New pedal day.... bad news...

[Willybomb]

Just picked up an as new MS-3 second hand, for roughly half price.  This is a great unit.. but it's made nearly everything else I own obsolete.  Everything in it is usable, and the drives are pretty functional, better than I expected.  With the assigns, you can change 8 parameters and/or effects on the current patch's footswitch, basically a new patch...

The pedal interface is painful to use imo, the PC editor is fantastic though.  If it had a cabsim and xlr out, it would be a killer pedal.

I'm a little torn.  I've invested so much time, money, and effort into building the pedals I have (and I have several in the works), and now.... I just don't need any of them.  I don't even know what I'm going to put in the MS-3's loops.  For a cover band gig, the MS-3 and a wah is enough.

I'm thinking about some amp type drives in the loop.  I have my HT-dual (big, bulky, sounds great), or the BE-OD in a few different flavours, but the MS3 can't control those beyond on/off, so I'm thinking either an Iridium or a Mooer Preamp Live.... But... do I need that many drive options?  I don't want to be stepping on a pedal in the loop to change high/low gain sounds either.

It's all a bit crazy, but I see myself selling off a lot of my pedals and building bits soon...

[jimilee]

I don't need any of the 150 pedals I've built, but man do I want them.


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[cooder]

I don't need any of the 150 pedals I've built, but man do I want them.


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What Jimi said.... he knows...

[mjg]

I enjoy building them more than playing with them...so yeah.  I'll keep making the things even if I don't play with them. 

[Willybomb]

I don't need any of the 150 pedals I've built, but man do I want them.

Yeah, I used to be the same.  But I'm more inclined to sell off the pedals I'm not using or enthused by.

I enjoy building them more than playing with them...so yeah.  I'll keep making the things even if I don't play with them. 

I think I have other things I want to do right about now.  Still have 7 or so pedals that need finishing though.

[Aentons]

The pedal interface is painful to use imo

My opinion is that this is really the deal killer for almost everyone else... and roland/boss is imo one of the worst at it. If you can put up with it by bypassing for the software then more power to you. but, I would be cautious and assume there will be a honeymoon period and then you may have some second thoughts.

btw, before I had ever used any pedals I bought a Boss GT Pro rack unit when they first came out and had it configured with all kinds of loops and patches and whatnot. I tried using the hardware interface and the software for a couple of years. I wanted to like and to make it work, but one day I cam to the realization that it just sucked compared to being able to reach out to a pedal and turn a knob without thinking too hard.
edit: I played with a Boss ES-5 for a couple of weeks and it was very similar to the GTpro

I think this is really why the Line6 DL4 took off. Line6 was trying to solve for that problem specifically and did a really good job imo. I bought a Line6 M9 thinking "Hey, I can have the DL4. DM4, FM4, MM4, all in one box!". It's close, but there is a major difference tho, it has a digital screen with buttons you push to change whats on the screen. Its minimal, but its enough to make me second guess whether I want to even mess with it.

Its kind of like that guitar you want to like but you just seem to keep picking up that other one for some reason.

[jjjimi84]

I think those Boss units have a lot of people changing up their rig. It looks like a great unit and I am sure is rugged as hell. I can relate to getting the urge to unload gear and go digital, for me I only record and will probably never play out again, so digital makes sense.

But I would recommend holding off at least for a little bit and here is why.

Do to covid I have been unable to record any loud amps at all and have been using either my two notes torpedo or fractal ax8 when I get the time to record. They both sound good but to get to a point where I am happy takes time and I am always fiddling knobs and parameters. I had a day set aside to try and record but with the wife home I was forced to go silent, I played a lot but got nothing done. Too much low end, too much distortion, not enough low gain crunch, I drove myself crazy and ended up putting the guitar down to work on drum programming instead. As soon as I was able to turn up an amp with a mic on it, I had a sound dialed in within minutes and played my balls off with a smile on my face.

Now three months ago I had a similiar situation but the complete opposite the fractal sounded amazing for the track and I was happy. Our ears change and our feel changes, so my recommendation is, if you can swing the cash hold onto an amp and your favorite pedals just in case. It's not a great time to sell right now anyways.

Also don't stop building, I love viewing everyones build reports it is what keeps me going through all of these crazy times.

[jimilee]

I used a digital unit on stage for a couple of years. Sure they're easier to manage, but IMHO, they sound so sterile.  I switched back to pedals for the warm analog sound you get from parts making the sounds,. The limitations of the parts and the sometimes usable unintended sounds you can get really is my niche. Of course, I'm almost 50 and I grew up with 70s Metal after the terrible disco years and before the horrible pop years.


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[lars]

I would get a backup MS-3 then, if you're going to rely on one computer to do everything. Computers like that fail, and when they do, it's usually "throw away and buy new". That's the main reason I stick with pedals I've built. When something breaks, yes, when it breaks, I can fix it or just use one of the other pedals I have. Something in the MS-3 goes haywire during a performance...you're up a creek unless you have a backup setup exactly the same.

[Muadzin]

I bought an Axe-FX in I think 2016 and started using it a year later (manual cold feet mostly), but once I did start to use the number of pedals I built has dropped down to less then I can count on one hand. It used to be that I could excuse myself building 4 tot 6 pedals a month was okay, because one of them might end up on my pedal board. Now no pedal makes it on my board anymore, as the Axe FX can literally do anything, so why bother building pedals any more?

For the lulz you might say? I also build guitars, so I'm still building things so that urge still gets scratched. If anything getting an Axe FX only makes your guitar collection explode. Which makes sense, right? You don't need amps or pedals any more, but you can always use a new guitar.