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Great OD Quest

 
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woland99



Joined: 31 Mar 2007
Posts: 155
Location: Austin, TX

PostPosted: Wed Nov 19, 2008 3:01 pm    Post subject: Great OD Quest Reply with quote

or rather - quest for great OD (pedal).
What do you guys/gals use?

I am about to help economy by buying decent OD.
In the past I had a few different ones:
1. Boss Blues Driver - can't deal with pedal without true bypass
2. Ibanez Tube Screamer - too "blanket'y" for me (and no true bypass)
3. SIB Varidrive - 12AX7 based - should have kept this one - huge
pedal - size of a brick and needed direct 110V power. But you could swap
the tube and get different sounds out of it. Not very jazzy - it was hard
to get "almost clean" OD but man that thing could sing.
4. Barber LTD - that one was supposed to be almost clean OD but somehow
I never liked it - there was something not very natural about EQ on it.
5. MI Audio Tube Zone - very flexible pedal. And on a downside - very
flexible pedal. Tweaker nirvana - all the controls seemed to depend on
each others so you could sit there for hours happily tweaking. Which I hate.
6. Xotic RC Booster - still have this one - not really OD - more like a
very musical boost altho at the extreme setting it will overdrive slightly.
Great booster pedal. Best EQ I seen on any pedal. Smal, relaible and
easy to work with - gain, volume, active bass and treble - all doing what
they were supposed to do.
7. ProCo Rat2 - I kindda like it - it was rather warm and not very harsh
even on extreme settings. But usable range for me was 0 to 1 tick and
to do any modding on newer (Chinese made) Rats Keeley charges $110
so I returned it after a day.
8. Xotic AC Booster - after RC it was natural to get a "gainier" brother.
It can be a bit harsh sounding on lower gain - but if you roll the volume
on guitar a bit it sounds nice. Seems better in front of tube amp than SS.
I only had it for a day so I did not explore higher gains much but it seems
to be good and non"blankety" tubescreamer like OD. Great EQ - ame as
RC. So I am pondering spending a bit more and getting AC+ (Plus) Booster
which is 2 channel pedal - and keeping RC on for clean tone then one
channel of AC+ for sortta "clean SRV" and the other one as lead.
BTW - here is decent review of AC+ by Jack Zucker - very able jazzer:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k-l5FX1x9s0

Any other OD suggestions to try? Or is it "no-OD" forum Wink
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nylenny



Joined: 31 Mar 2007
Posts: 291

PostPosted: Wed Nov 19, 2008 4:12 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I have two overdrive pedals that I like -- a Fulltone and a Zen. The Zen gives great Carlton / Ford sounds. I am happy with both of them. Each allows the creaminess of the guitar to ring through, as a top end pedal should. You should also check out pedals modified by Keeley. I have a Keely digital delay that is excellent.
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woland99



Joined: 31 Mar 2007
Posts: 155
Location: Austin, TX

PostPosted: Wed Nov 19, 2008 4:35 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I know about Fulltone - almost bought it once - friend of my has their OCD
that he likes a lot. As for Zen - I remember they were reviewed in Guitar
Player and got good marks but I was not convinced by their audio clips and
there are no dealers here in town to check it.
Guitar Center/Musiciansfiend were carrying Fulltone for a brief moment
so it was easy to just buy it with no risk. But their local dealer .... - I do not
like that shop much - their prices are insanely high - and not too many OCDs
or Fulldrives end up on craigs.
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nylenny



Joined: 31 Mar 2007
Posts: 291

PostPosted: Wed Nov 19, 2008 4:55 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I buy all my pedals on eBay. Pedals are so personal, and if you bought it cheap, you can sell it cheap. I sometimes look at eBay as a rental shop. I buy a piece of gear, use it for a while, and then decide if it's a keeper. It's too hard to do that in a music store.
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woland99



Joined: 31 Mar 2007
Posts: 155
Location: Austin, TX

PostPosted: Wed Nov 19, 2008 5:52 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

You are right about eBay - although you never know if stuff
that you bought was abused or not. I bought 2 guitars, amp,
couple pedals and 2 guitars synths there. Was really lucky with
all of those. But all of the purchases were few years back - nothing
recently - seems like it gets harder to get good deals there now.
So my first choice is usually craigslist.
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nylenny



Joined: 31 Mar 2007
Posts: 291

PostPosted: Wed Nov 19, 2008 6:23 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I think with the tough economy there are some good deals. I just saw a Fender 5-string custom shop jazz bass go unsold with a "buy it now" of $1500.
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corky4strings



Joined: 21 May 2008
Posts: 109
Location: plain, pa.

PostPosted: Wed Nov 19, 2008 7:18 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

with the buy it know on ebay there are so many music stores on there now you could get some great deals on new equipment. i bought my new bass rig through one of the music stores that use ebay. ended up being $600.00 less then if i was to buy at my local music store.
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corky




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woland99



Joined: 31 Mar 2007
Posts: 155
Location: Austin, TX

PostPosted: Wed Nov 19, 2008 8:23 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Well too late now Wink I just sank money into AC+ - and from little that
I had a chance to play it it may be a keeper. Shop that I bought it at
was always very good at supporting everything I bought there - they
did tons of tweaking on (used!) amps that I bought there for free.
Plus that is first pedal I bought in almost two years so I guess I will
chalk it as my stimulus package.
Next stop I will look some sort of chorus/univibe deal and my pedal
board will be complete (RC Booster, AC+ Booster, Buddha wah, Ernie
Ball volume and whatever chorus I go with - gotta keep things simple -
I am complete anti-tweaker).
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Gorecki
Site Admin


Joined: 24 Feb 2007
Posts: 238
Location: Glenwood, MD

PostPosted: Fri Nov 21, 2008 3:00 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

I've used the same thing for a long time now and can't match it. I have a old (now) modified ADA MP-1 and it's my tone machine. From mild dirt to OMG my brain is going to explode box. Pedals suck. Wink
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Larry_DC



Joined: 31 Mar 2007
Posts: 207

PostPosted: Fri Nov 21, 2008 12:52 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

When I got my Line6 a few years ago my pedals went to the dust bin. With all the amp and effects settings and the drive knob I have everything I need in one box.
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woland99



Joined: 31 Mar 2007
Posts: 155
Location: Austin, TX

PostPosted: Fri Nov 21, 2008 1:54 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Gorecki wrote:
I have a old (now) modified ADA MP-1 and it's my tone machine. From mild dirt to OMG my brain is going to explode box. Pedals suck. Wink


Heh - rack effects suck^2 Wink
Looked up ADA's Youtube demos but it is really hard to compare it.
Even that Xotic AC Plus - it is nice in front of HRD but but just OK
in fron of one of my SS amps. On some combinations of pickups on
my Forshage it works great on some other it is OK. One reason I prefer
pedals is that I like certain level of simplicity - I am not a tweaker.
I had Boss GT-3 and some other mfx boxes and I hate turning those
knobs and going thru menus. I want max 4 knobs and sth designed
so it will sound good most of the time.
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