Noob to pedal switchers. Hip me.

[popvulture]

So, Goroth's pedge thread got me thinking about things that I need but have been hesitant to buy or just unjustly de-prioritized...

A pedal switcher is the biggest void for me, pretty much. I know my life would be a whole hell of a lot better if I had one. The problem is I'm not sure what the advantages are to the various kinds; they completely run the gamut from bare bones to crazy complicated (or in some glorious cases, seemingly crazy complicated but actually simple, like the Gigrig).

I don't even know where to start, and would love to hear some opinions / experiences.

The Gigrig G2 looks incredible, but oy it's expensive. Like, beyond expensive. Yet of course it seems to be the one that wins on functionality / ease of use.
Boss ES-8 also seems really cool (can change order?!), yet I've heard hardly anyone talking about it now that it's available.
Cusack PBTs have caught my eye.
So did the EC Superswitcher reviewed in this month's PG.

HALP.

[popvulture]

Damn. Pedal switchers = too TGP?

[ThurberMingus]

So I am not in any way against pedal switchers. Especially if you play live and sing, I spend way too much time on stage correcting mis-stomped pedals.

But fuck there's this page on FuckBook called "Pedalboards of Doom" and there's always pictures of like a huge board with like 5 pedals and a giant-assed switcher and that shit drives me nuts.

I can't believe people take time to program those things to control like, a Tubescreamer, a Klone, one of those Xotic compressors and like a TC Flashback or DD-20 or some shit.

Holy fuck get your act together!

That being said I've often times thought about going for a slightly bigger and getting a midi switcher. It would make life and preset changes on the TimeLine and PitchFactor so much easier, but I'd also feel weird about limiting myself to certain patches. It's a weird thing.

[popvulture]

Oh I think that's pretty silly too, believe me. I think people go really overboard with a lot of things (see: having like 5 ODs on your board), but hey, if it works for them, it works for them I guess.

The main attraction for me buying one would just be to get through big changes in sound that would require nearly if not completely impossible tap dancing. For example, I've usually got a couple of different verbs and a couple different delays, not to mention usually and OD and maybe one or two fuzzes. I think it'd be SO awesome to have something like a really crazy/deep delay/verb setting, then with the simple tap of a switch, reel it into a different patch with tight verb and metallic sounding slapback. That's just one example, obviously tons of options beyond that. It just sounds fun as hell to me...

But yeah, 5 pedals with a big ass switcher sounds super dumb.

I often crave simplicity, and whenever I load up my bigger board with like 14 pedals, I just don't really wanna use it because all that tap dancing is unappealing. Having some assignable patches would make it make sense for me...

[lordgalvar]

Personally, I love the idea, but I feel like it is something that should be custom built for what ever you are doing. Which is good and bad because it could create a bunch of extra loopers floating around or empty boxes. But something like arduino controlling a relay array could be pretty neat and cusomizable without the crazy costs of that those switchers sometimes have. They already make relay sheilds for them too.

Just learn to program a bit, and you have a custom, editable, neat switchboard.

[AlexanderPedals]

As a manufacturer of pedalboard switchers, I can tell you they're not for everyone. If you need one, then they're amazing. If you don't need one then you're adding unnecessary complexity to your rig and that's never good. We sell lots and lots of them through Disaster Area Designs, and I'm happy to answer any questions you might have but I don't want to spam it up in here.

[Inconuucl]

A pedal switcher is something I was planning to get when I had the pedaltrain pro but then my back told me to fuck off and I switched to a smaller board.

[popvulture]

Thanks guys!

Inconuucl, I'm certainly with you on that. Ideally what I'd love to have is a little board for my minimalist fantasies - like 5 peals plus a tuner - then just a big ass board that's the total dweeb sploogefest with more options than I'll ever need.

And thank you, Alexander - didn't come across as spamming, will definitely investigate your wares and might message you.

[PeteeBee]

I'm pretty much right in line with what's been said. I'd like one that had a couple presets, but what I would mostly use is a reset switch. Like just one stomp to turn everything off. Then I just click my fuzz and in two clicks went from huge modulated, delayed, Verby, space town right back to riff city.

[KaosCill8r]

I was thinking of just building a simple true bypass looper with five, six or more loops for my bass board. All depends on the size of the enclosure when I can find one. There will still be some form of tap dancing but at least the tap dancing takes place all in roughly the same place. Would like one with presets but they are way too expensive.

[Andrew]

I splurged on a Onecontrol Xenagama last year. It was neat, but finding the right patch cables with kind of annoying and really, I didn't see the point of having just one pedal in it's own loop.

[goroth]

Remind me to post my
Thoughts on this.
At work. On mobile. Can't type properly.

But.

I couldn't do a single gig without my switcher.

[futuresailors]

Depends on what you need to do. If you want to easily switch between 2 groups of pedals, a bypass box or A/b switch works wonders. If you want to have a couple groupings, a multi channel would be up your alley. Look at the crazy feature ones if you want to be able to have multiple groupings that you'll be using in different variations more easily than the multi channel.

[Seance]

I don't have a pedal switcher. But I've had some idle speculation about how a switcher that allows you
to change the pedal order might work with a delay or two (in trails mode) in line with a phrase looper
and other assorted noise makers and manglers. Especially if the switcher allowed for volume fades
between patches. Doesn't the Boss ES-8 allow for that?

In my head this would allow you to achieve some of the things that rack delay-line loopers can do.
Like preserve some little small fragment that's repeating in trails mode from one delay and then
feed that back into a looper or other sound mangler (octave, randomizer) ahead of the delay in the chain.



But I don't want to spend money I don't have to pursue idle speculation.

[popvulture]

Remind me to post my
Thoughts on this.
At work. On mobile. Can't type properly.

But.

I couldn't do a single gig without my switcher.

See, you're the type of person I really wanna hear from in this instance—I want the "couldn't live without it" perspective. When you get a sec, I'm psyched to hear what you use / how you use it.