I think this chorus is very clean and transparent sounding. It is not noisy and does the job perfectly. It is basically the same circuit as a CE-2 which is one of the best chorus pedals around as the reviews here show. I found these two schematics on the web and the CE-2B just seems to have an added Effect Level control and the rest is the same:
http://www.generalguitargadgets.com/boss/BossCE-2B.gifhttp://www.generalguitargadgets.com/boss/BossCE-2.gif
Turning back the effect level seems to let more of the unaffected signal through - I think this is how you can blend plenty of straight bass with the effected sound and get plenty of fundamental solid bass through.
Whatever - it is a totally top notch analog chorus sound. I like to use it on a slow setting, with the effect level and depth wound back so the whole thing is a subtle fattening of the tone - you can't put your finger on it and call it chorus when you hear it set like this but it does transform the guitar sound in an interesting way.
It will go fairly deep too, but dimed chorus is firmly stuck in the 80's for me.
Reliability/Durability:
This is a Japanese pedal, 20+ years old and good for another 20 easy.
Ease of Use:
This is easy to use. With most properly designed pedals, setting all the knobs as 12 oclock is a good starting point - this one is no exception and set that way is a great chorus sound.
Having both effect level and depth as two separate controls is perhaps a bit confusing but you soon get the hang of it.
This pedal is equally suited to bass and guitar. It has everything that the CE-2 has plus and effect level control to blend direct and effect together - so no reason why it is bass-guitar specific at all!
The only problem I have had with it is using an external 9V supply the juice is not enough to light the LED (still sounds OK) - this is a problem with early Japan Boss pedals, they dropped the voltage on the DC input with a resistor so it works fine on a 9V battery but may be tricky on 9V external input. As I said it works OK sound wise but with a very dim led. There is a mod you can do to remove the led I think - or use a 12V PSU.
Customer Support:
Overall Rating:
A bargain - Japan CE-2 pedals sell for big bucks these days - this is basically the same thing with an extra knob to blend the effect and I got it cheap.
Its a great analog chorus pedal - I recommend it.
