Dont forget,if you gte the Kemper you still need an amp (or PA) if you play live, and all PAs can change the sound...at least you know what you will sound like from a DT25 and the HD500 gives you a good recording option for guitar, bass and vocals....

If your only recording, and only guitar, maybe the Kemper is the answer- some one will probably do a VST version soon (Guitar rig?), DT25 has real valves ans real volume

True enough. The cool thing there is I think you can still feed the Pod HD 500's stereo outputs into the PA, which in my mind gives the best of both worlds (I hate miking up the guitar cab on live gigs).

Come to think of it, it'd be rad if Pods had separate outputs for pre-amp and post-amp modeling. That way we could feed the post-amp to the PA and the pre-amp effects into the front of an amp. I could find a way to put up with the sound of Pods if that were possible.

The HD500 "issues" are mostly user error related as the learning curve is quite high for this unit and there are some design flaws with the way the HDs handle dual inputs. Most (if not all) of these issues can be worked around with a healthy amount of patience and research

That's what I'm missing!

Ha! There are some exceptions I'm sure and some notable design flaws where Line 6 has made it harder than it needs to be to deal with gain staging. MeAmBobbo's guide was a HUGE help to me in this area and I HIGHLY recommend it

Sure it is userrelated - playing a humbucker guitar!

And the cure is - switch to SC guitar if to use Line6.

Line6 support(which seems excellent) informed me that HD500 and HD Pro has pad switches, and meant I should buy those models if having humbucker guitar.

I have not tried HD versions yet and they might have increased headroom on inputs on HD series compared to XT - I don't know. But since some models come with -10dB pad it's needed in some cases.

I'm puzzled.

The HD is a complicated beast. I do just fine with humbucker pups but it took some work to figure this all out enough to be satisfied with it. If I didn't have the matching DT25 amp, I may have already lost patience and returned it but I'm glad I stuck out

So it wasn't just to press the pad button and off you go?
You've got the HD500, didn't you?

I have nothing really high output - just regular Gibson and Ibanez, Burstbucker Pro, 57 Classic, 490R, 498T, Ibanez 70's or similar.

Then a Jazzmaster, but that's SC(P90 looking).

If nothing else I really liked the speaker cabinet emulation in XT Pro, to get a really nice small ambient room for the guitar.

Best emulation I found otherwise is Izotope Trash boxmodels, and the ability to place two mikes where ever you want and regarding distance - not just the regular on axis or off axis.

It's very practical with digital stuff and you can continue working at quite different occations and always get the same guitarsound each time.

I must pick a guitar and make a visit to a store that let me play for a while.

Yes, I have the HD500. The MOST important thing is to get the gain staging right and it's not (necessarily) set up, out of the box for that. It seems to be set up for dual input, stereo rigs. So, first I go to the mixer, and set Path A to MUTE and Path B to center (pan) and 0db (unity gain). Then, I go to "INPUT SOURCE" and make sure "Guitar" is selected on input one and something that is not being used, like "Aux" for input two. The default "Same" setting for the second input is erroneous and can cause digital clipping because it multiplies the signal. The same is true for setting both inputs to "Guitar". People may like the tone because it's louder but further down the signal chain, they are setting themselves up for digital clipping. Make sense?

So yeah, big learning curve and strange defaults make for easy pitfalls with this unit

I have a Behringer V-Amp that has an input gain setting hidden in the edit menu parameters, maybe it is the same for the original PODs, seemed to make a difference between using my single coil strat and my LP humbuckers.

I was just thinking about this myself as it seems like you'd want some things like stomp effects in front of an amp and other things post preamp. I think the direct link with the DT amps deals with this issue, but if you're using another device then you're up the creek.

Thanks.

I saw on some of the floor-PODs they had a switch for amp or studio, why not a third option for the other obvious alternative one wonders?

Make it real easy for all Line6 gear. This gear if anything should be plug and play.

Strange.

Just wanted to mention that I recently bought a Zoom G5 out of curiosity, to compare with the HD500/DT25 system. It came in last week, and I spent a couple of days running the G5 straight into the PA through the XLR connection, and I also ran it into the front end and the power amp input on three combo amps (a Fender, an Egnater, and the DT25).

At first I thought I was hearing some pretty good things out of the G5, especially straight into the board. However, after much tweaking, and side-by-side comparison with the HD500/DT25 (run by itself or into the PA through the direct out on the DT25), I've come to the conclusion that it's no contest: DT25/HD500 winds hands down. To me, the G5 sounds like a toy in comparison. Of course, this is highly subjective, to say the least, but that's the conclusion I reached. The G5 is going back as soon as I get the RAN from the retailer.

This is not to say that the G5 sounds bad, I believe it sounds pretty good actually, but the fidelity through either an amp or the PA is much lower than the Line 6 system. This is apparent in both the high end and the low end.

The whole experience left me even more strongly bonded with the HD500/DT25. It's without a doubt the best rig I've ever used, so far I have played 6 live shows with it, and it just keeps getting better and better! YMMV, but I'm totally loving it

The HD500/DT25 sounds like the amps it's supposed to sound like. The G5 gets fairly close, but the lower fidelity was the deal-breaker for me.

Pete

Bummer, I was hoping the G5 would be cool, just because of that great expression pedal.

You say that as if most gigs don't go down with some sort of PA anyway. Yesterday I went to a friend's party and they rented out a nice space and had their band play a set. I got there early and the band was still sound checking and I thought to myself, "Ah... this. If only they had all had Kemper's this would have taken 15 minutes." I've mixed my fair share of gigs and let me tell you it's always a struggle to get guitarists (especially bass players) to keep their rig at a volume that lets me do a good job. Everyone wants to kick their amp up to it's "sweet spot" so then you've got to crank the vocals and before you know it you're getting feedback so you're backing off and then the vocals are swamped. When was the last time you went to a gig where the vocals weren't somewhat swamped? So there's your "real volume." It's almost always contributing to a crappy mix. This wasn't a heavy band either. They were doing kind of groovy 60s sounding lounge/rock. They ended up sounding pretty good... better than most bands I hear live, though the bass was always a bit too loud and most of the time the lead guitarists was too far back in the mix. As I watched it all go down I couldn't help but think of how much better they could have sounded and how effortless it would have been if they'd all had a pure modeling set up. Oh, I forgot to mention, their drummer had to cancel so they were sans drums. I'm sure if they had their drummer it would have been even harder to get a good mix.

Just a note, less you think these people were a bunch of amateurs, the lead guitarist is a professional live audio engineer who knows his stuff. The whole band is full of seasoned pros.

Oddly, after they played a duo of two acoustic guitarists/vocalists played and there was no issue with the mix.

So, to all the amp-meisters out there: All that "tube-amp magic" and "real volume" you love is overall making your band sound a lot worse than if they were all using decent modelers. There! I SAID IT! Sure, there are some venues, engineers, bands, etc that are the exception to this rule, but not many. You guitarists are like the Nazis at the end of Raiders Of The Lost Ark... mesmerized by the beauty of your face melting tone!