Iii. Simple setup for amp with effects loop

This hookup is nearly the same as above, but you run into the effects loop return (power amp in) on the amp. Use "Combo Power Amp" or "Stack Power Amp" output mode (or "Studio/Direct" and make sure you choose "no cab"), and set the line/amp switch to line.

Here you bypass your amp's pre-amp completely, and you use the Pod's amp modeling instead. This gives you a very clean tone - power amps usually don't color the tone very much, at least not until you start really pushing the amp. In that case, you should see the "pre" vs. "full" section for help in choosing the right amp models for your power amp.

The downside is that you do not have the option to use your amp's pre-amp. If you want that option, you have to use the 4 cable method, described below.

Guitar > [external effects >] Pod guitar in

[Pod effects loop out > external effects > Pod effects loop return]

Pod unbalanced out > [external effects >] Amp effects loop return (power amp in)

This is how I run the Pod to my Spider Valve combo.

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Iv. 4 Cable Method

This is the most versatile setup for the Pod. You can run effects before or after your pre-amp, and you use either your amp's pre-amp or one of the Pod's amp models. Which pre-amp you are running is completely patch-dependent. You can even toggle it inside a single patch using a single footswitch on the Pod.

You send your signal to the actual amp via the FX Loop effect on the Pod. You set up your patches with the Pod's FX Loop on and amp model off to use your real amp's pre-amp, or vice versa to the use the Pod's amp modeling. Place the FX Loop right in front or behind the amp/cab model in the Pod's signal chain to keep things simple, and only turn on one or the other. Effects before the FX Loop/amp model on the Pod will run before your pre-amp. Effects after are post-pre-amp.

For a more detailed guide, see this and this by Jim Reynolds, an especially helpful Pod HD community member. Both BROKEN LINK

Guitar > [external effects >] Pod guitar in

Pod effects loop out > Amp guitar in

Amp effects loop out > Pod effects loop return

Pod unbalanced out > [external effects >] Amp effects loop return (power amp in)

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E. I Tried This and It Doesn't Sound Good

The above settings should work well for most gear. But perhaps your gear is different, or perhaps you simply have different tastes about what is harsh or sounds good. As long as you're not running the output of a real power amp into the Pod or other effect (high watt power amp output should only be run into speakers or a dummy load) or sending a line level (mostly anything not coming from an actual instrument) signal into the Pod's instrument level Guitar In input, you probably won't break anything by experimenting.

My friend used to run his Boss multi-FX processor into his Fender amp, and he got the best tone by using the speaker simulation in the Boss unit, even though he was running into real guitar speakers. When he told me his settings, I thought, "That's not right" and tried to tweak his gear how I thought it should be set up. I could never get a better tone than what he already dialed in using the "wrong" settings. Whatever gets you the best tone and doesn't break your gear is how you should run it, no matter how many people say that your settings are "wrong".

If the tone is too harsh and you're using "no cab", you want to switch output modes to non-"Studio/Direct" and try some of the cab models. They can help reduce highs.

If that still doesn't sound good to you, try switching to "Studio/Direct" and messing with different cabs and mics. There may be a particular combination that sounds great with your gear. See the cab and mic selection section for general pointers about what to expect for frequency response.

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F. Dual Output

Many have asked if they could run a "dual output mode" - IE, have one set of outputs send a signal without cab/mic simulation to a guitar amp and cab and send another signal with cab/mic simulation to the PA. There's no built-in feature to do this, but you can do it with some trickery.

Since the cab/mic simulation is contained within the amp block, you have to use dual amps, which eats up lots of DSP unfortunately. Anyway, make sure you are in Studio/Direct output mode. Set one amp up with the cab/mic sim you want. Set the other one up with "no cab".

There are two ways to route the output. Both involve some trade-offs.

The simplest is to use the FX Loop effect block. Place the FX Loop at the end of either one of the channel paths, right before the mixer. At the mixer, mute the channel with the FX Loop to guarantee no signal is passing through. For the other channel, set the pan to full center - this allows both sides of the stereo spectrum for that channel to pass through to the analog outputs on the unit.

The upside for this method is that you get two stereo outputs (FX loop send is a stereo output). Also, if you don't want to use multiple/special cables to extract the stereo output, you can just use a single 1/4" unbalanced cable for each signal to get mono output. The downside is that you need to place the FX Loop before the mixer, so you have to apply any post-amp effects twice - once in each channel, which can run into DSP limit errors.

The other method is to use the mixer to pan each signal full left and right and not bother using the FX Loop. Then the two sides have different processing.

The upside is you can use (some) effects after the mixer, avoiding DSP limit errors. The downside is that they have to be true stereo effects, or the two signals will be mixed to mono. Also, you have to make sure you use 1/4" output cables in both the left and right outputs. If you just plug into 1/4" left or 1/4" right but don't insert a dummy cable into the other output, the unit will sum the stereo signal into a mono output. But you don't need to run the other cable to anything - just make sure it's plugged in. This isn't the case for the XLR outputs, though, which never sum to mono.

Another thing to keep in mind is that some stereo effects affect one side of the signal differently than the other. For example, the analog chorus and many of the delays. Thus, your PA tone would differ from your amp tone.

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G. Wet/Dry/Wet Output

Similar to above, you can place an FX Loop effect with Mix set to 0% to output a "dry" signal before the signal hits "wet" effects and sends the "wet" signal to the main outputs. By using Mix at 0%, the signal is basically split at the FX Loop, being sent out the FX Loop Send but also passing straight on down the chain, regardless of whatever (if any) signal is returning into the loop.

So for instance, you may want this "dry" signal:

Screamer > Amp

and this "wet" signal:

Screamer > Amp > Reverb > Delay

Your chain would be:

Screamer > Amp > FX Loop > Reverb > Delay

The output from your FX Loop Send is the "dry" signal (which you can send to your monitors), and the main outputs carry the "wet" signal, (which you send to your PA).

If you cannot use the FX Loop as such, you won't be able to get stereo output; but you can get a mono wet and mono dry output by placing all your wet effects in Channel A and not in Channel B, then panning each Channel hard left/right in the mixer. Then your Channel A (left) output is wet, and the Channel B (right) output is dry. Just remember that if you are using the 1/4" analog outputs and aren't using both of them, you need to put a dummy cable in one of them to prevent the unit from summing them to mono (which would give you a 50% wet mix).

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H. Multiple Instruments/Independent Paths

The Pod provides two independent signal paths. This path independence can also be used to handle multiple instruments, for example setting Input 1 to guitar and Input 2 to mic. Input 1 will go to Channel A, the top side of the path, and Input 2 to Channel B, the bottom. Just make sure you don't have any mono FX before the path/channel split. See the input/output routing section to understand how the Pod routes audio, mixing down stereo signals when they hit a mono effect. Follow the instructions from the previous section to route the audio to different outputs.

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I. Input Settings

Global/Patch

First of all note that just because the input settings exists in the system menu, it is not necessarily a global setting. There's a specific setting on this menu page to change whether it applies globally or per patch.

Multiple Sources = Noise

The default setting is input 1: guitar + aux + variax, input 2: same. This is not ideal - if any of the non-guitar inputs are generating any noise, it is being thrown into your signal. So change input 1 to guitar only, unless you need to use those additional inputs.

Input 2

Some people have noticed that changing input 2 to variax (a digital input, which ensures silence when not connected) (or an unconnected Mic or Aux) gives them a more desirable tone. Input 2: Same/Guitar does seem to be buggy. You don't just get equal Input 1/2 signals - one of them sounds partially delayed, causing some comb filtering (less bright highs) and making the tone sound looser and slightly out-of-phase. The difference can be very subtle - I had denied a tonal difference for over a year before only recently beginning to clearly see the difference.

For single-amp patches, Input 2: Variax is simple to use. If you were previously not using this setting, you just need to add more compression/gain.

For dual-amp patches, there is more work to do. You will NEED a mono-summing effect in front of the channel split, or no signal will be sent to Channel B. If you already have a Dynamic or Distortion effect, that will sum to mono. If I don't have one of those already in my patch, I like to use one of the following, listed in order of the DSP they consume: Hard Gate, Noise Gate, FX Loop. Luckily the FX Loop takes up very little DSP; however, it does add noise to the signal; so I save it as a last resort.

If you want to know exactly how the Pod is routing the inputs and audio streams, please check out the signal routing section.

You will find your patches initially have less gain when using this. I like to try to make up the difference on the earliest effect(s) in my signal chain. For instance, if my first effect is a Screamer, I increase the Drive a bit and also the Output. Or if I have a Mid-Focus EQ, I boost Gain. If I don't have any effects, I increase Drive on my amp blocks.

The lower gain can also be a positive if you are getting breakup on your clean tones, although I cover other ways to dial in pristine cleans here.

I have heard of splitting your guitar signal before the Pod and sending it to both the Guitar and Aux inputs, then setting Input 1: Guitar, Input 2: Aux (thanks to Line 6 forum member anglepod). This would eliminate the need for a mono-summing effect, and reduce problems trying to dial in heavy amounts of gain in some cases. It requires a little extra hardware but seems to be a better solution than using up effects blocks and DSP to try to force the signal into Channel B.

Impedance

With firmware v1.4 the PodHD got variable input impedance. Line6 says before this the impedance was always set to 1M, but I feel like something changed...for the better. The unit seems more responsive to me. Anyway, I like this setting at 1M or 3.5M. This allows the loudest, tightest, and brightest tone to pass from guitar to Pod, which helps dial in the high gain tones I like. If you prefer a muddier or fuzzier distortion or looser feel, you may want a lower value.

For the F-Ball amp model, I find it can get kind of gritty and nasty for the distortion if your guitar signal is a bit bright. When I want a smooth tone from this model, normally I like to use a Mid-Focus EQ to roll-off enough high-end to smooth the tone out. However, if I don't have enough DSP or effects blocks to do so, I will turn down the impedance to attenuate some highs. I like it around 230K for this.

Also, the "auto" setting works well - it matches the impedance to the first effect in your chain, which helps make fuzz boxes sound fuzzier. If the first block is the amp, your impedance is likely 1M, which is the setting for most amps. The advanced manual shows you the input impedance values for each effect when you use "auto" on pages 2.5 - 2.7.

Remember, if you set the input settings to apply per patch, just because you changed the setting on one patch doesn't mean you are using the same settings for the patch you're currently tweaking. If the patch is noisy or you can't get the tone clean enough, be sure to double-check these settings.

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Date: 2016-01-03; view: 802