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radial bigshot mix - info?

#21
just thought i would bump this as i just got one of these the other day...

in short, the pedal works as advertised and is wonderful. i've tried it with a bunch of my distortion pedals and it makes all of them sound much, much better. better low end and overall definition, and much more natural sounding. even if your pedal has a mix knob, i'd recommend checking one of these out.

with the mix set at full, you get a 50/50 mix. what is suprising is that i've found the best distorted tones with the mix at about half way, or 25%. so far i've used it with my Diesel Dawg, OCD, BYOC muff, and modded BOSS dDS-1 and it made them all sound much better. if you use any kind of overdrive, i'd say this pedal is a must have. eventually i'm gonna try it out with my Choralflange as well.

it does not run on batteries, 9vdc only. the best feature, an absolute necessity, is the phase switch. i've found it necessary to set the phase to 180 degrees out with all of the aforementioned pedals.

MF and AMS now have them in stock in case anyone is interested.
JR
 
#22
interesting review! I recently bought the barge Concepts VFB-2 which has also improved the sound of my overdrives. It does not have a phase switch.

Could you explain why the phase switch is an absolute necessity? What happens when the phase switch is not engaged?
 
#23
I have the X-Blender with the phase switch. The deal is that many OD/dirt effects actually invert the phase of your signal as a normal part of the circuit. This is not audible until you blend the effected signal with the original dry signal, at which point they will partly cancel each other out. This can result in a thin, honky, scooped sound. It will vary with different effects, though. Sometimes I use the phase switch, sometimes I don't, depending on the sound I get each way.
 
#24
bongomania said:
I have the X-Blender with the phase switch. The deal is that many OD/dirt effects actually invert the phase of your signal as a normal part of the circuit. This is not audible until you blend the effected signal with the original dry signal, at which point they will partly cancel each other out. This can result in a thin, honky, scooped sound. It will vary with different effects, though. Sometimes I use the phase switch, sometimes I don't, depending on the sound I get each way.
Click to expand...

yup, and all of the effects i tried needed the phase inverted. they didn't sound band per se with it normal, but they were definately fuller/more low end with it inverted which tells me that most of these pedals do indeed invert the phase.

JR
 
#25
Hmmm this makes me wonder if my sound is out of phase with the Barge unit. The setup seems to sound good but I wonder need to turn the blend control down a lot to be able to actually hear the clean signal mixing with the effected sound.
 
#26
it may not be out of phase - i've found with the radial that about half way is a good mix of gain - and given that all the way up is 50/50, this is probably around 25% of the dirt mixed in.

if the signals are out of phase, you may notice a thining of the sound which could be less overall volume, less low end, and/or a bit of scoop to the sound... set your dirt pedal as clean as you can and then switch it in and out and see if you can tell a difference....

JR
 
#27
I'm using a custom barge with a TS-9 and is sounds KILLER. Definately no weird phase cancellation going on. I was going to get the bigshot, but I also needed a second loop, and by the time I bought the bigshot looper as well I'd be in the same price range as the barge, which is a completely kick-ass piece of gear. The buffers on the loops are fantastic -- I LOVE mine. It also saves me a cable (another chance for tone suck) having both functions in one case. My bypassed tone is as clean as could be, and even with the loops in the buffers do seem to reduce "tone suck" greatly.

I use a bigshot I/O in front of it. :D The Radial units are very nice ... you just have to look at your total needs to see if it fits.
 
#29
lowbpuffyd said:
Are any of you that are using the Barge or the Radial running 18v active? I just ordered the Radial and I'm curious if there are any issues with the output overdriving the buffers that anyone has seen on either pedal
Click to expand...

No one's gonna ding you for not using the search feature :D

I use an 18V active occasionally with my Tonebone - no problems.
 

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