YOU KNOW WHAT GRINDS MY GEARS - gear rants

[ryan summit]

the only thing that really bothers me
is the horizontal layout
like this

it justdont work with a board
filled with other layouts
and my soldering iron
way too hot
or ice cold
almost cried causeof it the other night
had already clipped my cables to length

[dubkitty]

when i had the PT it drove me bats trying to arrange the pedalboard. i often place boxes sideways to save weight, but that line of knobs across the top dictated that it sit on the upper edge of the board...there was no way i was going to try and step over those knobs. also, placing the in/outs on the narrow end but the adapter jack on the side was hella lame for placement.

what i hate in general are pedals with the in/out jacks on a different axis than the DC jack...pick one or the other so i can save space on ONE side/axis, come on!

[aen]

EHX Bass Micro Synth: absolute essential pedal for me, never found any other pedal that can do what it does (especially the filter section), but shitty 24V supply that uses up two of my power supply outlets, and most of all, it has a volume drop that absolutely kills me. I'm still trying to figure out what to do about the volume drop. I've always wondered if I could install a clean boost inside the damn thing.

There are some trimpots that help that issue, IIRC. I had mine open a while back and i ended up tru-bypassing it, and twiddling some trimpots to make it much nicer.

[Dr. Sherman Sticks M.D.]

the only thing that really bothers me
is the horizontal layout
like this

it justdont work with a board
filled with other layouts
and my soldering iron
way too hot
or ice cold
almost cried causeof it the other night
had already clipped my cables to length

yea this is a really stupid layout.

[bigchiefbc]

EHX Bass Micro Synth: absolute essential pedal for me, never found any other pedal that can do what it does (especially the filter section), but shitty 24V supply that uses up two of my power supply outlets, and most of all, it has a volume drop that absolutely kills me. I'm still trying to figure out what to do about the volume drop. I've always wondered if I could install a clean boost inside the damn thing.

There are some trimpots that help that issue, IIRC. I had mine open a while back and i ended up tru-bypassing it, and twiddling some trimpots to make it much nicer.

There's a trimpot for input gain, which I definitely had to tweak to get the trigger range I wanted. But let me know if there's another one for output volume, that would be awesome.

[StivBrigggs]

Know whats grinds my gears?
Cables.
all of em'
They get covered in booze, spit shit and sweat.
Still, I will probably never go wireless...

[Casavettes]

the only thing that really bothers me
is the horizontal layout
like this

it justdont work with a board
filled with other layouts
and my soldering iron
way too hot
or ice cold
almost cried causeof it the other night
had already clipped my cables to length

yea this is a really stupid layout.

Agree 100%
I have an pigtronix aria and the layout just pissed me off

[greyscales]

Know whats grinds my gears?
Cables.
all of em'
They get covered in booze, spit shit and sweat.
Still, I will probably never go wireless...

+1000
I have so many cables everywhere and they seem to get tangled no matter what. Fucking cable pixies, man.
And there are never enough patch cables to do what I want with a board. Or never enough long or medium length patches. Makes wiring a big board so difficult.
When I was 16 and playing through a Dual Recto I was so close to going wireless because it was too much of a hassle to have cables going from guitar to amp, send and return from effects loop, plus channel switcher. Thankfully I didn't and just downsized, but there's no way I could deal with all those runs now. Wireless would be a must.

The problem with wireless is the batteries though. Can't stand buying 9volts. Wayyy overpriced.
Same with active instruments. Good in theory, too expensive in practice.

[Jenesis]

There's no way in hell I'd buy one of those sideways pedals.

[spacelordmother]

The Music Electronix GeminiDrive. It's every bit as amazing as everyone says it is... except that when you hit the stomp there is an INSANELY loud pop which makes it basically unusable. I even tried it in a TB loop and the pop remained...

[insubordination]

The Music Electronix GeminiDrive. It's every bit as amazing as everyone says it is... except that when you hit the stomp there is an INSANELY loud pop which makes it basically unusable. I even tried it in a TB loop and the pop remained...

So...the footswitch on the TB looper you are using also has a pop then? Aren't you just leaving the Gemini engaged and then clicking the TBL on/off?

True bypass pedals sometimes pop a little and you have to hit the switch 5-6 times to discharge static electricity or something, whatever is causing the pop. And then sometimes switches just go wonky.

[Casavettes]

ehx smmh

can't self oscillate, won't pitch with delay time knob. IF ONLY! YOU*D BE THEONE, MY ONLY ONE!

god this pedal...
such amazing sounds overshadowed by stupid flaws

[spacelordmother]

The Music Electronix GeminiDrive. It's every bit as amazing as everyone says it is... except that when you hit the stomp there is an INSANELY loud pop which makes it basically unusable. I even tried it in a TB loop and the pop remained...

So...the footswitch on the TB looper you are using also has a pop then? Aren't you just leaving the Gemini engaged and then clicking the TBL on/off?

No pop on the TB looper by itself. Yes, leaving the GD on and on/off with the loop somehow doesn't rid the popping.

True bypass pedals sometimes pop a little and you have to hit the switch 5-6 times to discharge static electricity or something, whatever is causing the pop. And then sometimes switches just go wonky.

Truth, and giving a few stomps does bring the pop down a little - but this is no little pop. This is like double+ unity. I even sent it back to Os to fix because he thought something might be wrong with it, and then I got caught in round 1 of Music Electronix going down in flames. It was quite an ordeal to get it back, and when I did, there was no change.

[Gone Fission]

My EBS Valvedrive is several things I hate in a pedal. It's big - in a stupid board space stealing way. It's awkward to power - it's 12VAC @ 500ma.

I can deal with the size of my Magic Stomp, but its power supply is even further off from normal supported standards at 12VAC 1A. I'm not aware of any power brick that'll support it. That and Yamaha discontinued it without a replacement -- it's still a pretty great pedal, though not quite perfect -- a better buffer circuit and control inputs or real-time MIDI control support would have gone a long way.

[rustywire]

The Music Electronix GeminiDrive. It's every bit as amazing as everyone says it is... except that when you hit the stomp there is an INSANELY loud pop which makes it basically unusable. I even tried it in a TB loop and the pop remained...

So...the footswitch on the TB looper you are using also has a pop then? Aren't you just leaving the Gemini engaged and then clicking the TBL on/off?

No pop on the TB looper by itself. Yes, leaving the GD on and on/off with the loop somehow doesn't rid the popping.

True bypass pedals sometimes pop a little and you have to hit the switch 5-6 times to discharge static electricity or something, whatever is causing the pop. And then sometimes switches just go wonky.

Truth, and giving a few stomps does bring the pop down a little - but this is no little pop. This is like double+ unity. I even sent it back to Os to fix because he thought something might be wrong with it, and then I got caught in round 1 of Music Electronix going down in flames. It was quite an ordeal to get it back, and when I did, there was no change.

Try shuffling around your pedal order/switching power supply outs/even swapping out power supplies, trying batteries in pedals around the Gemini etc.
That's what fixed my 3PDT *POP* issues in certain pedals/areas of my chain; and to this day I'm not entirely sure what the true culprit was...but now everything is quiet again.
I use a mix of buffered & TB analog & digital effects that seem to be finicky in where they will play with each other.