EHX Re-Issuing more stuff, aw yeah. (Behndy wants your EHX!)

[Scruffie]

I generally hate the way their XO line looks, and some of their pedals have a center positive power jack, but their big box stuff... SIGN ME UP. BIG KNOBS AND SHINY SCIENCE BOXES MAKE ME FEEL LIKE MADE SCIENTIST GUY. And the DMM is such a perfect delay, I won't say its the best, but it is perfect. And I used the English Muff'n for years and it never failed me.

But yeah, their xo line makes me cringe, I like pretty boxes or boxes that look like something found out of a cheesy sci-fi movie, or destruction devices... EHX doesn't do any of that anymore. That hot tubes looks okay though.

Some of the new Nanos look decent (this being a good one with basically the original artwork) but some are butt ugly.

I'd say the more space they have on the enclosure now the uglier they are where as it was a more uniform look of simplistic but sweet back in the day.

The old hot tubes enclosure was ridiculous in size for what would have fit the old big muff boxes fine so i'm glad they put it in a nano box (plus I looked up the prices of originals after seeing this, damn they going for a lot).

I like the big boxes for some stuff, but there comes a point when it was just a waste of pedal board space.

*weakly pukes on self*

...... Super... Ego..... good.... everything else.... sad making......

So wrong... original Electric Mistress, Original Polyphase (re-issue was a sucky fail) original Attack Decay, Bad Stone Phaser, Big Box Small Stone & Clone, Memory Man's and while I personally am not a fan, you can't really deny the big muffs effect on music.

Then all the rare shit not many people get to try like the Rack Mount delays and synths, the percussion effects, deluxe octave multiplexers I stand by being the best analog octave down ever yadayadayada.

Then there's Pogs (depending on your preference, I do concede the 1st sounded best but the micro does the job for my needs when used 'tastefully' didn't like demos of the Pog 2 but would try it) The Hog which is just awesome but i'll never afford one and of course the super ego which were all pretty ground breaking effects... a lot of the new stuff is a bit crap though, I prefer the originals or proper straight re-issues.

Go and play with your tube screamer collection Behndy

Anyway this has gone wayyyyyyy off topic, hot tubes! and with the RTG hopefully they'll bring back some more old stuff properly... new crying tone was fail.

[fishtankdork]

i used to love ehx, i owned alot of the big boxes. however i notice a significant tone kill, and my setup is as noisy as shit whenever i try to add one to my board (some crazy white noise that hangs out behind everything/ only noticeable at large volumes) . i had the hog and ddm on my board for years, but i just couldn't take it anymore. they are so big and clunky and unreliable and ime they stack like shit. i purchased the hog when it first dropped, and i owned three of them. ehx pedals are not ment to take a beating like all my other pedals. i guess now that im older i like smaller companies, where i can talk to the builder about tone, mods, fixes and get true bypass instead of whatever nonsense ehx uses.

[Scruffie]

lol. i don't hate it like i want to punch Weird Santa Guy in the face or anything.

i hate the way they look, i hate the way 92% of them i've tried have sounded, i hate that they have an interesting idea then mudhole rape it by adding some stupid other section or design that makes it look like NO ONE there has ever played out, i hate seeing friends waste their money on Bass Big Muffs because the guy at GC told them how awesome it was, when i first was trying to like them i had at least half of the ones i owned fail at shows....

they just SUCK. and they a lot times put out stuff that has the potential to be really cool. one of the few times they did it right was putting out the Freeze, which they kept simple and focused on a box that did one thing really well, then they put out a Big Chubbly version that had SMART upgrades with the effects loop and the auto grab setting.

so rare it stands out. SOMEONE DID A SMART THING.

*weakly vomits again*

so.... empty of.... puke fuel.....

I think the build quality has gotten better, there was a period of failing effects after the swap from old big box to nanos and I think they got bored and sorted it out, a lot of those were down to the mechanical foot switches (which I think they have changed to a better quality one) and some generally stupid construction techniques (loads of peoples memory toys failed due to a loose daughter board, the one I had was so tightly put together I couldn't get it off).

Some stuff they obviously market at a certain market which is not you, the Tone Tattoo... none of us are gunna use that but if you're a kiddy guitar player starting out and want to sound like some emo band, pretty sweet little box and you'll probably be in to the art work.

Some extra features are added to stuff just to avoid use of a separate/specially drilled enclosure type to keep cost down, that's always been the case with them and sometimes it can lead to cool shit, no one is forcing you to use the stuff you don't want on a pedal, oh except they'll come and break your legs if you don't.

[Scruffie]

i used to love ehx, i owned alot of the big boxes. however i notice a significant tone kill, and my setup is as noisy as shit whenever i try to add one to my board (some crazy white noise that hangs out behind everything/ only noticeable at large volumes) . i had the hog and ddm on my board for years, but i just couldn't take it anymore. they are so big and clunky and unreliable and ime they stack like shit. i purchased the hog when it first dropped, and i owned three of them. ehx pedals are not ment to take a beating like all my other pedals. i guess now that im older i like smaller companies, where i can talk to the builder about tone, mods, fixes and get true bypass instead of whatever nonsense ehx uses.

Mostly true bypass now, vintage big boxes weren't, then very early re-issues weren't, then they went to relays for a bit on some stuff (which is true bypass) but mostly it's true bypass switching these days.

Noise has been an issue on some stuff, dunno why that is, the old stuff it's probably either the nature of the design or needing a service, new stuff... couldn't say.

Naw hog wouldn't take a beating, doesn't surprise me, then again if I had a pedal that spensive I would wrap it in blankets and cuddle it to keep it safe.

[Haki]

lol. i don't hate it like i want to punch Weird Santa Guy in the face or anything.

i hate the way they look

The guy who gets EVERY pedal sent straight to DanW to get it etched naturally starts his list of complaints with this.

[bigchiefbc]

i used to love ehx, i owned alot of the big boxes. however i notice a significant tone kill, and my setup is as noisy as shit whenever i try to add one to my board (some crazy white noise that hangs out behind everything/ only noticeable at large volumes) . i had the hog and ddm on my board for years, but i just couldn't take it anymore. they are so big and clunky and unreliable and ime they stack like shit. i purchased the hog when it first dropped, and i owned three of them. ehx pedals are not ment to take a beating like all my other pedals. i guess now that im older i like smaller companies, where i can talk to the builder about tone, mods, fixes and get true bypass instead of whatever nonsense ehx uses.

Mostly true bypass now, vintage big boxes weren't, then very early re-issues weren't, then they went to relays for a bit on some stuff (which is true bypass) but mostly it's true bypass switching these days.

Noise has been an issue on some stuff, dunno why that is, the old stuff it's probably either the nature of the design or needing a service, new stuff... couldn't say.

Naw hog wouldn't take a beating, doesn't surprise me, then again if I had a pedal that spensive I would wrap it in blankets and cuddle it to keep it safe.

Will definitely say that the old tone suck problems are largely gone now, because they're basically all true bypass. My old BMS was one of the worst tone suckers I'd ever heard before I modded it to true bypass. As for noise, never really noticed a problem with most stuff, but a few of the pedals that used a certain bbd were insanely noisey, including the Flanger Hoax and the newer reissue of the Clone Theory.

[coldbrightsunlight]

On topic, I'd never heard much about the hot tubes before but from that demo somewhere in the thread it sounds pretty nice!

Off topic, I think EHX are kinda hit and miss but overall good. I loved the sound of the old DMM and the features of the SMMwH but they both have the mix control that turns down the volume of the dry signal when you turn up the delay. WHY. WHY THE FUCK DID ANYBODY EVER THINK THAT WAS A GOOD IDEA??? At least the DMM has the pre to counter it, the SMMwH gave you an unavoidable volume drop on most of the settings, which is obviously totally awesome. I love full wet and delay higher than dry sounds, but either use a single mix knob that works properly or have dry and wet separate.

My main problem with them are all the pedals seem to have good features/sounds but implement them poorly in some important way.

EDIT: and I just remembered the Flanger Hoax, which I still have because it makes lots of cool sounds, but I can't make it not sound like ass running with dirt. Seriously, a flanger that I can't make sound good with fuzz? Why?

[Scruffie]

i used to love ehx, i owned alot of the big boxes. however i notice a significant tone kill, and my setup is as noisy as shit whenever i try to add one to my board (some crazy white noise that hangs out behind everything/ only noticeable at large volumes) . i had the hog and ddm on my board for years, but i just couldn't take it anymore. they are so big and clunky and unreliable and ime they stack like shit. i purchased the hog when it first dropped, and i owned three of them. ehx pedals are not ment to take a beating like all my other pedals. i guess now that im older i like smaller companies, where i can talk to the builder about tone, mods, fixes and get true bypass instead of whatever nonsense ehx uses.

Mostly true bypass now, vintage big boxes weren't, then very early re-issues weren't, then they went to relays for a bit on some stuff (which is true bypass) but mostly it's true bypass switching these days.

Noise has been an issue on some stuff, dunno why that is, the old stuff it's probably either the nature of the design or needing a service, new stuff... couldn't say.

Naw hog wouldn't take a beating, doesn't surprise me, then again if I had a pedal that spensive I would wrap it in blankets and cuddle it to keep it safe.

Will definitely say that the old tone suck problems are largely gone now, because they're basically all true bypass. My old BMS was one of the worst tone suckers I'd ever heard before I modded it to true bypass. As for noise, never really noticed a problem with most stuff, but a few of the pedals that used a certain bbd were insanely noisey, including the Flanger Hoax and the newer reissue of the Clone Theory.

Yeah I can imagine a non true big muff sucking big time, hardly a high impedance buffer, OpAmp ones were probably a little more forgiving.

Oh yeah, you mean the nano clone, or do you mean the stereo clone theory? That was digital, nano wasn't a Clone Theory... I do not know why that was so noisy because as far as I know, that chip is used in the neo clone which is supposedly fine and i've used those chips loads. Some noise with BBDs is to be expected but people were saying it was useless, the overall design must have just been sucky.

[friendship]

That looks like it could be a fun pedal. It has the same design concern that my Memory Toy does, though, which is that the toggle switch is so close to the footswitch, you're bound to put heavy pressure on it from turning the pedal on and off. I love the Memory Toy but it's a matter of time before I step on it and snap that little guy. I wish they would have put it above the knobs.

[behndy]

lol. i don't hate it like i want to punch Weird Santa Guy in the face or anything.

i hate the way they look

The guy who gets EVERY pedal sent straight to DanW to get it etched naturally starts his list of complaints with this.

hee. i LOVE you.

yesh. owning a Devil's Own Box becomes much more palatable -

[Scruffie]

On topic, I'd never heard much about the hot tubes before but from that demo somewhere in the thread it sounds pretty nice!

Off topic, I think EHX are kinda hit and miss but overall good. I loved the sound of the old DMM and the features of the SMMwH but they both have the mix control that turns down the volume of the dry signal when you turn up the delay. WHY. WHY THE FUCK DID ANYBODY EVER THINK THAT WAS A GOOD IDEA??? At least the DMM has the pre to counter it, the SMMwH gave you an unavoidable volume drop on most of the settings, which is obviously totally awesome. I love full wet and delay higher than dry sounds, but either use a single mix knob that works properly or have dry and wet separate.

My main problem with them are all the pedals seem to have good features/sounds but implement them poorly in some important way.

EDIT: and I just remembered the Flanger Hoax, which I still have because it makes lots of cool sounds, but I can't make it not sound like ass running with dirt. Seriously, a flanger that I can't make sound good with fuzz? Why?

Yeah it is a nice one! I've had it on the breadboard before just never got to building one, does have that tubey break up thing going on.

You can actually mod the DMM pretty easily to get a more useful mix, i've only ever tried my DIY build one and went straight for modded so not experienced the original mix.
That does sound like a weird set up on the SMMwH though.

That does suck! Flanger & Phaser need harmonic content like Synths and Fuzz to sound awesome! I can only speculate it's down to the fact that maybe the dry line delay is not companded and those chips can't take the signal but I couldn't say without knowing if it has companding chips or not. I wanna know why it's got a weird power supply, 10v max BBDs and it's got a 12v regulator inside... seems like it could have easily been a 9v effect.

That looks like it could be a fun pedal. It has the same design concern that my Memory Toy does, though, which is that the toggle switch is so close to the footswitch, you're bound to put heavy pressure on it from turning the pedal on and off. I love the Memory Toy but it's a matter of time before I step on it and snap that little guy. I wish they would have put it above the knobs.

Least they're making them side to side now so they're less likely to accidentally get switched.

[Ghost Hip]

I like the big boxes for some stuff, but there comes a point when it was just a waste of pedal board space.
.

I know there are people who will always disagree with me, and there are good reasons to buy great small pedals. I mean shoot, I have about six or seven little devi pedals I use mostly for recording. But honestly pedal board space is never a problem for me. My board is never cramped together, but then again I probably only use five to seven pedals at a time, and I swap them in and out frequently. Different strokes as they say.

[retinal orbita]

The only EHX I've kept is a 70's Muff, I've parted ways with a small stone, big box DMM and a holy grail, however I just picked up a used Cathedral which I like a lot....

The hot tubes looks awesome. I always see one on Kim Gordons board, and have been curious.... maybe the time is nigh?

[behndy]

hee. STROKES.

yah. i like them little boxes (giggety).

[kosta]

The 16 Second Digital Delay RI (and the original, I assume) is pretty badass. EHX definitely has some wins, historically.