Zoom Owners' Club!

[stingray69]

Even though I'm happy with the B2-Four, I decided to get an MS-70CDR+ as well. At that price, it was kind of hard to pass up. The MS+ will be a bit easier to use, if I just pop some AA's in and use on short/casual gigs. I think I can deal with the way they've designed the buttons.

I see the MS-70... has a "mono synth" and "Z organ". Where the B2-Four instead has Z-Synth, Bass Synth, and BassTalk Synth.

Nothing wrong with adjusting to a product better suited for your needs. I'm in the same boat - I reverted back to my B1 Four after tiring of the rather large footprint of the B6. The B6 was wonderful, but some became too bulky for my tastes to be lugging to practices & gigs after some time with it. I thought I could get used to it, but alas...

The B2 Four will be a nice addition as the footprint is much better suited (for me), and will give me back the extra preamps, etc, that the B6 had in it.

 

[KPJ]

I think the B6 does have a large footprint for what it is. I liked it but decided to go with a Boss ME90B instead, which is slightly smaller but has more available, particularly the expression pedal. Really the only thing the B6 has over the ME90B is the looper. I have my MS60B+ on my small pedal board and I can use it for most of what I want on the majority of gigs. I still have my old MS60B and will pair it with the + if I want more flexibility in accessing effects.

 

[stingray69]

Played a first gig with my "new-to-me" B2 Four - it was awesome - an absolute keeper! Reminded me very much of my B6, only in a much more convenient sized package. It even fits with room to spare in my gig bag's main accessory pouch - to me, that's a huge bonus!

It sounded killer & the gig went great! IME, if I'm sounding good, the gig always goes good & the B2 Four was sounding good!

One thing that surprised me (even though my gig patches don't usually contain amp sims) was that initially, I was put off by the idea of having the amp sims permanently attached/married to their corresponding cab sims. In practice, all the amp/cab sim combos sounded very good to my ears. So that was a pleasant surprise, that may come in handy for some recording. Anyway, I think it's time to safely retire my B1 Four(s), permanently, I think.

 

[stubbsonic]

After taking the MS-70CDR+ for a spin, it helped me to appreciate the strengths of the B2-Four.

One sort of big question for the hive mind. There is some ambiguity about the preservation of stereo in the signal path. Which effects have a stereo output, and which ones have a stereo dry-thru (for the MS+ series), which sum the input to mono but have a stereo output.

Zoom is so ambiguous about this in their docs & fx list.

With the B2-Four, for example, you can build a glorious stereo effect chain, then turn on the DI and now EVERYTHING is mono.

 

[DuluthDank]

I play bass and guitar, and am wondering what would work better: guitar with the B2 Four, or bass on the G2 Four. i'm looking at buying one and making the best of it. The benefit of the guitar version is it seems to be cheaper on the used market these days...

 

[stubbsonic]

I play bass and guitar, and am wondering what would work better: guitar with the B2 Four, or bass on the G2 Four.

Sorry I don't have an answer to your question, but just want to point out that this is another reason why it would be useful for zoom (and or hackers) to find a way to customize the included modules.

 

[DuluthDank]

Sorry I don't have an answer to your question, but just want to point out that this is another reason why it would be useful for zoom (and or hackers) to find a way to customize the included modules.

True...the more I think about it I'm leaning towards the Line6 Helix. I'd really like to download whichever bass or guitar effects I want on the Zoom. It seems kind of old fashioned to have separate bass and guitar units these days.

 

[bassbrad]

I play bass and guitar, and am wondering what would work better: guitar with the B2 Four, or bass on the G2 Four. i'm looking at buying one and making the best of it. The benefit of the guitar version is it seems to be cheaper on the used market these days...

It would depend on which way you are willing to compromise, I would rather make guitar sounds with bass voiced amp/effects instead of bass with guitar voiced amp/efx. Like it or not but the Zoom engineers design bass and guitar feature sets and control options specific for guitar or bass, there is a good bit of trade off as the sonic needs for each instrument are quite different. Some effects translate well either way but not that many, I tend to prefer the bass version of providing mix options that are not as needful for guitar. The major trade off will be in the amp/speaker choices as well as the choice of distortion choices and control sets.

FWIW I am still using an older G1x for lots of guitar tones and when I need something more recent then I will use a CDR or CDR+

 

[GotGroove]

I play bass and guitar, and am wondering what would work better: guitar with the B2 Four, or bass on the G2 Four. i'm looking at buying one and making the best of it. The benefit of the guitar version is it seems to be cheaper on the used market these days...

I guess it depends on what you're looking for in both.
If it's the guitar that uses the most effects, I'd take the G. It has a few bass amps which will probably do in the mix, even if it's not the one you might favor. Many effects are available on both and have a mix setting, so they aren't completely unusable on bass.

If it's the bass that'll get the most effects, get the B. You may have to play with the EQ and drives to get a better guitar tone though.

True...the more I think about it I'm leaning towards the Line6 Helix.

That would works as an all-in-one solution unless you need synth tones. The Helix doesn't have any synths. You'll have to play with octavers/filters and whatnot to get that 'synthy' feel. It's also quite a bit more expensive than a B(G)1-four. You could get both the G1-4 and B1-4 and still have money left. But the choice is yours.

 

[Wfrance3]

I'm considering replacing my B2-Four with the Zoom CDR-70+

Sorry to be a month late to the party on this one. I go back and forth. I am currently rocking an MS70 CDR+ with a Solid GoldFX Beta-V Bass Preamp. So, I for sure support your comment about having a wider range of options!
My goal is to have a small board that has more than I could possibly ever want and be done gear chasing. I think this little combo might be it. We will see...

 

[bassbrad]

I have a new cross era jazz thing and after putting together several iterations of a pedal board decided to keep it simple and just used my much tweaked B2.1u as a all in one solution. After over a decade and a half of tweaking this just has the sounds that both inspire and identify my style. I start with a patch of their version of a Bassman for general warm tone with a touch of room reverb for air. After that I add effects as needed from chorus, flanger, octave up, 2 octave up, Octaver and a couple of envelope follower synth-ish sounds some have different reverb or added delay others not. This set up has covered my range of gigs from blues, rock, C&W, fusion and jazz. If it sounds good why not?

 

[Rocket Queen]

Help! I've recently acquired a B1 Four, and am entirely new to the Zoom multi-fx UI. I've been through the Operation Manual several times, with particular attention paid to the Edit Mode section. I may just be dim, but I don't see how you actually add new effects to, or delete existing effects from, a given selected patch. What am I missing? Or do you actually need the Guitar Lab software to do this? Thanks in advance for any tips or hints.

 

[stubbsonic]

I don't have a B1 Four, but I have owned other Zoom FX.

First, go into EDIT MODE by pressing that button to the left of the screen until you see the individual module with 4 parameters shown on the screen.

From there, press on any of the 5 buttons to select/view the specific slot you want to edit/change. Might be worthwhile to go through pressing each of them, just to see what FX module is in each of the five slots. From the currently selected slot, if you press the numbered button (again), it will toggle the FX module between on & bypassed.

Now, from that screen, if you press the larger UP/DOWN footswitches, that will change the current FX module to a different FX module; going up or down the big list. This can take a while as the list is long. But you should still do this (at least once) just to view the full list of FX-- and familiarize yourself with what's there, and the order in which they appear.

Next, is the all-important shortcut of using the CATEGORIES function. This will jump you quickly to a specific part of the big list. From where you are in EDIT MODE; PRESS-AND-HOLD the right/UP footswitch. KEEP HOLDING IT DOWN. Now press the left/DOWN button once, and you will see a CATEGORY of FX show up on the screen. I don't mean to nag, but keep holding down that right button. Press the left/DOWN button again (and again) until you see the desired category of FX module.. NOW you can release the right/UP button. You'll now be "jumped" to that category in the list. From there, use the UP/DOWN buttons as above to find the specific module you want.

Changing the chain order follows the procedure shown on page 22.

Hope this helps. Please report back if that instruction helped. Or if you're still stuck.

 

[SteveCS]

Help! I've recently acquired a B1 Four, and am entirely new to the Zoom multi-fx UI. I've been through the Operation Manual several times, with particular attention paid to the Edit Mode section. I may just be dim, but I don't see how you actually add new effects to, or delete existing effects from, a given selected patch. What am I missing? Or do you actually need the Guitar Lab software to do this? Thanks in advance for any tips or hints.

It looks like all 5 slots always have something assigned to them. Any slot can be any effect - you can even have more than one instance of the same. If you scan through the effect types using the footswitches you might come across something called 'THRU', which is a blank unit. So to 'Delete' an effect from a patch just assign the effect type 'THRU' to a slot. After that, adding an effect to a chain/patch is simply a case of reassigning to something other than 'THRU'. If there is no 'THRU' effect, just put anything in a slot then turn it 'Off'. Adding to the chain/patch is then just a case of assigning the desired effect to the slot and turning it back 'On'.

 

[stubbsonic]

If you scan through the effect types using the footswitches you might come across something called 'THRU', which is a blank unit. So to 'Delete' an effect from a patch just assign the effect type 'THRU' to a slot. After that, adding an effect to a chain/patch is simply a case of reassigning to something other than 'THRU'. If there is no 'THRU' effect, just put anything in a slot then turn it 'Off'. Adding to the chain/patch is then just a case of assigning the desired effect to the slot and turning it back 'On'.

Thanks for bringing that up! I think using THRU is best because otherwise, even if the slot/module is bypassed, I think it will still take up CPU-- which might limit choices when choosing modules for other slots.

 

[Rocket Queen]

@stubbsonic and @SteveCS, thanks a lot. Both of your contributions were very helpful. I finally got to play around with the unit last night. On the B1 Four, every "empty" effect slot is actually assigned to a bogus "effect" named "BYPASS," and this "effect" is also a Category of its own, just beyond the last real effect category ("REVERB'). So, as you both indicated, adding or deleting an effect is really just a matter of reassignment in one direction or the other.

The Operation Manual makes absolutely no mention of this. I guess Zoom figures that you'll just discover it on your own.

 

[stubbsonic]

The Operation Manual makes absolutely no mention of this. I guess Zoom figures that you'll just discover it on your own.

Yea, it's kind of dumb that it isn't listed in the effect list, or in the general manual. As you say, it is a pretty essential piece of information.

I also think "Bypass" is a sort of misleading name for it-- THRU is better. Does it show the graphic of a horizontal piece of cable?

 

[Rocket Queen]

I also think "Bypass" is a sort of misleading name for it-- THRU is better. Does it show the graphic of a horizontal piece of cable?

Yes. It's not identifiable as cable, just a horizontal bar.

 

[stubbsonic]

You can tell by the subtle use of shading and texture in that graphic.

 

[Rocket Queen]

You can tell by the subtle use of shading and texture in that graphic.

Mmm, OK. It's a dotted horizontal bar. Maybe I need to upgrade to the B2 to get the full effect (no pun intended)...