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Elements: for the right deal I'll give one another shot. Peer pressure'd Oh and has to have the right graphics ofcourse.

I had a BAT Black Forest, was way too thin and scratchy imo. That was ages ago though, don't even remember what amp I was using in those days.

I sold my two HM-2's cause...well, cause I made a considerate profit on 'em and wasn't putting them to good use at the time. Remember them sounding sick at rehearsels. Much wider gain range than what they're typically known for. But yeah, at home, living room volume levels...Sounded like ass.

I have 3 that I swear by:

Boss SD-1: Simple, easily attained, built like a tank. They always give me the sound I want right out of the box. Set all the knobs to noon, plug in a Strat, and it's a solid sound.

Boss BD-2: I prefer two of these in series. The first is dimed out and the second is set more neutrally to control volume. Great for a feedback laden shoegaze sound.

MXR Distortion+: While they need a volume boost, D+ is my favorite. Slammed into a loud Fender amp, the D+ is the sound of Post-Punk for me.

frigid midget wrote:As far as Boss goes...It's not like I gave up on all their entire od/sd range of pedals. Never tried the OD-3. Seems to cut a fair amount of bass though, one of my pet peeves. Also came across the OS-2, forgot about that one. Gets a lot of mixed reviews, I guess cause there's fairly narrow range of good useful tones. But still, the idea of getting an OD-3 that can you can blend with a pinch of ds-1...Might be the set and forget type pedal I need. Tweaking the gain a bit and maybe adjusting the tone/volume a bit depending on gtr/ampsituation, is really all I need from this one.

I never experienced that the od-3 cuts alot of bass, it can get really trebly but its not like a tubescreamer or such where a low-cut is baked into the sound.

qersty wrote:

frigid midget wrote:As far as Boss goes...It's not like I gave up on all their entire od/sd range of pedals. Never tried the OD-3. Seems to cut a fair amount of bass though, one of my pet peeves. Also came across the OS-2, forgot about that one. Gets a lot of mixed reviews, I guess cause there's fairly narrow range of good useful tones. But still, the idea of getting an OD-3 that can you can blend with a pinch of ds-1...Might be the set and forget type pedal I need. Tweaking the gain a bit and maybe adjusting the tone/volume a bit depending on gtr/ampsituation, is really all I need from this one.

I never experienced that the od-3 cuts alot of bass, it can get really trebly but its not like a tubescreamer or such where a low-cut is baked into the sound.

If anything, actually maintains bass really well and is good friends with bright instruments.

I loved my Sabbra Caddabra, except that it was super noisy AF.

An OD-3, or any non-collectible Boss pedal for that matter, can be found cheap any day of the week. I'll just try one out for size and find out for myself if it likes my rig or not.

If you're looking at the OD-3, check out the OD-2/OD-2R. It's got a Turbo Mode that gives it a wider gain range. I think it sounds less saturated and more natural than the others in Non-Turbo mode. I'm not sure how it compares to the OD-3 in terms of retaining bass. The problem with mine is that I have to crank the volume for unity gain, (although I don't think they all have this problem) which means it's not possible to goose your amp.

Plus if you just get a OD-3, you can't get really serious and yell "It's Turbo Time" and start running around the house as fast as you can and jump over the couches, because when OD-3 try to jump in, they yell "You're not part of the Turbo Team....DON'T RUN!...YOU CAN'T RUN WITH US. We're the ones who RUN, UNtil you're part of this Turbo Team...WALK - SLOWLY" So you then have to go upstairs to be by yourself and read your art books....

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IgqCivFPbAE[/youtube]

Mark of the Beast wrote:check out the OD-2/OD-2R

OD-2R has almost 200% of the OD-2's headroom which has proven to be not enough for humbuckers or active pickups. As you wrote you cannot achieve unity gain with the OD-2. Plus the OD-2R's Turbo mode has an improved slight volume boost plus the expression pedal jack.

The OD-2R is one of my all time favourites. It sounds killer with analogue synths, too!

Maybe a bit of a crapshoot in terms of quality control, but the Little Bear R.attack may be worth trying (if you haven't already). The Germanium (You Dirty Rat), mode stays smooth, is decidedly darker than other variants I've tried, and covers a wide range of gain. The DOD Boneshaker is a relatively versatile DOD-250-type option, though its controls are a bit more involved, and the range of gain remains within overdrive territory. Valeton also offers cheapo mini Rat (Dark Tale) and Boss OD-1 (Loft Series Overdrive) variants, the first of which has a decent 2 band EQ that can dial out icepick frequencies and add gratuitous bass boom. Lastly, the EHX Graphic Fuzz is actually an overdrive and covers a signficant amount of gain territory decently. If all else fails, Elements is probably the answer you seek (or Harmonic Percolator if fuzziness isn't verboten).

ck3 wrote: Lastly, the EHX Graphic Fuzz is actually an overdrive and covers a signficant amount of gain territory decently.

interesting... never noticed that, I always figured it was like a deluxe big muff or something but it looks totally different I am very curious about the dynamics bit

Mark of the Beast wrote:I'm not sure how it compares to the OD-3 in terms of retaining bass.

They are nothing alike in my experience, but this:

An OD-3, or any non-collectible Boss pedal for that matter, can be found cheap any day of the week.

OD-3 is an original design but people say it sounds close to a BD-2, never owned this but it did sound stupidly close to an OCD.
It sounds best on Bass but it's already amazing on guitar

OD-2 sounded like an anemic SD-1, but everyone's saying they fixed it on the OD-2R, which I never owned either.

Pepe wrote:

Mark of the Beast wrote:check out the OD-2/OD-2R

OD-2R has almost 200% of the OD-2's headroom which has proven to be not enough for humbuckers or active pickups. As you wrote you cannot achieve unity gain with the OD-2. Plus the OD-2R's Turbo mode has an improved slight volume boost plus the expression pedal jack.

The OD-2R is one of my all time favourites. It sounds killer with analogue synths, too!

Here's a vid of an OD-2 achieving unity gain at about 12 o' clock. The one I own doesn't. I'm not sure if this is a problem that was in earlier ones or what.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aNqxSPPO0Hg[/youtube]

Mark of the Beast wrote:

Pepe wrote:

Mark of the Beast wrote:check out the OD-2/OD-2R

OD-2R has almost 200% of the OD-2's headroom which has proven to be not enough for humbuckers or active pickups. As you wrote you cannot achieve unity gain with the OD-2. Plus the OD-2R's Turbo mode has an improved slight volume boost plus the expression pedal jack.

The OD-2R is one of my all time favourites. It sounds killer with analogue synths, too!

Here's a vid of an OD-2 achieving unity gain at about 12 o' clock. The one I own doesn't. I'm not sure if this is a problem that was in earlier ones or what.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aNqxSPPO0Hg[/youtube]

No, the OD-2 hasn't changed in design. At the Bossarea forum or StompBoxZone forum someone wanted to mod his OD-2, but due to the ICs in the OD-2 it was only possible to enhance the volume of the turbo mode.

You can achieve unity gain with the OD-2 if you use rather low output single coils. I already had problems with my MIJ Fender Stratocaster. And I had two units of the OD-2 - both were identical in their behaviour.

And you don't know what they did in the YT video. Maybe there was some post-processing to get the volume on par with the clean sound. Or that guitar has pickups with really low output.

tremolo3 wrote:

Mark of the Beast wrote:I'm not sure how it compares to the OD-3 in terms of retaining bass.

They are nothing alike in my experience, but this:

An OD-3, or any non-collectible Boss pedal for that matter, can be found cheap any day of the week.

OD-3 is an original design but people say it sounds close to a BD-2, never owned this but it did sound stupidly close to an OCD.
It sounds best on Bass but it's already amazing on guitar

OD-2 sounded like an anemic SD-1, but everyone's saying they fixed it on the OD-2R, which I never owned either.

From what I remember OD-1 and OD-3 were roughly the same circuit. I just watched a shoot out vid between all of them, OD-3 has more bass and they added a tone knob.
I think the OD-2 was short lived because of the problem with the volume. I wouldn't say it was an anemic SD-1 I had both at one time and sold the SD-1 because there was so much overlap and the OD-2 covered more ground because of the Turbo. T U R B O !

Mark of the Beast wrote: From what I remember OD-1 and OD-3 were roughly the same circuit. I just watched a shoot out vid between all of them, OD-3 has more bass and they added a tone knob.
I think the OD-2 was short lived because of the problem with the volume. I wouldn't say it was an anemic SD-1 I had both at one time and sold the SD-1 because there was so much overlap and the OD-2 covered more ground because of the Turbo. T U R B O !

I thought the OD-1 was an SD-1 with a fixed tone control.
Is BossArea still around?