Multi-effect guitar pedals?!
Question: What do they do, what effects do they have and are they worth the money?
Answers: What do they do, what effects do they have and are they worth the money?
ok, it all depends on the type, but i have one that i got for $250 and it has practically everything in the world on it. But most multi-effect pedals have cabinets effects, delay effects, reverb, wah pedals, basically everything you can think of. In my opinion, they are worth it.
They have all the effects you could think of, but they lack the ability to alter the effect. While you could get a distortion effect out of a multi pedal, buying a single distortion pedal that you could alter to make seven different sounds might be the way to go if your not going to use all the effects.
I dont use most of the effects, usually distortion, reverb, delay and every now and then flange and regen and because of that I only have three pedals. If your only going to play metal for example, your better off getting the single effect that you could alter.
My friend just got a really good pedal for about $200. It has something like 13 different tones, near the same amount of distortions, and a bunch of neat delay settings. In the end with all the different possible combinations what it does is make your guitar ridiculously versital. It's not for everyone, but if you have a use for it, especially if you like to play a lot of different styles, it's worth it.
What do they do,
The provide multiple effects for your guitars >> all crammed in a single unit.
what effects do they have
It really depends, but the high end ones like the Zoom G9.2tt and Boss GT8 have 100+ effects.
and are they worth the money?
Definitely worth the money as compared to buying several analog stompboxes. But many say that they produce sounds that are slightly inferior to the stompboxes all because it's digital and you can't fine-tune the presets.
I'm going to answer this very loosely. I don't use many effects, however have had extensive experience with them. I've found that I like one or two company's distortion, and another company's chorus (or what ever). I've not found a multi-effect that I liked all the sounds in and you usually wind up with effects you don't use. . .depending on your music. So, you're paying for effects that you either don't use or don't like.
My opinion is to minimalize (everything) and just try to get the effects you like, individually. If you can find a multi-effect that you think you'll like everything in, buy it, use it, if you wind up not liking it, sell it. Don't stress out about it too much.
Ive been playing pro. now 35yrs and have played every kind of pedal & Multi-effect guitar pedals & 19" rack stuff there is .....
I now use a digi tech RP 50, it cost me $35 !!
I swaped 20kilos of pedals for about 600 gramms !!!
Just because its cheap dosent mean its bull 5hit any more.
multi-effect giutar pedals are generally good if you need a different sound for a song, say a cleaner sound. most have delay reverb and other stuff like that and some others come with a bunch of preset sounds and effects. a decent one is worth the money go for the high end zoom or boss pedals, they usually are the best but a simpler one is good to
You can't alter the presets? Are you guys smoking...?
I just bought a GT-3 a little while ago, and this is one of the most versatile, tweakable units I have ever experienced. The sound quality is not as high as if I had all analog pedals, but I can modify the parameters to the nth degree, far more than if I had analogy pedals.... And it's all within one pedal, instead of having to juggle a dozen pedals I only have to deal with one.
The GT-x are a pain in the keister to program, but once you figure it out it's amazing - with analog, how could you possible synchronize two or three different modulation effects to the same master bpm tempo.. much less make one pulsate at quarter notes, one at triplets, and one at whole notes?
Most multieffects can have great clean tones, and most of them have crappy distortion. The important thing is to be able to balance what each one offers and go with what you need most.
They sound best through a tube amp.
Saul
I've been playing for 33 years & I've found I can get the sound I want with just a CryBaby Wah pedal, a MXR Phase 45 & a Danelectro chorus pedal through a Marshall amp! Any effect, whether it be a single or mult-effect is basically just a talent booster! The only pedal I use most of the time is the Crybaby just mainly to change the tone of my guitar! The MXR pedal I got from a friend's Mom when he got killed & the Danelectro pedal I got for $10 at a music trade fair....I seldom use them unless I'm doing a solo to change my sound! It's pretty much to each his or her own taste musically!