I've had enough of line 6.....

[Ian Price]

and now want to get rid of my UX1 and replace it with something hand held and cheap. Was considering either the Micro BR or BR600. Other than the obvious size difference I'm assuming that features etc are pretty similar?

Has anyone got experience of both of these? Would like to hear opinions.

[MDV]

What seems to be the problem (other than it sounding horrible), and what do you want your kit to be able to do?

[Ian Price]

What seems to be the problem (other than it sounding horrible), and what do you want your kit to be able to do?

I just don't get on with recording programmes i.e. cubase. The sound is pretty bad from the line 6 and I end up bypassing it most of the time and using an SM57 infrot of my amp. I also want portability as I have a piano downstairs and have started bashing a few chords round on it.

[Lew]

You really should spend some time with a DAW and get to grips with the basics, the learning curve can be steep but once you get the basics they're pretty transferable. If you're using a mac Logic is unbelievably easy to use and learn and in the grand scheme of things getting to grips with the basics of Protools isn't bad.

Probably no help sorry, just my two penneth  8)

[MDV]

Might I suggest not getting anything you cant plug a mic into?

Those look ok for just throwing somewhere and not giving a shite about the sound, just recording what happened with no regard for tone, but if youre going to get good sounds you need carefull mic placement, which in their case means carefull device placement, which means youre going to have to get up and muck about with it and move it and get inconsistent sounds recorded (if they sound any good to begin with, which I dont know).

I'm a little tempted to get the little one myself, just as a notepad. But I wouldnt use it to record properly, or even semi-properly.

Maybe a standalone with some ok mic pres and phantom power so you can get a condenser for your piano?

[MDV]

Oh, yeah, or learn the DAW. I loathe them as much as the next guy, but once you get to grips with any given one you can use it very fluidly.

And if you do, I'd get a laptop, USB interface (a proper one, not that line 6 tat; or semi-proper at least - emu or edirol or similar), and then youre set, again. Far more powerfull setup - you use as much of it as you need to.

[Jonny]

I hate the BR range, my experience I'm better with Line 6. However that's me not you, and there are packs for Line 6 which do improve the Line 6 sound.

[Lew]

Oh, yeah, or learn the DAW. I loathe them as much as the next guy, but once you get to grips with any given one you can use it very fluidly.

And if you do, I'd get a laptop, USB interface (a proper one, not that line 6 tat; or semi-proper at least - emu or edirol or similar), and then youre set, again. Far more powerfull setup - you use as much of it as you need to.

+1

Yea, don't skimp on the interface! The Apogee duet is great, sound wise it's basically a mini Apogee Ensemble. Bear in mind if you have Protools LE, it will tell ya to sod off unless you use an interface it likes.

[MDV]

I hate the BR range, my experience I'm better with Line 6. However that's me not you, and there are packs for Line 6 which do improve the Line 6 sound.

That is SO not a selling point to me. Its $%&#ing bullshitee in fact.

You buy a line 6 piece of shite, then you have to buy more things to make it sound good. Riiiiiiiiight. They can go $%&# themselves.

This is the business strategy of someone that knows fine well that most guitarists dont realise that the actual modeller is pretty inconsequential - its just a computer thats designed to process larger packets of data with a lower clock speed. It in and of itself has no sound any more than your PC does (except the ones with valves in, and then only a little bit). Its the software, the models, that matter, so they keep their best ones off the actual product release so they can sell you the good ones as well later.

Its not a plus that you can buy more patches and keep giving L6 money, its a sneaky business practice to milk you.

[_tom_]

I would try Reaper before you give up completely :) Its so much more intuitive and easy to use than Cubase imo. And it doesnt really cost anything.

[MDV]

Oh, yeah, or learn the DAW. I loathe them as much as the next guy, but once you get to grips with any given one you can use it very fluidly.

And if you do, I'd get a laptop, USB interface (a proper one, not that line 6 tat; or semi-proper at least - emu or edirol or similar), and then youre set, again. Far more powerfull setup - you use as much of it as you need to.

+1

Yea, don't skimp on the interface! The Apogee duet is great, sound wise it's basically a mini Apogee Ensemble. Bear in mind if you have Protools LE, it will tell ya to sod off unless you use an interface it likes.

True, but he's using cubase, which doesnt have Digide$igns monopolistic marketing tactics; it'll work with anything.

Cubase + Emu 0404 + SM57 + BX8-As + HD280s = great place to start. Should keep you busy for a good while; theres a shite load you can do with that, and make decent sound. Add one more mic and the number of possibilities explodes again.

[MDV]

I would try Reaper before you give up completely :) Its so much more intuitive and easy to use than Cubase imo. And it doesnt really cost anything.

I liked reaper for a bit. Till I started screwing with effects and vsts on it and got HORRIBLE latency problems (on my fireface 800; ~2ms in and out). Went back to the least intuitive and most powerfull DAW out there - sonar producer (7 in my case); zero problems (except learning to use the $%&#ing thing!).

never had a problem with SX3 either. Would still be using it if it worked on vista 64.

[_tom_]

Its weird that you have those problems. I've never had that, using either my onboard soundcard or Edirol UA25EX, neither of which are as "good" as your interface :?

[MDV]

I know. I'd probably still be using it if it werent for that - its so much easier than sonar and not exactly incapable software.

I did record one chap with it that just wanted utterly raw sound - bit of a hippy, dead against anything 'artificial', so no VSTs or digital effects!

I've formatted since then, so I may reinstall it and see if I get the same problems. It is nice stuff. I especially liked the way it handles DFH (just not that it plays it with a half-second delay!!)

[ash96]

Another +1 for logic. I got the express version as my First DAW and it was pretty easy to learn to use.

Did it all through trial and error and looking on the internet.

You'll get much better results with a DAW and interface over a BR.

You may as well just get a cheap minidisk player with a mic.