Cool new synth pedal - Meris Enzo

[Quatschmacher]

1 hour ago, tonyxtiger said:

Got a couple of these in this week. Lovely synth sounds and the filter control works well. A lot of the future impact tones can be found in here but with better tracking. Switching between square and triangle is useful. Choosing the pitch is straightforward. 

Didnt get a lot of time with it but in a short time it did a lot. 

Are you stocking them to sell?

[Al Krow]

1 hour ago, tonyxtiger said:

Got a couple of these in this week. Lovely synth sounds and the filter control works well. A lot of the future impact tones can be found in here but with better tracking. Switching between square and triangle is useful. Choosing the pitch is straightforward. 

Tighter tracking than the FI?

That would make it very good indeed. I've not yet come across a synth pedal that is more usable "live" than the FI (particularly with its 99 presets) and one thing that I do like about the FI is that it tracks very well / tightly. So if you're saying the Enzo improves on the FI for tracking, that definitely gets my attention. The fact that it is poly rather than mono is another big plus.

Has anyone made a decent video showing what's it's capable of on bass? 

[tonyxtiger]

34 minutes ago, Al Krow said:

Tighter tracking than the FI?

That would make it very good indeed. I've not yet come across a synth pedal that is more usable "live" than the FI (particularly with its 99 presets) and one thing that I do like about the FI is that it tracks very well / tightly. So if you're saying the Enzo improves on the FI for tracking, that definitely gets my attention. The fact that it is poly rather than mono is another big plus.

Has anyone made a decent video showing what's it's capable of on bass? 

I felt it was tighter. I never found the FI bad but I know some did. That’s always the problem with tracking. What works for some doesn’t for others. 

[tonyxtiger]

1 hour ago, Quatschmacher said:

Are you stocking them to sell?

I got some in yes. Selling quick. At this stage I have one left on the reverb page but I can order more if required. 

[Quatschmacher]

12 minutes ago, tonyxtiger said:

I got some in yes. Selling quick. At this stage I have one left on the reverb page but I can order more if required. 

I presume since it’s distance selling there’s a straightforward return-for-full-refund policy should it not be to the buyer’s liking. 

[Quatschmacher]

2 hours ago, tonyxtiger said:

Got a couple of these in this week. Lovely synth sounds and the filter control works well. A lot of the future impact tones can be found in here but with better tracking. Switching between square and triangle is useful. Choosing the pitch is straightforward. 

Didnt get a lot of time with it but in a short time it did a lot. 

Any chance you could post some bass clips?

[Quatschmacher]

1 hour ago, GisserD said:

A couple??? Are you a retailer??

@tonyxtiger is Mr. FXPedalrental.com

[Al Krow]

Just found 9 full mins of bass video clips on here 5.40 to 14.50...

 

[Al Krow]

Enzo vs FI

A few observations so far:

I think where I'm landing with this, having now seen how fiddly it is to scroll through settings on the above clip, is that for live use this is absolutely going to need a midi controller. Just check the YouTube clip at 12.25 when he is trying to engage the ring modulator. NO WAY are you going to be wanting to do that live! So we are realistically looking at a "two-pedal" solution and a budget of > £450. A used FI can typically be picked up for around £250, although tbf they don't come up very often used and don't tend to hang around too long before being snapped up. 

I'm still struggling to hear anything like the variety of sounds that the FI offers, but that may change with more better video clips. (And what it seems to be able to do as a basic filter doesn't, for me, go much further than the SA Manta or even the MXR BEF). The 99 presets on the FI put it in a different league for ease of live use for the gigging bassist. 

If the Enzo has tighter tracking** than the FI that is a plus (although I'm personally really happy with the FI's tracking), but its other USP, polyphonic capability, for bass is less important than on guitar as it's not often that we are required to play chords on bass. And it's perhaps important to remember that this is primarily a guitar pedal that bassists are looking to use, whereas the FI has been designed and voiced with the bassist in mind. 

**Update - initial impressions about the tracking on the Enzo aren't uniformly great from guys who have already got their hands on one:

• "I think the filter envelope may be closing quickly and “choking” (more like high passing everything) the subsequent note if it is played too fast..."
• "I've experienced the exact same issue and I think you're right. Also of note, it will do the same thing with a guitar. It will basically just skip a whole bunch of notes until the envelope recovers"

So I think I'm also landing exactly where Hazbeen is with his post below and will be sticking with my FI. 

Edited October 3, 2018 by Al Krow
Updated for feedback from TB users

[HazBeen]

For me the FI tracking is great, as such me thinks that tracking issues = sloppy playing or “interference” from within the fx chain. Great sounding pedal the Meris but too unpractical for my personal taste. My FI is staying where it is.

[GisserD]

7 hours ago, Quatschmacher said:

@tonyxtiger is Mr. FXPedalrental.com

Ah great! 

How do I rent an Enzo then? 

Edited September 22, 2018 by GisserD

[tonyxtiger]

10 hours ago, GisserD said:

Ah great! 

How do I rent an Enzo then? 

Sadly rentals not available until I have more time. My other business eats up all my time so I had to take it offline for now. Just doing sales from reverb until there’s time to resurrect it. 

[tonyxtiger]

17 hours ago, Quatschmacher said:

I presume since it’s distance selling there’s a straightforward return-for-full-refund policy should it not be to the buyer’s liking. 

Sure yes. As long as it’s returned boxed and same condition. Usual rules. 

[Quatschmacher]

5 hours ago, tonyxtiger said:

Sure yes. As long as it’s returned boxed and same condition. Usual rules. 

Alas, you’ve sold the last one. When’s your next delivery?

[Al Krow]

Zach Rizer has just pointed out the lack of input / output volume control on the pedal over on TB.

Gonna make balancing out sound with clean by-pass and different basses tricky.

That combined with a lack of presets and its chunky price point makes this increasingly looking like a non starter for me. Shame.

[Quatschmacher]

2 hours ago, Al Krow said:

Zach Rizer has just pointed out the lack of input / output volume control on the pedal over on TB.

Gonna make balancing out sound with clean by-pass and different basses tricky.

That combined with a lack of presets and its chunky price point makes this increasingly looking like a non starter for me. Shame.

There are loads of pedals which are like this. Admittedly I do like to have the feature wherever possible but it’s not a deal-breaker.

There is a mode to switch between instrument level and line level in the global menu.

Don't all basses come with a volume control? So at least any level differences between basses can be dealt with.

Perhaps Angelo will be able to add a per-preset volume setting via a firmware update. 

Edited September 23, 2018 by Quatschmacher

[Al Krow]

1 hour ago, Quatschmacher said:

There are loads of pedals which are like this. Admittedly I do like to have the feature wherever possible but it’s not a deal-breaker.

Just checked my board and the only pedals that don't allow you to adjust volume are (understandably) the two filters which are essentially subtractive in operation.

So with respect I strongly disagree.

Being able to set the volume balance on pedals so that the effect is neutral to the dry signal as the starting point is a pretty basic and as you say you "do like to have the feature wherever possible". Well me too. In fact I insist on it, especially if the manufacturer is expecting me to fork out north of £300 on his bit of kit.

So I'm increasingly finding myself agreeing 100% with Hazbeen when he says:

On 22/09/2018 at 07:20, HazBeen said:

Great sounding pedal the Meris but too unpractical for my personal taste. My FI is staying where it is.

 

 

[Quatschmacher]

11 minutes ago, Al Krow said:

Just checked my board and the only pedals that don't allow you to adjust volume are (understandably) the two filters which are essentially subtractive in operation.

So with respect I strongly disagree.

Being able to set the volume balance on pedals so that the effect is neutral to the dry signal as the starting point is a pretty basic and as you say you "do like to have the feature wherever possible". Well me too. In fact I insist on it, especially if the manufacturer is expecting me to fork out north of £300 on his bit of kit.

So I'm increasingly finding myself agreeing 100% with Hazbeen when he says:

 

 

Sorry, I meant “loads of filter pedals”. Of the ones I’ve owned and played I think there were only 3 or 4 that allowed this.

[Al Krow]

1 hour ago, Quatschmacher said:

Sorry, I meant “loads of filter pedals”. Of the ones I’ve owned and played I think there were only 3 or 4 that allowed this.

Ah ok, noted. But I'm not looking for yet another filter pedal; there are a ton of very capable ones out there. What I am after from the Enzo is a fantastic synth to rival the FI, particularly if it's similarly priced.

[Quatschmacher]

Just seen that my lovely local shop is selling Meris pedals now. If you’re thinking of buying one, please consider getting one from these guys. I will be. 

https://www.richtonemusic.co.uk/search/?query=Meris

[Quatschmacher]

FINALLY! I got to try one of these today. Here’s my take:

this is a really cool pedal!  It does a ridiculous amount of stuff. I had a solid 2.5 hours with it (with 15 minutes on my Future Impact for comparison).

The basic waveforms sound fantastic and fat. Dialling in a bit of the modulation knob, (which introduces a second oscillator with increasing amount of detune) gives a very analogue-sounding gentle phasing, especially on the sawtooth.

I was using a Mexican P with rounds and tracking was great. There were two notes (low F# and F) which caused multiple triggering but that may have been the bass itself.

With the synth voices, the lowpass filters sound gorgeous, especially with resonance. This is the best sounding digital filter I’ve heard. The cutoff goes way low (probably 40Hz or less).

It is very easy to dial in good sounds quickly, and great ones once you’ve got the shift functions down, which doesn’t take too long. (The main thing which tripped me up was the fact that some knobs do completely different things (in shift and normal mode) depending on whether the pedal is in dry (not bypassed), mono, poly or arp mode. I can see how it can be easy to quickly lose track of which knobs are set to where. For instance, I was wondering why the dry envelope filtered sound sounded a bit naff. It turns out I’d inadvertently switched compression on which killed all the dynamics. I think this happened because the shift knob on this unit was switching out at the slightest release of pressure (I was operating it one-handed, thumb on button, fingers on dials); I was trying to adjust a different parameter.

The triggered envelope control has some pretty cool possibilities and is capable of a reasonable range of sounds, though it is still frustrating that there isn’t separate control over the attack and decay. Due to the fact there’s no (filter) sustain control, the fast envelopes cut off the sound quite abrubtly at the end. This might also be partly to do with the fact that there’s no separate envelope depth control.

The envelope follower was quite disappointing and didn’t seem to have much of a range. (Perhaps there’s a setting to adjust input gain somewhere but I was only using the quick-start manual as opposed to the full one.) That was a shame as the filter on the dry bass sounded pretty good. Not as fat as my analogue pedals but actually pretty decent. I’m pretty sure the disappointment is due to the lack of envelope sensitivity though as it sounded really rather good when sweeping the filter knob manually.

There’s portamento! This is cool. Sadly the scaling on the knob means there’s much more travel devoted to the longer times than to the shorter (and more useable-to-me times).

I only played with the arp and poly modes briefly. Arp produced some pretty cool sounds.

Ring mod sounds cool too. I’m not sure if there’s a way to decouple it from the envelope whilst still having the envelope controlling the filter, I’ll have to investigate further.

Pitch shifter sounds cool, though I didn’t play it much.

I put the synth into the highest register for lead sounds and I thought it played much more tightly than the FI. (I’m interested to hear if the new FI update will change that as there is to be a new and improved tracking algorithm.)

I’m partly regretting not having bought this last week when the eBay 15% discount was offered. I didn’t buy it today but I may in future next time a similar discount comes around. Yes, it has its limitations but it the sounds it does make are pretty awesome.

I still hope that the Meris people consider a future firmware update to add more envelope control and refine the envelope follower.

Quatschmacher out. 

Edited December 23, 2018 by Quatschmacher

[Quatschmacher]

I’ve just re-read the manual. I’m puzzled by the way presets have been implemented as it means it’s really easy to accidentally overwrite them. Presets are saved by pressing the “alt. function” button, so basically whenever you make an adjustment to one of the shift-function parameters (such as filter resonance), the preset gets overwritten. This seems a daft choice.  It seems there’s no way to use a given preset as a springboard, tweak it to one’s liking and then save it as a new preset without losing the original one (unless you’ve already backed it up to a computer).

Doesn't appear that you can the filter controlled by the envelope without having the ring mod also controlled by it (unless maybe adjusting ring mod via midi cc overrides the envelope).

Also seems that there isn’t a way to further control the sensitivity of the envelope follower to the input signal.

There’s no final level control! Just a switch between instrument level and line level output. 

Edited December 22, 2018 by Quatschmacher

[Quatschmacher]

I think I have to agree with @tonyxtiger that the Meris has tighter tracking than the FI. I found that fast octave switching seemed much more reliable.

How are you finding yours, @Embra, now that you’ve had more time with it and used to own a FI?

[Embra]

I love it but with a few caveats. So much tweaking with a huge range of very useable bass synth sounds but it desperately needs some software so you can see (remember!) your settings (although I may have to take the plunge and get midi designer). The tracking is heavily dependent on which preset I use but yes, the octave is vary handy. Some regrets about selling you the FI but realistically, for my needs, the Enzo is 90% there. I'm hopefully Meris will update it and possibly even develop some Mac-based software but even as it is, it's one of my favourite buys of 2018 (along with a GFI Specular Tempus and a just acquired Lightning Boy NuVision preamp).

[Quatschmacher]

2 hours ago, Embra said:

I love it but with a few caveats. So much tweaking with a huge range of very useable bass synth sounds but it desperately needs some software so you can see (remember!) your settings (although I may have to take the plunge and get midi designer). The tracking is heavily dependent on which preset I use but yes, the octave is vary handy. Some regrets about selling you the FI but realistically, for my needs, the Enzo is 90% there. I'm hopefully Meris will update it and possibly even develop some Mac-based software but even as it is, it's one of my favourite buys of 2018 (along with a GFI Specular Tempus and a just acquired Lightning Boy NuVision preamp).

Try TouchOSC first, it’s free and pretty powerful (though it has couple of quirks such as toggle buttons sending midi in both press and release with no way to disable one or the other).

You could actually get a hardware MIDI controller for it as all parameter are controlled via CCs. There are some products which are just units with a bunch of knobs that can be freely assigned.

I really hope Meris refine it too. Angelo seemed to be taking the stance that it was complete as is, which is a little disappointing - admittedly it’s pretty amazing the way it is but surely there’s room for improvement if the hardware and firmware allows. I certainly wouldn’t mind getting one. I wish this had been around when I first started buying pedals as it would have saved me much time and money (though I have enjoyed the journey and have learned a lot on the way).