Help! My pedalboard is sucking my tone

Its all in the fingers, or is it?

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Re: Help! My pedalboard is sucking my tone

Post by Rog »

I did a great gig recently where I arrived and found that I'd left my pedalboard power supply at home, so I played for 5 hours just plugged straight into my Mesa. At first it was weird, but before long I was getting the best tone ever. Sure I had to work on my playing and guitar tones more to get the sound, but that's a damn good thing.
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Re: Help! My pedalboard is sucking my tone

Post by Cdog »

Erm.... sounded pretty mean at gearfest!

The methodical approach... isolate all your pedals, looper channels and cables 1 by one, see if its just one culprit in particular.

2c of thought, no matter how much snake oil you pay for, going through a pedalboard will always change your bypass tone... It can be easy to obsess about the difference when realistically the tone is acceptable, and the benefit the pedal adds outweighs the change in your bypass tone. <= *guilty* :oops: :mrgreen:

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Re: Help! My pedalboard is sucking my tone

Post by Hot_Grits »

Reg18 wrote:
Although it does concern me that going straight from my guitar to my bypass looper to my amp (without any pedals on) does make the sound duller, maybe this means my cables do need an upgrade anyway.

yeah, a lot of people think that TB loopers are the solution to tone loss by themselves, myself included when I first got one.

I remember getting my TB loop and wondering how on earth my sound was dull.

Truth is they are a set of switches that will load down your signal, so they still need a buffer in front (or built into the front).
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Re: Help! My pedalboard is sucking my tone

Post by calling card »

This is why I've not used pedals for years, even just one pedal takes away the raw sparkle of naked guitar. Thing is you're just plain missing out on all sorts of tone munting options without them. If it all turned to pedalboard shit I'd just as happily play on straight into the amp.
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Re: Help! My pedalboard is sucking my tone

Post by Conway »

Buffers are cheap and easy, and they do actually work. No big drama.
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Re: Help! My pedalboard is sucking my tone

Post by calling card »

O.K so I had to google for it - Aha! http://screaminfx.com/tech/why-and-when ... -pedal.htm

Interesting, I'm using 8 metres of cable + 6 pedals & link cables and none too worried about tone loss so far. Seem to be getting some feedback of the most likeable type too I'll add.
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Re: Help! My pedalboard is sucking my tone

Post by Reg18 »

Found this video which is very interesting as well, compares different length cables and different bypass buffers effect on your tone.
I found it very interesting how much better the Strymon buffered bypass was compared to the Boss TU2. Worth a watch if your inclined.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dNU5NZQGF2Y

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Re: Help! My pedalboard is sucking my tone

Post by calling card »

Is there some brand of mini tuner pedal with buffering available?
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