Bass + octave pedals = disapointment

[niftydog]

MXR Bass Octave sucks, I was quite disapointed.  Anyone else tried this?

I was expecting something better than a Boss octave, but I got something WORSE!  Two knobs - dry and octave, LED and switch.  DC jack input, 4 screws to get at the battery.

Doesn't track very well at all, and quite variable depending on the pickup selected.  Tried two basses, one was H-J, the other J-J... didn't like the double coils.

Totally died at about low B or A, and that's about as good as I get with my Boss, but the boss is far more stable on long notes.  All this from a pedal designed for bass!  (least, that's the impression I got from the name!)


EH Octave Multiplexer was better, much better... but still nothing too spectacular.  Had a cool switch that seemed to add square wave to the signal, phat and flabby sound... wish I could have turned up the amp!

Filter knobs for high and low pass and a blend control.  No LED. Switch, DC jack in and only 1 screw to open the battery hatch.

Big though, real big compared to the MXR!

I found the square wave sound never really went away, you always got some distortion with the octave, not as clean as the boss or the MXR.  Supposedly does multiple notes, but couldn't get much musical out of simple chords.  Even a fifth up at the twelth fret was an aquired taste!

It'd be great for guitar, but no improvements for bass players I'm afraid!



Anyone heard of / tried the EBS octabass?

[Mike Burgundy]

it's very, very hard to get an octave down to track well anywhere below a guitar's low E.
Never seen anything that'll track a low B on bass (which has a fundamental you can't hear at volume anyway - 31Hz).
I have heard the octave on an SPX90 effect module is quite good, but I've never tried it that low.
I think the Rocktave is probably the best tracker, but it doesn't go that low either.
hih

[loki]

I know about an effect from Akai called "Deep Impact"....
it's basically a bass synth pedal, and it's digital so it has 9 editable presets...
I've read that one of these presets, no 6 i guess, if edited with all values around 1, provides the best bass clean octave down effect...
I've never tried it, just heard it once 'cause i saw a bassist using it, don't know how it was setted though... but I've read enthusiastic reviews about it....
I'm planning to buy it soon.... on ebay they show up sometimes for 69 UK pounds