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Sonicake Pocket Master - A $65 Swiss Army Knife?

gtirard

gtirard

Feb 22, 2020
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Paris, France
inred-music.com
#1
For $65, the size of a tuner, you've got an amp models, multi-fx, tuner, drum machine, USB audio interface…

www.sonicake.com

Sonicake Pocket Master Compact Multi-effects Processor (QME-10)

Pocket Master is a compact multi-effects processor with potent circuit design and high quality digital effects. It contains 100+ various effects suitable for different musicians, whether you play electric guitar, acoustic guitar, bass, even keyboard, etc., it can make your playing sound more...
www.sonicake.com www.sonicake.com

In general I don't like Chinese disposable toys so much, but…

It seems to be a great companion for practice too, with the drum machine.

As usual only guitar demos for now, but it says it contains bass amp models too.

Thoughts?
 
#3
It's funny that you posted this. I just got mine Monday. I bought it for a relatively inexpensive chance to play with cab sim IR's and amp sims to use with the double bass.

The effects are ok. I like the reverb, delay, and the wah filters... but didn't care for the octave pedals at all. I also noticed some clicking sounds in the mix with more than 4 effects going at the same time. I bet that little processer can't keep up with that much at the same time.

I don't think it'll replace real pedals, or any of the Zoom modelers... but since I'm only planning on using the IR's it might be beneficial.

I loaded up some third party IR's last night and so far I've been pleased with the results. I'm using it tonight at a rehearsal, which will be the real test for it.

*Last minute edit-addition:

The drums/metronome seem to only work with bluetooth audio. It isn't routed through the TRS output with the bass.

Also, I haven't tested the USB audio interface with it yet. Not sure if I will. There's also a looper I haven't tried.
 
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#4
Well I brought it to a rehearsal with a big band last night and was more impressed that I thought I would be. However I feel I need to qualify that statement a little.

I only used the amp sim and a third party cab IR. The amp sim was their version of the Fender Bassman. I kept the EQ flat and reduced the gain and presence significantly to get a clean tone on my EUB. The cab IR was from Shift-Line. I was using tested the EBS Proline 410 IR, the Ampeg SVT 810e, and the Mesa RR215 IR. The Mesa was a little too thick for my use case, but probably sounds good on electric bass.

Sound was clear and consistent. Played very nicely with my EA Doubler amp and 112 cab. I had planned on bringing my acoustic Double Bass, but at the last minute swapped over to my Yamaha SLB200 EUB. Was super easy to dial in the tone I wanted. Battery life was good and it was actually kinda nice to be able to tweak the settings with my phone. It's a pain to try and adjust pedals while holding onto a double bass or EUB, so the novelty of phone controls was quite pleasant. Bonus points for including a decent tuner that also doubles as a mute switch.

While I might not be the best person to sing the praises of this little pedals power and flexibility, I might be the person to say it's a pretty inexpensive way to get into basic amp modeling and cab IR's.

Maybe I'll spend some time with it over the next week or so and make an actual video review of some of the sounds it can make.
 
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#5
Well I've had a few rehearsals with this thing and I'm pretty impressed so far. One rehearsal with the EUB and another with my acoustic double bass.

The interface is actually pretty decent. I hooked it up to my iPad and recorded into my DAW (MultiTrack DAW by Harmonicdog) and the sound quality was really decent. I've been using it as a headphone/practice interface on electric bass and I've liked the sounds I've gotten with it.

I'm really enjoying the ability to add third party IR's. Until I started playing with this, I didn't realize just how good IR's can be.

Also, they just updated their firmware and now you can add NAM files (Neural Amp Models) so I went to ToneHunt.org and downloaded a few to try out. Again, I was impressed.

So I would say if you're looking for an inexpensive way to get into IR's and NAM stuff this is a decent gateway.

I'm going to gig with it this weekend. Be interesting to be doing everything with something the size of an alphanumeric pager instead of my regular pedalboard. Plus it's rechargeable so I don't even need my OneSpot. Just plug into the board and go. My back will appreciate it for sure.
 
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#6
Hasty said:
Well I've had a few rehearsals with this thing and I'm pretty impressed so far. One rehearsal with the EUB and another with my acoustic double bass.

The interface is actually pretty decent. I hooked it up to my iPad and recorded into my DAW (MultiTrack DAW by Harmonicdog) and the sound quality was really decent. I've been using it as a headphone/practice interface on electric bass and I've liked the sounds I've gotten with it.

I'm really enjoying the ability to add third party IR's. Until I started playing with this, I didn't realize just how good IR's can be.

Also, they just updated their firmware and now you can add NAM files (Neural Amp Models) so I went to ToneHunt.org and downloaded a few to try out. Again, I was impressed.

So I would say if you're looking for an inexpensive way to get into IR's and NAM stuff this is a decent gateway.

I'm going to gig with it this weekend. Be interesting to be doing everything with something the size of an alphanumeric pager instead of my regular pedalboard. Plus it's rechargeable so I don't even need my OneSpot. Just plug into the board and go. My back will appreciate it for sure.
Click to expand...
Yes, it's quite incredible that it can now also load NAM profiles.

 
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#7
Bump. I bit. Fun practice toy. I use it mainly for guitar into headphones but looks to do the job for bass too.

The app side had me surprisingly pleased and how well integrated things are for a $65 product.

Still need to play with the NAM and IR stuff but just making my own presets and I’m happy.
 
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#10
I moved mine onward to a friend. He loves it as a basic starter kit for late night stuff when his kids are sleeping.

There is quite a gap between it and some of the higher end devices out there but quickly 10x in cost.

imo, it’s not a bad device but it’s not going to replace things like ampero or nano cortex.
 
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#14
So, I gave it a test drive. It's functional, has some interesting capabilities for a small, not expensive device. But - I'm returning. In my post-retirement, zero income universe, it didn't meet minimum requirements for the $65 expenditure. I'm in the minority, I'm sure, because of my current and permanent financial situation. It's a decent pedal - just not for me. I didn't find it bass centric enough, either. Advertised for guitar And bass, but 95% of the presets are for a guitar.
 
#15
SBassman said:
So, I gave it a test drive. It's functional, has some interesting capabilities for a small, not expensive device. But - I'm returning. In my post-retirement, zero income universe, it didn't meet minimum requirements for the $65 expenditure. I'm in the minority, I'm sure, because of my current and permanent financial situation. It's a decent pedal - just not for me. I didn't find it bass centric enough, either. Advertised for guitar And bass, but 95% of the presets are for a guitar.
Click to expand...
Yeah, the lack of more bass stuff has kept me away, despite being able to do NAM and IR. was just going to be a headphone practice device. Would be perfectly happy with something cheaper that doesn't do the effects but does NAM and Bluetooth. Would make a really nice portable practice headphone amp.
 

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