Palm muting with a Headrush Pedalboard - Anyone else find this problematic?

[BadgerDave]

I just picked up a used Headrush pedalboard and started running through the presets for the first time.

Through headphones I've noticed that palm muted strings come through at the same volume as unmuted strings. Even touching strings near the pickups with my picking hand or lifting my hand from resting on the strings causes noise at near full volume. It's not a grounding fault, the noise isn't buzzing. It's like there's a microphone directly over the strings picking up and amplifying my hand, fingers or pick touching the strings.

Has anyone else experienced (and hopefully resolved) this issue?

 

[alex mansman]

For the sake of making sure everything is on the up n up I'd start with a factory reset. Here's a video of how to do it.


That doesn't sound like normal behavior so since you got it used (as I did mine) this gives you a clean slate. Sounds like something that could be happening in the IN or OUT blocks.

Make sure the preset you're using doesnt have a compressor on too. Also if you're palm muting any kind of cranked amp with no dynamic range (clean headroom) left in it that IS your compression so that would cause the same thing.

For example the SLO 100 Ext Range does not clean up too well, it's pretty much always going to be dirty unless you turn the guitar's volume way down too or use a volume pedal. That amp is always gonna be full bore whereas the non "ext range" SLO is more dynamic (especially the crunch one).

As for the noise you're experiencing it's possible that whatever amp you're using on your preset could be so gainy (plexi, jcm, deluxe gain mod, slo, 5150) that under normal conditions you would hear the noise/buzzing from that amp at all times. With many modelers the internal noise gate is set pretty aggressively, which is great because its quiet when in the real world you'd be running for cover.

The problem is that when you mask that much noise even some light contact from your hand or pick can trigger the gate to open up for a split second which results in spurts of noise becoming audible. It's a compromise guitar players have to live with. FWIW I think the Headrush's default gate settings are great.

And last but not least. I'm a huge fan of my Headrush, but the factory rigs it comes with are pretty bad. I went through every one of em and afterwards hooked the HR up to my computer and mass deleted every factory preset. Its possible one of the presets is not interacting well with the headphone output.

I really recommend Doc McFarland's YouTube videos on the Headrush and in this particular case I'd day check out his videos on input/output options. There's a lot you can do with I/O in the global settings that if done wrong could be a culprit as well.

 

[FPFL]

Palm muting... on a Headrush?
Really?
That's an interesting new technique!
Normally I am palm muting on the guitar, back by the bridge. : )

Total dad joke I know... but the title made me laugh. Just thought I'd share.

No idea on the HR, don't own one but I'd be shocked if it isn't capable of a really good chug.

Happy Sunday folks.

 

[Fireproof]

Palm muting... on a Headrush?
Really?
That's an interesting new technique!
Normally I am palm muting on the guitar, back by the bridge. : )

Total dad joke I know... but the title made me laugh. Just thought I'd share.

Well it IS a touchscreen - so you never know!

 

[NeedmoreCrunch]

Perform a factory reset and try again.