Used my Pod HD500 for 1st time last night

[nocaster]

And to be honest, I'm quite impressed.

I'm not surprised though. Reason is simple....I have had the entire M series from Line 6 (M5, M9 & M13) and they've all been superb, however, all have had a flaw of some sort. In summary, the M5's switching is a total nightmare. Moving between patches isn't easy. The M13 is just too damn big and I'd need a FAR bigger flight case than I'd want to lug around. The M9 seemed ideal (in fact I had 2!) and I gigged mine a few times. The problem was that I needed more than 6 sounds available and I often turned the tuner on when selecting sounds on the top row.

Now the geeks will say that I can have more than 6 sounds available on the M9, but I really wanted to avoid scene/bank changes during gigs. I don't like doing it.

So, thinking out loud at work one day, my Boss said - "what about the pod floor units". To be honest I hadn't looked at them and didn't know much about them. After checking the web site I noticed they contained all the M effects - now I'm interested. The wah's and exp pedal look decent and I can run it without the amp sims on - now I'm really interested!

As if by magic, Tony was selling his HD500 on here. A few hundred quid later and I now have my own HD500.

So the plan is to run it in a "manual" mode and have 8 pedals available in front at one time. No amp sims. Running into the front of my Bogner. Simples.

I got it yesterday and set up a basic board in a few mins and took it to practice last night. The first thing that struck me was the low output from it. Plugging into my amp was a lot louder than going through the HD. I had been reading various sites over the last few days and noticed people talking about setting the mixer to +6.5. I did that and it helped a lot. The next problem I had was that it sounded quite nasal. Almost as if it had a wah at a fixed position running all the time. It didn't though. Any ideas what that could be?

Other than that, the fx quality was outstanding and just having everything at the press of a button is ace. I love it. If I can sort the (apparent) nasal sound then it'll be getting gigged very soon.

K

[RobDavies]

The Boss GT100 is out very soon, so I'll have first dibs on the Pod when you want to sell it in a day or two.

[nocaster]

You're not the first to say that!!!

I like the look of the Boss unit but I think that's just because I like Boss units though. Looking at the spec, it wouldn't do what I wanted.

K

[relic245]

Have you checked what the global output is set to, options are direct, combo front, combo power amp, stack front etc. They change the eq settings and I cant remember what it was set to when I shipped it. Failing that do a factory reset if you haven't already but if you do check the output type again as I think the default is direct.

[MrMenturm]

I was gonna do the same thing. Could never get it to sound transparent enough, no matter what I did.

[nocaster]

Have you checked what the global output is set to, options are direct, combo front, combo power amp, stack front etc. They change the eq settings and I cant remember what it was set to when I shipped it. Failing that do a factory reset if you haven't already but if you do check the output type again as I think the default is direct.

Aye Tony that was the first thing I changed. Last night I was playing into my Rocker 30 so I set it to combo front. I also bumped up the mixer levels to compensate but I'm thinking the global "focus" control might affect the sound and might be what was giving it the "nasal" character??

When I used to use a GT8 the very first thing I did was switch everything off and get a transparent tone to work from. I managed it but it took a while to sort levels, etc. I simply need to do the same with the 500.

Will tweak at the weekend if I have time. Well impressed with it so far though.

K

[nocaster]

Two things I'm going to try this weekend :

1. Ensure my input settings are "global" and not "preset"
2. This :

http://line6.com/support/thread/74045

K

[Sir Axeman]

You're not the first to say that!!!

I like the look of the Boss unit but I think that's just because I like Boss units though. Looking at the spec, it wouldn't do what I wanted.

K

Well Kev - good luck! I'll be waiting for the HD500 for sale thread in the classifieds n the GT-100 GAS thread on here!!

Time will soon tell. If you stop GASsing the ecomomy will slow up and we'd all feel it!


And Boss have often been regard as secondary to Line 6 in the amp modelling but superior in their FX and routability etc. Once I've A/B the HD500 with the GT-100 I'm gonna get one or the other myself! They both sound like they're awesome units..just hope Boss has raised its game signficantly in the modelling dept.

[GearAddict]

That 'cocked wah' thing you describe sounds like the issue I had with most of the GT-10 drive sounds. You also hear it in the Boss Micro-BR COSM modelling...I'd be nervous of the GT-100 until I was sure they'd sorted that out.

Strange you are getting the same thing on the Pod though...I've not had a problem with that on the M9.

[nocaster]

That 'cocked wah' thing you describe sounds like the issue I had with most of the GT-10 drive sounds. You also hear it in the Boss Micro-BR COSM modelling...I'd be nervous of the GT-100 until I was sure they'd sorted that out.

Strange you are getting the same thing on the Pod though...I've not had a problem with that on the M9.

Yeh it's weird as I'm using the same fx models on the Pod as I did with my M9.

I reckon it's a routing/input issue as it sounds like the input is getting split and then is out of phase. The link I posted above seems to sort this issue.

K