Effects Advice

[Slartibartfarst42]

As you may know from another thread I started a while ago, I've been toying with what to do with my effects. I have now decided 100% that I'm not using another multi-FX like the RP1000 or GT-100 as I think I'll ultimately prefer better quality and they drop in value too fast. One option for me is still the Carl Martin Quattro and I'll be trying one of those next month but it also seems to me that if I use Ebay prudently, I could get the same good quality effects for similar money or less (unless a used Quattro comes up). That's got me thinking about what I'd like to use in each of the four effects areas I'm interested in and this is where I'd appreciate some help.

Overdrive

Pretty sure I want to go with the Blackstar HT-Dual as it has the two stages of gain I like to use to boost the drive channel on my amp and there aren't too many pedals like that.

Compressor

This one is causing me a lot oif thought and where I'd primarily like some help. Although I do use a compressor on cleans, most of our set uses distortion so I mainly use it to give me some thick 'chug' on the heaviest songs we play and give me plenty of sustain (think Gary Moore for this) but without giving me excessive amounts of noise to deal with. Having scoured through Ebay and lots of reviews I've come up with these as possibles:

 Black Finger
 Tone Press
 Dyna Comp
 Super Comp
 CS-3
 DOD FX80
 Seymour Duncan Double Back

Any advice in this area would be very appreciated.

Chorus
I think this is an area where I can save some money as the Digitech or Boss offerings seem to be quite good so I'm thinking of either the Boss Super Chorus, Digitech Multi Chorus or Digitech Chorus Factory.

Delay

I'm not quite as sure here but I think I want something with a tap tempo function ands that seems to restrict my options. At the moment I'm thinking of either the Vox Time Machine or Blackstar HT-Delay.

Of course, the Carl Martin Quattro may be just as good as any of these in all areas but that seems like it might be a tall order and it does no harm to be prepared.

As usual, any help and advice is gratefully received.

[juansolo]

My personal take on this (so don't take it as gospel).

Compressor - It depends on the type of comp you're after, they go from so transparent you hardly know they're on (Rothwell Love Squeeze) to full on there (Orange Squeezer). Somewhere in the middle is the Ross Compressor. But consider a MoRC (Modified Ross Compressor) if you're going that way, it's just more versatile. Moving on from that in DIY terms ( as that's where I tend to live ;) ), you've got the likes of Merlin's Engineers thumb which is a RC that's got more headroom and a little less noise (but is a lot less apparent that it's doing it's thing). It doesn't have some of the versatility of MoRC though. Closer still to the Rothwell is the Madbean Afterlife.

Delay - The best analogue delays out there, IMO run MN3005 ICs. You simply can't get these any more sadly. You can get a good approximation of a single IC MN3005 from a V3205 Aquapuss clone or, I suspect a newer Aquapuss themselves (don't know what they use these days, but it's probably the same). As long as you don't want long delays, this really is the daddy. If you can get a V1 puss, then get that. (someone is selling a MN3005 AP clone in the UK over on Madbean at the moment for £110...). Bearing in mind that genuine MN3005 (there are a ton of counterfeits annoyingly), when they do turn up are nigh on £30 each these days, that's really not bad. No tap on these though.

Regular digital based delays are built around the PT2399 IC. This can get a little noisy at very long settings. However I've built one recently with a variable filter that increases the filtering as you increase the delay time and that's nigh on silent. I need to have a little more of a play with it to get the tapering right on it, but it's not far away and is surprisingly good. Again no tap though. I suspect the Skreddy Echo  does something like this, which is one of the higher regarded delays out there.

Proper digital, ie: DSP based effects generally cost a lot. Personally I've just bought a Stereo WET Reverb that can be re-flashed as a chorus or a delay (I believe tap is on the way for that and it's going to happen as a regular pedal also). The delay is spectacularly good. Strymon, Eventide and the like are the titans, but massive money.

Chorus - Get someone to make you a CE-2 clone. They're still the daddy in analogue chorus terms as far as I'm concerned. Get a clone to avoid Boss's horrid buffers.

Overdrive is really too subjective to get into and also depends a lot on your amp and how you use it. Best to try before you buy on those with your own kit if you can.

[JimmyMoorby]

These are my 3 favourite chorus pedals.  I think the Greenhouse effects one sounds the nicest but for live use I use the Zakk Wylde Chorus its just seems to be cleaner and interferes with the singal less which is important to me, hell Zakk cranks it up and plays stadiums and festivals with it so its good enough for me.  I also love the Danelectro chorus pedal and prefer the sound of it to the MXR but I can tell its affecting the singal more which im really anal about.

Greenhouse Effects Stonefish Chorus - £150
MXR Zakk Wylde Chorus - £80
Danelectro Fab Chorus - £20

As per the above overdrive is subjective. The majority of people seem to gravitate towards a tubescreamer but TO ME theyre nothing special.
I dont use compressors and I dont use any tap functions with delays so I cant really give you any tips on that

[Slartibartfarst42]

I'm really grateful to you Juan for the detail in your reply but I'm going to need to research a lot of those as I've never heard of them! The ones I mentioned for the compressors simply reflected pedals that seem to get decent reviews and are available on Ebay for a price of less than £100. That's why I was trying to stick to the ones I've already mentioned. As for whether I want a compressor to change my tone or be transparent, I can't say I really care. As long as I get that thick chug for the heavier songs and oodles of sustain without excessive noise, I'm happy. I'm perfectly happy with the basic tone of my amp so there is no particular need for the compressor to change my tone but if the best compressor for what I need does, I can live with it as long as it doesn't introduce mush.

Good shout on the Zakk Wylde Chorus. I'd forgotten about that one  :D

[dvorak]

Although not analog, the TC tone print pedals are really nice.

On my pedalboard I have: Hall of Fame reverb, Flashback X4 delay, Vortex Flanger and a Corona Chorus.

I like them alot because they sound great and they have the Tone print technology. If you put them in tone print mode you can get a totally different sound out of them depending on the toneprint. It even works on the fly with the phone app. Now TC are releasing the tone print edit which looks very cool:
http://www.tcelectronic.com/toneprint-editor/

I like analog pedals alot, but TC has done something very cool here. It might be an option for some of your effects if you are having a hard time choosing between different models.

[richard]

I see you have a Blackstar amp - is that what you're using ? If so, which one ? The reason I ask is that I have a Blackstar Drive and, on the whole, it seems to match better with a clean channel or a very mild crunch from the amp. I've used the Dual pedal through a clean Fender Twin and that worked very well - clean, crunch and lead.

[Slartibartfarst42]

My amp is a Blackstar HT-60 Soloist and from what you say, I may need to rethink the overdrive. I use the drive channel on my amp with gain at about 6 or 7 and then put an overdrive pedal in front of it with the gain set at zero and the level on maximum to tighten things up. Traditional Tube Screamer idea really. If I want more saturation I tend to stick with that set up but add some gain onto the overdrive. This way I end up with three types of distortion on the one channel as I have the straight distortion of the amp, amp distortion plus a boost from the overdrive and distortion from the amp plus a gain boost from the overdrive. From what you say, the HT-dual wouldn't work that way or could I use the overdrive part of the HT-Dual that way and for more saturation, use the second channel on the pedal into the clean channel on my amp? Of course I could just use pedals for all distortion but then what's the point of having a two channel amp? All very frustrating!

[juansolo]

If it bears any relation to the HT-5, you'll be best trying OD/Distortion on the amp to see what it likes. A whole chunk of the pre-section is pretty much a HT-Dual anyhow.

[dave_mc]

i'm not too well up on compressors but i found the cs3 pretty noisy, so you might want to avoid that one. Also, i'd personally rather use an OD than a compressor to get that chug, but that's just me. the other thing is if you're sure you're buying an OD anyway, you might as well get it first to see if it covers both your od and compression/chug needs.

ce2 clone is a good call by juan solo. i have the tonerider one, which i don't think is a direct clone, but which is very closely based on one, and it's very, very nice. you could pick them up for £50 a while back from dangleberry (i paid £67 IIRC  :shock: ), but they seem to have stopped stocking them and the tonerider pedals seem to be hard to find now for some reason. or you could get the mooer chorus for like $44 from china, it's supposedly a ce2 clone. I haven't tried that one, but the mooers i do have (aside from the fuzz, which i think is faulty, to be fair) are very nice and the chorus seems to be one of the ones which has a good rep.

overdrive, it's really up to you. Your blackstar is (far as i'm aware) hybrid, so you'd want to be sure it takes ods like a proper tube amp. That's not to say it won't- plenty of solid state dirt pedals stack really, really well- but i'd check out that it'll work first before spending any money, kind of thing. just in case. the other thing is, if you're thinking of the blackstar pedal, i think the BS HT amps' preamps are based pretty closely on their pedals (or vice-versa), so you want to be sure you're not paying for something you more or less already have in your amp.

EDIT: no clue on the delay, sorry.

[Slartibartfarst42]

I just checked Tonerider and you're right; can't be found anywhere. I can't even find Dangleberry music anymore!

I think that based on what you say about my amp, it might be best to avoid the HT pedal. All I really do most of the time with an overdrive is use it like a Tube Screamer to tighten things up so a much cheaper option may well suffice and possibly a seperate pedal for real saturation. I used to use a Hardwire Metal Distortion that was really good and even the Bad Monkey was impressive. That would certainly reduce the cost! However, I'm not doing anything until I can try the Carl Martin Quattro alongside some pedals and I'll be doing that next month at Gear4Music in York. At first I thought I'd be disappointed as they told me they only brought one in if it was sold. Rather annoyed I emailed First Line Distribution in the UK as well as Carl Martin themselves and within 30 minutes I had a reply from both of them saying they would have a Quattro there for me to try. It was even Soren, the CEO of Carl Martin who replied to me!! Service that rivals BKP is impressive indeed. I'll be heading to York on the 18th February so if any of you are curious about the Carl Martin Quattro and live in that general area, you might as well grab your chance and go in to try it, if only out of curiosity.

[jpfamps]

I would save money on a chorus by not buying one.

But then I had to suffer the 80s........

[JJretroTONEGOD]

I like the mxr 76' vintage dynacomp more than any other I've used but it sucks about not having a 9volt input. Sound quality though is amazing and it sounds really natural.

chorus: the marshall supervibe is a very under used pedal and prefer it to boss one,

can't fault strymon at all really, all of there pedals are incredible but also mega expensive, as everything though it's all down to individual taste.

[Telerocker]

Compressor: the Okko Coca Comp is really good and effective. Doesn't ''eat up your sound'' with lots of compression. The Barber Tonepress is quite good too.
Overdrive: Lots of choiche here, but Brunetti Mercury and Emma Reezafratzitz feel/sound like an extension your amp.
Chorus: the old Boss CE2 (like Juan Solo mentions) gets a lot of praise.
Delay: TC Electronics Flashback delay offers a lot for a reasonable price.

[dave_mc]

I just checked Tonerider and you're right; can't be found anywhere. I can't even find Dangleberry music anymore!

I think that based on what you say about my amp, it might be best to avoid the HT pedal. All I really do most of the time with an overdrive is use it like a Tube Screamer to tighten things up so a much cheaper option may well suffice and possibly a seperate pedal for real saturation. I used to use a Hardwire Metal Distortion that was really good and even the Bad Monkey was impressive. That would certainly reduce the cost! However, I'm not doing anything until I can try the Carl Martin Quattro alongside some pedals and I'll be doing that next month at Gear4Music in York. At first I thought I'd be disappointed as they told me they only brought one in if it was sold. Rather annoyed I emailed First Line Distribution in the UK as well as Carl Martin themselves and within 30 minutes I had a reply from both of them saying they would have a Quattro there for me to try. It was even Soren, the CEO of Carl Martin who replied to me!! Service that rivals BKP is impressive indeed. I'll be heading to York on the 18th February so if any of you are curious about the Carl Martin Quattro and live in that general area, you might as well grab your chance and go in to try it, if only out of curiosity.

dangleberry's still there but they don't seem to stock tonerider pedals any more for some reason. northwest guitars stocks the delay, for some reason, but none of the other ones (and i found the delay didn't like being in a loop, there was a big volume drop, so that's not ideal).

and yeah i mean if you just want a boost there are a ton of cheaper options from the likes of joyo, mooer (from china to get it cheap), even digitech and boss etc.

that's nice to hear about carl martin :)

[Slartibartfarst42]

that's nice to hear about carl martin :)

You're right it is. If only Gear4Music were as good!!

Now that I've sorted out the problem of getting the Carl Martin there I thought it would be a straightforward case of comparing it to a selection of pedals I gave them, all of which are on their website and none of which are 'boutique'. I asked to try a Hardwire Overdrive, Hardwire Metal Distortion, Hardwire Delay, MXR Analog Chorus, Marshall Chorus, Hardwire Chorus and Marshall Compressor (also thinking of a Tone Press). The Hardwire seemed to represent good quality for minimal expense while the Marshall pedals seem to get astonishingly good reviews given their low price. Remarkably, they now tell me that Hardwire pedals are also only brought in to order!!

Clearly a direct comparison is going to be impossible and that's annoying but at some point I'm going to need to make a decision as to which way to go and I don't see how I can do that without at least trying the Quattro by itself as £400 is a lot of money if I don't like it. I've tried to make my alternative selection of individual pedals a sensible balance between quality, affordability and availablity on Ebay so that I can save some money buying them used. The Hardwire Overdrive and Distortion I've owned before and are very impressive, especially as you can pick them up new for only £70 each so £100 for the pair on Ebay seems very achieveable. I've also owned the Hardwire Delay before and again it's excellent at what it does. This one is much closer to £100 but compared to other Delay pedals with tap tempo, it's still not expensive. That leaves a Chorus where I don't really need that much and a Compressor. If the Marshall units are both as good as the reviews say, they could both be had on ebay for only about £35-40 each and if any individual pedal doesn't suit me, I can change it without losing much, if any, money. On top of that, I could probably buy the lot for about £150 less than the Quattro and spread the cost, though I'd need a pedalboard and power supply as well, which may well eat up a lot of that difference.

Well, that's where I am at the moment. There are pedals I'm interested in on Ebay right now but I'm wary about making a move now in case the pedals turn out to be a poor choice and the Quattro is the dog's danglies. The agony of choice!  :?