devices · HX Effects · reference · levels
levels
A thin, quiet, harsh or fizzy sound usually comes down to two settings, and neither is a tone control. One is what you told the box your instrument is. The other is what you told it your speakers are. Get both right and the preset that sounded broken sounds like the demo.
HX Effects 3.80 Owner's Manualfirst, tell it what you plugged the outputs into
Global Settings > Ins/Outs, page 1, Knob 2: Output Level. When you feed a single amp or a single mixer channel, connect only the LEFT/MONO jack. A mono rig cabled from the RIGHT jack alone loses half your signal.
- Stompboxes, or the front of a guitar amp
- Inst
- The guitar input of a stompbox or another multi-effect
- Inst
- A mixer, or a standalone recorder
- Line
- A four-cable-method rig into a line-level return
- Line
then tell it what you plugged in
Global Settings > Ins/Outs, page 1, Knob 1: Input Level. Instrument for a guitar, a bass or stompboxes. Line for anything that arrives at line level.
- A guitar or bass with passive pickups, or stompboxes
- Inst
- A guitar or bass with very loud active pickups
- Inst or Line, by ear
- A synth, drum machine, or the sends from a mixer
- Line
Distortion that shows up on loud notes and disappears on quiet ones is clipping, not an effect misbehaving. Turn the input down before you reach for a tone control.
both effects loops have the same choice
Send/Return 1 is on page 1 and Send/Return 2 on page 2, each set to Instrument or Line independently. Instrument for a loop of stompboxes, Line for line-level rack processors. If an external pedal sounds weak or distorted in a rig that is otherwise fine, check this setting first.
no Global EQ on this one
The bigger Helix boxes carry a Global EQ for compensating on the day. The HX Effects does not. Fix a room in a preset, or on whatever it is plugged into.
watch the block levels too
Every block has its own Level parameter, and Line 6's advice is to leave it at 0.0 dB on most of them. Nudge three or four in a row and the output can clip while each setting still looks reasonable.
Levels are half of it. The other half is the cab block: on into anything full-range, off into anything that ends in a real guitar speaker. With both right, little else can make it sound broken.