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Hello Everybody
I accidentally discovered Active Melody a few weeks ago and impressed with what Brian has provided us. My guitar and amp sat idle in the closet for “30 years” Brian has me playing again – after all that time!
I incorrectly posted this question in another spot on the forum. Sorry about that. I’m not used to forums and posts.
I want to start buying new equipment. Brian describes it as “GAS” i.e. Gear Acquired Syndrome. I was looking at the Line 6 HD500 but I understand that Brian uses the M13. I am a newbie to this and don’t know all the technical terminologies but I do know that I wish to buy a new toy.
Does anybody have any thoughts on this equipments as to which Line 6 to purchase?
Thanks,
Jim
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Hey Jim, the Line 6 HD500 is VERY cool. It’s great at home playing around the house, great for recording, and also great for playing live. In some ways I would consider it superior to the M13 because of the built-in expression pedal. That pedal can be programmed to, so it can act as a wah wah, volume pedal, control delay tempo, and many other uses. The M13 basically gives you 4 channels, and 3 buttons in each of those channels that you can assign pedal effects to. So the M13 is better for doing things like switching on and off effects when playing live.. i.e. add a little more reverb or delay. It makes it easy to turn on or off certain effects in the chain, whereas the HD500 allows you to pre-program a sound and assign it to a switch. I hope that makes sense.. they both do very similar things, but if I were you – I’d go with the HD500. I also own a POD XT (which is similar to the HD500) and it’s one of the best effect units I’ve ever used. VERY versatile.
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Hello Brian and ‘all’
I’m buying the Line 6 HD500 tonight. I already bought the Duet Apogee, an Imac and picked up a pair of KRK’s so I am indeed suffering even more GAS .
I hear people say they don’t use an amp. I assume they connect their device whether it be a HD500, M13 or otherwise via an interface to their computer and are playing out of their speakers.
Are most people just playing via GarageBand?
Are there optimal hardware hook up configurations and can somebody suggest anything other than what I have?
Thanks,
Jim
PS Next week … maybe a Fender MIM? Still not sure on whether a Strat or a Tele. I like the idea of having a Tele permanently in open tuning for playing some Stones. I have an only 335 copy or similar so that should do me for my blues type sounds
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I’m also looking into new toys to get. I’m new to guitar so I’ve been doing a lot of research on everything.
It seems that there are two ways to go.. One, old school where your relationship with your amp is critical. Sustain, overdrive, tube sound etc. The other school is amp and effects modeling (line6, Roland cube, etc)
Currently I’m exploring amp modeling solution. Either with an integrated environment like a line 6 Spider IV 30 or IV 75, or more component like a Vox Tonelab ST, POD, Zoom etc and a clean practic amp to ply it through like a ZT
Any sugestions or experience anyone would like to share.
v.
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lvictor, I think it depends on where you’re going to be playing. If this is something you’re doing in your basement for now, and you’d like to do some basic recording.. the option of amp modeling would be more the way to go.. but if you’re in a band or going to be playing live somewhere… it’s really critical to have an amp and use some basic effects (either an all in one unit like the Line 5 HD300 / 500 series) or by using some basic pedals. Most people lean towards an amp with whatever the necessary pedals are. Currently I use a Boss BD-2, Fulltone OCD, Flashback Delay, Voodoo Lab Tremelo pedals and a Fender Blues Deluxe amp (if I’m playing live). When at home, I just use a Line6 M-13 Stompbox and run it straight into the computer. Hope that helps.
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Hi Brian,
I’ve got the line 6 Pod 2.0 on order, a decision partly based on your tone you get just through your computer.
My question is what is involved in hooking it up to a computer? As I understand it, no special leads are supplied for this. Also I gather you can download patches from Line 6 to use. Is this a complicated procedure?
Finally, I have a Blues Junior amp. Some people on the forums say it sounds pretty ordinary with a Pod. If I use it this way do I turn all tone knobs down and play clean while using the Pods effects?
I’m totally new to this so any help/ advice would be appreciated.
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Hey Puffin, good questions. So if you’re using your Pod 2.0 with your Blues Jr. amp, you’ll want the amp to be clean channel… and the reverb even all the way off so that the Line 6 can control all of that. The one that you can use on your amp are the tone controls (trebel, mid, bass) – other than that I’d let the Pod shape the sound.
As for connecting to a computer, there are really 2 ways to do it. One way is to just go straight from your Pod (using a quarter inch cable) into your Line In on your computer (although you’ll need an adapter to take it from quarter inch down to 1/8 or whatever your line in input jack is in your computer) – you can get those adapters for about 3 bucks at Radio Shack.
The other option (the better of the 2 because you can connect via Midi, and have a more true signal) is to get an audio interface that connects to your computer (via USB). So for example I currently use the Native Instruments Komplete, but M-Audio makes some great ones too. Just Google “Audio Interface” and you’ll see all of the options. You can actually picks these up at Best Buy too if there’s one nearby or a Guitar Center would have them.
Hope that helps!
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