OC-2 Octave

First off, this pedal was given to me by a guy in my office for nothing, so I think I'll have a pretty un-biased opinion about it.  Mine is a Japanese 'Octaver' version of this pedal built in 1983. Here's my setup for those keeping score: 2007 Gibson Les Paul Standard (stock) > Dunlop GCB-95 > Boss OC-2 > Boss MD-2 > Boss BD-2 > Boss CE-3 > Line 6 Echo Park > Traynor YCS-100H > Traynor Y-212.  The CE-3 and the Echo Park are on the Traynor's effects loop. Ok, everything you've read about this pedal from every review on this page is true.  It's pretty much useless from the 8th fret down, chords sound my dog after I fed him too much fat off a steak from last week (hint: it wasn't a good sound).  That said, when you do figure out what this thing can do, you can get some real interesting sounds out of it.  As others have mentioned, this is an analog pedal therefore behaves very differently then it's digital brothers.  My personal favorite use for this thing is to turn all the volumes to full, and turn on my MD-2 and my BD-2 and use it to cut a really odd sounding lead high up on the neck.  It creates this heavily overdriven howl effect that really doesn't sound like anything else.  Guys in my band have said "We've gotta find a place for that". It's a bit of a weird beast, because it's very limited in what it can do, but if you know what you're getting into I suppose this is what you'd want. 

Boss es bueno

Pretty simple, the three knobs are volumes.  Direct Level is your dry signal, OCT 1 is down one octave, OCT 2 is down two octaves.  Just load and go.

Do they even need this?

I'm a blues-rock-metal dude, this pedal was dropped in my lap one day and to date is still on my board, although it doesn't get used all that often.  If I lost it, I probably wouldn't replace it, but for now it's a fun toy to pull out every so often just to get people to give you the "What the F*ck was that?" look.

This is an update from my last review. I have found two ways to use this that sound amazing. First, dime all the knobs in front of an overdrive. Second, dime the direct signal, and put the octaves both straight up, and put the pedal in front of a ring modulator. Last, the overdrive.

Well I wont say my chain of effects hahaa but i will say use it after a decent 'vintage' compressor. May not comply with toppy effects units. I use dist and overdrive after this pedal took me a while to set all three but sounds excellent!

Depends on the gig...

Boss oc-2 Octaver You have to mess round' wit this thing to get your sound and levels right. When u got it yo got it! its not the easiest pedal to use on my board but was well worth changing the chain around a bit to make this pedal fit, I use it after my compressor for guitar and no compressor for bass and yes it does work well with bass to no need for a seperate bass input....

Get your hands on the original Octaver i've heard they are better than the Octave's dont kno wether thats true try before you buy to see if u like the effect.