Variax and POD XT

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biggcheese

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I attended a demo for the POD XT today at GC in S. Jersey and found it to be very interesting. One thing that immediately stood out was that 90% of the attendees looked to be over 40 and only one person under twenty, a kid who was there with his father.

Although the demo was supposed to be for the XT the Rep spent quite a lot of time demoing Line6's new entry into the world of guitars, the Variax. That thing is really amazing. It replicates a large variety of different guitars and stringed instruments, such as a Strat, a Les Paul, a Gretsch, etc., in all different pickup configurations. The electronics are internal to the guitar and it has no visible pickups, but uses a piezo under the bridge. It is powered by a small box that looks something like an AB switch, but can also be powered by batteries in a pinch. In addition to doing an standout job on the electics, it also did an excellent job on a Martin, a Banjo, and a Dobro as well. As I understood it, it won't be released for a couple more weeks but they do have a link on their website. Variax.

I was pretty ignorant about the POD 2.0 so I didn't really see what was so exciting about the upgrade, but most people seemed to think the sounds were greatly improved. Since I seldom use distortion, I wasn't that impressed with the XT, since so many sounds are different distortion patches, but it will probably suit a good many of the headbangers out there. I am not much of a guitar techie so I am going back sometime this week to compare the XT and the GT-6 and try to make a decision from that. Of course the Line6 Rep was an amazing guitarist and could rattle off a lick for any occasion, so that raised the Wow! factor a bit, but overall I would say the equipment was worth checking out. I would be interested to hear opinions from any of you that are more technically oriented than me.
 
That variax scares me. I saw it in the new MF catalog already. It's now possible to run a "model" of a guitar through a "model" of an amp through a "model" of a mic and a "model" of a pre amp.


Oh my.

H2H
 
Scary indeed (and I'm a POD owner).

Don't tell me a guitarist modeler is their next project. :eek:
 
I thought you meant a Variac--to control the power to the XT and thought you were joking!

This Variax is an interesting idea and I'm not making any judgements until I hear it. Roland had that VG8 or whatever it was--a guitar modeling box where you put the hex pickup on your own guitar. I know of one person who uses it in all these years. Oh, and Joni Mitchell used one because you can put the guitar in any tuning you want (via software in the box)and change it for every song via presets.

If the Variax has decent dobro, banjo and acoustic emulations it would be a great thing for certain live gigs. Maybe it wont be good enough to record with, but it would be very cool for those live dates where you want a lot of different guitars but you don't want to carry them all.

Whats next? A preamp that is used before my V-Amp? :D Hey, I think all this stuff is fun and kind of exciting. Let's see...Crawdad its VARIAX, not VARIAC.

Oh....nevermind!
 
I'm with hard2hear all the way. I must draw the line at modeling the amps and the effects - if you call that modeling.

You may can make a guitar sound like another guitar, but you still gotta hold the thing in your hands and that's hard to forge.

Speaking of the XT - who's used it and is it worth the $400 to jump to it from a pod? What all do you gain with the usb? Does sound travel through the usb?

Thanks!
 
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