All in One Effects Processor?

[Phoenix1]

I recently inherited a handful of stomp boxes from a friend of mine, who played regular guitar. Among them is an Arion MOC-1 Octave and a Boss CE-5 Chorus.

After a playing bass in a band in college in the 60s, a loooooong layoff and a recent return, effects boxes are new to me. Used to be just me and my bass.

As I read through a score for a musical I'll play soon for community theater, I noticed places where the composer calls for an octave box and a chorus box. I plugged them in and they seem perfectly fine and fit right in with the mood of the piece.

My question: Given how impressed I am with the job these two boxes do, is there a "one box/rack module" that does it all well enough to consider?

Boss appears to make a GT-10B. Is it worth the money to get other cool sounds? Other choices out there? Or should I just add boxes at $50 - $100 at a time?

Thanks from an old noob.

[Phoenix1]

BTW, I don't expect to do any recording, and I'm playing a Fender Precision custom with EMG P and J pickups through a TC Electronics amp.

[K-Frog]

The general consensus seems to be that most people that start with a multi fx unit eventually gravitate to the individual pedals that cover the few sounds they really use. The main benefit is that you can usually get a much better quality distortion or octave, or whatever sound you are after, in a single pedal.

I did the opposite, I went from singles (vol, chorus, compressor, pre/dist, DI) to an older Boss GT6B. It does everything I need (including tuner) and I no longer have to worry about multiple batteries, or power adapters, or mulitple interconnecting cables crapping out.

Different strokes for different folks.

[darkstorm]

The upper end offrerings by companies for multi effects are generaly very good. But have poor presets which must be tweaked onto good things. I like the upper end Zooms mytself best. Using a B9.1ut now. It replaced a zoom player 2000B which stoped working. The 2000B had better ring mod and better low eq section. Other things are a bit better in the new unit though.

[WJGreer]

I bought a GT-10B a couple of years ago and sold off $700 worth of effects boxes afterwards. It's a very powerful and flexible unit, and relatively easy to use. The weakness is in the synth patch, which is very limited in capability. But the modeling is good, the basic effects are as good as the Boss stomp boxes, the unit is actually pretty economical compared to even three or four pedals, and you only have one power source to worry about.

Highly recommended. Here is the megathread, lots and lots of information.

[ksandvik]

I've had multiple pedals and switched back to a single system MFX unit, of many reasons:
* Less cabling and power cables means less Signal/Noise ratio as well as less need to worry about less signal out from complex pedalboard combinations.
* I have one small MFX (Zoom B2) for jams and a big one (BOSS ME-50*)) for the rig, both easy to take with me. The B2 fits in my soft gig bag.
* There's something about saving patches and recall them within seconds rather than memorize lots of settings.
* With a good MFX you could build complex chains of effects without the need to bring or purchase tens of pedals.

Some say that analogue pedals are better than modern digital ones. I have a Boss Chorus from 1982 (Japanese made) and I disagree.

*) Yes it's guitar MFX but works really well with bass rigs. No degradation of the bass low end.

PS: I thought a Sansamp BDDI would change my position but I was not that impressed, I could get very similar tube-distortion sounds from both MFX boxes so it's been returned.

[Phoenix1]

Thanks, everyone. This has been particularly helpful, and expecially the megathread that I missed.