Line6 POD X3 Live or VOX ToneLab LE?

[Parma_TeleMon]

Nothing like starting a gear argument, ya know?

I figure this is as good of a place to start an opinion thread - playing in church is a natural for integrated amp modelers. Folks on our teams have used mostly Line6 modelers - POD, X3 Live and my Spider II, which weighs in at a svelt 53# plus floorboard. I'm thinking about one of the new processors and would like to know if you've played one or both and what you honestly think.

Or if you have a better idea, I'm up for that, too.

[Preacher]

After reading Lincoln Brewster's input on the Line 6 stuff I decided to try one out. So being the cheap man that I am I got a floor pod on the Bay and I am loving it. I don't usually change setups in the middle of a song, I run clean most times with a little reverb and use the foot pedal for a volume pedal instead of the wah. I love it, it really makes my tele sound good and my **ahem** strat sounds much nicer than running direct or even with effects pedals. I have not ran the Vox, but the line 6 is getting good reviews.
check it out.
http://lincolnbrewster.com/

[Wanker]

I like my Line6 X3 Live, but I never tried the Vox. I'm sure it would be a good one as well.

[twangcaster1]

Ummm...........Sparkle Drive?

[777Brad]

I had the PodXT Live (not X3 Live) & the Vox LE. Of the two, the Pod had more gee-gaws. The Vox sounds a good deal more natural & 'organic'.

I never could find a good overdriven 'crunch' on the Pod. The Vox has that all over it. It is said that the Vox has fewer high gain models, but I think that it has plenty.

Also the Vox is considerably easier to get a good tone. I had to mess with the Pod for a while. Finally the Vox is much easier to dial in tones. It has analog chicken head knobs so it's stone simple to program.

[Parma_TeleMon]

Originally Posted by 777Brad

I had the PodXT Live (not X3 Live) & the Vox LE.

You used the past tense "had". Do you have them no more, if not, why not?

I really appreciate that you spent time with both units. One of my concerns, both from friends and inet research, is that the X3 has had some quality control issues. Did you have any problems with yours?

[giantslayer]

Originally Posted by Parma_TeleMon

You used the past tense "had". Do you have them no more, if not, why not?

I really appreciate that you spent time with both units. One of my concerns, both from friends and inet research, is that the X3 has had some quality control issues. Did you have any problems with yours?

I've had a tonelab LE for one or two years now. It sounds a lot better with a real tube amp than direct. Direct, the cab sim sounds kindof two-dimensional. However, it does have very good warmth and is quite organic for a modeler. It works great with my tube amp.

As far as reliability is concerned, I have had two foot switches die on me. I ordered some replacements and have soldered them in myself. It wasn't terribly difficult.

[777Brad]

Originally Posted by Parma_TeleMon

You used the past tense "had". Do you have them no more, if not, why not?

I really appreciate that you spent time with both units. One of my concerns, both from friends and inet research, is that the X3 has had some quality control issues. Did you have any problems with yours?

I had the Pod first but I heard so many good things about the Vox that I got one of those too. I had a chance to A/B the two of them & the Vox had the warmth and more natural sound that I was looking for.

In addition, the Vox was easier to set up to sound good thru the mixing board. And the Vox was easier to tweak it's sounds with the analog knobs.

I never had any reliability issues with either one, but my three gripes that I had about the Pod were answered with the Vox.

[Revman]

Give consideration to the Boss GT-10. I've been using it now for several months and really like the sound of the patches.

Revman

[Viqbang]

I've had the chance to use most of the processors on the market today...and when playing at a church I find myself most frequently using the XT Live. It is rare that I can use the dual amp setup of the X3 and I don't need it for its vocal capabilities...so the cheaper XT Live works wonders for me.

As for Vox vs Line6, I (presently) fall into the latter camp as the Line6 seemed most useful for my ever changing collection of nylon string, steel string acoustic, and various electrics. Interestingly, however, for all electrics I end up using AC30 TB amp model and should, probably explore the tonelab again.

In terms of setup, I usually have 4 patches for each guitar...unless doing a special that requires something wacky. The tones are amp sim, a tubescreamer on stomp (low gain to just add crunch without much volume), the drum/horn leslie sound (usually set to slow and 100% mix), and an analog delay (set to tap tempo) and the wah effect set to the teese vocal wah clone. The patches are setup as follows:

1 - above with tap tempo at 1/4 note delay (amp sim on when switching)
2 - above with tap tempo at dotted 1/8 (amp sim and delay on when switching)
3 - above with higher gain on amp sim and dotted 1/8 delay (amp sim on volume lowered)
4 - a "verb" patch set to cavern (i think) with a fixed delay for swells

In terms of setup. I run out of the mono into a DI and from their into the board. If the venue doesn't have quality monitoring (aviom setup) or isn't picky about volumes, I'll take the parallel send from the DI into my Atomic 112-50 amp for stage volume (pointed at my head).

If you have questions about modeling in general...or specifics of my setup...just let me know.

[scooteraz]

We use the Pod XT-Live at church. It does OK. I think the Vox has better amp models, but the Pod may have better speaker cabinet models, so....you pay your money and you take your chances.

Either will work in the situation.

[Parma_TeleMon]

Opted for the Vox. Pretty happy overall, but I'm spending a pile of time tweaking it. I bought it mostly for the ACxx models, which it does pretty well (go figger!), and I really like the Soldano and Boogie as well. I guess if I were to distill my decision-making process it was more about simple to program and still make my ears happy. And it makes me giggle, which makes my wife happy!

[wrw_tele]

I have had a ToneLab LE for several months now. I used to use a Line6 FloorPod, which was pretty good, too. Line6 makes really good gear; I've had two amplifiers and the FloorPod. Never had any issues with any of the gear.

However, I like the sounds from the Vox much better. Maybe because it has a tube in it? I have used it with tube amps and solid state amps. Frankly, the combination of tube amp and ToneLab is pretty incredible. Using it with a solid state amp and piping that into the house is what I normally do at church when I play one of my electric guitars and it seems to sound OK without putting out too much stage volume. My preference is to use a tube amp and put a mic in front of the amp, but that is pretty difficult to manage, from a sound-guy-doesn't-know-anything-about-guitar-sound to stage volume issues.

I say try 'em both with your guitar/amp if possible. Guitar Center has a 30-day return policy, so you could make that happen if you buy from your local GC.

bw

[Wanker]

my main gripe with the X3 Live versus an Amp and pedalboard would be keeping up with the wide variety of songs we play. With a pedal board you can instantly dial up any combo of pedals you want and turn any other pedal on or off. With the POD you have to program your pedal combinations and save them. Sure you can tweak on the fly, but once you switch patches (for a solo maybe) your changes are lost.

Let's say you get the tap tempo like you want for the song you are playing. You switch patches to play a solo. Your tempo gets reset. Sure you could use the boost or stomp to play the solo without switching patches. It's not a huge deal, but it's annoying sometimes.

If you have lots of time to pre-program your patches the POD is the way to go.

[Parma_TeleMon]

I'll cede your point - I've run into that frustration a bit and yes, I have to tweak my patches ahead of time. The downside of running a mic'ed amp is having the right setup to correctly get the tone into the PA that's coming out of your amp. Alas! We're back on the sound guys again! <GASP!>

[DarnThorny]

We have a new church band project.. started out with an X3 Live and a Tonelab LE.. I was using the X3. I come from a world of a guitar into a Super Reverb or Princeton Reverb.. no pedals. We first tried running them straight to the PA, amp models.. the whole deal. I hated it! First of all, the Line 6 was not very easy to use with the multi function buttons and menus.. I messed with the ToneLab a bit, but I'm just not a fan of this stuff... and for whatever reason, the Vox doesn't have XLR out, just 1/4"... stupid. Anyway, we now use Victoria 20112s (awesome amps, BTW) and pedals, I have been using the pod as an effects only pedal board..(I sort of feel dirty playing through the Victoria with a floor pod in front of it). It was going (just) ok, convenient tuner/wah/ tap tempo.. chorus sounded ok, but all chorus' are crap in my book anyway. The other day I went to my tremolo patch, and all I was getting was mid range boost... no trem. The unit is fine, it's just too hard to work.. and this after a month or two of reliability.. I'm sure I stepped on a button that changed something, but it's too aggravating to mess with anymore. Definately not too tweakable on the fly. I need a tuner, wah, dist/boost, trem, vibrato and delay.. oh, and a (ugh)chorus.. I am considering trying a Boss ME-70, just because it has all that and is easy to use. I don't know about the sound quality of the effects, but it's a church gig, so who cares as long as it's approximating what I need, easily. I don't understand why these things are stuffed full of sounds that are unusable.. a million amp models that sound like crap.. modeling a JCM 800? Why? Soldano? No thanks.. all the gates and nonsense.. I wish they'd make a simpler unit, with a just a few models of real amps, and good sounding effects... put the money into sound/build quality and ease of use. Any demos put out by the companies that make this stuff all have some uber shredder wanking the most ridiculous stuff, all with the same crappy tones.. they never get off the beaten path to show any of the most basic effects that are used in the real world. Every one of these units seems to have 90% unusable stuff... I feel like Grampa Simpson.
OK, sorry about my tirade- the Vox feels heavier duty, and even though I haven't messed with it that much, it sure seams alot easier than the X3 Live.. again, you can get some good sounds from the Line 6, it's just the little screen and menus that make it difficult to use onstage.. if you need to change a sound in a hurry, it can be a problem... and it's jammed with features that seem geared more towards a home recording setup than it's "Live" name would imply.

[Wanker]

Line 6 X3 is SUPER easy to tweak if you plug it into a computer. That is where it SHINES!!!! The gearbox software is awesome.

The LIVE refers to the fact that it's a floor unit rather than a desktop unit like a POD.

[Parma_TeleMon]

I ran into an interesting issue over the weekend - my Tele got lost in the monitor mix with the piano and acoustic guitar. I'll NOT rant against my sound guy - I trained him. Anyway, today I took another crack at RTFM, and whaddayaknow - I can plug my earbuds into it and it'll still send signal to the mixer!! WOOOOO!

Does the X3 work like that? If so, it could be a reall help for some of the folks at our other campus.

The LE has a PC app, too, but it's MIDI-based.

[jb12string]

+1 on Gearbox, I use the XT live and love it. As far as using phones, I think it will still output to the outs with phones in, but I haven't tried it.... ....yet. If I remember, I will

[callaway]

I used to use a Pod 2.0, then a Vetta, then an X3 Live (shortest stint of them all), and I'm now using the Line 6 M13 and a tube amp. I've heard some very nice clips of the Vox Tonelabs though, and I wouldn't doubt that they are easier to get a good sound than it is with Line 6 modeling stuff. The Pods and Vetta always took a ton of effort for me to get a good sound.

I can't recommend the M13 enough though---it's just stupidly brilliant. Get 1 good tube amp you like, then add the M13 for all the effects you could ever need. In fact, its effects options are far more extensive and flexible than the X3 Live. The Vetta came close, but again, too much effort to make the amp models sound decent.

It's all good gear though (not to mention far more advanced than anything my favorite guitarists of all time have ever use). With a little patience, you'll be happy with whatever you choose.