Clean Boost/Buffers

[scotch]

It's a bit expensive but the Lehle Sunday Driver is an excellent FET buffer/preamp with 15dB of available noiseless clean gain. It runs internally at 18 volts but runs on standard 9 volts. I often use it to balance the outputs of different guitars. It works well with electric or acoustic instruments.

Not all buffers are created equal. A really good buffer can also be used as a line driver direct to a PA after a long cable run. Many clean boosts aren't designed for that, they are really designed to go into a guitar amp which is fine it just depends on your purpose.

The Lehle IS an amazing sounding buffer! Expensive at over 200 bucks for the footswitchable one, but it does have a quality of sound that adds something really awesome!

I've installed 2 of them on pedalboards for customers (one bass, one guitar) that had tone loss issues due to long cabling and lots of pedals. Response was literally ecstatic from both fellas.

 

[nshuman]

Lehle is a no brainer in my experience. They just make amazing stuff. Their foot switches are amazing.

 

[JimmyM]

Checked out both the Sunday Driver SW and that Creation Labs pedal. Both look really cool. If this Bajo Mos doesn't work out, I think I may skip over the Micro Amp and try one of them. Obviously I'd rather not spend over $200 on a boost, but after experiences with sub-$100 boosts, I'm almost thinking I'd have to spend more than that or go used to get what I want.

 

[HolmeBass]

another vote for the EP Booster... although, I am not 100% sure that it is totally transparent. But man, it sounds nice.

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It is most certainly not clean/transparent. That said, at 18V I like the quality it imparts. At 9V it was more hit more miss, depending on how hard I was playing the bass (i.e. how loud the sound stage was at that moment).

 

[JimmyM]

And that Dunlop Echoplex wasn't clean, either. Rolled off the lows and highs a little and gave it a mid boost. That would be a vicious pedal for guitar, but I wanted a transparent boost for bass.

 

[JimmyM]

Hoo boy! I had to go and edit a comment I made earlier about a pedal that I thought sucked at the store but turned out to be not bad at all when I got talked into taking it home...the TC Mini Spark.

I returned the Echoplex preamp to Sam Ash today, which made the salesman happy because he said he wanted to buy it (guitarist), and it was their only one. I told him why I returned it, and he said I needed to try the Mini Spark. I told him I tried it on Monday and wasn't all that impressed then went into my thing about TC amps and their wattages, and he said, "You want a transparent boost, and this is it. So suck up your philosophical differences with TC and take it home and try it." He said it in a nice joking way, so I was cool with it. I hemmed and hawed a second, and then I said OK.

I plugged it up just now and did some comparo recordings. Boost set even with the P pickup, then boost at unity gain (which is dial all the way down, although I think it's just a tiny bit louder than unity according to my DAW), and then straight into the REDDI. I'll tell you...the dude at Sam Ash may have been onto something. It's darn close...certainly close enough not to care so much. Once I get all my tracks at the same levels, I'm hard pressed to tell a difference in tones. Really did not want to like it, but I do. And at least they admit the wattage thing now, so I guess I can get over it for a pedal that does what I want

So I may not be keeping it for good, but I'm keeping it long enough to give it a good onstage workout this weekend and test it against this Bajo Mos I have coming. But I must admit to being a lot more impressed with it now than I was initially. Probably a lot of psychology going on in that brain of mine...too much thinking getting in the way of progress.

 

[johnk_10]

I built an exact clone of the full size spark booster and IMO, it's an awesome pedal, so i'm not surprised that you like their mini.
IME, EVERY buffer/booster is going to change your tone slightly, mostly due to the fact that all of them have a lower impedance than a passive signal, so 90% of the time you get more top end (highs) coming out than going in.
that said, the Cornish buffer (not a booster) is probably the best buffer that I've used so far.

i'm in the process of building a Valve Wizard Glass Blower, which is said to to be an excellent buffer/booster capable of 27db of clean transparent boost and all from just a 9V power source,

 

[JimmyM]

27db on 9v is pretty impressive. And yeah, I thought I did hear a slight treble boost, although it's so slight I'm not 100% sure I'm getting it. For the PJ on full sound, though, a tiny little extra treble isn't necessarily a bad thing.

 

[JimmyM]

Whoa! Just found a very cool feature on the Spark Mini. If you click the footswitch normally it stays on. If you hold a little longer than half a second, it becomes a momentary switch and only stays on as long as you hold it. I could see using that to give me a short momentary boost when I want a certain lick to come out stronger than normal.

 

[madidus]

If you're still looking for a transparent bass boost check out the Lizard Leg Effects Blue Tail bass boost. Transparent, sub-$200, MXR sized box and no loss of low end. I love mine.

 

[Frank_Raider]

I bought the Xotic Bass RC to use it as a buffer in the beginning of a long signal chain with my passive bass. It worked perfect for that. It is actually very transparent with no tonal coloration if you keep bass and treble at center (though, using those gets you a very versatile effect). The fact that it has separate gain and volume controls makes it a great tool, specially if you don't want to raise your volume but need some more bite to be added to a passive bass signal. Also, having gain and volume controls lets you use the RC with both passive and active basses. Later, I decided to give a little constant boost to my signal (that worked great with ODs) and, man, I gotta say, this thing has its own. The sound it gets you is your own tone, but with more presence, more texture, more vivacity. I'm so happy for getting it; in fact, is by far one of my favorite pedals. Great construction, excellent quality sound, small footprint.

 

[ad9000]

I vote for the Fulltone Fat Boost. It's not entirely transparent but what it adds is very cool - in a nutshell I'd say it just makes the signal sound "bigger." Mine is the earlier version (FB-1) without treble and bass controls, just boost, tone, and drive.

 

[JimmyM]

Well let me just say thanks to everyone for their suggestions and for telling me your experiences with boosts. But it looks like it's come down to the TC Spark Mini and the HBE Bajo Mos for me. I used the Spark Mini on my gig tonight, and I was pretty happy with it. Got my levels evened out nicely and it sounded very much like it did with it turned off, just a little louder. Not sure when I'll be getting the Bajo Mos, but should be here by Tuesday at the latest, and then it's on.

Never used a booster before, and I'm starting to develop an appreciation for what it can do. In addition to evening out the volume between my P sound and my PJ sound, it made a nice little boost for when I solo on the P pickup that was louder but not crazy different. Beats having to rely on a soundman for it

 

[Laurent]

[QUOTE="JimmyM, post:

However, Laurent tipped me off to a used HBE Bajo Mos on Ebay so I've got that coming (thx pal). If it works, I'm done, but if not, maybe I'll give that Morley a shot.[/QUOTE]

You are welcome. Hope it rocks your boat. I think it will.

I did a three way shoot out between the HBE Bajo Mos, the RC Booster and the Linden from Barber.

The HBE was the cleanest. No change in tone or dynamics.

The RC Booster added a tad of woolly character to the notes. It's not so much the tone that seems to bet impacted by how the notes hit. I seem to lose a little of the impact/velocity.

The Barber Linden (a terrific EQ) seem to add a hair of compression to the notes. It was very musical and again was very subtle but it seemed to be there.

RE the Lizard Leg Blue Tail, it's a great boost but it boosts bass frequencies and adds a little wool/loss in impact when pushed hard. This pedal was not part of this shoot out and my notes are from a previous comparative audition.

Test were done with a P bass and a SVT-CL/Berg NV610. Not the best gear for a clinical test but it fits the "real life" bill.

All that being said when you amplify anything high enough you'll start hearing things!
If you are running long cables and 5 to 10 pedals a boost makes a huge difference on your tone.

 

[JimmyM]

I do like that Linden, but now I'll have to take a closer listen to it when I get it home.

 

[JimmyM]

Bajo Mos came today. Tried it briefly. Not bad at all. Thinking I'm hearing a little bit of difference in the lows but not quite sure since it may have been a slight difference in volume causing it. I do like the red box, though...my pedalboard doesn't have enough red on it.

 

[nshuman]

This is making me want to revisit my boost needs yet again...

On a side note, I am kind of happy to see that this has reached the 5th page and nobody has yet chimed in to say they don't believe in effects

 

[JimmyM]

They know better with me! I'll rip out their hearts with my bare hands and show it to them before they die.

Or as close as you can get to it using written words that don't get me banned again.

 

[JimmyM]

So two pedals go in and one comes out.

The Contenders:

TC Spark Mini
HBE Bajo Mos

Used the Spark Mini on my gigs this weekend and was happy with it. So I came home and plugged up the REDDI, set both pedals to unity gain, and recorded samples of both plus one sample going straight into the REDDI. Listened back, and noticed the TC track was coming off as a tad smoother than the others. Hmmm...didn't notice that Thursday night. I thought it was closer than that, but there's a little midscoop in it that the Bajo Mos didn't have. It's not very big at all, but it's there. And the low end cut I thought I might have heard in the Bajo Mos when I played it through my Countryman earlier today to test it out didn't seem to manifest itself on the recording. As a matter of fact, I'd be hard pressed to tell you which was clean and which went through the Bajo Mos.

Both are good at what they do, and if I hadn't heard the Bajo Mos, I would have been happy with the Spark Mini for my purposes. But the Bajo Mos nailed the transparency thing, so while I'll miss the very small size, the momentary switch (made good use of that tonight more than a couple times), and especially the neato artwork, the Bajo Mos is staying and the TC will go back to Sam Ash.

 

[monkeyfinger]

Jimmy -

You might want to give the Empress ParaEq a look. The latest version has programmable switches. This allows you to set the pedal to true or buffered bypass and to use the boost independently of the EQ, or in addition to it. Changing operation just requires you to press and hold both switches at power up. (No need to open the case.) It runs 9 or 18 volts so there is plenty of headroom. I think these new features make it much more versatile. I got one a few days ago. I like it so far. The buffer is very good, as is the boost. The buffer was very good with my Fender Roscoe Beck. The one Meg input impedance really helps here. You can get as much as 30 dB of boost, but who wants that much on bass. I find 6-10 dB is ideal for driving dynamic effects a little harder. It also has an input buffer switch which allows 0, 6, or 12 dB of padding. This would be excellent for switching basses except for the fact that the EQ must be engaged for the pad to engage. I wish it was always on when in buffered mode.