marnold
June 26th, 2010, 08:57 AM
As mentioned in this thread (http://www.thefret.net/showthread.php?t=15622), I got myself a Boss DD-6 Digital Delay in like-new condition for $72. Can't beat that with a big stick. Here are my initial impressions/review of it.
I'm not The Edge so I don't need massive amounts of delay. I just want a pinch to add some bigness to everything. This pedal gives up to 5.2 seconds of delay which is a crazy amount for regular playing, but not so much for using this as a looper, which I'll talk about later. It has all the standard Boss DD features--multiple modes for various levels of delay, multiple outputs for panning or to send a dry signal to one amph and an effected one to another. It also includes a reverse mode to get your Jimi on. Cool, but of limited usefulness, IMO. The Warp mode is the same as the 800ms mode until you press and hold the pedal. That turns up the effect level and the feedback, enabling you to do some either creative or very annoying things.
Holding down the pedal for two seconds puts it in tap tempo mode which I find to be very useful. In tape tempo mode the mode knob chooses the rhythm of the repeats instead of the delay range. You can set it to quarter notes, dotted eighth, eighth, and quarter note triplets.
All three controls (effect level, feedback, delay time) are very interactive so you can spend quite a bit of time tweaking. For example, if things are starting to sound a bit muffled, do you cut back on one control or bits of each? You can obviously get some profoundly awful (to me) sounds on some extreme settings.
The hold mode allows you to use the pedal as a poor man's looper. With one 5.2 seconds of recording time, it is extremely limited. Nevertheless, it is a handy feature to have.
If the choice were between the DD-6 and the DD-7, I'd take the DD-7 in a heartbeat. The DD-7 adds: 40s of recording time, analog delay, modulated delays, and a jack to add an external pedal for the tap tempo. Of those, the only feature I'd really be interested in is the analog delay. Analogman can mod a DD-6 to give it a more analog-like sound via a switch (Rant: it basically rolls the high end off of the repeats. So if you make the repeats sound crappy, it's more analog. Anyway . . .). However, if you find a DD-7 for $72--especially in pristine condition, let me know. Good luck with that one.
Regarding putting it in front of the amph as opposed to an effects loop: I don't have a loop, so I could only test it in front of my Jet City. Obviously (or maybe not) if the amph is clean, it doesn't matter much where you put the pedal. With lots of gain, it's a different issue. For whatever reason, I found the effect to be a LOT more obvious with gain. I had to dial back on the effect level. The problem that came up then is that my original signal would be all nice and crunchy, but the delays would be mostly clean because the volume is so much lower. It's not that noticeable unless you stop playing. While playing you get the bigness and space that you would expect. A loop would probably help.
I also tried using my DVM-made OD2 overdrive/boost with it, both before and after the delay. The delay seems to take the extra signal from the OD2 just fine until you get to extreme settings (aka dime everything). I didn't much care for the way the OD2 sounded when placed after the delay. Using the overdrive part as a solo boost worked nicely (FWIW, I set the level at noon, gain and tone at 9:00, TS mode, Normal mode). The gain from the pedal dirtied up the repeats a bit so that problem wasn't as noticeable.
One last thing: I've read speculation that your signal is always digitized even if the pedal is off. Not sure if that's true. If it is, I haven't noticed a massive change to my tone. If one is there, it's nothing major.
I'm not The Edge so I don't need massive amounts of delay. I just want a pinch to add some bigness to everything. This pedal gives up to 5.2 seconds of delay which is a crazy amount for regular playing, but not so much for using this as a looper, which I'll talk about later. It has all the standard Boss DD features--multiple modes for various levels of delay, multiple outputs for panning or to send a dry signal to one amph and an effected one to another. It also includes a reverse mode to get your Jimi on. Cool, but of limited usefulness, IMO. The Warp mode is the same as the 800ms mode until you press and hold the pedal. That turns up the effect level and the feedback, enabling you to do some either creative or very annoying things.
Holding down the pedal for two seconds puts it in tap tempo mode which I find to be very useful. In tape tempo mode the mode knob chooses the rhythm of the repeats instead of the delay range. You can set it to quarter notes, dotted eighth, eighth, and quarter note triplets.
All three controls (effect level, feedback, delay time) are very interactive so you can spend quite a bit of time tweaking. For example, if things are starting to sound a bit muffled, do you cut back on one control or bits of each? You can obviously get some profoundly awful (to me) sounds on some extreme settings.
The hold mode allows you to use the pedal as a poor man's looper. With one 5.2 seconds of recording time, it is extremely limited. Nevertheless, it is a handy feature to have.
If the choice were between the DD-6 and the DD-7, I'd take the DD-7 in a heartbeat. The DD-7 adds: 40s of recording time, analog delay, modulated delays, and a jack to add an external pedal for the tap tempo. Of those, the only feature I'd really be interested in is the analog delay. Analogman can mod a DD-6 to give it a more analog-like sound via a switch (Rant: it basically rolls the high end off of the repeats. So if you make the repeats sound crappy, it's more analog. Anyway . . .). However, if you find a DD-7 for $72--especially in pristine condition, let me know. Good luck with that one.
Regarding putting it in front of the amph as opposed to an effects loop: I don't have a loop, so I could only test it in front of my Jet City. Obviously (or maybe not) if the amph is clean, it doesn't matter much where you put the pedal. With lots of gain, it's a different issue. For whatever reason, I found the effect to be a LOT more obvious with gain. I had to dial back on the effect level. The problem that came up then is that my original signal would be all nice and crunchy, but the delays would be mostly clean because the volume is so much lower. It's not that noticeable unless you stop playing. While playing you get the bigness and space that you would expect. A loop would probably help.
I also tried using my DVM-made OD2 overdrive/boost with it, both before and after the delay. The delay seems to take the extra signal from the OD2 just fine until you get to extreme settings (aka dime everything). I didn't much care for the way the OD2 sounded when placed after the delay. Using the overdrive part as a solo boost worked nicely (FWIW, I set the level at noon, gain and tone at 9:00, TS mode, Normal mode). The gain from the pedal dirtied up the repeats a bit so that problem wasn't as noticeable.
One last thing: I've read speculation that your signal is always digitized even if the pedal is off. Not sure if that's true. If it is, I haven't noticed a massive change to my tone. If one is there, it's nothing major.