Is True Bypass Essential (Boss content)?

[Chrisk-K]

I never owned a Boss bass pedal before. I understand Boss pedals are not true bypass. Does it mean that a Boss pedal still colors the tone even when deactivated? I'm interested in the Boss dynamic wah.

[RCCollins]

Boss has used various buffer designs over the years and it is very hard to be sure which is used in any given pedal (without looking inside, and knowing what to look for). But all buffers are designed to help preserve your tone by preventing high end loss due to cable capacitance, so don't believe the hype.

[Chrisk-K]

I hope you are right because my search for funky tones will be (almost) over with the addition of an AW-3 now that I truly enjoy my BEF.

[BigOldHarry]

It was the last time I was in a studio - the engineer refused to let me use any non true bypass pedals. Bit of a prig that guy, but the recording ended up sounding good...

[Bloodhammer]

This is informative.

http://www.petecornish.co.uk/case_ag...ue_bypass.html

[Jared Lash]

The buffered bypass of a pedal like a Boss OC-2 can be a very good thing if you have several pedals in your chain.

[chicago_mike]

TBP loops are tone suckers. The shop I worked at constantly got those 3 to 7 TBP boxes in for repairs and what not. Most have horrible grounding methods. Plus all that contacts and bare wires inside too many of them.

If you want TBP strips...do it with CMOS.

[Hellbastard]

Originally Posted by Bloodhammer

This is informative.

http://www.petecornish.co.uk/case_ag...ue_bypass.html

+1
Beat me to it

Read these to

http://www.tech21nyc.com/technotes/index.html

http://www.ovnifx.com/store/truebypass.shtml

[The Lurker]

Originally Posted by chicago_mike

TBP loops are tone suckers. The shop I worked at constantly got those 3 to 7 TBP boxes in for repairs and what not. Most have horrible grounding methods. Plus all that contacts and bare wires inside too many of them.

If you want TBP strips...do it with CMOS.

That makes a great deal of sense-- essentially he's putting a preamp before the effects, right?

How does he keep the load on the switching output constant when the pedals are being switched on and off? I may be misunderstanding somehting here.

Also, is anyone whose big days were more recent than the 80s using Cornish systems?

[McSpunckle]

I love how much people think into the concept of true bypass.

True bypass:

You guitar signal continues through, reasonably untouched. All the patch cables between the pedals, and the cables after the pedals will make a -passive- bass lose high end. How much depends on your exact pickups and cables.

Buffered bypass:
The pedal buffers your signal on the output. Generally, one or two buffers aren't going to hurt your tone. It adds up, though. You probably don't want 10 buffered pedals in a row. The advantage is that the signal can now get through your cables without losing the high end. The disadvantage is that some pedals (mostly fuzz) don't sound right with an active signal. And, again, a bunch of buffers in line will hurt your tone. Then you have to worry about whether or not your pedal has a good buffer in the first place.

The older type of bypass left you with the signal from your passive guitar, but still attached to one end of the effect circuit-- which will tend to load it down pretty bad and you, like everything else, lose high end.

My advice: Try not to line up too many buffered pedals, and keep any effect that hates buffers at the front of the chain. If you have several buffered pedals you like, get/build a true-bypass box. They're cheap, and you can test to see how its affecting our tone.

BTW, that Pete Cornish article is a bit off. Not many of us use 2 foot patch cables, and with true bypass, the input impedance of the circuit literally doesn't matter-- because if your guitar signal sees the circuit, it's -not- true bypass.

[BassGuyNL]

Originally Posted by Jared Lash

The buffered bypass of a pedal like a Boss OC-2 can be a very good thing if you have several pedals in your chain.

Please explain? I'm just starting to use effects. The first will be my Boss OC-2 which has been lying around, good as new, since my guitar playing days in the eighties. I would like to add a fuzz or distortion, envelope, maybe a compressor.

So why is the buffered bypass of the OC-2 (specifically) a good thing? If I add more pedals to the OC-2 , should they be true bypass or not?

[JimmyM]

Originally Posted by BassGuyNL

So why is the buffered bypass of the OC-2 (specifically) a good thing? If I add more pedals to the OC-2 , should they be true bypass or not?

if you add any more pedals, it should be because they make a sound you like, and whatever type of bypass is in it doesn't matter as long as it works for you. don't bog yourself down in minutiae. if you hear some tone suck going on, isolate the pedal that's doing it. otherwise it really doesn't matter what kind of bypass your next pedals have. they can all be buffered and it can be just fine.

[Munjibunga]

Not only is true bypass not necessary, it may not even be desirable.

[JehuJava]

Originally Posted by JimmyM

minutiae

AWESOME!!!

[cybersnyder]

I like the relay switching that VFE Pedals now uses:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sr-RQNd-FHg

[kevteop]

On all the Boss pedals I've used, the bypass has been pretty much the same. Not bad in the grand scheme of things (not nearly as bad as the bypass on the old BMS or the Korg G5 for example) but still noticable enough for me to spend money bypassing them all with a better buffer.