The Guitar Gallery Forums - The Guitar Legacy of Matsumoku

IMHO way too steep considering the dings all over, it has an ill-fitted replacement saddle and one of the dual sound switches is bent and if it is the phase switch that is definitely proprietary to Matsumoku. To me it is hillbilly gold.

They will come down on the shipping a bit if you contact them. I bought a Variax 300 from them and it was as advertised.

If you talk them down to a reasonable price I have a replacement saddle you can have for shipping (it is a little pitted though).

https://reverb.com/item/58442651-aria-p ... -mij-japan

Agreed, a tad on the high side.

However, you still have that Variax? I've been looking at some 600s...

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Quality service since 3:00 last Tuesday

Yup, still have the Variax. I have a Helix and some of the Variax features work but others such as string output and tuning does not. I did not find out until after that the 300 was not fully supported. Only the JT, Standard and Shuriken are fully supported. The JT is way out of my price range even used, the Standard is just another freaking stratocrapper and the Shuriken is way too costly for something that butt ugly.

Yeah, the old ones are not supported anymore but I really like what I've heard with the acoustic sounds, especially the resonator.
I've been looking at acoustic and resonator guitars and thought I could pick up a variax and it could possibly fill both wants.
If you plug directly into an amp, all of the features of the guitar are built in, correct?

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Quality service since 3:00 last Tuesday

As far as all the models yes, but no string output, tuning, or modding is supported. That and it runs on 6 AA batteries (about 3 hours). There are USB interfaces for the VDI port but still run on battery. There is a guy on eBay that sells the power module that powers the guitar via the TRS input jack with a TRS cable. You still need the VDI cable for the rest. About $30 at Sweetwater.

This is what you'll need to both power the guitar (you still have to have batteries in it though) and to edit the parameters. I had thought about going this route but my frustration with Line 6 negated this. My 300 does all it needs to do with the Helix. I don't really need all that extra garbage. Not at $173 when I already have a $1000 Helix guitar processor.

Power supply (Note: This is only for the older models which are 9v, the newer are 7.5v)
https://www.ebay.com/itm/394012304176

TRS cable for above
https://www.amazon.com/Elebase-Instrume ... r_1_1_sspa

USB interface and VDI cable
https://www.sweetwater.com/store/detail ... -workbench

Workbench software (You'll need a Line 6 account to download) Also, it will NOT run on Winblows 10 or later. They may even remove this in the future.
https://line6.com/software/readeula.html?rid=5162

You will find that Line 6 has pretty much abandoned earlier Variax models. It is called Planned Obsolescence. They want you to buy one of their newer overpriced pieces of fugly instead. Kinda reminds me of another company that forces planned obsolescence, MicroSuck.

Tell us what how you really feel Crusty!

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"A little song, a little dance. A little seltzer down your pants." -Chuckles the Clown
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So, if I had a variax with power supply (no batteries) and TRS cable, would I be able to plug it into my amp (no Helix) and access the different guitar models?
I realize I couldn't change anything (no Workbench software) but would all the options on the guitar work like that?

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Quality service since 3:00 last Tuesday

You would still have the models but whether you use the power supply I linked to or not you still have to have batteries in it and they last about 3 hours on their own from everything I've read. Would get costly pretty fast.

With the power supply and a TRS cable (between guitar and power supply) and a regular guitar cable in the out of the power supply you'd be able to make use of all the models and it wouldn't eat your batteries.

That is what I intended to say. I left out connection from pwr supply to amp.
So the only issue would be, will it actually do what I want it to do well enough?
Might be worth $300ish to find out. . .

I really appreciate all the info.

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Quality service since 3:00 last Tuesday