Sansamp PBDDI primer advice

[firstbassman]

OK, I know I’m opening myself up to a lot of abuse for this, but that’s the chance I’ll take.

I recently purchased a Sansamp PBDDI and recklessly went into the rehearsal studio with it before taking the advised 54 ½ years to really “get the most“ out of the box. I think I tried a couple of the settings in the manual for about a half hour before I had to go to rehearsal. However, I’m a fairly techno-shy effects newbie (although I’m feeling the fever), so I was hoping some of my more charitable comrades here would take pity and explain to me how I can actually use this 3-channel wondergadget as something more than a gig-bag counterweight.

Background:
I play in a group that mainly plays a lot of 60’s-today pop and classic rock. We’ll typically jump around from something like “Come On Eileen” to Zeppelin to “Let’s Get it On” to U2 to “American Girl” to Van Halen, to Asia, etc. So you can see how I thought that the 3 channels would cover the “round and bassy”, “clean and trebly” and “gritty and distorted” sound rainbows.
I also play a Rick, a Jazz, and an old Ibanez Blazer, so the tone changes there a lot, too.

Issue #1: My “plug and play” idea went nowhere. Of the three settings, only one didn’t set the other guys’ hair on fire with its distorted feedback and open the Gates of Hell with its floor-shaking. So I used this one exclusively, hardly ideal for the purpose of the 3-channel design.

Issue #2: We rehearse in a wide variety of studio settings, so there’s no continuity in equipment (I use the Sansamp in my minimal effects chain, not as a preamp). So while the concept of “unity gain” is intriguing and possibly something that I understand, there’s not much time to tweak the settings when you’re in a “ there’s no time to even change a broken string because we only have the room for a couple of hours and dammit there’s the flashing light and we haven’t even managed to tune up yet” situation.

So, can anyone give me a simple, English-language based primer on using this magic box that I still hope will have a positive impact upon my setup?

I expect something like 85% abuse/15% advice for posing this question. I’ll take whatever help I can get – I’ll just go to my happy place for the rest.

[SpankyPants]

You're an idiot.

Dummy.

Jerk.

Stupid.

Bafoon!

Get your head out of [rest of insult removed to prevent exceeding 85%]

Now for the advice:

I'd suggest trying to fine-tune your pedal to achieve unity gain (when the volume is the same when the pedal is either bypassed or engaged). Unity gain may sound different in your bedroom than it does in louder situations, so that'd be the first step. The manual has a bunch of cool settings and whatnot, but it doesn't take into account the different outputs levels of different basses/rigs. So first try to set the pedal at unity gain (when it's engaged) in your bedroom, and then re-adjust it when you're playing at practice/gig volume.

Only then can you really start messing with the different sounds. You've got to tame it, first.