Friend of mine provided me with his Mojo Vibe unit so i can finally compare it with my DIY Neovibe. For purpose of blind testing i am gonna call the units Bodie and Doyle. All the clips were recorded under the same conditions within about 15 minutes. Both units were set to the maximum intensity, maximum volume and the same speed (the speed pots do not work the same so mine is at about 2 o'clock and MV is about 11 o'clock).
1. clean -> Bodie -> Doyle (Danelectro DC59) http://www.hoho.cz/public/both.mp3 (http://www.hoho.cz/public/both.mp3)
2. guitar picking - Bodie (Strat) http://www.hoho.cz/public/1-1.mp3 (http://www.hoho.cz/public/1-1.mp3)
3. guitar picking - Doye (Strat) http://www.hoho.cz/public/1-2.mp3 (http://www.hoho.cz/public/1-2.mp3)
4. chords - Bodie (Strat) http://www.hoho.cz/public/2-1.mp3 (http://www.hoho.cz/public/2-1.mp3)
5. chords - Doyle (Strat) http://www.hoho.cz/public/2-2.mp3 (http://www.hoho.cz/public/2-2.mp3)
an now you can guess which one is which - yes they DO differ ...
I only listened to the two guitar picking mp3's and I reckon the 1.1, which would be Doyle, is alot crisper and clearer, a stand out. I hope it was your DIY that was Doyle.
I like 1.1 and 2.1 better. Twice Bodie it is.
And if I may guess... it does sound like my neovibe... so Bodie=Neovibe.
I honestly like the Doyle clips better because of the less clarity. It's darker, and for , me, that works.
Now, if I had heard some clips with some gain on them, I might have preferred the other. I'd say that Bodie would cut through the dist. better...
Have any dist, fuzz, or overdrive clips?
1-2 seems better than 1-1 for me
To me, DOYLE sounds best! Bodie is too thin and doesnt swirl enough. DOYLE sounds to me like a true univibe.
darn friggin computer wont let me listen to them.
Doyle has deeper more resonant sounding sweep.
In the picking clip it's almost like a phaser type sound with the "wee-you" swoosh.
I liked the Bodie more on the picking sections.
Both sound good though.
With a more complex setting with other instruments Bodie would cut through more possibly.
With a different cap arrangement I'm sure you could get both type of sounds from a NEOvibe.
There are a few contributors to the sound of these vibes.
No two sound the same and you can alter how they sound by your choise of LDRs, transistors,
and the tolerances in parts used. Not to mention trim pot settings and tweaks here and there.
John
Bodie sounds brighter, Doyle darker. I suppose Bodie is the Mojo Vibe :icon_wink:
They sound both very good anyway. It would be interesting to hear clips without reverb and some bluesy distortion, playing some solos. i would go for the brighter sound honestly, but maybe you can tweak something on the neovibe to make it sound less dark. I don't hear any hum issue from both clips, wich is amazing, this means the neovibe is dead quiet!
I'm down with the Doyle, and I'm in agreement with most of the folks here.
The Doyle has a darker sound. Both sounds are decent, it would just be a personal preference to me.
Hope Doyle is yours =)
I think it would be interesting to test two of each and do the same kind of voting. :icon_eek:
:icon_biggrin:
Bodie= Univibe
Doyle= MojoVibe
My guess..... ;D
i love to be the devil's advocate..... :icon_twisted:
bent
Doyle sounds more like my neo with those settings.
Yes
The Bodie is way subtle. I would guess the Doyle is the Mojovibe. I've built a neovibe and have heard my friends Mojovibe...
--Brad
People thank you for your participation, it is really a reward. Both guys, Bodie and Doyle are clones indeed - since not many of us had a chance to play a real unit we've got just certain expectations about the sound mainly because of the hourly listening of our favourite "Vibe" albums (Hendrix, Floyds' Dark Side ..). I always dreamed of the Gilmour's sound that was recorded on bootlegs of early Dark Side performances (The Best Of Tour 72 - you may know it, you may not). It is interesting to see that both units - anyhow different they are - have their supporters. Yes, Bodie is brighter and less prominent in phasing, Doyle is darker and wobblier in phasing. I'll reveal their real names tomorrow, please go on with your opinions.
Ah yes, Yeeshkul!! That's where I've seen that name before..... it's a Pink Floyd bootleg album title (recorded live in Canada 1972?)!! Somebody in the audience yells what sounds like that bizarre word, ha. I've got it in the collection here somewhere.
Well, I'm guessing "Bodie" is the Mojo. Maybe it's brighter because of a possible buffered input and the Neo Vibe is without one? My Neo Vibe build has a thick midrange hump to it and really smooths out the tone of my bright sounding Fender Vibrolux, a great match.
Haha, guess my nick has been revealed :) (Toronto 73)
I opened Mojo yesterday - the buffer's off
we do get gutshots from both, right?
I'm kind of surprised by the responses. To me the Bodie sounds deeper. The Doyle thin. Maybe my headphones play a (too) big role here.
I am not gonna put gutshots of Mojo here, i can't do it and i don't wanna do it .... and ... er ... Doyle is definitely deeper and less clear :)
Ok, I was listening to just one half of the stereo-image (yeah... on can of my headphone doesn't work). I've set output to mono (so I hear both sides) and have to say that indeed Doyle is 'darker' and in my opinion 'sweeter' . Doyle is my vibe of choice.
Great comparisons!
Both sound good to me.
I find that Bodie has more of an "on/off" ( like amp vibrato) effect in conjunction with the phasing. I wonder how that is accomplished?
The Doyle sounds very thick & swirly.
Steve
I preferred Doyle. So which ones were they??? :P
Quote from: R.G. on October 20, 2008, 09:33:30 PM
I think it would be interesting to test two of each and do the same kind of voting. :icon_eek:
:icon_biggrin:
if I understand the point here, it would be interesting to find if the perceived audio sample difference is unit to unit variance (as would be found in Shin-ei/Univox originals) or the cloner (DIYer or commercial) found some set of parameters that was found to be more subjectively pleasing.
also, I found this clip of what is supposed to be an original, and it sounds like it has more top compared to the clips, plus (the top end) seems nicer, so kind of wondered if the units used for the clips had more highs in person (i.e. some fidelity was lost in the recording ).
(skip to 1:43--when the demo starts) :
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PDrY_eD6biU
The good thing about the Mojo is that it colours your tone in a perfect way, adding more attack while picking, it sounds brighter and crispier than any other vibe pedals, that's why every clip with a Mojo sounds terrific, even with a crappy microphone, hear this on youtube for example.
http://uk.youtube.com/results?search_query=mojo+vibe&search_type=
But if you record some clips with some reverb and without any bluesy distortion you wouldn't find any difference between the Neovibe and the Mojo. I wish at GGG there was a Mojo Vibe project, especially now that they are hard to find.
all right, here are the true identities of Bodie and Doyle :)
BODIE
(http://www.hoho.cz/public/bodie.jpg)
DOYLE
(http://www.hoho.cz/public/doyle.jpg)
My DIY Neo-Vibe clone with no mods at all, cheapo photocells and as you can see ... i forgot to put the shield on the bulb, hahaha
There is FF and RM in the box as well.
Seems like the NEO wins but unit to unit variance is still an issue.
Thanks for the suspense yeeshkul :icon_wink:
john
Lovely ;D
To be honest i was really happy when i first compared MV with my unit. I enjoy that deep phasing ... actually when i was working on it i bothered quite a few people here with "how to improve the depth ...?". So again thanks to R.G., SteveB and Brad (RedHouse) :) for patience.
I recorded some FF->NV/MV(no more Bodie and Doyle) today and will add them soon. The results were very similar to the previous ones - MJ works better with distortion, the sound is clear especially on bass strings. NV is juicier and warmer, however distorted MV sounds better to my ears.
The last thing - when i listened carefully to the MV, i could hear a bit of the other sound - the "funny chorus" in the phasing. More than in case of NV, where there is none of it. You know what i mean - it was called vibrato on the original box i guess ...