Page 1 of 1
Got 8 bucks? Want a surprisingly awesome little Chorus pedal
Posted: Sun Mar 20, 2011 12:05 am
by Mark
http://www.bestbuy.com/site/Starcaster% ... Id=8410524Definitely a neat little thing for less than the price of some 9V adapters...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=phlwChxJ2DMReposted from here:
http://guitarforum.net/guitarist/index. ... 213.0.htmlEdit: YMMV. mathias' came broke and in terrible shape under the hood.
Re: Got 8 bucks? Want a surprisingly awesome little Chorus p
Posted: Sun Mar 20, 2011 12:14 am
by mathias
Mine came broken. The action-figure-style packaging was cheesy to begin with, but at some point it broke through that and snapped off a knob, ruining the pot. When I looked inside, components were bent over and shorting out. The pedal didn't work even after I cut a groove in the level(wet/dry mix) pot to turn it up.

Buyer beware.
Re: Got 8 bucks? Want a surprisingly awesome little Chorus p
Posted: Sun Mar 20, 2011 12:27 am
by Mark
Wow. Edited OP with warning. Still though, you could have got a lemon.
Re: Got 8 bucks? Want a surprisingly awesome little Chorus p
Posted: Sun Mar 20, 2011 12:30 am
by Gone Fission
Packing was inadequate when mine shipped, but it survived. Bad packing is typical on these from what I gather.
It's a good pedal stock, not just "for the price" IMO. Not true bypass, but that can be easily remedied if you're willing to sacrifice the LED indicator. More extensive mods provided by Bill Oakley in this thread:
http://shortscale.org/forum/viewtopic.p ... c&start=20 Even without, it's a quiet, shimmery chorus in the Boss vein. I'm not a chorus guy, but I justify having both this and a Guyatone MC-3 on the floor.
Re: Got 8 bucks? Want a surprisingly awesome little Chorus p
Posted: Sun Mar 20, 2011 12:31 am
by mathias
As a bonus, it is a cheap source of jacks, power connector, stomp switch (not 3PDT, just DPDT, but oh well), battery box and a weird metal enclosure. Turns out that the area where the knobs are is about perfect for a small adhesive breadboard. I'm probably going to use it as a pedal prototyping rig once I harvest the usable parts.
Also,
Gone Fission wrote:Even without, it's a quiet, shimmery chorus in the Boss vein.
It's basically a Boss Chorus-3 inside from what I can tell from looking up the chips.
Re: Got 8 bucks? Want a surprisingly awesome little Chorus p
Posted: Sun Mar 20, 2011 12:42 am
by Gone Fission
mathias wrote:
It's basically a Boss Chorus-3 inside from what I can tell from looking up the chips.
Basically a CE-5. Small variations only, apart from the lack of the standard Boss FET buffering/switching circuitry.
Re: Got 8 bucks? Want a surprisingly awesome little Chorus p
Posted: Sun Mar 20, 2011 12:48 am
by mathias
I stand corrected. Makes sense.

Re: Got 8 bucks? Want a surprisingly awesome little Chorus p
Posted: Sun Mar 20, 2011 12:50 am
by Mark
Wasn't aware that people have know about this :P Sorry...
Re: Got 8 bucks? Want a surprisingly awesome little Chorus p
Posted: Sun Mar 20, 2011 12:56 am
by unownunown
that enclosure alone is attractive enough to warrant the purchase
edit: more cheapy choruses that have nice sounds. and this guy sounds like the crocodile hunter.
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aG16q2YZAUE[/youtube]
Re: Got 8 bucks? Want a surprisingly awesome little Chorus p
Posted: Sun Mar 20, 2011 12:58 am
by mathias
Mark wrote:Wasn't aware that people have know about this :P Sorry...
I think it warranted a post here.

Re: Got 8 bucks? Want a surprisingly awesome little Chorus p
Posted: Sun Mar 20, 2011 1:01 am
by BlindtoFaith
That enclosure is screaming for a fuzz circuit!!! Like a Tone Bender.
Re: Got 8 bucks? Want a surprisingly awesome little Chorus p
Posted: Sun Mar 20, 2011 1:09 am
by Mike
It's definitely a CE-5. Different BBD/Clock, no dry output. I traced it, and put together a cross reference between it and the Boss schematic that is out there:
Link.
Also, the Starcaster Distortion is an MT-2, with one error. I traced it, too:
Link.
Re: Got 8 bucks? Want a surprisingly awesome little Chorus p
Posted: Sun Mar 20, 2011 1:21 am
by Gone Fission
Mike wrote:It's definitely a CE-5. Different BBD/Clock, no dry output. I traced it, and put together a cross reference between it and the Boss schematic that is out there:
Link
Handy damned link I've seen and linked before.

And pointing out the deal again is worth it, though the lack of non-US shipping may be unfortunate for some. Oh well.
Re: Got 8 bucks? Want a surprisingly awesome little Chorus p
Posted: Sun Mar 20, 2011 2:13 am
by Achtane
Since you can only pick it up in-store I tried to ship it to the ones near me, but it says "this item is not longer available".
If anybody is planning on picking one up, wanna buy two and I'll give you the $15 or whatever it takes to cover the cost and ship it from your place to mine?
Re: Got 8 bucks? Want a surprisingly awesome little Chorus p
Posted: Sun Mar 20, 2011 12:08 pm
by Mark
Achtane wrote:Since you can only pick it up in-store I tried to ship it to the ones near me, but it says "this item is not longer available".
If anybody is planning on picking one up, wanna buy two and I'll give you the $15 or whatever it takes to cover the cost and ship it from your place to mine?
I would take you up on that but shipping to a store near me is also "No longer available."
