Synth Bass whats the deal

[jmarnett]

So I'm somewhat new to some effects as far as what they do the the signal in the amp, and how they sound. I was reading on musiciansfriend.com that there is a synth pedal that has an option of "square waves", I always thought square waves were bad for your speakers? Maybe I'm wrong, can anybody help?

[bobbass4k]

A square wave is basically distortion, as a clean signal gets distorted it becomes more and more like a square wave (feel free to correct my anyone) overdrives and distortions clip the signal slightly, where as fuzz turns it pretty much completely into a square wave, as long as you're careful with levels there's no reason distortion should damage your speakers.

As for synth pedals, most synth sounds are achieved through combinations of fuzz, filter and octave effects,some of them can get into speaker blowing territory, a compressor afterward to even out spikes would defintley help avoid that

[kevteop]

Analogue synths have been producing square waves for decades without damaging anyone's speakers.

AFAIK it's square wave distortion at high voltages (when a power amp is being pushed too hard and creating a square wave effect) that is harmful, but it's quite safe to create a square wave from an oscillator (or square-ish clipped wave from a fuzz box) and use it at volumes within the limits of your gear.

[Kael]

clipping a ss power amp produces a massive boosted signal that is a square wave. This signal can damage speakers. The damage is caused by the signal being boosted so much and not the "shape" of the wave.

[bongomania]

^^^ Correct! It is not the wave shape that does the damage, regardless of whether it's from distortion or any other source! What does the damage is the peak levels of the signal and the amount of time those peaks are held. If your speakers are not rated to handle the level of power that is present in those peaks, then the speakers can be damaged. If the amount of power present is less than the amount the speakers are designed to handle, then no damage can occur.

[jmarnett]

thanks guys, that really helped clear things up for me!