Helix Stadium vs Fractal FM9: whch is the king of amp modelers (vs real tube amp)?

[lscottk]

IMO, I don't think "hostility" is being thrown your way. Just expression of a point of view that's different than yours. Many of us hang out here because we like and use Fractal products, so it's sort of a "self-selecting" crowd. Plus, this forum is for Fractal products, not for competing products. So debating the value or pros and cons of a competing product on the Fractal forum might be more appropriate somewhere else . . . just a thought to consider.

Though some make purchase decisions based upon brand loyalty alone, many make decisions based upon usability vs price vs features/functionality vs tone. From that perspective, knowing how product workflows function is a necessity, especially if you use more complex patches. How the variables in each brand and/or device balance out is a personal choice. IMHO, when making this choice, there is no right or wrong answer. It's what works for you (or me or whomever). Music, and what's "best" to make music, is personal, not objective "truth." So to me, the whole premise of the title of this thread is flawed. IMHO there isn't a "King" for everyone. It's what works best for me or anyone who is seeking to create music.

Back in the 1970s I owned a Lab Series L5. I had it for a few months and then sold it because an L5 is a solid state amp and the tone just wasn't right for me. However, BB King used a Lab Series L5 for years and, IMHO, his tone was terrific. Different strokes for different folks. Similarly, Tosin Abasi uses an 8 string guitar. He performed with backing tracks at the first Axe-Fest in 2012. He was a force of nature. Simply amazing. But if you handed me an 8 string, I wouldn't know what to do with it. 8 strings might be best for Tosin Abasi, but it certainly is not for me.

Years ago I saw a non-descript band playing in the cafe at the Experience Music Project in Seattle. The guitarist was playing a Sears Silvertone into a silver face Deluxe Reverb. His tone was most excellent. He found an instrument that is typically considered "inferior" but it served his creative process. More power to him because he sounded great.

A few years back Fractal Audio posted that the target for CPU usage should be 80% because CPU usage is dynamic, and keeping 20% in reserve is necessary to preserve CPU headroom so that there aren't device freezes, non-musical artifacts or weird behavior. I hear you that Stadium also has use parameters that must be followed or you won't maximize the potential of the Stadium platform. Though I'm not interested in buying a Stadium, I find this information to be interesting and informative.

I think that people should buy what they believe will best suit their creative process, regardless of the final choice. If it works for you, then it works. Just my opinion . . . YMMV

 

[Ellumpo]

IMO, I don't think "hostility" is being thrown your way. Just expression of a point of view that's different than yours. Many of us hang out here because we like and use Fractal products, so it's sort of a "self-selecting" crowd. Plus, this forum is for Fractal products, not for competing products. So debating the value or pros and cons of a competing product on the Fractal forum might be more appropriate somewhere else . . . just a thought to consider.

Though some make purchase decisions based upon brand loyalty alone, many make decisions based upon usability vs price vs features/functionality vs tone. From that perspective, knowing how product workflows function is a necessity, especially if you use more complex patches. How the variables in each brand and/or device balance out is a personal choice. IMHO, when making this choice, there is no right or wrong answer. It's what works for you (or me or whomever). Music, and what's "best" to make music, is personal, not objective "truth." So to me, the whole premise of the title of this thread is flawed. IMHO there isn't a "King" for everyone. It's what works best for me or anyone who is seeking to create music.

Back in the 1970s I owned a Lab Series L5. I had it for a few months and then sold it because an L5 is a solid state amp and the tone just wasn't right for me. However, BB King used a Lab Series L5 for years and, IMHO, his tone was terrific. Different strokes for different folks. Similarly, Tosin Abasi uses an 8 string guitar. He performed with backing tracks at the first Axe-Fest in 2012. He was a force of nature. Simply amazing. But if you handed me an 8 string, I wouldn't know what to do with it. 8 strings might be best for Tosin Abasi, but it certainly is not for me.

Years ago I saw a non-descript band playing in the cafe at the Experience Music Project in Seattle. The guitarist was playing a Sears Silvertone into a silver face Deluxe Reverb. His tone was most excellent. He found an instrument that is typically considered "inferior" but it served his creative process. More power to him because he sounded great.

A few years back Fractal Audio posted that the target for CPU usage should be 80% because CPU usage is dynamic, and keeping 20% in reserve is necessary to preserve CPU headroom so that there aren't device freezes, non-musical artifacts or weird behavior. I hear you that Stadium also has use parameters that must be followed or you won't maximize the potential of the Stadium platform. Though I'm not interested in buying a Stadium, I find this information to be interesting and informative.

I think that people should buy what they believe will best suit their creative process, regardless of the final choice. If it works for you, then it works. Just my opinion . . . YMMV

I appreciate this response. This is actually one of the few in the thread that reads as thoughtful rather than tribal, so credit where it’s due.

I agree with you on the core point that there is no single “king” and that what works best is deeply personal. Tone, workflow, and inspiration are not objective truths, and history is full of examples like the ones you mentioned that prove great music comes from all kinds of unconventional or supposedly inferior tools.

Where I push back a bit is on the idea that this is simply a case of wrong venue. Yes, this is a Fractal forum, and I understand why the crowd is self selecting. But when strong claims are made about competing products, especially framed as ethical failures, stagnation, or inferior engineering, it’s reasonable to challenge those claims even here. Otherwise it stops being discussion and turns into affirmation.

And I fully agree that understanding workflow is essential, especially for complex patches. That’s exactly why UI and interaction design matter, not as a substitute for sound quality, but as a practical part of how musicians actually work under real conditions, not idealized lab tests.

In the end, we’re probably much closer in perspective than it might seem. I’m not arguing that everyone should like or buy Stadium. I’m pushing back against the idea that preference can be dressed up as technical inevitability or moral high ground. If Fractal fits someone’s creative process best, that’s great. If another platform does the same for someone else, that should be just as valid.

If it works, it works. Everything else is just arguing taste with fancier words.

 

[danrussell185]

I completely get that you can put the amps on the first row and I did try that but then things you would traditionally put before the amp like drives, wah etc started getting greyed out very quickly. So then I tried putting an amp on each row to spread it out which worked but then I lost what I wanted to do with my dual input PRS because of the 4 row limit.

The answer I seemed to get in the line6 forum was it’s because I was using 2 of the new amps and I should just use one and one of the legacy amps to save memory and even Eric who I believe is one of the higher ups replied and said it’s because I was using 2 of their new amps. Someone else who was very helpful and lovely to chat to offered to have a go at building a preset to do what I wanted but the only way they could get close was by using work arounds and a few other sacrifices. He also said I could avoid most the issues if I used one of the legacy amps. Thats always a possibility but seems alarming on a product where one of the main marketing points was its amazing new amp modelling that advice is not to use them.

I’m not saying it sounds bad or the legacy amps sound bad, it sounded very good but for what I was looking to do with it, I found it underpowered and I think that’s a fair and realistic term to use and I don’t seem to be the only one using it. For what people want in their chains it might be more than enough but that’s subjective to what you are looking to achieve.

Some of the footswitching stuff is amazing, very impressive with the touch sensitive abilities

When I got another FM9 I dialled in the same style preset with everything I wanted that I tried to do on the stadium and I was at around 48% dsp. Then once I added what I wanted for the acoustic part of my hollowbody I was at around 60% leaving room for plenty more if I wanted it (which I don’t).

The amps and effects are what matters to me the most in any modeller and I get the FM9 isn’t keeping DSP spare to run backing tracks or light shows so maybe it’s not a fair comparison and maybe the stadium was the wrong product choice for someone who doesn’t care about the other bits it can do.

People will love the stadium and people will love the FM9 and people will love the QC, it just depends which fits your use case the best. I did dial in my ToneX One as a back up…. I love that thing.

 

[sprint]

That “golden rule” you’re referring to isn’t a real thing, it’s something you’re presenting as fact without any basis

Disagree based on my past related experience / training which seemed sensible then, and does still now.

Exposing aspects of system architecture in professional tools is extremely common.

"Pro" tool or not, I shouldn't need to know how an engine works to drive - regardless of if my car has 4,8, or 12 cylinders, I'll still have only one gas pedal (aka, a UI focused primarily on the user's task, and that shields users from the complexity or config of the underlying mechanical hardware that facilitates the user's task).

A key point of your post above was to illustrate to danrussell185 the misunderstanding HX users tend to have wrt processor allocation to the 2 signal paths in HX - a misunderstanding brought on, imo, by exactly what I'm referring to. The user has to consider underlying processor architecture in his/her initial preset concept even when working well within overall system resource availability. This results in the misunderstandings you referred to. Not the case on my Ax3 - If I need 2 amp blocks, I put them in the grid - done - I don't have to change the preset around, and need to know that: "oh, if I add a 2nd amp block, now I need 2 processors to handle it, so I need to put the 2nd amp block in a 2nd grid path to activate the 2nd processor, instead of in the split 1st path I may have initially logically planned for" - The Ax3 UI tries to shield me from that kind of thing as per what I understand to be best practice in many areas of systems dev.

Fractal literally shows CPU usage to the user. By your own logic, that would also be “bad UI,” which obviously isn’t the case

Misses the point I made above: When designing presets "within available resource availability", there is no consideration of underlying processing architecture required with Axfx3. Wrt, resource availability status, and / or what happens when the device starts to red line, which is another discussion entirely, I think, Axfx presents it pretty simply: X% / stay below 80.

Excellent overall ease of use” is pretty debatable

I'll admit to a bit of snark there but not much given the depth of tweak-ability Axfx has, and warranted a little given the mountain of undeserved abuse Axfx UI seems to often endure here for few sensible reasons I can discern.

I've posted many times here praising various aspects of HX (ie: imo, the split L/R I/O blocks capability in HX outperforms Axfx, and HXStomp, which I own, is imo, a brilliant very small footprint modeller). I'm not an HX basher and its not a huge deal once you know how its working, but I have a really hard time believing this path1>processor1 / path2>processor2 design aspect in HX is some sort of UI "feature" that benefits users - it's always looked to me as a more or less satisfied L6 user for decades, like a UI design that took a shortcut and which confuses users.

 

[guitarplayer1969]

I can only speak to the Helix which I ran since launch to 2024 when I swapped out for an FM9 but at church we run Dual amps and cabs in stereo, stacking drives and using delay and reverb. The two path DSP allocation in the Helix was definitely an issue, and required me to move stuff around and sometimes accepting a chain that was not exactly what I wanted but would be the only way to equally allocate.

I've heard that if wanting dual amps on the newer augora algorithm on the stadium, there are issues with DSP on the same path. If that is happening at launch, before Line 6 has even released newer effects, then it's a hard pass for me. To pay over $2k for a new unit that is already experiencing DSP challenges for a config that many player run, tells me it's not designed to last 10 years like the OG Helix did.

 

[wavded]

I find it bizarre that a company would even ask its product users such a question with intention to proceed depending on the answer. Significantly unfinished products should never be released imo, regardless of what users want. There must be more to this story.

My understanding was they were going to delay the release the Showcase functionality but the pieces they were going to ship were well tested already. Apparently not it sounds like?

 

[sprint]

My understanding was they were going to delay the release the Showcase functionality but the pieces they were going to ship were well tested already. Apparently not it sounds like?

That makes more sense.

 

[lscottk]

I appreciate this response. This is actually one of the few in the thread that reads as thoughtful rather than tribal, so credit where it’s due.

I agree with you on the core point that there is no single “king” and that what works best is deeply personal. Tone, workflow, and inspiration are not objective truths, and history is full of examples like the ones you mentioned that prove great music comes from all kinds of unconventional or supposedly inferior tools.

Where I push back a bit is on the idea that this is simply a case of wrong venue. Yes, this is a Fractal forum, and I understand why the crowd is self selecting. But when strong claims are made about competing products, especially framed as ethical failures, stagnation, or inferior engineering, it’s reasonable to challenge those claims even here. Otherwise it stops being discussion and turns into affirmation.

And I fully agree that understanding workflow is essential, especially for complex patches. That’s exactly why UI and interaction design matter, not as a substitute for sound quality, but as a practical part of how musicians actually work under real conditions, not idealized lab tests.

In the end, we’re probably much closer in perspective than it might seem. I’m not arguing that everyone should like or buy Stadium. I’m pushing back against the idea that preference can be dressed up as technical inevitability or moral high ground. If Fractal fits someone’s creative process best, that’s great. If another platform does the same for someone else, that should be just as valid.

If it works, it works. Everything else is just arguing taste with fancier words.

Thanks for the kind comments. I appreciate it.

I'd have more to say but I cut the shit out of my thumb on my fretting hand today, and the Novocain from putting in the stitches is wearing off. It hurts like a MF. And no drugs prescribed. Ouch!

It's even worse that I cut myself trying to pull a large roll of aluminum foil from our pantry. It's one of those 20lb king size rolls from Costco. I forgot how heavy it was so when I pulled it off the shelf the end furthest from me was too heavy and the box pulled from my hand and fell to the floor. I was grasping the box in just the right way that the serrated edge made a deep one inch gash into my thumb. At least the doctor doesn't think there's damage to any tendons. I still got a referral to a hand surgeon. All because I didn't use both hands to pick up an aluminum foil box. And it's the thumb on my fretting hand. OMG!

 

[Karl Houseknecht]

I've heard that if wanting dual amps on the newer augora algorithm on the stadium, there are issues with DSP on the same path.

Like you, I run Helix (now Stadium) and FM9 in that environment with dual amps in stereo. My presets on both units are essentially the same. I have zero issues with DSP having two Agoura amps on the same path. The Stadium has FAR more DSP in this use than the original Helix.

Both units sound amazing. And even though there are not new effects in the Stadium (yet), the ones there somehow sound better than they used to. I am still trying to duplicate the Glitz reverb on stadium in Fractal land and not having much success.

 

[skategeezer]

For what it is worth I returned the Stadium within a few weeks.
I have a FM9 and a Axe FX3.
Very underwhelming release. The cost for what you get does not match up.
The ease of editing does not make up for the lackluster sound and the fact that the amps are better but still do NOT respond like they do on a Fractal unit.
And the lack of flexibility DSP routing. For example if don’t use the top channel and second channel correctly you run out of DSP quickly.
The Stadium was rushed and should get better once they actually finish the firmware. But for now if you have $$ and need something now just buy a FM9.
The Stadium is a hard pass IMHO.