synth pedals

[HollyDTVGE]

so i'm possibly to part with my boss distortion pedal soon due to building something similar/better and so want to replace it with some sexy synth. i've not tried out the boss, behringer or any of that stuff and i'm aware of the awesomeness of the ehx however, as ehx stuff always is it's a bit pricey for me. can anyone suggest one that's good or circuit bendable to become sounding good, but isn't going to destroy my money?

[escholl]

what sort of synth sound do you need?

[TimR]

I've got a Boss SYB-3 bought off a fellow forumite. It didn't fully work, tracked terribly, wouldn't switch on and off very well and the mixed output only outputs the synth. I think it's had a hard life. I cleaned the board up with some cleaner and brush and it now works fine except for the mixed output. It would make a nice project, even if just a mixer to bridge between the two outputs. I paid £45, make me an offer?

Edited May 20, 2010 by TimR

[thisnameistaken]

Link to some synth sounds you'd like to emulate. "Synth pedal" can mean anything from actual waveform generation to fancy filters and dirt, or even fancy distortions like that new Soundblox multiwave pro box.

If you show us the noises you want to make we can recommend gear, or wish you all the best while exchange knowing looks.

[HollyDTVGE]

haha, i don't know the noises i want. some with a good range i guess. we're not using anything like it in any songs at the moment but have a habit of changing stuff so anything interesting would be good.

TimR i'll have a think and pm you, thanks.

[Bassnut62]

i got rid of my Boss SYB3 ASAP too - horrible piece of junk; although the wah wasn't bad and could mix with dry signal.
EHX MBS can be picked up for £100 second hand; but make sure it's an old steel 24v one. I've heard the new small 9v ones are not nearly as good.
It might mean a bit of saving for the MBS; but it'll be really worth the wait and you'll be synth-sorted for as long as you need to be.

[thisnameistaken]

[quote name='Bassnut62' post='844059' date='May 21 2010, 12:51 PM']EHX MBS can be picked up for £100 second hand; but make sure it's an old steel 24v one. I've heard the new small 9v ones are not nearly as good.[/quote]

I think I started that rumour.

I meant it though - I was really disappointed with the XO model it doesn't have the same grunt as the old one, the controls are harder to use and it feels cheaply made. I sold it and bought another old 24v model and modded it for true bypass.

[carlitos71]

I got an octavius squeezer that I'm thinking selling, looking for around £300...

Is really good and got lots of extra effects (fuzz, octave and filter) but you not so easy to program

Edited May 21, 2010 by carlitos71

[thisnameistaken]

I've got a Squeezer too. Excellent pedal. Worth every penny if you use a lot of synth noises.

[Ghost_Bass]

[quote name='thisnameistaken' post='844167' date='May 21 2010, 02:01 PM']I think I started that rumour.

I meant it though - I was really disappointed with the XO model it doesn't have the same grunt as the old one, the controls are harder to use and it feels cheaply made. I sold it and bought another old 24v model and modded it for true bypass. [/quote]

Can you extend a bit more your thoughts betwen both these Synts, please? I'm thinking in buying a MBS in a near future but never herad the rumor that the old one is better. Thank you

[danny-79]

I has a Boss SYB-3 and personally couldn't do a usable thing with it , it a good effect doing pretty much what it says on the tin "turning your bass into a key-type-synth" (in my words) but in the right hands can defiantly get some "interesting" sounds out of it .

[v8bass]

Maybe try a Bass to MIDI convertor such as the Sonuus B2m ( there may be one in the misc for sale section somewhere ... :blush: )

Hook it up to a cheap synth module Roland Korg Emu etc or even virtual soft synth via laptop ....I had a dog and his name was ...... Bingo ...

Apologies for the shameless advertising however could be done pretty cost effectively ..



Gary
v8

[escholl]

[quote name='v8bass' post='844776' date='May 22 2010, 01:02 AM']Maybe try a Bass to MIDI convertor such as the Sonuus B2m ( there may be one in the misc for sale section somewhere ... :blush: )

Hook it up to a cheap synth module Roland Korg Emu etc or even virtual soft synth via laptop ....I had a dog and his name was ...... Bingo ...[/quote]

+1, B2M into a DSI MoPho would be just about the ultimate tiny mono bass synth. The only downside, of course, is it would set you back a fair bit...but think of all you could do!

[Bassnut62]

[quote name='Ghost_Bass' post='844365' date='May 21 2010, 04:47 PM']Can you extend a bit more your thoughts betwen both these Synts, please? I'm thinking in buying a MBS in a near future but never herad the rumor that the old one is better. Thank you [/quote]

I've heard from numerous sources that the new 9v MBS is poor compared to the old 24v.
There's a lot of discussion about this on Talk Bass too.
My understanding is that the only plus for the small one is that it is True Bypass, so you don't get any degredation of your signal when the effect is not engaged, which you do get with the old 24v MBS; but it's simple to fix that. I have mine in a bypass loop.
The big pros you get with the 24v are:
- much more headroom in the scope of the effect's sounds due to more voltage available
- much more travel in slider controls and more space between them, all of which makes the pedal more easily tweakable for more precise dialing in of the sound you're after.
- big old one is much better put together, whereas the new one feels cheap.
- the old one is a stone cold classic, that is bound to become a sort after collector's item eventually IMO

Hope that helps

[thisnameistaken]

[quote name='Ghost_Bass' post='844365' date='May 21 2010, 04:47 PM']Can you extend a bit more your thoughts betwen both these Synts, please? I'm thinking in buying a MBS in a near future but never herad the rumor that the old one is better. Thank you [/quote]

Negatives:

The new one's suboctave will distort if you play loud, low notes into it - the old one will just deal with it.

Generally the new one doesn't seem to produce as much bottom as the old one. This I can't describe very well, but I found there weren't the same powerful, bassy sounds in the XO model, it really disappointed me having had an older BMS on my board for a couple of years and got familiar with how big it sounds.

The 'rate' slider on the new one is a pain in the arse to use, the first half of the slider pretty much sounds the same, then there's a quarter of it where most of the useful settings are, then the last quarter is pretty much all the same again. The old one has a much more useable rate slider.

The sliders on the new one are smaller, making them trickier to set. They're also fairly loose, so they're easy to un-set! The old one has slightly longer sliders and they have a bit of resistance to them, so they tend to stay put a bit better.

Positives:

Old one is 24v and needs its own PSU. New one is 9v which looks like a plus, but you can't daisy-chain it, so what's the point.

New one is smaller and a bit lighter than the old one, but once you get jacks into the in/outs you're really not saving much space on your board. And the new one's stomp switch is a lot nearer the sliders than on the old model.

New one is true bypass. The old model has a horrible tone-sucking buffered bypass, but it's actually dead easy to mod it to true bypass - I did it myself and I don't know anything about electronics. Still, the new one wins here but I don't buy pedals based on how they sound when they're switched off.

Edited May 22, 2010 by thisnameistaken

[AttitudeCastle]

[quote name='Bassnut62' post='844059' date='May 21 2010, 12:51 PM']i got rid of my Boss SYB3 ASAP too - horrible piece of junk; although the wah wasn't bad and could mix with dry signal.
EHX MBS can be picked up for £100 second hand; but make sure it's an old steel 24v one. I've heard the new small 9v ones are not nearly as good.
It might mean a bit of saving for the MBS; but it'll be really worth the wait and you'll be synth-sorted for as long as you need to be.[/quote]

I love my SYB-5 and my SYB-3,

But its not the same as other synths its basically a "make my bass into a glitchy keyboard" pedal, which i really dig:)

[Bassnut62]

[quote name='AttitudeCastle' post='845094' date='May 22 2010, 02:04 PM']I love my SYB-5 and my SYB-3,

But its not the same as other synths its basically a "make my bass into a glitchy keyboard" pedal, which i really dig:)[/quote]

Glad the SYBs work for you.
Making glitchy keyboard sounds with it sounds interesting too.
When I had mine it frustrated me, as it just didn't track well.
Also it didn't give me the more organic blooming bass synth sounds I was after and can dial in very easily with the old EHX MBS.

[pete.young]

I have a Korg G5 for sale. I bought it because I couldn't get either the Digitech BSW or the Behringer SYB-5 clone to work for me - the Behringer wouldn't track and the BSW was a great octave pedal but almost unuseable as a synth.

[Ghost_Bass]

Thanks for the replys, very usefull
"thisnameistaken", would you think i be better of with a octavius squeezer? I've heard it on youtube and it sounded pretty good.
I'm not a big fx addict (still i have 6 pedals in my board and looking for 2 more, lol), just need one good synth sound. I'm a "set and forget" guy. The synth sound i was looking for is something like the keyboard synth sound on Depeche Mode's "Just Can't Get Enough" intro. Do you think the octavious can be closer than the BMS?
Thanks

[thisnameistaken]

[quote name='Ghost_Bass' post='846152' date='May 23 2010, 11:34 PM']"thisnameistaken", would you think i be better of with a octavius squeezer?[/quote]

In all honesty, probably not. It's a brilliant pedal, very versatile and it's been awesome for me for the last year or so because I can store so many sounds in there, but you need to carefully work around its shortcomings sometimes (tracking can get difficult to manage) and to get the most out of it you really need to understand how to program it. If you're not much of a tweaker then leave it well alone! I think it would frustrate a lot of people.

[quote name='Ghost_Bass' post='846152' date='May 23 2010, 11:34 PM']I'm not a big fx addict (still i have 6 pedals in my board and looking for 2 more, lol), just need one good synth sound. I'm a "set and forget" guy. The synth sound i was looking for is something like the keyboard synth sound on Depeche Mode's "Just Can't Get Enough" intro. Do you think the octavious can be closer than the BMS?
Thanks[/quote]

The EHX BMS is best suited for doing old '70s synth bass (Moog, ARP) sounds, although it can do some other things well too. I call it my Stevie Wonder pedal.

The Octavius Squeezer... Can sound more raw and gnarly sounds thanks to the oscillator. When I'm using it for synth sounds (it's a great individual filter and fuzz too) I tend to shoot for G-Funk -style sounds, and thanks to ADSR on the amp and filter it can do percussive-style '80s synth bass sounds - think Madonna's "Borderline". It's only got one oscillator though so it would struggle to do that doubled-up keyboard part on Just Can't Get Enough.

I had a Korg G5 for a while too. Its sawtooth octave down voice is pretty decent and you don't get the tracking issues you get on pretty much every other "synth" pedal. I found it sounded a bit fluffy around the edges though - no doubt a result of modulating the input signal to produce the waveform rather than tracking and triggering.

TBH for that Depeche Mode intro (and I'm recommending this a bit blind because I've never tried one) the Markbass Super Synth might be your best bet. It's got three voices you can tune, and while you're limited to them all producing sawtooth voices I think it would get closest to that sound. And apparently the tracking is stellar. It seems to me like a beefed-up Korg G5 in a smaller box, well worth looking at.

Don't even bother considering the Deep Impact they're selling for absolutely insane money to Muse fanboys these days.

[Ghost_Bass]

[quote name='thisnameistaken' post='846305' date='May 24 2010, 10:25 AM']In all honesty, probably not. It's a brilliant pedal, very versatile and it's been awesome for me for the last year or so because I can store so many sounds in there, but you need to carefully work around its shortcomings sometimes (tracking can get difficult to manage) and to get the most out of it you really need to understand how to program it. If you're not much of a tweaker then leave it well alone! I think it would frustrate a lot of people.



The EHX BMS is best suited for doing old '70s synth bass (Moog, ARP) sounds, although it can do some other things well too. I call it my Stevie Wonder pedal.

The Octavius Squeezer... Can sound more raw and gnarly sounds thanks to the oscillator. When I'm using it for synth sounds (it's a great individual filter and fuzz too) I tend to shoot for G-Funk -style sounds, and thanks to ADSR on the amp and filter it can do percussive-style '80s synth bass sounds - think Madonna's "Borderline". It's only got one oscillator though so it would struggle to do that doubled-up keyboard part on Just Can't Get Enough.

I had a Korg G5 for a while too. Its sawtooth octave down voice is pretty decent and you don't get the tracking issues you get on pretty much every other "synth" pedal. I found it sounded a bit fluffy around the edges though - no doubt a result of modulating the input signal to produce the waveform rather than tracking and triggering.[/quote]

Thanks, very detailed description.

[quote name='thisnameistaken' post='846305' date='May 24 2010, 10:25 AM']TBH for that Depeche Mode intro (and I'm recommending this a bit blind because I've never tried one) the Markbass Super Synth might be your best bet. It's got three voices you can tune, and while you're limited to them all producing sawtooth voices I think it would get closest to that sound. And apparently the tracking is stellar. It seems to me like a beefed-up Korg G5 in a smaller box, well worth looking at.[/quote]

I've heard of the MB synth but haven't spend much time researching it because i thought the MBS was better... i'm going to have a good look to the MB to see if it's more suited to my needs, thanks for the idea.

[quote name='thisnameistaken' post='846305' date='May 24 2010, 10:25 AM']Don't even bother considering the Deep Impact they're selling for absolutely insane money to Muse fanboys these days.[/quote]
You're right on that one! It's an absurde the prices this things are selling on e-bay! Some reach $700 or more!!!
From what i've been reading on the web it isn't such a good pedal considering it's price, some say it has traching issues and sometimes it glitches and you have to turn it off and back on... but the sound it puts out are simply juicy

thanks for everything, i'm going to search some more and post back my findings

Edited May 24, 2010 by Ghost_Bass

[K-Dog109]

I really like the new EHX MSB. Use it all the time and it sounds mega when combined with my micro pog for a wider frequency range plus some super distortion for more grunt, so I would recommmend it if you couldnt find an old one.
The Markbass Super Synth is great too, though I am a bit of a fan of cheap and simple as opposed to the more detailed plugin programming you get as standard with the Mark (although you can stick to the presets), which for me is a little more control than I want. I would say find some shops with them in stock and try them out if possible!

[Finbar]

If you have the money spare for a Deep Impact and you do fancy one, then I say buy it. That is a big IF, but you will be guaranteed to make your money back and possibly more if you don't like it, or just get bored of it.

[Al Heeley]

[plug]I have a Boss SYB-3 up for sale at the moment if you're interested [/plug]
[edit]sold.[/edit]

Edited June 9, 2010 by Al Heeley

[Mace]

Have got my Deep Impact up for sale [url="http://basschat.co.uk/index.php?showtopic=72236"]here [/url]

Whoever said the tracking is glitchy has never plugged a bass into one - Mine tracks as low as I need it to, all the way down to a low B

I'm a firm believer in "buy cheap buy twice" but that's just me - well worth the money and alot of fun