Would I REALLY benefit from a Maxon OD808 in front?

[jdurso]

Thanks for all the info guys...now I'm not sure what I'm going to try. I deally I would swtich my pups inboth guitars to the blackouts as I have had them before and really like them a lot...BUT they are no Alnico either when it comes to dynamics of the tone that I like playing with mostely. They are awesome but a one trick pony.
I almost ordered a OCD last night but then thought I should look at one of my local sjhops to see what used stuff they have. I may get lucky on a Maxon or Fulltone.

By chance if anyone is interested I have a bunch of stuff for sale in the Classifieds...if there is something you like and you have a OD808 or a OCD you want to trade just let me know.
http://forum.grailtone.com/viewtopic.php?f=18&t=36343

Another reason I really want to try one of these out on my rig is that I have cheap Ibanez that I set up with the ZW GHS Boomers.."13's"...We now can cover all of the Chevelle tunes my band hasd been wanting to do..but I'm affraid that it will be way too lose on the bottom...we'll see.

In my experience there is more ebnefits to using a low to medium output passive pickup that the super hot active pickups or even the super hot passive pickups. Chris McKinely will be the first to tell you, the benefits from the medium to low output pickups is there is a lot more character there and i have found that to be true. The pickup no being overly compressed gives you more breathing room in terms of your tone... and to compensate for the lower output when compared to actives or higher output passives, you can use a boost or OD. By doing it that way you keep the character and dynamics of the pickup while getting the signal strength you need to push the preamp tubes into amore compressed state. In the end you get the same signal strength but with the character and dynamics of your pickups.

Now I myself have relatively hot pups in my PRS (Suhr Aldrich) but i still find them to have tons of character. By boosting my signal with the OCD or other clean boosts, I get some of the best tones I have ever achieved. This is something my ESP with EMGs can't touch even though with the ESP i really dont need the boost (especially sicne the EMGs are mid heavy).

So while an active pup can duplicate this effect of signal boosting, I find you get more variety out of your favorite passives with the right boost. In terms of finding the right boost, what i did was tried basically all the ones i could find and i settled on the OCD... BUT the OD808 was a close enough second that i may eventually buy it to use alongw ith the OCD some day... that or the Xotic BB Preamp.

BTW thicker strings should yield a tighter bottom end as long as the tuning isn't too low.

 

[Mark Fore]

I own a Keeley TS-808, Fulltone OCD and a BB-Preamp (sold the KLON a couple weeks ago). Of these three pedals the BB-Pre has the smoothest effect (almost too smooth). The TS-808 I think I liked better pre-mod. The OCD is by far, for my playing style, my favorite. It is a little crunchier than the rest. And if you run it at 18v (per the manual) it sounds even better.

 

[TREC]

What is the difference between the OCD and the maxon? I have a Maxon.

 

[Chris McKinley]

undrcroft,

Sorry you didn't have any luck trying out those pedals. For most, putting something like the Keeley Metal Zone in front of anything but a very clean channel will sound like garbage, where an OD is actually meant to go in front of a dirty amp. Though if you found a workable sound, go for it.

Both the OD-808 and the OCD in front of a Recto will produce a great sound. I'm wondering how you had your pedal and amp set when you tested it out.

Elixir,

RE: "what's this LP/HP mode crap i'm seeing on the fulltone? And damn the fulltone is 160 bucks!!". The LP/HP is a low-pass/high-pass filter that allows you to tailor the pedal to the kind of amp you're using. Marshalls tend to be naturally brighter, so the bass emphasis setting would balance it out, whereas Rectos tend to be bass heavy naturally, so the brighter setting might work better there. As to the price...well, welcome to the world of boutique pedals. They are all generally fairly pricey compared to their stock counterparts.

 

[Elixir]

Elixir,

RE: "what's this LP/HP mode crap i'm seeing on the fulltone? And damn the fulltone is 160 bucks!!". The LP/HP is a low-pass/high-pass filter that allows you to tailor the pedal to the kind of amp you're using. Marshalls tend to be naturally brighter, so the bass emphasis setting would balance it out, whereas Rectos tend to be bass heavy naturally, so the brighter setting might work better there. As to the price...well, welcome to the world of boutique pedals. They are all generally fairly pricey compared to their stock counterparts.

What would you say about the

OCD vs OD808 vs TS9 (keeley modded) ?

 

[Chris McKinley]

Elixir,

RE: "What would you say about the OCD vs OD808 vs TS9 (keeley modded) ?". They're all fine in different ways. The OD808 is a top-shelf version of the classic Tube Screamer. It will give you some nice harmonics, a good supply of the mids that a Recto is missing, and will tighten up the flubby bass. If you don't yet know precisely what you want out of an OD (or even if you do), it's hard to go wrong with this pedal as an OD.

The Keeley-modded TS-9 will give you a similar sound to the OD808, only with a bit more in the middle mids, though the modded version is much less compressed and nasally than the stock unit. Sustain will be fairly easy to achieve, and the harmonics can be rich for solos. The overall character is the smoothest of the three.

The OCD is built off of the most different circuit design, with the goal of being able to do a convincing classic Marshall in a box as well as provide a boutique-quality overdrive. It's got the most transparent and full-range tone of the three, though with a Recto, the bass may still have to be tamed a bit because the pedal has such full bass response. Generally, the tone is open, less compressed and more crunchy, with the best feedback harmonics of the three, though not as much of a mid boost as the others. Of the three, it's also got the most available gain, enough to be used as a stand-alone distortion pedal as well as an OD.

All of them are good enough to make your Recto sound better than it does without an OD, but each does it in a slightly different way.

 

[undrcroft]

undrcroft,

Sorry you didn't have any luck trying out those pedals. For most, putting something like the Keeley Metal Zone in front of anything but a very clean channel will sound like garbage, where an OD is actually meant to go in front of a dirty amp. Though if you found a workable sound, go for it.

Both the OD-808 and the OCD in front of a Recto will produce a great sound. I'm wondering how you had your pedal and amp set when you tested it out.

Well i didn't try the OCD, i tried the Maxon od808, the ibanez tubscreamer, and the BBE sonic max. I basically had my 3 channels at the normal settings that i like most. I tried every possible setting on the pedals, and didn't notice anything favorable over the amp by itself. I was hoping for a thicker, smoother distortion, but they didn't give me anything. Something along the lines of super heavy with the Mids cut out(deftones, 30 seconds to mars) But i got nothing i could use. No think sound, no help with harmonic squeal, no punch, nothing .

 

[Elixir]

undrcroft,

Sorry you didn't have any luck trying out those pedals. For most, putting something like the Keeley Metal Zone in front of anything but a very clean channel will sound like garbage, where an OD is actually meant to go in front of a dirty amp. Though if you found a workable sound, go for it.

Both the OD-808 and the OCD in front of a Recto will produce a great sound. I'm wondering how you had your pedal and amp set when you tested it out.

Well i didn't try the OCD, i tried the Maxon od808, the ibanez tubscreamer, and the BBE sonic max. I basically had my 3 channels at the normal settings that i like most. I tried every possible setting on the pedals, and didn't notice anything favorable over the amp by itself. I was hoping for a thicker, smoother distortion, but they didn't give me anything. Something along the lines of super heavy with the Mids cut out(deftones, 30 seconds to mars) But i got nothing i could use. No think sound, no help with harmonic squeal, no punch, nothing .

You must have done something wrong? I dunno, i've never heard of someone not say they didn't feel a notable difference.

 

[mr_fender]

If you're going for a mid-scooped sound, a tubescreamer is NOT the way to go. They have a pronounced midrange hump. They also have a pretty significant amount of low end rolloff too. That is what causes the "tightening" of the low end of the amp. Recto's are post gain EQ amps, so turning down the bass knob won't effect the tightness of the distortion near as much as pre gain EQ amps like the Mark series (hence the graphic EQ for tonal shaping). Pushing too much bass into the input of any amp will make it fart out.

The TS-9, TS-808, and OD808 are all basically the same circuit with just a couple of component swaps. The OCD on the other hand is a different and more simple circuit. All of these are opamp based circuits that use diodes for clipping. There's a ton of info online about building and moding pedals. It can be MUCH cheaper than "boutique" pedals. You can pickup a BOSS SD-1 for about $35 new, swap out about $3 worth of components and make your own OD808. Give it a try, but I warn you. It can get addictive.

 

[KH Guitar Freak]

Has anyone tried a Keeley mod? I ask cuz I ended up getting the TS9 and i'm not pleased with it at all. I was wondering if the Keeley mod would help.

It's about 50 bucks

I have a Keeley TS9DX Flexi 4X2, basically most of the Keeley TS9 mods into a TS9DX housing. It's awesome, and trust me, you'll never go back to a stock one ever again... 8)

 

[Chris McKinley]

undrcroft,

First of all, the BBE Sonic Maximizer doesn't really belong in that roster because it's a very different type of effect than an overdrive. I'm not even sure why you included it in a comparison of OD's.

RE: "I basically had my 3 channels at the normal settings that i like most.". Okay, but you still haven't said what those settings are. Additionally, any OD will produce different sounds depending upon whether you are running it in front of a clean or a dirty channel.

RE: "I was hoping for a thicker, smoother distortion, but they didn't give me anything.". That's puzzling, since smoothness in distortion is in direct proportion to the amount of total even-order harmonic distortion, and to a lesser extent, compression, and each of those OD's will allow you to produce more of such distortion than the amp alone can produce.

However, you then reference for that thicker, smoother distortion a sound that is "Something along the lines of super heavy with the Mids cut out...". Having all the mids cut out might yield a somewhat smoother sound, it will definitely not be thicker, especially on a Recto. The Recto is already slightly thin on the mids to begin with, and further sucking all the mids out of your sound will leave you sounding very thin rather than thick, and even worse, you will almost completely disappear in the mix when you play with the rest of your band.

You mentioned earlier, "Tried a bunch of settings and didn't get better harmonics, or the tight thick low end i was looking for.". Total harmonics are boosted in any of those OD's, but cutting out all the mids will virtually guarantee that you will have no harmonics left to work with, so it's no wonder you are complaining about harmonics not being there even with the OD's. As to "tight thick low end", that's a bit of a contradiction in terms. A tighter low end will be one with less overall distortion, especially in the roughly 200Hz range. A thicker low end will be one with more overall distortion, not less.

mr fender gave good advice in this regard. While getting into modding or creating your own effects is a lot of fun, I think you would be best served by getting a bit clearer on how amps and effects work in creating the tone you are looking for first.

 

[DirtyNoise]

OK - I have the OD808 showing up today from UPS. Crossing my fingers that it will give me some of what I need...and that is..tighter bottom and better easier harmonics. We will see...

 

[Chris McKinley]

DirtyNoise,

That's almost guaranteed to happen. What are the settings on your amp currently?

 

[DirtyNoise]

Not sure with out looking at it again. I just do it blind and let my ears do the adjustments. I do think my gain is around 12-1230..mids at 11..treble 1230..pres at 1130..thats my best guess with out looking at it.

 

[Chris McKinley]

That's cool. Just keep in mind that you may need to adjust your amp's settings once you put the OD in front. Other than your presence, which sounds a tad high, I'd say your settings will mesh fairly well with the OD. You might bump the mids just a smidge, but then again the pedal might make that unnecessary, so adjust to taste.

 

[DirtyNoise]

I got a chance to try out the OD808 last night. HOLY FREAKING CRAP!!! I was just in awe of how good everything that I wanted to correct sounded. The bottom end is tight and the harmonics are now...How I want to say..more controlable yet eaiser to use..if thats makes sense? True Bliss!!!!
I was so freaking happy I was laughing out loud in this evil madman sort of way broww-ha-ha!!
I truely wish I could share the my sound with you all now. However I'm no recorder. When my band gets the CD together for the gas houses maybe then I will have something to share.
Thanks to all and this sight for input and facts on the OD808.
imho - No rec should be played with one of these pedals in the front. WOW!!!!

 

[DirtyNoise]

No OD808 in this photo but it's there NOW!! Yeahhhh!!!

 

[Robusto]

UPS delivered my od808 last night.

haven't had time to give it a try yet though.

 

[DirtyNoise]

You will poop your pants when you here what it does for your recto.

 

[tennisplayer]

WOW, what a difference it makes! I hooked up my Ibanez TS9DX on mode2 and it's like it gathers up all the loose ends of sounds and wrapped a band around them for a smooth tone.