C. Running Direct (pa/board/computer or daw/monitors/headphones)

Use this method if you want to run the Pod straight into a PA system, mixing board or mixing board for live purposes or a computer/DAW, home stereo, or headphones for recording or practicing. The Pod will completely simulate a guitar rig - amp (including pre-amp and power amp) and speakers (including cabinet). If you want, you can disable some of these features and use other gear to get that tone - like a speaker simulator device or a convolution reverb device/software that is using an impulse response (IR) designed to mimic a guitar cabinet.

You can additionally use effects from the Pod or use external effects, placing them before the Pod or in its effects loop (or even after if you use 1/4" or XLR output).

Running this way generally means you must choose "Studio/Direct" as your output mode, to enable cab/mic simulation (see output modes section), unless you are running external speaker simulation (such as an IR). Otherwise, your tone will be very harsh. Even in this case, I still recommend using "Studio/Direct" output mode and using the "no cab" option for your cabinet selection, simply to reduce complication.

However I should point out that you can use the cab models with a non-"Studio/Direct" output mode as a mild EQ effect, and it will sound relatively natural with an external speaker simulator/IR. I don’t recommend this, as it seems to dial out some of the high end, which is the area most difficult to dial in with the Pod; but it may be fruitful to experiment with if you don't mind losing some highs.

Here are a few guidelines to keep in mind for this connection type:

• If connected via USB, the Pod ASIO driver control panel has a default option of adding +18 db to the signal. This will often push it into clipping. If you have clipping, try turning this off.

• The Pod's ASIO driver is pretty low latency, if your computer is powerful enough to handle it. I've never had good experiences with high-quality audio over USB, so I connect via SPDIF to a firewire interface. My latency is extremely low (3 ms). I get no pops or clicks with 128 buffer size.

• Connecting digitally to a DAW (or an advanced mixing board) via USB, SPDIF, or AES avoids converting the sound to analog then back to digital, which will add a bit of noise and distortion into the tone.

• If you're using the 1/4" output(s) from the Pod and also using external effects, it's likely better to place them after the Pod's output rather than in its effects loop, to save on a possibly unnecessary D/A/D conversion. For other output connections or if your effects are level-sensitive, this might not be possible.

• The 1/4" outputs will sum to mono if only one of the two outputs is being used. In contrast, the XLR outputs will never sum to mono.

• The effects loop send connection is actually a 3-ring stereo connection. If you know what you're doing, you can use this as an additional unbalanced output.

• 1/4" unbalanced cable is subject to interference, often produced by florescent lighting. Use XLR where possible for better tone, especially where long runs of wire are necessary.

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