With mini pedals, you're stuck with offset 1/4" jack on the sides. If they put power on one side, you still need a foot switch, you're quickly running out of space for any components. Power on top gives more room inside.
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Show me your compact pedalboard setup
- Thread starter garmenteros
- Start date
With mini pedals, you're stuck with offset 1/4" jack on the sides. If they put power on one side, you still need a foot switch, you're quickly running out of space for any components. Power on top gives more room inside.
I love how they interact. The M81 along with the Becos and Fairfield are a great combo.
the TC minis are on the side. It can help or hinder depending on the location of neighbouring pedal output. On top isn't that bad with 90 deg connectors such as ebs flat patch, which is what I used.
Yup. If a pedal has top jacks, power should on the top, if a pedal has side jacks, power should be on the side.
deepestend
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- Feb 21, 2003
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I struggle with this on my boards since I never seem to use uniform designs throughout. It's always a mix. I was thinking about trying all mini pedals on my Nano+, but the space saving compared to 125B with top jacks is minimal or non-existent the way I set them up. And I decided I didn't want to sacrifice my preferred sounds/pedals to maybe add 1 more effect to my board.
If you can manage to tetris the side jacks on 1590A pedals using the EBS flat patch cables - i.e. offset the pedals so the "out" of one is 'above' the input of the next to keep them as close to one another as possible - you can fit 8 mini pedals vs 7 standard (125Bs) with top jacks on a Nano+. If you line up 1590A pedals side-by-side with the edges of each in/out patch cable touching, you'll actually save more space using all 125B instead.
With the exception of a setup like @Rocksolid (custom board, top row, ace tetris job), I don't feel like the mini pedals save an appreciable amount of space compared to 125B. I also prefer the footswitch spacing and ease of cable routing with top jacks compared to mini pedals. All that said, Rocksolid's mini board is a killer example of how to make the most of the mini setup. That extra space/rail along the top is a huge advantage for that setup...
I almost went for the mini polytune, but with my board full, if I ever did add an extra pedal, I figured the Poly tune makes the most sense to sit free of the board and feed into it, so it's better to have the battery option. Plus, the polytune sends power out and can feed another pedal power. This mini didn't really seem to offer enough space saving for what I'd lose.
Thanks for your kind words Graham.
The effort to putting that board together was ridiculous and in the end I just didn't want to let it beat me! As apposed to how crazy simple it is to throw those Aguilar pedals on a board and patch them together. Sometimes it's just easier to take something bigger.
The other massive thing is cost. Mini pedals from Ali Express, eBay etc are so ridiculously cheap! The prices for some of those pedals were insane! The EQ was $45 (all prices in Aussie $ which is about the same as Canadian), The Mosky OD which is an OCD Clone was $35 (and I really like how it sounds!), The Valeton Modulation was $40ish delivered from Ali. The Mooer, Sub n Up, Fairfield, were all 2nd hand. The Becos I bought new for the same price I sold my Empress for, The mThump I've had forever, The M81 I got new B stock. When you start to consider the cost difference to build a board with all the same attributes in full size brand name pedals, the cost is considerably different.
The TC Mini polytune is great, but I sold mine. The power connection on the side actually wastes space on a tuner often as the tuner is likely first in line, and jammed right on the edge of the board. You lose 10mm+ trying to get the power plug inside the edge of the board. I much prefer the D'Addario tuner. If I ever remove a pedal from my mini board, the D'Addario tuner will be going straight on there, and the mute and pedal train tuner will come off. No hesitation.
Compact, neat, and ready to rock. This is making me happy.
On my Nano with the mini's? Thats a pedaltrain tuner. Ok, but not amazing. Had to make sacrifices to get everything on that board. No mute option so I am running that little passive mute box on the top right.
done for (I hope) some time. I can cover all the needs of my 3 bands with this...
First Raspberry Sherbet HX Stomp I've seen, and I only saw the white one for the first time just the other day... so I had to go look up what other colours are available:
GREY
BLUE
BLACK
WHITE
RED.
As for space saving on a board, I think the 1590N1 gives the best performance ratio of just about any enclosure in terms of the amount of circuitry crammable inside in combination with number of controls on its exterior and still manage to have all top-jacks.
A better space saver than the 1590A would be the 1590B2 with top jacks. You can fit all the bits you'd find in a 1590A into a 1590B2 and have extra room for more controls and indeed more circuitry inside whilst taking up less space overall than the 1590A once you've got them all plugged in. In that regard, the B2 outperforms the A, without a doubt, but...
I think the 1590A will continue to be popular due to the perceived space savings, even if you're not saving space overall.
Besides, 1590A sure are fun (and challenging) to build.
With the B2 available (thanks Mr Rutter), the only pedals that should be permitted to have side-jacks anymore are Boss pedals and 1590A, IMO, and I'm not so sure about the Boss. With 1590A it's impossible, but with Boss... they could be all top jacks, too, except for stuff like the Line Selector, stereo pedals or those with expression input.
GREY
BLUE
BLACK
WHITE
RED.
As for space saving on a board, I think the 1590N1 gives the best performance ratio of just about any enclosure in terms of the amount of circuitry crammable inside in combination with number of controls on its exterior and still manage to have all top-jacks.
A better space saver than the 1590A would be the 1590B2 with top jacks. You can fit all the bits you'd find in a 1590A into a 1590B2 and have extra room for more controls and indeed more circuitry inside whilst taking up less space overall than the 1590A once you've got them all plugged in. In that regard, the B2 outperforms the A, without a doubt, but...
I think the 1590A will continue to be popular due to the perceived space savings, even if you're not saving space overall.
Besides, 1590A sure are fun (and challenging) to build.
With the B2 available (thanks Mr Rutter), the only pedals that should be permitted to have side-jacks anymore are Boss pedals and 1590A, IMO, and I'm not so sure about the Boss. With 1590A it's impossible, but with Boss... they could be all top jacks, too, except for stuff like the Line Selector, stereo pedals or those with expression input.
They should make these with right-angle jacks instead of sockets so you can slip them between pedals without needing extra leads!
Tuners often first in the chain, so the input would probably suit most people than a right angled jack
Yeah I considered cutting the leads and cutting a Flat patch cable in half and changing the ends. solder them on and a bit of heat shrink. I actually think pedaltrain should offer it as a variant of the product.
