ZVEX effects; tell me your truth, I'll tell you mine.

[Bob Johnson]

Who's got any effects pedals from good 'ol Zack Vex? What do you think? King's new suit of clothes or something special?

[Twinfan]

I've got a Box of Rock.

Nice tone, flabby bass, similar to a JTM45 like it says it is.  OK, but nothing special to my ears.  I prefer my Blackstar HT-Dual.

What do you think of Z.Vex stuff?

[hamfist]

Box of Rock was one of the best pedals I ever owned, if not THE best. Wish I hadn't sold it. IN all honesty I'm really happy with my tone, and I now get most of it from the amp. But, when I was a "clean amp and pedals" guy, the Box of Rock ruled !

[Ian Price]

I had a Vexter Fuzz Factory. Sounded very nice but there were sooo many different tones that I ended up playing around with different settings on it more than playing I was guitar. I sold it in the end. I have kept my Seek Wah II. Very nice analog sequenced wah - not really useful for a band situation but great for relaxing with (when combined with a delay it is very cool).

Zvex are well made pedals but I think that some people buy them because they are 'cool' rather than really functional. I'm sure some will disagree with this but it's just the way I feel about them. He does offer great service as well - although not as good as Tim.

[Kilby]

Personally I think it's a combination of brillient pedals and Emperors new clothes

The latter isn't Zachs fault though.

I only have a nanohead, and I think it's brilliant for what it does. It's not the only amp but it does 99% of what I want.

However there are many people who go, it looks cool and Mat Bellamy uses them so it must be the best thing ever (thats quite sad)

I personally loved the Fuzz Factory, as it could do all the classic Germanium fuzz stuff. But for me there where too many options (most of which where unuseable) and it was too much bother for what I wanted

The Super Hard On, Box of Rock & the Wahs look much more practical though

[Ian Price]

Personally I think it's a combination of brillient pedals and Emperors new clothes

+1

[Brow]

I have 1 of the ZVex Super Duper 2-in-1 double boost pedals and have mixed views on it.

I bought it almost 3 years ago while I was in New York, and within 2 months, 1 of the switches had gone faulty and wouldn't work. I posted on the ZVex forum about it and Zach himself took my address and sent me 2 new switches free of charge so that I could fix the pedal and still have 1 as a spare. That's good customer service in my book :)

As a boost pedal, it can be very good or very bad. I can try it on some amps and it'll sound great, while on others it'll sound like cr@p. This isn't something I've found with other boost pedals I've tried though.

I've used a Fuzz Factory for a bit, but couldn't settle on a general fuzz tone I actually liked. It's great for that wall of noise/Muse thing, but other than that, it's not for me.

I tried 1 of those Wah Probes too and that was a cool pedal. I'm not sure I'd take 1 over a traditional wah though.

[prozacbear]

I've got one of their limited edition fuzz factories and I do think it's awesome (although I have little experience of other fuzz pedals, so maybe they are all like that). It's a mother to dial in for the best tones plus I have to start from scratch when I get a new guitar/amp/pickup, but personally I think it's worth it. When I do get a tone I really like I take a picture with my phone, and write a little description. I now have a whole personal catalogue of tones to choose from.

[Bob Johnson]

Thanks for all the comments. My original reason for asking is that people are increasingly asking me to install ZVEX stuff into guitars that I build and my personal experience of this stuff is quite limited. I've just fitted a Super HO unit into a seven string fitted with a Nail bomb and a Cold Sweat. The initial problem was the noise the thing picked up once it was taken out of it's box. Anyway you could probably store a cobalt 90 isotope in the control cavity now it is so heavily screened but part of the noise problem was down to two points on the PCB being bridged by solder; I only spotted it by comparing it to another unit.

The bottom line IMHO is that it just wasn't worth it, the guitar sounds a lot better with it switched off; but of course me being an old git I probably don't appreciate the "benefits" of insane, amp wrecking gain.

[prozacbear]

people are increasingly asking me to install ZVEX stuff into guitars that I build .

I guess they are all Matt Bellamy wanabies. But then who can blame them I am too :roll: