Interesting new Behringer FX Pedals

[WalMan]

[quote name='brycebites' post='102934' date='Dec 11 2007, 09:48 PM']It would be interesting to see what the valves actually are.[/quote]
The manual for the Vintage Tube Overdrive VT911 - [url="http://www.behringerdownload.de/VT911/IMPL%20Tech%20GLOB_P0618_M%20Web%20EN_2007-08-21_Rev.1.pdf"]HERE[/url] - says [quote]BUGERA 12AX7B vacuum tube[/quote]

[Buzz]

Mine came, rather impressed. Quasi Review and pics coming soon.

Will be interested to see GreenKings stance on his (which may be the version to get).

[GreeneKing]

Well, the VT999 is very useable. It is great for adding a barely discernable burble of valve warmth right through to a great overdriven metal riffing sound.

For £45 including a power supply it'd be madness not to.

Now looking for a cool sticker to cover the 'Behringer' label

Peter

[GreeneKing]

For those doubters among you the VT999 certainly does have a valve in it:



In fact here it is:



Wondering just how good it is I popped this'n in for comparison purposes:



It's a Russian made Electro Harmonix frozen 'Cryo' valve.

It's made the tone crisper and cleaner but the original aint that bad anyway.

I'm really pleased with this pedal that gives everything from a gentle 'burble' to real overdrive.

I may just have to repaint it though

Edited December 17, 2007 by GreeneKing

[Buzz]

Right, review and pictures time (apologies for the terrible carpet) for the VT911 Vintage Tube Overdrive:

[b]Construction[/b] wise:

2 piece body, all the electric gubbins are attached to the top, undo 6 screws and the bottom falls out as it's rather substantial. Nice big and thick rubber pads on the bottom are nice touches.
The body is really solid when it's all screwed together, the base is slightly thicker and robust than the top. Paint is quite thin though, I managed to scratch it undoing a screw.
Controls operate smoothly and quickly, plastic knobs and plastic shafts on the pots though, so while would probably survive for a long time, dropping/kicking it might sheer the knobs off.
Electrics are look fine, some suspect angles on the wire connectors where they've been soldered onto the pcb's, but nothing that'll cause problems (see the pics). There's also a really bright blue LED, and the pedal will only work when there is an input cable in the socket, nice little undocumented feature (bit like activating pre-amps using a stereo jack).

The valve wasn't seated properly when I went prodding around inside, but that's down to transport, it still made connection and worked.

The only real complaint I've got is that the bypass switch, while functional lacks any sort of positive action (there's no click), so I'd consider maybe replacing it if it was going to be used in anger, even though the case & switch will easily stand you stamping on it.

Odd feature: It doesn't like my other psu, which according to the specs on them both output 9v 300ma and have the same polarity on the connectors. Using the non-beringer one causes the pedal to screech like a banshee.


Now, [b]soundwise[/b] (I've got no experience with valve based stuff before so no comment on the valve itself):

It's a distortion box, pure and simple with a little bit of overdrive.

Interesting note here, it seems to be much more sensitive with a bass plugged in, the squire telecaster I've got required more extreme movements to alter the sound.

Now, it does the overdrive thing a bit too extreme with the standard valve, and it does get awfully noisy as you turn the drive up.
For just a bit of valvey crunch I tend to run the drive around 2 or 3, 10 is some really muddy distorted sound which I don't like, however this is running the combo at a really low volume, I might turn it up loud and see how it sounds.

The tone control does make a little difference to the sound, but it really operates as a treble control so you'd probably have a bigger effect with an onboard preamp.

Volume control does what it says on the tin, the pedal is quite loud so I tend not to turn this past 3ish for my stock Aerodyne.

I'll probably change the valve soon to something that is more usable for me, it really starts to distort heavily around 5.


Rig: Stock Fender Aerodyne Jazz (p+j), Orange Crush 35b, some sh*tty cables. It would sound much better with a full rig probably.



Summary:

Build is quite good, not as good as my tonefactor fuzz, but easily on the same level as the Ibanez PD-7 in terms of durability I would have thought.
The sound from it favours distortion, and isn't to my taste, needs taming with a less aggressive valve if you want more degrees of crunch and OD.

I'd say that the VT999 would be worth the extra £10 for the noisegate, eq controls and general flexability.

For £35 though, it gets preliminary 5/10 due to the sound, which will be let down by the cheap valve.

[attachment=4169:P1010005.JPG][attachment=4170:P1010006.JPG]
[attachment=4171:P1010007.JPG][attachment=4172:P1010008.JPG]
[attachment=4173:P1010009.JPG][attachment=4174:P1010010.JPG]
[attachment=4175:P1010011.JPG][attachment=4176:P1010013.JPG]

Edited December 17, 2007 by Buzz

[Alpha-Dave]

[quote name='Buzz' post='105532' date='Dec 17 2007, 07:41 PM']Odd feature: It doesn't like my other psu, which according to the specs on them both output 9v 300ma and have the same polarity on the connectors. Using the non-beringer one causes the pedal to screech like a banshee.[/quote]

You're sure it the Behringer and not any thing else thats hooked up to the same power supply? Simple because I've had a conversation with Dave at DHA before about using his valve pedals with daisy chained power supplies, and he said that it was a bad idea because of the way valve preamps use the power input to heat the valves and send a signal back ... I got lost about here, but the gist was that the signal could reach other pedals via the power supply if they weren't buffered/screened.

Nice review though, thanks!

Edited December 17, 2007 by Alpha-Dave

[GreeneKing]

Just to add that my Diablo power supply works fine daisy chained to the VT999.

That's together with an EBS Microbass II, Unicomp and Peterson stompbox tuner.

I will try it with it's own power supply tonight to see if it makes any difference.

That is an excellent review by Buzz. Suitably prompted I'll update mine later.

[DHA]

[quote name='Alpha-Dave' post='105641' date='Dec 17 2007, 11:17 PM']You're sure it the Behringer and not any thing else thats hooked up to the same power supply? Simple because I've had a conversation with Dave at DHA before about using his valve pedals with daisy chained power supplies, and he said that it was a bad idea because of the way valve preamps use the power input to heat the valves and send a signal back ... I got lost about here, but the gist was that the signal could reach other pedals via the power supply if they weren't buffered/screened.

Nice review though, thanks![/quote]

I think that the PSU will have to be well regulated or it will hum.

Dave

[GreeneKing]

To follow Buzz's excellent review here's my more detailed take on the big brother, the VT999 Vintage Tube 'Monster'.

[b]The case[/b]

All metal construction with 6 screws holding on the thicker steel base that has the chunky rubber feet. They'd need to be removed for fitting velcro. Inside it's pretty neat and tidy and my valve was seated correctly. Inserting the EH Cryo valve was simplicity in itself.

I didn't check but I suspect the pots have plastic shafts and I'm not sure how you would remove the plastic knobs.

The bypass stomp button is supposedly true bypass and it lacks the usual clicky action that almost all pedals have. It always functions correctly and the 'drive' light that illuminates red when the unit is 'on' is bright and makes the click less than essential.

There is a 3 band EQ being fairly obviously Bass, Mid and Treble, a gain control, a master volume and a noise gate with an input level setting control knob alongside it. It's possible to see the valve glowing gently inside the case through a grill in the top.

So all in all a solid unit that is laid out logically and is easy and intuitive to use.
[b]
The zounds[/b]

Very interestingly if the gain is kept to zero the unit simply works like a pre-amp with the EQ controls and the master volume. There's no stated specification as to cut/boost levels but the EQ is effective.

Unlike Buzz's pedal I wouldn't describe this unit as a distortion effect, even with the chinese valve left in. I also notice no real difference powering it either from my chained Diago supplies or the supplied Behringer PSU.

Bring the gain up to 1 and a noticeable valve 'crunch' occurs, albeit a gentle one. This increases pretty rapidly to an overdrive at levels 3 to 4 followed by a subtle increase up to lvl 10.

It's being played via Ric 4003, Microbass II with unit in effects loop set to 100% and with a Unicomp on the way to my BBT500H or LM II heads through an Epiphone 2 x 10" cab.

It's the best overdrive that I have used in my 'home' setting. I'd give it 8/10 because it's huge and because of the plastic knobs.

If anyone knows how they come off I'd appreciate the heads up.

Peter

[Pearl_Jammin]

I played the smaller Tube model today. To me it just sounded like a poor TS rip...but that was to be expected really. Suffice to say if I wasn't becoming such a pedal facist and was looking for a cheap OD I would probably pick one up.

[spree]

[quote name='GreeneKing' post='106151' date='Dec 18 2007, 07:34 PM']......All metal construction with 6 screws holding on the thicker steel base that has the chunky rubber feet.....[/quote]

All metal eh? Wheres that post about them being plastic?

[RichardH]

It was a misreading/quoting of a Harmony Central review for a similarly named but completely different Behringer pedal.