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Taking Recommendations on Rack Multi-effects Unit


selfinflikted

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What multi-effects unit do you guys use? I'm thinking of getting myself a Christmas present this year to the tune of a new rack unit for reverbs, chorus, flanger, tremolo, etc etc. What do you guys use and recommend? I also may be in the market for a vocal effects processor too, just as an aside. So, gimme recommendations please! smile.gif

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Lots of good stuff from the 90s is cheap now. My personal favorite is the Digitech TSR-24, in which you can program the effects in a very modular way. Plus the chorus is just divine, the gigaverb is really good, etc. Plus you can easily get it for like 75 bucks so you'll have room for another effects unit to add to it smile.gif

Other favorites from the 90s include:
. Roland SRV330 (I have the SRV3030 which is excellent and a steal, but the SRV330 is the one the collectors go for)
. Ensoniq DP4+
. Kurzweil Rumour (this one I think is from the 2000s but is equally an excellent deal)
. Yamaha and Lexicon have a ton of good stuff, and Boss too, though I think the Boss stuff is a bit overpriced for what it is - a budget version of the Roland units that sell for cheaper.

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I have a Kurzweil KSP8. It's total overkill for my needs. It'll handle 4 independent stereo channels and you can spread the DSP love however you want over those, or concentrate it all on one channel, or whatever. All manner of DSP effects available, you can chain them together however you like, and it even allows you to perform some modular-like processing via FUNS and such. Effects parameters are tweakable via MIDI.

I've got mine loaded with the ADAT I/O board and linked to my Fireface... I can setup 4 effects buses in Sonar, route them to KSP8 and back and have world-class effects without ever putting a dent in my CPU.

Total overkill. icon_lol.gif

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Oh! Lots of lovely suggestions! I did forget to mention that my budget is going to be around $500.00. So that probably rules out the Eventide (man, don't those things have GREAT verbs?!).

I was REALLY thinking about getting the newest POD HD, because I have an older POD and I just bet the new one kicks ass. Aside from that, there are a couple of Lexicon "MX" series racks I've been pondering. Anyone have any experience with those?

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Quote Originally Posted by ElectricPuppy

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Aaaaand I have the MX200. icon_lol.gif Now it's used exclusively to process my Chroma Polaris. REALLY easy to use, has a pair of processors you can chain together or run parallel, effects have very simple controls. Nice effects for cheap.

 

But does it SOUND cheap? :p I ask because I'm getting really sick of my software effects that came built in to Cubase 5. EVERY single reverb sounds like an echo inside a very large tin can. I'm really trying to get away from such metallic-sounding 'verbs.
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Quote Originally Posted by selfinflikted View Post
But does it SOUND cheap? :p I ask because I'm getting really sick of my software effects that came built in to Cubase 5. EVERY single reverb sounds like an echo inside a very large tin can. I'm really trying to get away from such metallic-sounding 'verbs.
Do yourself a favour and demo Valhalla Shimmer, Valhalla Room and Valhalla Uber Mod and test them out is Cubase - to give you and idea of how Shimmer and Room Sound they are the only two reverbs I used in this remix I did for Stereospread last month.
Really great sound reverb tools I must say.

http://soundcloud.com/venndiagram/st...ad-all-my-life


Excuse the soundcloud MP3 codec but it still gives you a good idea of the reverb quality IMHO.


I used to use a DP2, SE70, SE50 & Behringer V-Verb Pro (now discontinued but stupidly good hardware reverb for the money) until getting these 3 VST/AU's.
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Quote Originally Posted by U&I View Post
Do yourself a favour and demo Valhalla Shimmer, Valhalla Room and Valhalla Uber Mod and test them out is Cubase - to give you and idea of how Shimmer and Room Sound they are the only two reverbs I used in this remix I did for Stereospread last month.
Really great sound reverb tools I must say.

http://soundcloud.com/venndiagram/st...ad-all-my-life


Excuse the soundcloud MP3 codec but it still gives you a good idea of the reverb quality IMHO.


I used to use a DP2, SE70, SE50 & Behringer V-Verb Pro (now discontinued but stupidly good hardware reverb for the money) until getting these 3 VST/AU's.
Two votes for Valhalla now. Hm. There must be something to it...

(I can't listen to the track at work, they have most of the intarwebz blocked because, basically, they hate me)
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Will definitely look into it. I just hate the notion of having to fire up the PC when I want to noodle. Besides that, I'm not even sure it's an issue any more with how powerful 'puters have become, but I remember back in the early days of DAWs most people saved as much processing power as possible by using outboard effects and such so as not to eat up the CPU. Does that even factor in nowadays?

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Quote Originally Posted by ChristianRock

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It depends on your computer smile.gif Nowadays, I'd say most people use hardware for its flavor, unless you have a really old computer. Freezing tracks usually saves you enough processing.

 

Not a particularly old computer, it's a 3gHz dual with 4gb ram plus a crappy EMU soundcard. I've never run into any processing issues though, even with lots and lots of tracks all running various software effects. Keep in mind it's just a project studio that I use to write and record stuff just for my own pleasure, so none of the components have to be top of the line, or anywhere close really. I'm just getting tired of all my recordings sounding like they were recorded in a culvert somewhere. Hell, it could just be the crappy soundcard, I dunno. But I do know I want something new, and I don't have a hardware multi-effects processor except for my guitar POD. So, I want one biggrin.gif
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After PCI, Firewire is the next best thing with the lowest latency.

I expect thunderbolt interfaces or interfaces with thunderbolt option like the UA Apollo to become more and more common. It's the firewire substitute.

Quote Originally Posted by ElectricPuppy View Post
Firewire is also a dying breed, it seems. frown.gif There's no such thing as "future-proof".

In the meantime, I shall firewire until it dies.
Hear, hear!
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