Gear Paralysis

[rustywire]

Paralysis by analysis is something I've been rebelling against since an early age.

It's what happens when you load up a digital music library or netflix and wind up staring at thumbnails for 20min.
Or an expansive dinner menu at a restaurant, row of hangers in a walk-in closet or emulator with thousands of roms.

The way around it, I think, is to impose some limitations and see what happens. Whether food, movie, gear selection.
Pick 1 dirtbox, 1 type of modulation, 1 delay, 1 filter, activate them in different pairings, then altogether.

Also +1 on patchbay.
Get a rack-mounted combo patch bay [xlr+trs] and consider a BoredBrain Patchulator for your wheeled-island pedalboard.
They're on my list, too

[Jwar]

The solution is obvious. Use less as Brand suggested. As much as we want to use every day thing we have, we can't without it sounding like shit at least. At the end of the day a phaser is a phaser, a fuzz is a fuzz and so on. Yes there are many numerous variations but you don't need ten options of each type of effect to get a great sound. Is it fun??? Fuck yes it is! I'd love to have way more than I do and just fuck around with shit all day. As it is though, I have too much going on and can't even focus on what I'm trying to play most of the time because I feel like I have to play things in order to justify them. Which if you get right down to it, seems a bit ridiculous don't you think? I mean, I should purchase things because I need them or think they will work well with my set up, not because they are new and shiny. LOL!

So, I'm not telling you to purge your gear or anything. Maybe just to take a step back and play with a bit less. OR! Find one pedal you love with each instrument and make a board out of that. That could be fun.

If you're like me though, you'll continually do this and never be happy regardless. hahaha

[popvulture]

If you're like me though, you'll continually do this and never be happy regardless. hahaha

Yes.

[Ruiner]

Some really great replies, thanks fellas.

Instead of responding to everyone individually i'll try to get everything responded to here.....

First of all, this isn't my first rodeo as far as excessive amounts of gear. I understand limiting and learning every pedal well. However... that's not me. Not what i'm interested in. Part of why I play music has to do with the joy of creating a new sound that I've never once heard in my life. Something completely unique which typically comes from different pairings and utilizing those in a track. I can't explain how much that interests me and how much I love it. I don't go for the "this is my core sound" thing. I understand it for some projects and do that to an extent on some, but what i'm going to be working on requires the ability to utilize all my instruments (i'm a one man band) and all my effects. I do utilize everything now but pairing different things is more infrequent if i only have one pedal board or pedals assigned to a pedalboard. Sure, i take them on and off but eventually the boards fall apart from moving stuff around and not putting everything back... the room becomes a mess of wires and instruments left here and there and then it causes paralysis until it's all organized again.

This is why I want everything hooked up at once. I have the patchbay to do it that way but I'd be changing orders so much it would get confusing and I still like having individual boards to make sure i am keeping it concise to some extent. I'm also worried about the cable lengths and amount to try to patchbay everything. That'll not only get confusing but tone suck like crazy as well I would think. I think I can handle having 3 pedal boards and just utilzing whatever I build and swapping things in and out some times. That actually helps focus so I may just leave it at that. I had a Bored Brain but never used it but I am considering giving it another go.

I think the main thing is utilizing all the instruments and keeping them ready to go at all times. I'm not overwhelmed by options surprisingly. I embrace that and the spontaneity that comes with it. I want ease of switching from one thing to the next. So i think a mixer is the best option.. maybe some ABY boxes.

I have a Montreal Assembly Fewtility coming in. This is an ideal item but I wish i had several of them or even better... a rackmount version with many I/Os. That would be awesome especially being able to switch if it's In or Out like the Fewtility does which opens up routing options all over the place. Alternatively, a rack mixer would be great but i actually want the I/Os on the front for easy changing without using a patchbay.

Perhaps a patchbay would be smart for the instruments...... i just see that getting confusing but maybe that's just cause i haven't used the one i bought yet.....

[rfurtkamp]

Yea, I'd go patchbay for the rack and outboard stuff for sure. And consider output - are you running to one amp, two amps, a bunch of inputs on a console?

[Ruiner]

Hit me up if you want to make a plan for everything, we could make a sick setup for all you're stuff.

I may have to do that. Thanks for offering!

[rustywire]

All of your unbal gear may be best used with short patch/cable runs in the aux sends of a mixer which can output bal +4dB.
Then with a transformer-balanced patchbay you can run loooooooooong lengths of cable without signal loss or added noise.
IMO they also assist in bringing out the best... depth of sounds
A label maker is quite valuable, label every cable's connector, each patch socket's routing. Take photos & print settings often.
Once you create a system for yourself...and stick with it...workflow should become far more intuitive.

[Ruiner]

All of your unbal gear may be best used with short patch/cable runs in the aux sends of a mixer which can output bal +4dB.
Then with a transformer-balanced patchbay you can run loooooooooong lengths of cable without signal loss or added noise.
IMO they also assist in bringing out the best... depth of sounds
A label maker is quite valuable, label every cable's connector, each patch socket's routing. Take photos & print settings often.
Once you create a system for yourself...and stick with it...workflow should become far more intuitive.

Yeah, i'm definitely getting a lable maker if i go the patchbay route. Getting organized is a great suggestion. Mixer idea for unbalanced gear is smart too.

I think for the moment before making any big change decisions i'm going to keep it at 3 pedal boards. The cool thing about the rolling stand is i can make any of them into a table top effects when necessary. The table top one i'm doing is a dual setup though... it'll make more sense when i take a picture of it after it's complete. I'll still be limited to what's on each board for now but can swap in and out and it's still a good way to really get to know if something pairs well or not. That's all already pretty much set up.

I think to make all the instruments accessible to any pedalboard I need to decide whether to keep them on the desk or on a rolling stand and then figure out a good mixer solution so that they can all be on and accessible at any time with easy change to route to whichever pedalboard i want and then whatever amp or DI to the interface....

[manymanyhaha]

Have you thought about a matrix mixer?

[Ruiner]

Have you thought about a matrix mixer?

I haven't but I just found this which could be great for routing multiple instruments to different sources or even more than one source..... and then can also be used for fun stuff like parallel routing, effects loop that feeds back into itself, stereo routing variations, amp and direct routing outs, multiple instruments through the same chain, instrument into instrument for sampling, routing to a looper, etc etc.

Thinking this might be a good way to go for right now before diving into my patchbay which is going to require more thought and reaarangement

[Ruiner]

^^ Also, i think if i had one of those for the inputs then i could route to all the pedalboards and never unplug a cable... just turn up whichever instrument i want going to whichever pedalbaord......

but then, also have one of these where all the pedalboards go into. Then I could just turn up whichever board is being used to whichever amp or direct to interface or both or run in stereo or run in parallel with two boards going into one amp, etc etc etc.


So many options and no more plugging and unplugging issues.


Anyone see any flaws or holes in this idea?

[ritz]

That one is passive, you probably want active, especially if you are worried about longer cable runs.

Seems like you have more gear than that little one would handle. 4 inputs routed to 4 outputs. Enough? I'm always tempted by those little matrix mixers, but for me that would be more for fiddling than a permanent setup.

You've got like 10 instruments to route. You need a mixer!

I like the Allen and Heath MixWizard mixer for the 6(!) aux sends which can be configured pre or post fader. Each of your three boards could be on an aux send, and then come back into the board on its own channel (where it could then be routed to other aux sends etc).

Plus you have inserts on the channels and, and inserts for the main mix. So you could easily route selected inputs or the whole mix through more rarely used effects. You can also use one of those fake insert adapters to split the signal of an input out for on the fly routing to an effect (if you already used all 6 auxs) and bring it back in on its own channel.

The only thing is I don't really mess with cabs so I don't know if you need some kind of re-amp coming off of the mixer, or maybe a re-amp into a cab switcher to switch on the fly...

But getting a good mixer set-up lets you just twist a few knobs to massively re-route things, which lets you play with routings on the fly. And also makes it easier to insert stuff into your overall chain *at the point of the mixer* without messing with the rest of it.

I don't play guitar so I can't speak to some of particulars of integrating a mixer, but if I were you I'd be looking into it

[D.o.S.]

Ritz is, per usual, right on.

[Ruiner]

That one is passive, you probably want active, especially if you are worried about longer cable runs.

Seems like you have more gear than that little one would handle. 4 inputs routed to 4 outputs. Enough? I'm always tempted by those little matrix mixers, but for me that would be more for fiddling than a permanent setup.

You've got like 10 instruments to route. You need a mixer!

I like the Allen and Heath MixWizard mixer for the 6(!) aux sends which can be configured pre or post fader. Each of your three boards could be on an aux send, and then come back into the board on its own channel (where it could then be routed to other aux sends etc).

Plus you have inserts on the channels and, and inserts for the main mix. So you could easily route selected inputs or the whole mix through more rarely used effects. You can also use one of those fake insert adapters to split the signal of an input out for on the fly routing to an effect (if you already used all 6 auxs) and bring it back in on its own channel.

The only thing is I don't really mess with cabs so I don't know if you need some kind of re-amp coming off of the mixer, or maybe a re-amp into a cab switcher to switch on the fly...

But getting a good mixer set-up lets you just twist a few knobs to massively re-route things, which lets you play with routings on the fly. And also makes it easier to insert stuff into your overall chain *at the point of the mixer* without messing with the rest of it.

I don't play guitar so I can't speak to some of particulars of integrating a mixer, but if I were you I'd be looking into it

Yeah definitely looking into mixers for a more permanent solution if i don't use the patchbay that i already have.

The matrix mixer was going to be just to run a few of the instruments in with outs to 3 different boards and one direct to the interface. The second matrix mixer was going to be to run the three pedal boards to 2 different cabs and one direct to the interface. Was assuming i'd want passive but maybe i'm thinking about that wrong. Logistics wise, for the setup of my room, this is an optimal setup. A mixer from the instruments to the pedal boards and then another from the boards to the amps and interface.

... but i'll definitely look into the mixer options you suggested! Thanks!

[D.o.S.]

You definitely want an active mixer, even if it's a matrix mixer.