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Digitech XBW Bass Synth Wah Pedal
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Recommended By
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Average Price
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Average Rating
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92% of reviewers
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$70.81
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7.8
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Description:
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-Seven Different Wah/Synth Settings
-Sturdy Casing
-Sensitivity, Control, and Range nob for each effect.
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Author
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Matt Till
Registered User
Registered: June 2002
Location: Edinboro, PA
Posts: 16303
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Review Date: Wed April 28, 2004
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Would you recommend the product? Yes |
Price you paid?: $79.99
| Rating: 8
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Pros:
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Many different synth settings, and a fantastic octave, the octave effect alone is worth the cash
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Cons:
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The wah is very high endy, it can be a bit squaky. There is also no real mellow synth effect. Everything is pretty over the top. But for some, this might be a pro.
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Cool beans.
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Mediocre Bassist Club Member #4
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syciprider
Banned
Registered: May 2005
Location: Inland Empire
Posts: 7322
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Review Date: Mon September 26, 2005
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Would you recommend the product? Yes |
Price you paid?: $80.00
| Rating: 8
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Pros:
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Awesome envelope filter and octaver
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Cons:
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Considerable tweaking is needed to find usable synth sounds.
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If you like knob twiddling you\'ll enjoy this pedal. There are so many sounds you can get out of it. The draw is, of course, the env filter and the octaver. Both track and sound great.
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Quote:
Originally Posted by SGD Lutherie
There is no reason to keep copying the past, except that people have gotten in a rut, and expect to hear the same or similar tones as on the records they grew up with.
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superbassman2000
Registered User
Registered: December 2000
Location: Minnesota
Posts: 11218
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Review Date: Tue April 11, 2006
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Would you recommend the product? Yes |
Price you paid?: $50.00
| Rating: 7
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Pros:
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usable effects, no latency, good price :)
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Cons:
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switching effects live is a hassle, have to use both outputs on the pedal
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this is a cool synth effect, it's got a nice variety of effects, its got synths, an envelope filter, and an octave effect. The effects are all very nice and usable. also has a cool 4x10 speaker sim too 
Onto the negatives, i have two main gripes with this box. With 7 really cool effects, i'd like to use more than one live. unfortunatly, you can't do that. with each effect change, the other two control knobs switch functions as well, which unless you like the same settings for each effect, you have to change three knobs for each effect change. this makes it seem (to me at least) that you can really only use one effect setting per gig, because you have to take the time to change each effect for every time...kinda like that digitech expression factory, they have several very unique effects in one box, but there is no way to quick change it on the fly. maybe some kind of MIDI control would be nice, but thats not going to be anytime in the future...The only thing i can think about doing is the Fieldy method with his Boss synth boxes, he has 5-6 of them, all with different settings, and then just hit the right one on the fly.
my other gripe is the output jack. There are two outputs, wet and dry. This is a good idea, but if you are just going out the wet output, the sound cuts out when you switch the effect out...which kinda bothers me...not a big deal, but still
of course, although i wrote more on the cons, it's still a cool effect pedal with lots of cool sounds! i like it a lot! i would recommend it to anyone looking to make some funky sounds and don't want to pay a boatload of money for the higher-end synth bass effects like the korg G5 or Akai deep impact, or even the Vbass!
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Swimming Bird
Registered User
Registered: April 2006
Location: Madison, WI
Posts: 1897
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Review Date: Tue April 18, 2006
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Would you recommend the product? Yes |
Price you paid?: $80.00
| Rating: 4
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Pros:
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Many different settings/sounds
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Cons:
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Some quirky or awkward settings, hard to change sound on the fly, no volume control
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I'm dissatisfied with this pedal. It has a lot of cool stuff to offer, but it's very hard to find usable settings on the fly. It isn't terrible though (just make sure you plan ahead) and the settings are all deep enough to give you some decent sounds.
My biggest issue is that of volume discrepencies between settings. My favorite setting, the envelope filter, has a much lower volume than most of the other settings as well as my dry volume and this causes some pretty obvious problems.
On the whole, it sounds okay, and plays excellently with other pedals (I especially enjoy the envelope filter going through a big muff pi) but if only they could've included an output level...
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Beh3muth
Registered User
Registered: September 2006
Location: New York City
Posts: 4
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Review Date: Tue September 5, 2006
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Would you recommend the product? Yes |
Price you paid?: $80.00
| Rating: 8
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Pros:
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Versatile
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Cons:
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Difficult to find good settings
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This Pedal makes so many great effects. However finding them takes a whole lot of time, screwing with knobs that vastly affect the sound you get. Not convienient for gigging if you want to use several settings, but if you find just one you like you can stick with it. One real problem is getting a setting that doesn't make such a drastic difference volume wise. Sometimes it does get a bit louder than you might want it.
I haven't dropped it down any stairs, but from what i can tell its built well.
Using a 9 Volt you only get a few hours of play time, because of all the complicated settings, i would assume.
The pedal is great for recording purposes, with the second output. Also, you can adjust volume to easily cut back on the volume of the more intense settings.
Overall a great pedal, just find a good setting or two (and make sure you remember what it is) and its all worth it.
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(Place Sig Here)
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stingray69
Registered User
Registered: August 2004
Location: St Louis Area
Posts: 2407
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Review Date: Sat December 2, 2006
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Would you recommend the product? Yes |
Price you paid?: $65.00
| Rating: 9
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Pros:
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Extreme amount of excellent sounds available
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Cons:
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Some volume increase on the distorted effects
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About 2 weeks I recently picked up an Ampeg SVP Pro preamp (incredible!), but I also picked up a Digitech Bass Synth Wah pedal at the same time. Between the two, I can't seem to put my bass down. Well, I finally found some time to hook everything up into my Soundblaster soundcard and record a few clips of the really cool Digitech Bass Synth Pedal. Having played/experimented the past two weeks I am really pleased with this pedal. When I first tried it in the store, I found a couple of really usable sounds, and thought that would be the end of it as most pedals of this type usually deliver a couple of good sounds & that's the end of the story. I found this one to deliver a lot of usable sounds (and some very unusable ones too). Anyway, I find that most of the sounds are very tweakable with the amount and the tone of the snarls, gurgles, wisps, etc. and some are not. Fortunately, the majority of them are however. The Sensitivity knob is great for bringing in a little of the wet sounds, or a lot of it. What's weird is that on some sounds, the sensitivity works great, from almost entirely clean/dry bass and gradually bringing in the wet/effected sounds to doing very little, depending on the type of effect you've chosen.
Luckily for me, the Wah effect is one of the many that you can use very little of and bring it in to taste - to full on wet funk. Experimentation is key with this pedal. Anyway that said, here are some clips at the very bottome of this thread to hopefully give a rough idea of what this sounds like.
For reference, this is my Schecter Stiletto Custom 5 (modded w/USA EMG 40CS & 40DC pickups) - straight into my Ampeg SVP Pro - straight into my computer's Soundblaster 24-bit digitial card. No enhancement whatsoever after clips were made with the exception of just a taste of reverb on "Money" because my bass was recorded dry in the first half of the clip and then the Wah effect was kicked in - I thought it sounded a little too dry, so I added the 'verb. Artistic liberty, anyway....
Also note: Brand new strings - very bright, along with the very active EMG pickups. Please excuse the sloppy playing.
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Craziness: A couple of variations of the "Synth Ya" setting in the manual.
Industrial Jam: Another weird sound over-the-top synth setting - not for the faint of heart.
Godzilla: Representation of a semi-slow Synth Bass setting from the manual.
Buzzards (of Green Hill): Representing an intentional 50/50 mix of clean signal mixed with Bass Wah setting. Could have gone much wetter with the Wah mix (as an afterthought...)
Money - An example to show how the dynamics & tone change between slap & fingerstyle playing. A 50/50 mix on the clean versus wet effect.
Octabass Noodlings - Represent the awesome & super fast tracking of this pedal - worth the price alone just for the Octa-Bass quality.
All in all - a really fun pedal that is very customizable and sensitive to playing dynamics. I know taken by themselves, some of these sounds can come across as harsh sounding to some people, but in the context of a full mix with drums, vocal, guitar, etc., some extremely usable and cool & interesting sounds & textures can be created. I sold off my EBS BassIQ in favor of this ($79.00 list) Digitech pedal. I honestly feel it gives me everything the IQ did but with vastly wider tone options and tones that were simply unattainable with the BassIQ. I also feel much more "in control" with the Digitech...not worrying that some random hi-frequency wah spike will toast my tweeter & make the audience's ears bleed in the process. A much more controlled feeling while playing the Digitech - IMHO YMMV.
Sorry for the long winded review, buy this pedal covers a lot of ground, and then some....
Peace,
P.S. -
If I had one gripe, it would be for a better control of the volume on some of the wildest, distorted effects - a volume jump can be detected. Nothing an effects loop level/blend knob on the bass head couldn't fix...but not everyone has that luxury (I do not). A compressor could help a little on those heavy tripped out effects. Fortunately, the most usable effects this pedal has to offer do not suffer from the same volume jump as the distortion effects do.
http://media.putfile.com/Craziness-64
http://media.putfile.com/Industrial-Jam
http://media.putfile.com/Industrial-Jam-10
http://media.putfile.com/Buzzards
http://media.putfile.com/Money-54-84
http://media.putfile.com/OctaBass-Noodlings
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Zoom B3|Gallien-Krueger MB500|Avatar TB153|Ibanez Club Member #1135
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molsen
Registered User
Registered: January 2007
Location: Jacksonville, FL
Posts: 132
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Review Date: Wed January 10, 2007
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Would you recommend the product? Yes |
Price you paid?: $79.99
| Rating: 9
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Pros:
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versatile, GREAT octaver
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Cons:
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difficult to change modes on the fly
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The octave setting is the best out of any octave pedals I've tried. It tracks quickly and accurately, even ridiculously low notes don't confuse it! On the downside, if your strings contain lots of harmonics vs. fundamental, it may have trouble tracking at times. I've noticed with the bridge j pickup selected and using a pick, that the tracking has trouble holding on to the note. Otherwise, it's superb.
The synth effects sound stupid on Digitech's website. They're capable of much cooler sounds. Settings 3 or 4 are awesome!
Unfortunately, pretty much every mode requires different settings so you can't switch modes on the fly very quickly. But if you're familiar with the pedal and know what you're doing, it's not too hard.
Overall, this pedal is worth the money JUST for the octaver. Throw in the other 6 modes for some synthy experimenting and it's a real winner!
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http://www.techonvent.net
http://flibbajabba.blogspot.com
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Searcy
Registered User
Registered: May 2004
Location: Nashville Tennessee
Posts: 299
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Review Date: Fri August 3, 2007
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Would you recommend the product? Yes |
Price you paid?: $79.00
| Rating: 9
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Pros:
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Fun Crazy effect with great octave
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Cons:
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Some sounds are fun to play with but not very useful.
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I do a lot of crazy loop based music and I like these little pedals that offer a million crazy sounds in one package. As has been pointed out some of the sounds on this stomp box would be had to work into a song but I have found the first two setting to e very musical.
#1 is an auto wah which is as good as most out there if you dial it in just right. With the RANGE and SENS knobs set at about 12 o-clock and the CONTROL knob pegged at 5 o clock I get all the Rufus "Tell me something good" I can stand.
#2 is the same sound but with an Octave effect added. Also an easy sound to play old 70's funk with.
#3 starts to get a little freaky. If you were back lit on a huge stage with lot's of smoke and lasers and it was time for your solo this could be a lot of fun. I have used it as a sort of sizzle sounding distortion by setting the SENS all the way down CONTROL all the way down and RANGE at about 2 o clock.
#4 and #5 and #6 are sort of mirror images of each other and create a sort of strange Moog synth like pad sound. In fact I use it for synth pad sounds but if I weren't writing songs for this effect it would be hard to work it in. We are now into full Bootsy range.
#7 is one of the best tracking octave pedals I have heard if you learn to dial it in. SENS set all the way off. CONTROL set to wide open and RANGE set to about 10 o clock is the way I like to use it on my junk J bass copy.
In my opinion if you are looking for a pedal that offers lots of useful sounds for playing 70's effect heavy funk than settings #1, #2 and #7 make this pedal great. If Digitech has stopped there with just 3 great settings I believe this stomp box would be getting rave review I think. But the crazy stuff on #4, #5 and #6 get people playing with the knobs and before you know it an hour has gone buy and you are over whelmed. Most folks like to plug in and get good sounds right off the bat. You can do that if you take the time to remember 3 or 4 setting. Folks like myself who are junkies for crazy sounds in the studio and don't mind tweaking knobs to get them will love this pedal.
In a live setting this would get a bit tricky without a flash light a note pad and front man that stretch between songs.
These go cheap used. Don't by a new one like I did. 
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www.searcystringworks.comhttp://searcystringworks.blogspot.com/
Hand made pickups for any thing you can think of.
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Roba2c
Registered User
Registered: November 2007
Location: Asheville, NC
Posts: 32
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Review Date: Wed January 23, 2008
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Would you recommend the product? No |
Price you paid?: $69.95
| Rating: 6
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Pros:
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Sturdy, green, 7 effects, and price
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Cons:
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1 effect at a time, can't save your dialed tone, and hard to use
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This box has 7 effects, I would agree with everyone that the octave alone is great, but I already had an octavator. The filter was why I purchased the effect. For me though 2 out 7 isn't enough to make me want to keep it.
I don't recomend getting this particular stomp box, because you don't get very much control over the tones it produces.
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:rob
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OilcanRacer
Registered User
Registered: May 2009
Posts: 145
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Review Date: Mon January 4, 2010
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Would you recommend the product? Yes |
Price you paid?: None indicated
| Rating: 0
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don't understand people raves about this pedal as an octaver. its ok, nothing great. tracking is good, but sound is very grungy and dirty. nothing clean or even much bass.
the other sounds are good, envelope and synthy. the only problem is that it sounds great by yourself, but with a band it gets covered up really easy. volume has no effect as it just turns into a wall of noise. yeah compete with the guitar for fuzz aspect, but why bother. ya couldn't tell who it was coming from.
the other thing is that it sucks all bass from your sound and ends up giving more nasal or high up glitchy sounds. even with an eq pedal after it, not very much bottom.
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I race mountain bikes, http://oilcanracer.blogspot.com
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Twocan
Registered User
Registered: October 2009
Location: Michigan
Posts: 827
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Review Date: Tue February 16, 2010
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Would you recommend the product? Yes |
Price you paid?: $45.00
| Rating: 8
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Pros:
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Great Octaver and Synth for your bass set up - Price is good. Threshold level works pretty well.
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Cons:
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It's not a Moog or an 80's synthesizer but you get what you pay for
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For the money, it's a great toy.
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The quest for the perfect octave pedal continues...
Finger, finger, slap your thumb. Dum ditty dum ditty dum dum dum...
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Dan B
Registered User
Registered: October 2008
Location: Amherst, MA
Posts: 874
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Review Date: Sat April 24, 2010
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Would you recommend the product? Yes |
Price you paid?: $70.00
| Rating: 7
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Pros:
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Sturdy, attractive, easy to use, sounds are usable once you have tweaked the pedal enough, cheap (for what it is)
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Cons:
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Some tones are not to everyone's taste, setup is easy but you have to tweak the pedal to get the sound YOU want, battery consumption seem, wish there was a more mellow synth
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I got this pedal new at Daddy's. First off, I recommend getting an A/C adapter for this pedal. From what I have experienced with all my Digitech pedals, they go through batteries like crazy (and that is with unplugging the jack from the input after use). Otherwise, your tone will be compromised. Anyhow...
This is your basic synth pedal encased in a Boss style 4 knob stompbox. 4 knobs (sensitivity, control, range, and type) control what sounds are coming out of the box. It's extremely sturdy, although battery replacement can be a pain. One more reason to get an A/C adapter for this pedal.
I like this pedal. It's cheap (for a synth), makes a good octave-down pedal and the filter and wah on this unit sound extremely good. The tones on this can go from space age modern to full on funky (for example, on one of the Synth modes), just by turning the sensitivity knob. I find myself using almost everything except the "synth" modes on this pedal though. I find those 2 modes are too over the top and (what I think is) the bottom note seems to jump octaves when playing, which is very annoying. However, the wah is very usable as an auto-wah, the filter modes are entertaining, and the Octa-Sub is a nice feature, although if I really wanted to use it for the Octave down aspect of this mode, I would have gotten an Octave pedal.
Would I buy this pedal new again? Probably not. Yes, it's good, but consider this; you get a better deal used (as with anything really). So with that said, I recommend getting this pedal if it costs $50 or less. Anything more and I think you can find a better used pedal that originally cost much higher.
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Quote:
Originally Posted by BassNeo
I spent a year trying to appreciate Country music. After a year I was depressed, drunk and owned seven broken trucks.
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theobeech23
Registered User
Registered: October 2012
Posts: 6
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Review Date: Mon January 28, 2013
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Would you recommend the product? Yes |
Price you paid?: None indicated
| Rating: 10
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Pros:
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funky sounds, good for muse tones, great octaver
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Cons:
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battery eater
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really good sounds on this pedal. for a bit of funk when slapping and popping it is perfect too. i would recommend getting a power supply for this pedal as the battery runs out really fast.
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