Zoom MS-60B Firmware Update 2.0 (June 2017)

[scotch]

Still using and loving my MS60b! (Actually have two: one on my large board and one on my fly board.)

I'm definitely a pedal snob sometimes but the sounds in this little box are pretty great. Best bang for the buck in the bass effects world no doubt! I do keep it in a true bypass loop on my studio board because I do detect a minuscule amount of noise when it is in-line, but the overall quality is phenomenal for the price.

 

[Johno Dunn]

Still using and loving my MS60b! (Actually have two: one on my large board and one on my fly board.)

I'm definitely a pedal snob sometimes but the sounds in this little box are pretty great. Best bang for the buck in the bass effects world no doubt! I do keep it in a true bypass loop on my studio board because I do detect a minuscule amount of noise when it is in-line, but the overall quality is phenomenal for the price.

I’m on my fourth one!

 

[jacoby75]

I used mine in church for the first time this morning. I’m definitely a tone snob, and have been on a never-ending quest for the right combination of pedals for my direct-only pedalboard for years. I think I can say (again) that I’m done. No. For real this time. I mean it. With the exception of maybe a dedicated synth pedal down the road, maybe a dirt pedal or two just for kicks, and definitely the tech 21 Geddy Lee pedal when it comes out, all of which are just the icing on the proverbial cake, my core tone is now well-established. I love the SVT sim of the 60-b into my DSM OCSD. I had been using a TC Spectracomp for a minute, but I decided to try some of the onboard compressors this morning based on what I’ve read around here. I tried the Orange Lim this morning. Holy Schnikes! No knobs, nothing to adjust, but that thing sounds fantastic! It immediately added a punch and girth to my tone that I have never heard before. I have read that there is tone suck to the unit when in bypass, but I never turn the thing off because it is my amp, essentially. So that’s a non-factor. Such a great unit. And so cheap! I’m gonna have to get a second one for my big board, just because I can.

 

[jacoby75]

. . . I had been using a TC Spectracomp for a minute, but I decided to try some of the onboard compressors this morning based on what I’ve read around here. I tried the Orange Lim this morning. Holy Schnikes! No knobs, nothing to adjust, but that thing sounds fantastic! It immediately added a punch and girth to my tone that I have never heard before . . .

Update: I had some time to fiddle with the Zoom last night with headphones. The OrangeLim really does sound great as far as the punch and sustain it adds. But I realized that with my passive jazz it also dramatically increases the string noise and 60-cycle hum when I dial down one of the pickups. Not good. I noticed that a little in church Sunday as well, but it sounded so good and punchy I didn't really care. It was slightly less noticeable playing through an amp, but it was way more pronounced direct. I tried using the noise gate and ZNR earlier in the chain to cut out the hum, but setting them high enough to negate the hum also had adverse effects on notes, like cutting them off too soon, or taking a split-second for a note to kick in after played. I don't know how to dial in that kind of punch with a regular compressor. I landed on the new "Gray Comp," set to about 30-40 for compression and unity gain. I'm digging it. Still better than the Spectracomp, IMO. But now that I'm not using some of my other gain-sensitive pedals, I can finally try some of the artist toneprints on the Spectracomp (which have a tendency to boost output level and would make my other pedals fart out) and see if those sound any better than the on-board Zoom ones.

 

[BrentSimons]

1. K

Update: I had some time to fiddle with the Zoom last night with headphones. The OrangeLim really does sound great as far as the punch and sustain it adds. But I realized that with my passive jazz it also dramatically increases the string noise and 60-cycle hum when I dial down one of the pickups. Not good. I noticed that a little in church as well, but it was way more pronounced direct. I tried using the noise gate and ZNR earlier in the chain to cut out the hum, but setting them high enough to negate the hum also had adverse effects on notes, like cutting them off too soon, or taking a split-second for a note to kick in after played. I don't know how to dial in that kind of punch with a regular compressor. I landed on the new "Grey Comp," set to about 30-40 for compression and unity gain. I'm digging it. Still better than the Spectracomp, IMO. But now that I'm not using some of my other gain-sensitive pedals, I can finally try some of the artist toneprints on the Spectracomp and see if those sound any better than the on-board Zoom ones.

I really need to pick on of these up! I usually have some form of Zoom multi-effect around (since the 506! ) but I recently sold my B3n here on TB. I just didn't get along with it for some reason.
Best wishes,
Brent

 

[jacoby75]

I really need to pick on of these up! I usually have some form of Zoom multi-effect around (since the 506! ) but I recently sold my B3n here on TB. I just didn't get along with it for some reason.

Indeed you do. I used to use electric guitar multi-effects units when I played rhythm guitar in church about 15yrs ago. The little Boss one (I forget the model, ME50 maybe?) and later the big Boss one (GT-10, or something like that). At the time I thought they were great. But then someone introduced me to actual high-quality boutique analog guitar effects, like the Fulltone Fulldrive, for example, and there was just no comparison. Analog overdrive sounded so much better. I sold the GT-10 and never looked back. That started me down the never-ending rabbit hole of high end boutique pedals for guitar.

But a lot has changed in 15yrs. When it became evident a few years ago that I would need a bass pedalboard after just playing with an amp for most of my life, I began the quest for boutique bass pedals. Some sound great. Don't get me wrong. I still have many I will never part with. And I am still a firm believer in analog overdrives and distortions sounding better than digital (at least in my experience with the cheaper digital modelers I've tried). But I have been very, very pleasantly surprised by the tone quality I can get out of this thing. Having had more time to fiddle with it I still think most of the drive sounds are obnoxious and will never use them, but putting actual overdrive and fuzz pedals in front of the Zoom seems to work well. I landed on the "FlipTop" amp model last night, and love that thing to pieces. Every amp model is unique, and very customizeable. And you can pair different cab sims with different amp heads for variety. I still think my DSM OCSD sounds better than the baked in cab tones, but in a pinch I could even do without that. There are a couple of the cab sims that I really like (the AG 1x15 and the Eden 4x10), and which sound great with multiple different types of amps. I seriously can't believe the quality and number of effects they packed into such a cheap box. Especially with the 2.0 update.

 

[jacoby75]

But don't get me wrong ^. I have been gushing about the thing and I do love it. But it's not perfect. In particular, I think it will be really challenging to use live if you have any intention of regularly changing patches or effects because it only has the one footswitch. And you'd have to use your finger to scroll left and right down the list of effects in any given patch to turn them on or off in certain circumstances, or use the menu button to scroll through your list of presets, unless you create patches and scroll through those with the footswitch. But then let's say you wanted to get to a patch four patches down the list. You have to scroll through all four to get to it, provided you're using the A/B/C/D method with the footswitch. If you were only switching between a couple of presets, it would be golden. I don't think it will be much of an issue for me. In any given worship set I might use 2-3 patches, if that. This past Sunday I used one and had a chorus at the end that I could switch on and off. And I intend to use the pedal in conjunction with other actual analog pedals. And I'm going to keep my tuner inline so I can mute and still be able to manipulate things on the Zoom while muted. Otherwise, if you use the Zoom's tuner (which works great, by the way, even for a 5-string), when you mute you can't do anything else on the screen, unless I'm missing something.

 

[BrentSimons]

Indeed you do. I used to use electric guitar multi-effects units when I played rhythm guitar in church about 15yrs ago. The little Boss one (I forget the model, ME50 maybe?) and later the big Boss one (GT-10, or something like that). At the time I thought they were great. But then someone introduced me to actual high-quality boutique analog guitar effects, like the Fulltone Fulldrive, for example, and there was just no comparison. Analog overdrive sounded so much better. I sold the GT-10 and never looked back. That started me down the never-ending rabbit hole of high end boutique pedals for guitar.

But a lot has changed in 15yrs. When it became evident a few years ago that I would need a bass pedalboard after just playing with an amp for most of my life, I began the quest for boutique bass pedals. Some sound great. Don't get me wrong. I still have many I will never part with. And I am still a firm believer in analog overdrives and distortions sounding better than digital (at least in my experience with the cheaper digital modelers I've tried). But I have been very, very pleasantly surprised by the tone quality I can get out of this thing. Having had more time to fiddle with it I still think most of the drive sounds are obnoxious and will never use them, but putting actual overdrive and fuzz pedals in front of the Zoom seems to work well. I landed on the "FlipTop" amp model last night, and love that thing to pieces. Every amp model is unique, and very customizeable. And you can pair different cab sims with different amp heads for variety. I still think my DSM OCSD sounds better than the baked in cab tones, but in a pinch I could even do without that. There are a couple of the cab sims that I really like (the AG 1x15 and the Eden 4x10), and which sound great with multiple different types of amps. I seriously can't believe the quality and number of effects they packed into such a cheap box. Especially with the 2.0 update.

But don't get me wrong ^. I have been gushing about the thing and I do love it. But it's not perfect. In particular, I think it will be really challenging to use live if you have any intention of regularly changing patches or effects because it only has the one footswitch. And you'd have to use your finger to scroll left and right down the list of effects in any given patch to turn them on or off in certain circumstances, or use the menu button to scroll through your list of presets, unless you create patches and scroll through those with the footswitch. But then let's say you wanted to get to a patch four patches down the list. You have to scroll through all four to get to it, provided you're using the A/B/C/D method with the footswitch. If you were only switching between a couple of presets, it would be golden. I don't think it will be much of an issue for me. In any given worship set I might use 2-3 patches, if that. This past Sunday I used one and had a chorus at the end that I could switch on and off. And I intend to use the pedal in conjunction with other actual analog pedals. And I'm going to keep my tuner inline so I can mute and still be able to manipulate things on the Zoom while muted. Otherwise, if you use the Zoom's tuner (which works great, by the way, even for a 5-string), when you mute you can't do anything else on the screen, unless I'm missing something.

Super insight! Thank you.

Yeah it would only be minor patch changes. One with chorus, one without etc.
Thanks again!
Brent

 

[stingray69]

And you'd have to use your finger to scroll left and right down the list of effects in any given patch to turn them on or off in certain circumstances, or use the menu button to scroll through your list of presets, unless you create patches and scroll through those with the footswitch.

Not sure if this helps, but the MS-60B has included an "effect" called "LineSel". This effect bypasses (toggles both On & Off) all the effects in the chain that follow after it in the patch. Depending on where you put it in the chain you could use it to bypass some or all of the other effects in a patch.

 

[Ricky Caboverde]

unless I'm missing something.

Nope, you're not missing anything! I think the consensus for complicated setlists requiring various patches was to create particular patches for each setlist, e.g., A - song#1 intro, B - song#1 verse, C - song#1 bridge, etc. Since you can copy and paste entire patches, it's easy to keep them all stored and just copy/paste/rename as needed for each gig/service. Like you, I only use about three patches, so this isn't necessary for me. An easier way around that whole mess is just to buy a Disaster Area Dmc.micro, which can move through presets in any order and access the tuner leaving you tap-tempo for long presses on the Zoom (not bad for $99 extra). I happen to have a 70CDR relegated to modulation and reverb at the end of my chain, and a 60b that I use from compression and dirt (overdrive and fuzz). I LOVE them! I'm constantly GASing over other pedals, but when I just mess around with them to get what I want and play live, I'm always happy with the sounds I get to the point that I realize I honestly don't need any "upgrades." I also own a DMC.micro, but never need it since I use less than a handful of presets. I'm still keeping it in case one day I want to try out an HX stomp; then I can control a Zoom MS and the HXS together...but that's overkill for my needs right now.


If you have any presets you'd like to share, please DO! I can post the ones I use, as well.

 

[BrentSimons]

Nope, you're not missing anything! I think the consensus for complicated setlists requiring various patches was to create particular patches for each setlist, e.g., A - song#1 intro, B - song#1 verse, C - song#1 bridge, etc. Since you can copy and paste entire patches, it's easy to keep them all stored and just copy/paste/rename as needed for each gig/service. Like you, I only use about three patches, so this isn't necessary for me. An easier way around that whole mess is just to buy a Disaster Area Dmc.micro, which can move through presets in any order and access the tuner leaving you tap-tempo for long presses on the Zoom (not bad for $99 extra). I happen to have a 70CDR relegated to modulation and reverb at the end of my chain, and a 60b that I use from compression and dirt (overdrive and fuzz). I LOVE them! I'm constantly GASing over other pedals, but when I just mess around with them to get what I want and play live, I'm always happy with the sounds I get to the point that I realize I honestly don't need any "upgrades." I also own a DMC.micro, but never need it since I use less than a handful of presets. I'm still keeping it in case one day I want to try out an HX stomp; then I can control a Zoom MS and the HXS together...but that's overkill for my needs right now.


If you have any presets you'd like to share, please DO! I can post the ones I use, as well.



View attachment 3395330

Hey @Ricky Caboverde ,
I would love to see your dirt and comp presets if you get a chance?
And not to derail the thread but did you see that @TonyP- posted about an update for the Plex in late May?
Also can you use the MS with headphones?
Best wishes,
Brent

 

[jacoby75]

Not sure if this helps, but the MS-60B has included an "effect" called "LineSel". This is effect bypasses (toggles both On & Off) all the effects in the chain that follow after it in the patch. Depending on where you put it in the chain you could use it to bypass some or all of the other effects in a patch.

Good point, thanks. But if I am already using a compressor and amp sim in every patch, adding a line selector would only leave me one more slot for effects. Unless the line selector does not take up a full slot memory-wise. Thereby negating it’s necessity. But if there was a particular instance in which two Effects being turned on simultaneously proved beneficial, I could always do without the compressor. Or use my Spectracomp.

 

[stingray69]

Good point, thanks. But if I am already using a compressor and amp sim in every patch, adding a line selector would only leave me one more slot for effects. Unless the line selector does not take up a full slot memory-wise. Thereby negating it’s necessity. But if there was a particular instance in which two Effects being turned on simultaneously proved beneficial, I could always do without the compressor. Or use my Spectracomp.

Right, the downside is you have to use a slot in the patch and you're left with (up to) 3 regular effects that you can toggle off and on. Might not work for all situations, but I think it's an often overlooked or misunderstood "effect".

 

[Teijo K.]

Just updated my ms60b. How did I miss this? It actually brought all the stuff from the B3 I missed in the 60B.

 

[Ricky Caboverde]

Hey @Ricky Caboverde ,
I would love to see your dirt and comp presets if you get a chance?
And not to derail the thread but did you see that @TonyP- posted about an update for the Plex in late May?
Also can you use the MS with headphones?
Best wishes,
Brent

Sure thing bro; as soon as I get home tonight, I'll post them. I'm always interested to see how other TBers are creating OD and fuzz patches. I've read that the MS pedals have enough power to push low impedance headphones, though I've never tried it...either way, I doubt it would be that great of an experience. The best option I see right now for headphone amps is the Shift Line CabZone (<$80 w/o case). As far as I know, it's the same HP amp that's in the Olympic preamp, in which case it's a very good amp. And thanks for the head-up on the Plex update! I'll be keeping an eye on the thread

 

[BrentSimons]

Sure thing bro; as soon as I get home tonight, I'll post them. I'm always interested to see how other TBers are creating OD and fuzz patches. I've read that the MS pedals have enough power to push low impedance headphones, though I've never tried it...either way, I doubt it would be that great of an experience. The best option I see right now for headphone amps is the Shift Line CabZone (<$80 w/o case). As far as I know, it's the same HP amp that's in the Olympic preamp, in which case it's a very good amp. And thanks for the head-up on the Plex update! I'll be keeping an eye on the thread

Thanks @Ricky Caboverde ,
I would most likely run the MS into my Plex so that should be fine for practicing. If not I do have a small mixer I can go into. Yeah I'm excited to see what GK has planned for us!
Take care,
Brent

 

[jacoby75]

View attachment 3395330

That's a fantastic compact setup.

 

[bassbrad]

Update: I had some time to fiddle with the Zoom last night with headphones. The OrangeLim really does sound great as far as the punch and sustain it adds. But I realized that with my passive jazz it also dramatically increases the string noise and 60-cycle hum when I dial down one of the pickups. Not good. I noticed that a little in church Sunday as well, but it sounded so good and punchy I didn't really care. It was slightly less noticeable playing through an amp, but it was way more pronounced direct. I tried using the noise gate and ZNR earlier in the chain to cut out the hum, but setting them high enough to negate the hum also had adverse effects on notes, like cutting them off too soon, or taking a split-second for a note to kick in after played. I don't know how to dial in that kind of punch with a regular compressor. I landed on the new "Gray Comp," set to about 30-40 for compression and unity gain. I'm digging it. Still better than the Spectracomp, IMO. But now that I'm not using some of my other gain-sensitive pedals, I can finally try some of the artist toneprints on the Spectracomp (which have a tendency to boost output level and would make my other pedals fart out) and see if those sound any better than the on-board Zoom ones.

FWIW the Ross Grey Comp was my comp of choice back in the day on bass and gtr when everyone else was using the Orange (which I admit much love for ) and the MXR Dyna Comp. In fact for a while I had a full board of Ross effects plus a few effects from EHX because Ross did not make envelope followers, why - well that is a different story all together.

 

[jacoby75]

FWIW the Ross Grey Comp was my comp of choice back in the day on bass and gtr when everyone else was using the Orange (which I admit much love for ) and the MXR Dyna Comp. In fact for a while I had a full board of Ross effects plus a few effects from EHX because Ross did not make envelope followers, why - well that is a different story all together.

Good to know. I feel like I'm "settling" for the Ross. A little guilty because I so loved the Orange when I first turned it on. But I do like the Ross. I might try to make the Orange work on my p-bass and thunderbird, which won't have the 60-cycle hum issue. I have a feeling it will be killer with those basses.

 

[bassbrad]

Good to know. I feel like I'm "settling" for the Ross. A little guilty because I so loved the Orange when I first turned it on. But I do like the Ross. I might try to make the Orange work on my p-bass and thunderbird, which won't have the 60-cycle hum issue. I have a feeling it will be killer with those basses.

Those old Ross Comps and effects have a strong following and good vintage value so no shame there, in fact becuase of the interest in the old comp pedals there was a recent attempt to bring back the company, I am not sure how that turned out.

Trey Anastasio (phish) is a Ross comp user

ross compressor - Google Search