devices · Axe-Fx III · learn · 08 of 08 · 6 min
playing live
The short list to settle before the gig rather than during it.
the one thing
Level-match your presets at home, and set up your layouts or scenes before you leave. Everything else here can be fixed at soundcheck. Those two cannot.
before you leave
Level-match every preset you plan to use against every other one. A preset 4 dB louder than the rest cannot be fixed from the front of house.
Back up first. A firmware update or a factory reset does not ask twice.
when you arrive
- Balanced outputs to the desk. Ask whether they want mono before you hand over two cables.
- If there is hum into your amp, reach for a Humbuster cable before a DI box. On the XLR side, use the ground lift.
- Check which layout or scene you are in. A switch doing the wrong thing is nearly always on the wrong one.
- Confirm the guitar is in Input 1 and not a line input.
things that look like faults and are not
A gap when you change preset is the grid reloading. Build the change as a scene instead.
A footswitch doing something different from yesterday is on a different layout.
Part of the chain passing no signal is usually a missing shunt.
troubleshooting