Thoughts on using a digital multi-fx with classic amps?

[Vinsanitizer]

I'm half-ass thinking about getting a multi-fx unit to use with my old Fender amps, plexi clone, and DSL50. Do you think digital effects are up to par these days? The dirt stuff isn't to my ears, but things like eq, clean boost, and time-based effects just may be good enough that compromising for a simpler setup might be worth it. What do you think? I tend to like classic sounding effects such as spring reverb, tremolo, unvibe, wah, as well as eq and clean boost. I guess I'm concerned with both the quality of effects and any monkey screwing that a multi-fx unit might introduce such as loss of tone from digital conversion and introduction of noise.

I'd do it, but I only use 2-4 effects and it's so much easier to set up those few pedals than to spend the time with a multi-box full of stuff I'll never use, staying up all night scrolling through menus and adjusting things like room damping, mic position, etc.

I really wanna jive with multi-units, but I've just gotten to the point where I lose patience and interest if I can't get a sound right within 60 seconds. It really needs to be that simple for me. Most of the time a just resign myself to a splash of reverb and a light 800ms delay with 1 repeat for solos.

My favorite effect? A good EQ. Fixes the highs and lows within seconds if you know what you want.

 

[Marshall4Metal]

A good floor processor is meant to be used with a PA either direct to sound or into a cabinet then mic'ed. That's how i use them and there great for that. If you have a nice tube amp i would not use a floor processor for effects. Far better off buying quality single effect units when combining with a tube amp that's my 2 cents from a guy who gigged with a PA/floor processor and with amps. You can do it but you won't get the most out of your processor or your amp running it that way.

 

[What?]

Now all that's left for you to do is some comparative clips between the Pedal and a real spring reverb tank

I got around to comparing this pedal to the reverb in my super reverb today for the first time. It's actually pretty damn close. A little less detail but alot more adjustability in the pedal, and no noticeable tone suck. I'm impressed with this pedal today. Obviously playing it through an overdriving 1987 style amp is going to be a different experience than with a fender style amp (which I had to come around to). But I have been getting along with it with the 1987 clone too at lower gain settings. Digitech really nailed this pedal. (Caveat here. Once you get the reverb mix up to a moderate level, which I would almost never use, the digital cons become apparent). So why in the hell didn't they keep producing it? And big thanks for the recommendation.

I wish Digitech would make a supernatural II, boot out the cliche shimmer mode, adding in a tank reverb mode. I mean, who in the hell really uses a shimmer reverb to make music anyway?

 

[IOSEPHVS]

My Vox ToneLab and VC-4 controller are great for practicing at home, but I would never use it live for a few reasons, notably if it goes down I would potentially lose all effects at once. That's why I carry around a couple dozen effect pedals - I can live with one or two crashing.

 

[zachman]

I got around to comparing this pedal to the reverb in my super reverb today for the first time. It's actually pretty damn close. A little less detail but alot more adjustability in the pedal, and no noticeable tone suck. I'm impressed with this pedal today. Obviously playing it through an overdriving 1987 style amp is going to be a different experience than with a fender style amp (which I had to come around to). But I have been getting along with it with the 1987 clone too at lower gain settings. Digitech really nailed this pedal. (Caveat here. Once you get the reverb mix up to a moderate level, which I would almost never use, the digital cons become apparent). So why in the hell didn't they keep producing it? And big thanks for the recommendation.

I wish Digitech would make a supernatural II, boot out the cliche shimmer mode, adding in a tank reverb mode. I mean, who in the hell really uses a shimmer reverb to make music anyway?

Re: Shimmer-- I do... Here's a touch of it from my H8000FW



At the VERY end on the last clean chord, it's not the keyboards you're hearing do the strings fade out... That's my Eventide doing a shimmer thing, w/ the delay tales from the TC 2290

 

[MKIII900]

I run a POD HD500proX in 4CM with my Marshall MKIII. Even though it's an older modeling unit I still think it sounds great using it this way. For me it's a convenience thing. I got sick of tap dancing and I also like to be able to save fx presets from songs I've recorded and recall them whenever I like. The trick is with a tube amp to not use much of the modeling and just stick to using it as an FX system. I do use a clean preamp from the POD to give my Marshall a clean channel but other than that I just use it for FX. It's really nice to go from a patch with delay chorus and reverb to another with totally different fx in a single click.
I started doing this because I was in a band where I had to play guitar and sing. It was way easier to have 8 banks of fx changes for different songs assigned to a single button each than it was trying to turn off 2 pedals and turn another three on during fast verse to chorus changes.

 

[What?]

@zachman, I despise shimmer verb. Sounds like a synth to me. Yack. To each their own of course.

 

[zachman]

@zachman, I despise shimmer verb. Sounds like a synth to me. Yack. To each their own of course.

It's supposed to, and it is only a mere tool. I figure just because I go to a restaurant, I don't HAVE TO choose everything on the menu and multi-fx are the same, as I see it.

Side note: The reverb on the higher gain vh1 tone attempt in the Soundcloud clip was the same H8000FW used for shimmer in the clean clip-- using an EMT Plate Reverb instead, for a totally different affect/effect.



Just because it affords the range of opportunity to create various sounds, it doesn't mean you are obligated to indulge in everyone of them.

What are the odds that you will prefer everything on any given menu whether it's a multi-fx selection menu or a restaurant menu? And, Does it even matter, if you know there's something you want on the menu? Just sayin...

Go get a damned spring reverb tank and quit your whining about it already. It's OLD and played itself out

My $.02

 

[freefrog]

What, this topic is still going on?

I've nothing personal to add regarding MY use of MFX's but as a side note, I've found the following link pretty instructive.

https://www.musicradar.com/news/guitars/in-pictures-36-pro-guitarist-pedalboards-630194

Many of these pro pedaboards include "semi multieffect units":there's something like 7 pb's with Eventide units (mostly H9), 9 with Strymon pedals, 8 with the old Line6 DL4.

And there's 10 pb's with "fully versatile" multiFX's: Line6 M5, M9, M13 [EDIT: forgotten a Helix. A LT, if memory serves me] and some old outdated Boss GT's (GT8, GT6, GT3), sometimes used in a "heretic" way -like the GT3 plugged as a whole in the loop of a PV 5150 if I've understood correctly; I did try one in 4CM 15 or 20 years ago and this MFX was rather a tone sucker without added "adaptative" components...

At first glance, I've seen only one pb with a foot controller corresponding to a rack unit (pic 59: it probably controls an AxeFX).

So, at least 34 pro muso's out of 68 use multi-purpose digital devices and 10 have multiFX's, mostly old and outdated.

It means nothing: the choices of any player are the best and the most legitimate for him.

But I still find the link above interesting to share.


And as a footnote, I'll just add that I've personally nailed once the reverb of a Fender Twin with a basic TC Hall Of Fame mini: the related software allows to "tune" the effect and it gives an absolutely decent approximation of real spring reverb to anyone knowing what to do. IME. IMHO. YMMV.

 

[zachman]

What, this topic is still going on?

I've nothing personal to add regarding MY use of MFX's but as a side note, I've found the following link pretty instructive.

https://www.musicradar.com/news/guitars/in-pictures-36-pro-guitarist-pedalboards-630194

Many of these pro pedaboards include "semi multieffect units":there's something like 7 pb's with Eventide units (mostly H9), 9 with Strymon pedals, 8 with the old Line6 DL4.

And there's 10 pb's with "fully versatile" multiFX's: Line6 M5, M9, M13 [EDIT: forgotten a Helix. A LT, if memory serves me] and some old outdated Boss GT's (GT8, GT6, GT3), sometimes used in a "heretic" way -like the GT3 plugged as a whole in the loop of a PV 5150 if I've understood correctly; I did try one in 4CM 15 or 20 years ago and this MFX was rather a tone sucker without added "adaptative" components...

At first glance, I've seen only one pb with a foot controller corresponding to a rack unit (pic 59: it probably controls an AxeFX).

So, at least 34 pro muso's out of 68 use multi-purpose digital devices and 10 have multiFX's, mostly old and outdated.

It means nothing: the choices of any player are the best and the most legitimate for him.

But I still find the link above interesting to share.


And as a footnote, I'll just add that I've personally nailed once the reverb of a Fender Twin with a basic TC Hall Of Fame mini: the related software allows to "tune" the effect and it gives an absolutely decent approximation of real spring reverb to anyone knowing what to do. IME. IMHO. YMMV.

It appears our friend is more interested in the this vs that approach conversation and the ensuing arguments that follow vs practical reality and using the tools to do what they were actually designed to do and making music with them-- also known as walking the walk vs talking the talk, and so far... he's all talk

He knows what he wants, but prefers to spin his wheels trying to figure out another option to complain about, instead of just getting what he says he knows he wants and prefers. It's RIDICULOUS... though would remove all the excuses to make music vs theorize about this vs that, so perhaps that's the motivation.

I figure life is too short, so advocate getting and using your preferred gear, and it's not like a spring reverb tank is a massive investment-- so make of that what you will. Reminds me of that fool ampmadscientist. Alt account? idk, but it wouldn't come as a surprise

 

[Redguitar]

I'll just throw this in there. I use a Digitech Studio Quad running through my 410 parallel loop. It's set to +4 db output (wet signal only) back into the amp return, so I don't have to turn the mix knob much away from full dry. The FX I use from it are phaser, chorus, delay, reverb. It works fine for live. No degradation of a clean signal.

Another digital FX option is my ART SGX 2000, that runs through the pre/pwr loop. It has a number of nice digital FX, but I currently only use it for the analog signal path dynamics control.

 

[tallcoolone]

It appears our friend is more interested in the this vs that approach conversation and the ensuing arguments that follow vs practical reality and using the tools to do what they were actually designed to do and making music with them-- also known as walking the walk vs talking the talk, and so far... he's all talk

He knows what he wants, but prefers to spin his wheels trying to figure out another option to complain about, instead of just getting what he says he knows he wants and prefers. It's RIDICULOUS... though would remove all the excuses to make music vs theorize about this vs that, so perhaps that's the motivation.

I figure life is too short, so advocate getting and using your preferred gear, and it's not like a spring reverb tank is a massive investment-- so make of that what you will. Reminds me of that fool ampmadscientist. Alt account? idk, but it wouldn't come as a surprise

Bingo. /thread

 

[chromeboy]

Personally I really like analog pedals. I have owned multi effects units in the past but if you are running it say with a high gain amp then I would run it through the effects loop using the 4 cable method otherwise you are basically running a pre amp into another pre amp and to me it sounds like crap and for sure doesn't cut through the mix. I feel that if I was to use another multi effects unit I would buy a power amp and use the multi effects with it because your multi effects units are basically pre amps. I believe they sound better with a pure power amp. Like I said I like analog effects pedals and I run all my time based effects through my effects loop and everything else into the front end of my amp. Some pedals sound better in the front of the amp and others sound better in the loop.

 

[SkyMonkey]

With my Boss GT-100 all the preset patches have the loop OFF by default.
So in 4CM, the amp preamp is bypassed in favour of the sim preamp, i.e. no preamp into preamp.
For my 4CM patches, the loop is enabled and the sims are off, i.e. DSL preamp only.

 

[AdrianDSL]

I'm using the Boss MS-3 mainly as MIDI channel switcher for my DSL. Has 3 loops, in 1 I have a Boss NS-2 and a Maxon OD-9, 2 is currently unused and 3 goes into a Boss GE-7 and into the amp's send / return. No tone suck afaict. I have made few patches with the inbuilt effects (very good chorus and delays!) but I barely use them now, I pretty much prefer the simplicity and the natural sound of guitar-od-amp, with some EQ-ing.

 

[end user]

I went back and forth for years. Keeping my good analog pedals and I use a Helix LT in 4cm. Sounds and feels phenomenal and YES it can be completely tweaked on the fly with my feet. Has a mode for that. Can tweak just about any parameter without bending over once.