 minutes ago, tegs07 said:

I think it’s more of a North/South thing. A lot of venues in the South (London and the South East in particular) are no more.

That might be it. We mostly play Nottingham and venues further North and as I said there is no shortage of gigs for us.

43 minutes ago, Woodinblack said:

It is quite a striking loss, so I am sure you will see it eventually.

When I moved to Nottingham in 1980 there were essentially 5 places for local originals bands to play:

The Ad-Lib Club

The Boat Club

The Hearty Goodfellow

The Newshouse (if you played blues-rock)

The Buttery Bar at Nottingham University (technically you had to be at the university, but local bands could get a gig there if they knew the right people).

Right now the list looks like this:

The Boat Club

The Bodega

Bunkers Hill

The Chapel at The Angel Microbrewery

The Grove

Jam Café

JT Soar

Liquid Light

Metronome

The Mist Rolling Inn

The Old Cold Store

The Old Salutation Inn

The Rescue Rooms

Rough Trade

Saltbox

As you can see that's 3 times as many and I'm sure I've missed a couple. The thing is, on the originals circuit, venues come and go, but here in Nottingham over the last 45 years they have been slowly increasing in number. We've lost couple recently, but the Maze has re-appeared at The Old Cold Store and The Chameleon in the basement of The Mist Rolling Inn. Getting a gig at any of these venues (with the exception of a couple which are very genre-specific), should be within reach of any well-organised and entertaining originals band - I've played most of the venues listed above within the last few years. Maybe Nottingham is special when it comes to venues for original bands? All I know is what I see, and there appear to be plenty of opportunities for my band to play all over the country. We'd be gigging every other weekend if the logistics were right. As it is we have 7 definite well-paid gigs in the next 4 months and several more that are just awaiting final confirmation.

This shrinking number of venues must be a pub covers band problem because I'm not seeing it at all.

22 minutes ago, Obrienp said:

True but the app authors update them to work with the latest OS functions, so they stop working with your iPad, if Apple are not updating the OS. This has already happened with a few apps on my iPad, including Apple Store, which I find ironic! There is also the problem of battery degradation.

That's not the behaviour I have experienced on my iPads. If the latest version of an app requires a more up to date version of iOS than you have it just won't get installed. The old version carries on working as before. Again if the app does everything you needed/wanted when you originally installed it then there is no reason to update. For any piece of technology that is mission critical, and I would included anything I use to gig with, automatic updates are turned off and updates are only applied if they definitely add extra functionality that I will use and they don't conflict with anything else on the device.

I think it very much depends on what you use your DAW for.

Mine is used for programming and then running the drum and sequencer backing tracks for my band to use when we gig and for recording my bass for the songs were are going to release to the public. I have Helix Native which allows me a bit more flexibility for my bass sounds without having to re-record the parts and a Simmons drum plug-in that replaces my somewhat incomplete set of samples I made when I used to own the real thing which I was accessing through Logic's EX24/Sampler plug-in. For everything else the virtual instruments and effects plug-ins that come with Logic are more than adequate, and I still haven't anywhere near exhausted the possibilities of those to even think about buying any more 3rd party plug-ins. Plus everything is far superior to the hardware I use to have in terms of sound and user-friendliness.

The way I look at it is that my setup will never become obsolete and I won't suddenly find myself with plug-ins that I can no longer use because I have upgraded my computer and either I can't afford to upgrade the plug-ins or that they are no longer being supported by the developer. Both of which have happened to me in the past.

21 minutes ago, christhammer666 said:

so spot on mate. playing originals on a Tuesday night to no one is soul destroying

We've done mid-week gigs, but it's always at decent venues that have a reputation for putting bands on other than at the weekend, and it's always supporting someone much more popular than us.