Midiverb II or Quadraverb?

Smarty · Post by **Smarty** » Thu Apr 13, 2017 1:32 pm

Guys, what do you reckon: the Midiverb II or the Quadraverb? Both have a good array of verbs and both have the coveted reverse reverbs. Is one better than the other however?

damnableman · Post by **damnableman** » Thu Apr 13, 2017 8:39 pm

...apparently neither?

Can't help you with knowledge, but I can bump this thread for the eyes of those who know.

friendship · Post by **friendship** » Thu Apr 13, 2017 8:49 pm

Wait for rfurtkamp, he's a mountain goblin who can only be roused from slumber when Venerable Racks are mentioned. He knows a lot about both of these units I think.

ratrod · Post by **ratrod** » Thu Apr 13, 2017 9:47 pm

I own both.

The midi is presets only, no editing. No modulated verbs. The sounds are great though, real dark and tasty. THICK. the bloom modes are incredible. And it sounds rad into dirt.

I recently got the Quadraverb and honestly I think I prefer the midiverb. The quad is infinitely tweakable though and can run eq chorus delay reverb all at once. Has modulated verb, stereo delays, pitch detune, Leslie.

Both are awesome and totally kill pedal verbs IMO

hotknife · Post by **hotknife** » Thu Apr 13, 2017 10:20 pm

They are both classics and worth trying since they can be found really cheap. I need to get another Midiverb II someday. The Quadraverb is my jam, though and holds a special place in my heart. So many great sounds and it's ridiculously easy to edit to make your own patches.

rfurtkamp · Post by **rfurtkamp** » Fri Apr 14, 2017 6:24 am

I have both.

If you get a Quadraverb, shell out the $20 for the EPROM to upgrade it to a Quad+, you'll be very happy you did. Also, spend another $20ish to get a modern LCD panel for it - both are user-swappable, and you should probably also do the battery in there too just because you have no idea how old it is. The LCD is a massive, massive quality of life improvement - something you can read from a couple feet away without needing a flashlight and much squinting.

That said, the Mverb II is a few trick pony, but...damn, it has glorious tricks. The caveat, as mentioned, is it's a preset only monster - you only have control over mix level (and that's not per-patch, that's global, with a knob on the front of the unit).

In terms of verb only, the one thing that the Qverb has that the Midiverb doesn't is a very, very nasty plate. It gets grainy and ugly and glorious.

A final note: do not buy a Quadraverb without the power supply without a substantial discount. They're not common items (the Mverb 2 uses a 9VAC adapter that's still in production!) and have DIN plugs for power.

Hypnodrone · Post by **Hypnodrone** » Fri Apr 14, 2017 8:55 am

I'd go for a quad because of the editing abilities. Thats really the only reason for me to buy old rack verbs. Only issue I have is that it is a gateway drug to MIDI and I don't want to end up in MIDI.

friendship · Post by **friendship** » Fri Apr 14, 2017 9:11 am

Speaking of MIDI what's the Quad's functionality for accepting MIDI data? If I hooked it up with a controller that had a lot of knobs and whatnot, could I control its effect parameters?

ratrod · Post by **ratrod** » Fri Apr 14, 2017 11:19 am

You can control basically everything in the Quad with MIDI

friendship · Post by **friendship** » Fri Apr 14, 2017 11:23 am

fffuck

this is shaping up to the be the year I go butts deep for MIDI hardware

Smarty · Post by **Smarty** » Fri Apr 14, 2017 12:05 pm

Hi rfurtkamp, thanks for the advice it's much appreciated. I'm very much torn between the two, is the upgrade work for the QV easy to do?

rfurtkamp · Post by **rfurtkamp** » Fri Apr 14, 2017 3:58 pm

Upgrade work is basically "pull out a chip from a socket" and "unscrew the old LCD and remove ribbon cable (no soldering), reverse". Take photos of the before to know pin alignment on the chip and ribbon cable, profit.

Battery is like a computer motherboard, little coin cell in a holder.