OD & Dist: a gain story

[goroth]

you can dial in some wonderfully smeared 12bit cascades of cicadas leveling a hail of rockets against an army of rusty box fans!

I love this.

[K2000]

That whole post was gold…

[ALLisNOISE]

Awww... you guys!
I log on to read about some fuzzes, and you guys give me a case of the warm n’ fuzzies!!!

[qersty]

http://kiwisdr.com/
You should check out this SDR! It is like the dutch one except you can connect to the recievers of private users all over the world to pick up shit. Plus some digital radio stuff i havent learned

[LaoWiz]

OD and Dist - A Gain Story part II, or how I loved to learn buying dirt again

While that was going on I'd been watching Laowiz do awesome stuff with the Cystech Overdrive. Jesus, that thing is awesome. IN particular that dude mysqrl or whatever his username is. That demo blew my socks off. And after not really being on a fuzz binge for the longest time I got obsessed with that pedal. So I eventually hit up Laowiz and got him to send a Cystech my way. And he just happend to have an IVP circuit ready to wire up and well, at this stage I still hadn't picked up a Surveyor. I don't think anyway. So those two were sent my way. The Cystech arrived and if anything I'd say it was better than I thought. Of course, I can't play as nicely as the mysqrl demo, but man. There are so many really fun and different sounds in this box. And it's easy to find your way around. It's not as simple as just a resonant filter plus a fuzz. It all interacts in this alchemical (that's so not a word) way and you can get these resonant sounds that crumble and swell and with the intermodulation. Complex chords can sound great or they can sound terrible. Or you can start off with them sounding terrible and lower your volume a bit until they sound good. Or you can make em sound good and bend a note until it sounds terrible. Then you choose another mode on the big dial and you start doing all sorts of other stuff. Previously the Fuzzhugger Suneater was my go to fuzz for "I want to just zone out and noodle", but now the Cystech is the undisputed champion. It can do a whole bunch of other sounds too. It may very well be my desert island pedal. Maybe. hehe. Anyways, anyone who missed out on this needs to get on Laowiz' case to make some more. I know he was thinking about a new version with some upgrades but he can shut up. it doesn't need upgrades. It cannot be improved. He just needs to make more of them and we need to buy them. Laowiz is not a wizard of marketing or promoting his own stuff, but he made like 10 of these and they sat around for waaaaay to long. Best pedal.

The Aion FX Isotope I can't really remember, but I think this dude arrived before the Surveyor did. I ended up swapping out two of the transistors from the funky BC whatevers Laowiz digs to I think 2N3904. I think. I was just messing around and found it sounded best this way. So this is a review for a slightly modded Isotope. Anyways, I found it stayed clean for quite a lot of the travel of the gain range, and that the bass and treble were surprisingly easy to dial in. The transformer limits the bandwidth a lot, so you can really go hard on the treble without getting ice picks. There are quite a lot of nice sounds in this pedal, up to medium gain. It gets that blown out transistor amp sound which isn't really my bag, so I use it in the slightly dirty range. It's a bit cleaner and "nicer" than the surveyor. If you're after the IVP sound then both are very very good, even though they are pretty different in a way.

My lord buddy, I can't tell you how much that makes me happy that you are still digging the Cystech! There's something about the core circuit that made me keep coming back to it repeatedly over the years. I really happy you are able to get so many sounds out of it I should probably put out more but there's just so much more to add! Not a whole lot but will probably add an expression pedal option for the filter sweep, an input cap blend for more or less bass feeding into the signal on the front end, an active tone control (this sounds incredible) and a bunch more Cyst modes. This shit take me forever but I am actively trying to be a bit more active lately but do have some other things I need to focus on first. When I do the next round, I will likely send to a few more demo folks so the word is out there a bit more as you are correct I am pretty terrible at promoting these things. It will be extremely tough to beat psqrcl's demo as that it is really really incredible. He really showcases everything in such a great way with that beautiful song and playing. I really love his work. Been meaning to hit him up to say hi as he hasn't put anything new out in over a year, hope he's ok. For the next one, I will likely hit up Collector//Emitter and Harsh Tones and maybe a couple of others, maybe psqrcl will do a new one. I think I also lost some momentum on the last round as I had ordered the circuit boards and placed an order to get the boxes printed right before Covid and the delay made me lose some excitement. Anyway, think I will do my Bath Salts pedal first and then circle back on the Cystech in some time!

For the ISOTOPE, I remember not digging it too much and figured maybe it was just not my sound and then when you said you swapped out the transistors and it sounded rad I think I knew what I had done wrong. Those BC338 transistors that I likely put in there have a pinout that is the opposite of the type called for in that project, I must have put them in correctly according to the silkscreen on the board. I think after I build my Dead End Fx Pompeii I am going to hit this one, the full meal deal -> https://aionfx.com/project/ivp-preamp/

[LaoWiz]

OD and Dist - A Gain Story part II, or how I loved to learn buying dirt again


While that was going on I'd been watching Laowiz do awesome stuff with the Cystech Overdrive. Jesus, that thing is awesome. IN particular that dude mysqrl or whatever his username is. That demo blew my socks off. And after not really being on a fuzz binge for the longest time I got obsessed with that pedal. So I eventually hit up Laowiz and got him to send a Cystech my way. And he just happend to have an IVP circuit ready to wire up and well, at this stage I still hadn't picked up a Surveyor. I don't think anyway. So those two were sent my way. The Cystech arrived and if anything I'd say it was better than I thought. Of course, I can't play as nicely as the mysqrl demo, but man. There are so many really fun and different sounds in this box. And it's easy to find your way around. It's not as simple as just a resonant filter plus a fuzz. It all interacts in this alchemical (that's so not a word) way and you can get these resonant sounds that crumble and swell and with the intermodulation. Complex chords can sound great or they can sound terrible. Or you can start off with them sounding terrible and lower your volume a bit until they sound good. Or you can make em sound good and bend a note until it sounds terrible. Then you choose another mode on the big dial and you start doing all sorts of other stuff. Previously the Fuzzhugger Suneater was my go to fuzz for "I want to just zone out and noodle", but now the Cystech is the undisputed champion. It can do a whole bunch of other sounds too. It may very well be my desert island pedal. Maybe. hehe. Anyways, anyone who missed out on this needs to get on Laowiz' case to make some more. I know he was thinking about a new version with some upgrades but he can shut up. it doesn't need upgrades. It cannot be improved. He just needs to make more of them and we need to buy them. Laowiz is not a wizard of marketing or promoting his own stuff, but he made like 10 of these and they sat around for waaaaay to long. Best pedal.

The Aion FX Isotope I can't really remember, but I think this dude arrived before the Surveyor did. I ended up swapping out two of the transistors from the funky BC whatevers Laowiz digs to I think 2N3904. I think. I was just messing around and found it sounded best this way. So this is a review for a slightly modded Isotope. Anyways, I found it stayed clean for quite a lot of the travel of the gain range, and that the bass and treble were surprisingly easy to dial in. The transformer limits the bandwidth a lot, so you can really go hard on the treble without getting ice picks. There are quite a lot of nice sounds in this pedal, up to medium gain. It gets that blown out transistor amp sound which isn't really my bag, so I use it in the slightly dirty range. It's a bit cleaner and "nicer" than the surveyor. If you're after the IVP sound then both are very very good, even though they are pretty different in a way.

OD and Dist - A Gain Story part II, or how I loved to learn buying dirt again

While that was going on I'd been watching Laowiz do awesome stuff with the Cystech Overdrive. Jesus, that thing is awesome. IN particular that dude mysqrl or whatever his username is. That demo blew my socks off. And after not really being on a fuzz binge for the longest time I got obsessed with that pedal. So I eventually hit up Laowiz and got him to send a Cystech my way. And he just happend to have an IVP circuit ready to wire up and well, at this stage I still hadn't picked up a Surveyor. I don't think anyway. So those two were sent my way. The Cystech arrived and if anything I'd say it was better than I thought. Of course, I can't play as nicely as the mysqrl demo, but man. There are so many really fun and different sounds in this box. And it's easy to find your way around. It's not as simple as just a resonant filter plus a fuzz. It all interacts in this alchemical (that's so not a word) way and you can get these resonant sounds that crumble and swell and with the intermodulation. Complex chords can sound great or they can sound terrible. Or you can start off with them sounding terrible and lower your volume a bit until they sound good. Or you can make em sound good and bend a note until it sounds terrible. Then you choose another mode on the big dial and you start doing all sorts of other stuff. Previously the Fuzzhugger Suneater was my go to fuzz for "I want to just zone out and noodle", but now the Cystech is the undisputed champion. It can do a whole bunch of other sounds too. It may very well be my desert island pedal. Maybe. hehe. Anyways, anyone who missed out on this needs to get on Laowiz' case to make some more. I know he was thinking about a new version with some upgrades but he can shut up. it doesn't need upgrades. It cannot be improved. He just needs to make more of them and we need to buy them. Laowiz is not a wizard of marketing or promoting his own stuff, but he made like 10 of these and they sat around for waaaaay to long. Best pedal.

The Aion FX Isotope I can't really remember, but I think this dude arrived before the Surveyor did. I ended up swapping out two of the transistors from the funky BC whatevers Laowiz digs to I think 2N3904. I think. I was just messing around and found it sounded best this way. So this is a review for a slightly modded Isotope. Anyways, I found it stayed clean for quite a lot of the travel of the gain range, and that the bass and treble were surprisingly easy to dial in. The transformer limits the bandwidth a lot, so you can really go hard on the treble without getting ice picks. There are quite a lot of nice sounds in this pedal, up to medium gain. It gets that blown out transistor amp sound which isn't really my bag, so I use it in the slightly dirty range. It's a bit cleaner and "nicer" than the surveyor. If you're after the IVP sound then both are very very good, even though they are pretty different in a way.

My lord buddy, I can't tell you how much that makes me happy that you are still digging the Cystech! There's something about the core circuit that made me keep coming back to it repeatedly over the years. I really happy you are able to get so many sounds out of it I should probably put out more but there's just so much more to add! Not a whole lot but will probably add an expression pedal option for the filter sweep, an input cap blend for more or less bass feeding into the signal on the front end, an active tone control (this sounds incredible) and a bunch more Cyst modes. This shit take me forever but I am actively trying to be a bit more active lately but do have some other things I need to focus on first. When I do the next round, I will likely send to a few more demo folks so the word is out there a bit more as you are correct I am pretty terrible at promoting these things. It will be extremely tough to beat psqrcl's demo as that it is really really incredible. He really showcases everything in such a great way with that beautiful song and playing. I really love his work. Been meaning to hit him up to say hi as he hasn't put anything new out in over a year, hope he's ok. For the next one, I will likely hit up Collector//Emitter and Harsh Tones and maybe a couple of others, maybe psqrcl will do a new one. I think I also lost some momentum on the last round as I had ordered the circuit boards and placed an order to get the boxes printed right before Covid and the delay made me lose some excitement. Anyway, think I will do my Bath Salts pedal first and then circle back on the Cystech in some time!

For the ISOTOPE, I remember not digging it too much and figured maybe it was just not my sound and then when you said you swapped out the transistors and it sounded rad I think I knew what I had done wrong. Those BC338 transistors that I likely put in there have a pinout that is the opposite of the type called for in that project, I must have put them in correctly according to the silkscreen on the board. I think after I build my Dead End Fx Pompeii I am going to hit this one, the full meal deal -> https://aionfx.com/project/ivp-preamp/

[goroth]

[Dowi]

Heck yeah, this is exactly where I wanted this thread to go.
Some really top notch posts here!

@goroth your posts made me GAS for at least half of those pedals. BTW i tried that Elements Hm2 setting earlier today next to the Throat Locust for reference and it sounded legit. Not the same but closer than what I thought it would be.

[counttherings]

My lord buddy, I can't tell you how much that makes me happy that you are still digging the Cystech! There's something about the core circuit that made me keep coming back to it repeatedly over the years. I really happy you are able to get so many sounds out of it I should probably put out more but there's just so much more to add! Not a whole lot but will probably add an expression pedal option for the filter sweep, an input cap blend for more or less bass feeding into the signal on the front end, an active tone control (this sounds incredible) and a bunch more Cyst modes. This shit take me forever but I am actively trying to be a bit more active lately but do have some other things I need to focus on first. When I do the next round, I will likely send to a few more demo folks so the word is out there a bit more as you are correct I am pretty terrible at promoting these things. It will be extremely tough to beat psqrcl's demo as that it is really really incredible. He really showcases everything in such a great way with that beautiful song and playing. I really love his work. Been meaning to hit him up to say hi as he hasn't put anything new out in over a year, hope he's ok. For the next one, I will likely hit up Collector//Emitter and Harsh Tones and maybe a couple of others, maybe psqrcl will do a new one. I think I also lost some momentum on the last round as I had ordered the circuit boards and placed an order to get the boxes printed right before Covid and the delay made me lose some excitement. Anyway, think I will do my Bath Salts pedal first and then circle back on the Cystech in some time!

The demo for the Cystech is so good. I’ve kept an eye out for them on the used market and it seems like no one is moving them. Fortunate for the people who bought them as they got an excellent pedal and unfortunate for people like me who missed the boat. I am 100% in on the next run.

[the_bright_undead]

I'm always a little late to these posts, but wanted to drop in, especially cuz as a new person around here, every dirt pedal i've discovered on ILF has been totally amazing!

Over the last year, I've picked up an RMA Tentanus Booster, an EAE Model feT, the Stomping Stones Virus, the Clang, and most recently a Basic Audio Supa MKI.

I'm gonna push the Basic Audio aside here because there's no way it's gonna be a drive or even a distortion, but gotta say, it's my first Basic Audio pedal and I'll be picking up more of these in the future, it's so intense! I really want to try a Kay and also some of the Fuzzface variations. its usually too dark for my setup but what an insane fuzz sound.

I use the RMA TB and the Model feT in a similar way....low to medium gain, on almost all of the time, heavy grit, and then pushing an amp. They have some overlap but are really different. the Model feT feels almost over-engineered for a drive pedal/preamp in terms of how stable/predictable it is. in contrast, the TB has a wild, alive, edgy feel to it that really inspires and in a lot of ways it remains my favorite dirt. But, I really like running a chain that stacks: Fuzz> Reverb > Drive > Delay, and the TB doesn't seem to like having a 'verb in front of it. the feT handles a reverb pedal in front of it better than any other dirt pedal I've tried, so at the moment, the feT is whats on my board. the TB works a lot better for me when I run it early in the chain. even though it's not on my board right now, it's probably my desert-island dirt pedal...i'm not sure what kind of circuit it is, but it feels similar to me to a fuzzface or a transistor-based drive like a colorsound powerbooster in terms of how well it responds to volume/picking dynamics. but then it takes those aspects and just crushes them with heavy tone, if you run it in the high-gain mode.

The Virus just kills. the range on this pedal is so wide, and i love how simple the controls are. it's my go-to heavy gain pedal at this point. right now, i'm actually using it more as a drive, with the toggle in the middle position, and gain about 11 o'clock, then stacking that into the Model feT. but the Virus is super adaptable and I love pushing it with the TB, too. it's got a rude, pinched, blistering personality and the real fun with this one is figuring out how the bias footswitch will change your sound depending on the toggle/gain/volume settings. flip the toggle into the down position and it's fuzz heaven.

the Clang is crazy. its a totally unique pedal to me (i've never tried the original Driving Notion). this dirtbox has been one of those deep pedals for me that has a lot of secret tones inside if you're willing to tweak and wander a bit. i started out running this in the stock position, with input gain at zero and EQ to taste, but mostly everything at noonish. like a few other folks around here, I found it hard to turn off as it made all my other pedals sound a lot better. but, it made other dirt pedals sound muffled when I turned it off, so i've settled on a different setting that plays better with other sounds. Toggle in the up position, input at 12 or 1 o'clock, Lows at 10, Mix at 11, and Highs about 11 or 12. I think of this as the 'trombone' setting, as it's a really raucous, brassy sounding fuzz-drive. In this setting, it does crazy shit to my other dirt pedals and also doesn't throw my EQ off-kilter, so I don't have to keep it on all the time. its an incredible sound for anything rhythmic, which makes it a drive pedal that shares a lot with ring modulators <3 <3

Wishlist:
Anything from Spiral Electric (anybody tried the White boost?)
More Basic Audio
I feel like I need to bond with a Rat....so, maybe a Mountain from Frost Giant??
Also if there was every another run of Cystech from Laowiz, I'd be into that

[goroth]

Are you putting the clang first or last when you’re stacking?

[gila_crisis]

Anything from Spiral Electric (anybody tried the White boost?)

I have the Allora fuzz and it's amazing! I lot of sweet spots, can do anything from low gain up to wall-of-sound fuzz disintegration!
I'm so amazed by Spiral Electric I'm considering also their Black Spiral Fuzz.... but since BSRI Audio came out with the TFZ... I don't know which one to get

[Jero]

Wow! Tons of specific stuff to touch on here, but I wanted to quickly say thanks for all the love this year Was not expecting to see so many mentions

[fcknoise]

Logging on to check whats up and I had missed out on year of the gain?

For my own contribution, I bought myself both a Digitech Death Metal and a DOD version, and I thought I'dd tell you about the important differences.

1) The Digitech has the direct out. Most people would not use this to go direct in though. But you can route it to itself and get some feedback loops
2) The Digitech has a bigger range on the EQ. The EQ on the DOD FX86 is massive, which it is why it is so cool. But with the reissue they decided to expand that shit.
3) It is so pointless to talk about the noise floor on this. Online people say the DOD has a higher noise floor, but honestly take any fucking dirt and max the gain and there's gonna be noise.

So, besides all that, the digitech is cheaper. Definite recommend, although, I will keep them both

[goroth]

Was not expecting to see so many mentions

Make worse pedals then.