Should I get the Source Audio C4?

[Nashrakh]

There is a new Boss unit that is even better. More money, still, I might try it.

Yes, throwing even more money at the problem is definitely going to help, considering you had problems finding and using the most basic functions of the pedal. Synth pedals have quite the learning curve, and whenever I see someone giving up on them, I notice it's because they apparently don't feel the need to get into the nitty-gritty of it. That's okay, but then any pedal with advanced functionality will not be for you.

 

[rsmith601]

I was going to sell both the C4 and the Boss SY 300. But I've checked out the sy300 some more and compared it to the c4. It seems the Boss allows you to play with more nuances and dynamics. Dynamics in the C4 seem very difficult to achieve in a natural way. The notes react to their own program and yes, there are some variations possible, but not fully remacting to the way you play. Unless you play super lighy, or super staccato or super hard or just long notes there doesn't seem to be much room in between on the C4.
Most patches I have tried (20 Pages at least) on it seem very sluggish so you have to kind of adjust and play ahead of the beat. I play a lot of tunes where I actually take care of the melody and I try to phrase like a singer on my bass. As far as I've seen that is impossible to do on the C4. Most of the User Patches are not made for the real world. And the factory patches are even worse.
There is a new Boss unit that is even better. More money, still, I might try it.

I am not sure why the C4 is not working for you. It is the second most popular pedal we have ever made. Further, we have worked very closely with the bass playing community to ensure it was effective (there is a huge C4 thread here). Nathan Navarro was on our team throughout the development and pushed us very hard to get the tracking up to his level of requirement. I am not saying that what you are experiencing is not real, I am just saying it is very unusual. Nathan was an SY300 user before the C4. For reference, this is the demo video he created for the pedal. Mind-Blowing Synthesizer Pedal | Source Audio C4 Synth - YouTube

 

[rsmith601]

I am not sure why the C4 is not working for you. It is the second most popular pedal we have ever made. Further, we have worked very closely with the bass playing community to ensure it was effective (there is a huge C4 thread here). Nathan Navarro was on our team throughout the development and pushed us very hard to get the tracking up to his level of requirement. I am not saying that what you are experiencing is not real, I am just saying it is very unusual. Nathan was an SY300 user before the C4. For reference, this is the demo video he created for the pedal. Mind-Blowing Synthesizer Pedal | Source Audio C4 Synth - YouTube

Nathan's tracking demo is at 2:35 in the video.

 

[gimmeagig]

Yes, throwing even more money at the problem is definitely going to help, considering you had problems finding and using the most basic functions of the pedal. Synth pedals have quite the learning curve, and whenever I see someone giving up on them, I notice it's because they apparently don't feel the need to get into the nitty-gritty of it. That's okay, but then any pedal with advanced functionality will not be for you.

No need to get snippy buddy!

 

[gimmeagig]

Nathan's tracking demo is at 2:35 in the video.

Thank you so much for sending the link.Unfortunately that video confirms what I was talking about. I am not writing this to be argumentative, or to say that the C4 is not good, but it definitely is not right for me. I just want to let you know what my experience with the pedal was.
For "normal" funky synth bass parts where you still want to create a deep pocket as part of the rhythm section,(Chaka Khan,We Can Work It Out,Ain't Nobody) or The System(You Are In My System) just to name a couple tunes, the sounds in the box and on the video are just too far out. For electronic, avant garde, experimental music,original compositions,sure, but for a "Meat and potatoes" kind of a player who wants to play funk and lock with the drummer, the sounds are not useful.
I can't show up on a soul/funk/pop gig and lay it down like I usually do with the C4. Believe me I tried lots and lots of patches. Some of the more promising ones I tried to tweak. I know how to create good sounds on keyboard synthesizers so I wasn't exactly tapping in the dark with the editor. But I thought for sure some of the users had already explored the C4 enough so that I wouldn't have to reinvent the wheel.
The sound example for the tracking towards the end the video is OK. The attack is there but all the notes are the same volume.On off.I don't want all the notes to be the same volume.I want the device to recognize the dynamics that I'm playing on my bass. I could not find a patch that would be able to handle quick octaves.The lower note would regularly choke out the high one or prevent it from sounding altogether, no matter how precise I played them. That is with a compressor before the C4 and good muting. The Boss SY300 tracks accurately all the way to my low B. The C4 would require me to play all the lines an Octave up and even then it would not work right. I do like to blend in my original bass sound without having to set up a completely separate signal chain. So transposing my lines up would make my actual bass signal useless.
So if anybody is looking for a barely used C4, PM me. I'll be posting it in the classified section in the next few days.