Rack mount effects

Maccattack

How do you guys feel about rack mounted effects over floor based?

I have some rack gear that is gathering dust. I think the quality of them is in some cases better than the pedals I have.

Im not sure how i feel about lugging it all around though. Id have to buy a road case for them.

I dont mind spending money on gear but strangely dont like spending money on cases.

The down side to rack gear as i see it is that you cant stomp on a switch to activate them. unless you buy a footswitch of course.

Opinions please...

SirLemonhead

Yeah, the annoying thing about MIDI controlled effects units is that each individual effect doesnt have its own "off/on" button.

I've got a couple of pedals i'm going to run through a Rocktron Patchmate. Basically a MIDI controlled looper where I can add or remove pedals from the signal chain using a midi controller. Leave the pedals on all the time and use the Patchmate to put them in or out of the signal as you please.

Not sure if there's any midi controlled loopers or effects units where you can assign a MIDI button as being an on/off switch...

What rack gear do you have, out of curiosity?

Maccattack

I have:

a zoom GFX100 multi effects
a Yamaha R100 reverb
an old Digitech delay
an old boss micro series flanger
a boss EH enhancer
a boss NR noise gate
a Behringer bass enhancer
a Behringer compressor

think thats about it.

jcoote

**** if your ever selling any of em let me know!!!

i have a tc electronics g-major and i really like it...but u are kinda seperated from your effects in a live situation as on the fly changes are tougher

so u have to spend a lot of time tweaking at home..but the quality and richness of the effects make up for this... i dunno which i'd choose now a g-major or anther setup eg boss gt-8

SirLemonhead

Yeah, i'd be interested in the Boss EH-2 if you ever wanted to part with it.

feylya

This ain't the FS board lads.

Is it just me or is it usually bassists who take up rack units first?

Eoin Madsen

Just be aware that most rack units are designed for line level signals, so effects loop would be a better place to insert than in front of the amp.

jcoote

yeah i've noticed a big difference in plugging the gmajor into the input rather than the loop...effects sound different and the volume pedal acts funny...any idea why that is???

disgruntled

MasterOfSolos wrote:

Yeah, i'd be interested in the Boss EH-2 if you ever wanted to part with it.

I'm guessing but if it's rack mounted it's most likely an EH-50. I actually have one myself, its basically a half rack stereo version of the pedal. I got mine on Ebay for not much money, so it might keeping an eye out there if you are intrested.

Maccattack

disgruntled wrote:

I'm guessing but if it's rack mounted it's most likely an EH-50. I actually have one myself, its basically a half rack stereo version of the pedal.

Yes I think thats the one. Ive never really used it despite owining it for years.

What do you think of it? Is it good?

Eoin Madsen

jcoote wrote:

yeah i've noticed a big difference in plugging the gmajor into the input rather than the loop...effects sound different and the volume pedal acts funny...any idea why that is???

Eh... because it's probably designed for line level signals not guitar signals.

Higher signal power, different signal impedance. Effects loop is usually after the preamp. From a gain structure point of view it's a better place to put processing.