Newbee - Using the Boss eBand (JS8) with Guitar Tracks 4?

I have just purchased an installed GT4 and have managed to get my Boss Eband (JS8) working via USB. I do however have a couple of questions and would appreciate any feedback as I am pretty new to this stuff.
 
1> How should I set up the JS8 in the best way to act as a USB interface for GT, currently the level of the guitar when recorded in GT from the JS8 is very low and i cannot work out how to boost it. There are various options on the JS8 but i'm not sure which is the best one to use so I would welcome any advice from users that currently use the JS8 with GT4.
 
2> At the moment I am using the built in effects of the JS8 when recording my guitar, whilst this is ok, I would like to have a play with Guitar Rig 3 also. What is the best thing to do on the JS8 when using guitar rig, should i just create/use a blank effects patch or is there a better way to have my guitar signal sent directly to guitar rig without the effects of the JS8?
 
Thanks for taking the time to read this, as you can probably tell i'm new to GT4!