Your user experience with the H9000

[homer]

Hi all,

I am pretty much on the fence buying a H9000 for over one year now but VSIG was aleays the missing piece as I like to tweak a lot.

Now I can see the Beta is ongoing and it feels like this could be the time to go all in.

I pretty much owned every Harmonizer product Eventide put out in the last 20 years at one point in time and went of hardware when I sold my H8000FW+EVE NET 1 year ago. When I come onto the forums I can read a lot about features and functions, issues, bugs etc but I am really missing any information from a users perspective that lets me understand the sonic qualities of the machine, new workflows and their impact on creativity. I do really appreciate the new interfacing option but in the end it is about sound quality and user experience. In fact I would need some arguments on why spending tha much money knowing that most of the H9000 algos are currently ported from the H8000 and the classical harmonizing features still not being implemented.

So it would be great to hear from those of you guys that already have a H9000 for some period of time about your user experience.

Cheers

 

[John Baylies]

I’ve had an H9KR for a month or so and love it. I never felt the need for a front panel aside from the R not having scenes yet, which I compensate for with Max/MSP. I’ve been using the Dante expansion to route audio from one FX chain to the next so that I can have up to sixteen algorithms in a row, and it sounds great. I have been having trouble getting more than one looper working correctly in parallel, though. Gonna make a forum post about that soon after I do more experimenting. Emote is intuitive and works well. It’s easy to make routing changes on the fly. Vsig works well too and it’s fun to pull algorithms off the H9K to see how they were made and edit them to better suit your needs.

[macgee]

There’s lot of info on Gearslutz about using the H9000, i wrote a review there and there’s a review on Sound on Sound

Loving my H9000 – we’re waiting for some missing Algos from H8000 and some new modules

I’ve never owned a Harmoniser before but I’ve found the H9000 very easy to use – I don’t use the screen much, in fact I leave it off and it just lights up when i use it and times out quick. Using Emote makes it simple

Vsig is great – found it ok to learn Vsig and have made a couple of Algo which sound great..it’s hard work but rewarding

 

[homer]

Thanks to all who replied. I was a bit disappointed first when there was no one replying after several days and did not check back earlier. Currently I am not sure wheather To go with an R model or the regular one. From your responses I can see that the display is hardly used for interaction and most of you opt for using emote to control it. For me the only issue is the need to have a laptop connected all the time which is a cost to add to the R. I was actually hoping they would release an IOS app so I could make use of my iPad. For being on stage I think I prefer a standalone setup that I could at least administrate via the display w/o the need to plug a laptop.
One question left though: Did anyone experience issues from the fact that there is no pre-amp stage in the H9000?

[John Baylies]

I’ve been using my MixingLink with the H9KR. I plug the Line Out into Analog 1 in and it works great. It’d be nice to have a MixingLink expansion instead of having to carry around another box, though I did appreciate having physical acces to the Imput Gain knob, but that’s just because of my rushed gain staging.

[macgee]

That MixingLink looks interesting..I’m considering it!

[ssgrfk]

Hi.

i went through a similar phase of being on the fence with the H9000, assuming that i would not be fully satisfied unless VSIG came with the package.

after going around in circles for months reading and watching every demo video i could find, i finally decided to take the plunge. and after almost 6 months owning the box. i can easily say it is the single best audio hardware purchase i have made (excuding synthesizers) 

from a usability and UX point of view, i think the H9000 has almost perfectly nailed it, and at no point now, after having initially set it up, do i think the user interface hinders me in any way or stands in the way of creativity. Obviously there is room for improvement, like anything. but i se nothing obvious that demands to be fixed.

the ability to edit things on the computer screen visually really makes the thing infinitely more flexible than the previous Harmonizer i used, the H7600.

from a UX point of view, its essentially more like 16x H9s

The ability to conveniently save FXChains as a file on my Mac file system, with a given audio project, is a convenience which means my effects are tied to my audio project in a way that is hard to mess up.

The sound quality itself, like so many others have said before, really is just way better than other effects units ive used. and the example i always use to demonstrate this to sceptics is to use a relatively simple thing, such as a basic delay. and just compare that delay to whatever else you might like using, there is a patch 9101 Digital Delay which is pretty basic . but just sounds really really good. again, you could read a billion pages of reviews and watch a lifetime of demo videos but until you get the box installed in your studio and hear it with your own ears, you wont really know.

the issue of it not having VSIG was more than compensated by the ability of being able to stack up patches, and my concern about being stuck or getting bored with the built in Algorihtms limits has not happened and now, in use, i dont think it ever would as the comination of the quality of the effects + the ability to stack up multiple algos means that, the potential combos are mathematically mind boggling. 

the one thing i do wish the box had, which i imagine will be implemented in the future, is a more robust midi remote control ability so i can automate things programatically from a DAW or other midi device.. but beyond that. its 99% joy.

Enjoy 🙂

 

 

[Danica589]

Thank you to everyone who responded. I initially felt a bit disappointed due to the lack of replies after several days and didn’t check back earlier. Currently, I’m undecided between choosing an R model or the regular one. Your responses highlight that the display is rarely used for interaction, and many of you prefer using emotes for control. My main concern is the necessity of having a laptop connected, adding an extra cost to the R model. I had hoped for the release of an iOS app to utilize my iPad. For on-stage use, I lean towards a standalone setup that I can administer via the display without needing to plug in a laptop.

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[tbskoglund]

Thanks for your interest in the H9000. If your main intention for the H9000 is for live use and you do not want to always have a laptop connected, then I would suggest the standard H9000 with the front panel/screen. Emote is great for configuring your routing and settings, but you can always use Emote to setup some basic Sessions and tweak them further using the front panel.

It’s also worth noting that this thread is quite old, and many updates to Emote and the H9000 have been released since it was started.

[ColinMuir]

I wanted the h9000 full UI model since I believe it’s slightly more future proof.

The downside is there seems to be an attitude that if it it doesn’t work on the native UI, because buggy, then no matter because you can just use emote, which is perhaps more ambitiously supported.

Other than the UI bugs, I think H9000 is so versatile that it can fit into any studio. The fact that I can connect more ADDA via adat, aes/ebu, etc, and also run it as a USB audio interface, and make connections between any i/o is just wonderful.

Also it just sounds absolutely freeking awesome.

[Author]

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