Results 1 to 1 of 1

Thread: Digitech 'The Weapon' Dan Donegan pedal review - revised

Threaded View

  1. #1
    Join Date
    Jul 2009
    Location
    Finland
    Posts
    3,424
    Post Thanks / Like
    Blog Entries
    23

    Default Digitech 'The Weapon' Dan Donegan pedal review - revised

    Got one of these for cheap, just for the hell of it.

    Pros: it has a sitar emulator, and a rather good octover, even a phaser plus autowah...it is very quiet too, even the extreme drive allows for very sharp stops and such, there is no backroung hiss or noise at all - maybe the least of any pedal I tried. And it has a D/I out that delivers a pretty good metal sound. Well built, came with a power source.

    Cons: It's not a drive pedal, it's a modeler with extremely limited choice of sounds, and it sounds mostly like utter cr*p into an amp, and where would I need a sitar sound? (or autowah that's ALWAYS also laden with ugly distortion you can't dial away?)

    I really don't like the pedal much in front of an amp. (I don't think I ever met a digitech product I liked very much, to me they all sound, well, very much digital technology). I haven't owned many but so far they've been really bad. Only the FX100 TubeDrive or whatever was very good to small SS amps. Did I mention this also has a very pronounced 'pop' when the fx is engaged?

    This could be good for those rare moments I need a really strong modern SS-style thrash metal distortion guitar recorded D/I - it has two drive sounds that via it's recording out sound even good in the genre. To me it sounds way too bright, but when on track with other instruments, it sounds way better than I thought it would. But there are no controls whatsoever, no drive amount control in any of the models, only level and 2-band EQ. In most applications, I don't know what could I do with a distortion pedal that has no drive level adjustment. It's just the one sound no matter how you cut it. Err, make that three sounds...lotsa drive, much less of the exact same drive, and another even more SS drive choice. And in between the sames with phaser, octover and autowah. And that sitar (thank you no drive in that!)

    Thru my amp the drive is just plain horrible. Not a single good sound about it to me. I mean, I don't hate high-gain sounds, far from it, but this is just very hard SS style messy distortion/fuzz...but I must say again - I could use this for D/I recording of very heavy guitar quite OK.

    If you like a very hardcore metal buzz distortion that IS very quiet (no extra noises, no hum or background noises at all besides the driven guitar) and that sounds good and powerful and thick when playing just one string, although goes into mush when several strings are used...AND are happy with just one preset amount of drive, AND have a pretty 'soundless' amp or go D/I, this could work for you.

    Then again I could use it as an octover only, yeah, that setting is not bad. But I have little use for an octover. Or phaser. Anyway those two are the only settings not driven, but clean.

    But, I mean, seriously, no gain adjustment on a drive pedal???? Gimme a break...

    Good for a beginner maybe, no need to adjust nuthing, and sounds best with single-string runs and such...you can instantly think/pretend like you're a real hardcore guitarist with this, even with minimal skills I bet. To any non-playing listener it probably sounds like great hardcore chops and speed when you just randomly beat the strings and hack away...like on my clip of the D/I sounds:

    http://deeaa.pp.fi/clips/theweapontest.mp3

    For this test I used the two preset sounds, with the high end cut to almost off, and also thru a behringer direct box. Then I used my normal mastering tools, including a stereo widener and master compression, and panned them slightly...but it's just two tracks and basically quite what it sounds D/I with no adjustments other than cutting the highs - this pedal has a VERY bright metal sound.
    Last edited by deeaa; April 29th, 2010 at 10:13 PM.
    Dee

    "When life's a biatch, be a horny dog"

    Amps: Marshall JVM 410H w/ Plexi Cap mod, Choke Mod & Negative Feedback Removal mod, 4x12", Behringer GMX110, Amplitube 3/StealthPedal

    Half a dozen custom built/bastardized guitars all with EMG's, mostly 85's, Ibanez Artwood acoustic & Yamaha SGR bass, Epiphone Prophecy SG, Vox Wah, Pitchblack tuner plus assorted pedals, rack gear etc. for home studio use.

Posting Permissions

  • You may not post new threads
  • You may not post replies
  • You may not post attachments
  • You may not edit your posts
  •