Top Ten Electric Guitar Wishlist

Discussion in 'Guitar Gear Talk Forum' started by jayswami, Feb 8, 2005.

  1. flood

    flood New Member

    i only do analog FX.... don't know any bow-tweakers doing digital stuff at all, except perhaps digital delays based on 2399 chips. the digital FX domain, due to the R&D/prototyping costs involved are ridiculous. not to mention a team of dedicated programmers who can write that sort of code. i can't write any code and don't know how to program 24 bit microcontrollers. so digital is not going to happen anytime soon.

    you like the amplug? :-/ i thought it sounds quite shite. do you want a headphone amp or a preamp? i could do you something similar, you need to tell me what kind of amp you want... essentially it would do the same thing as the amplug, would probably sound a lot better though, but here's what i CAN'T do - SMD soldering! so the footprint would be substantially larger, about the size of that fuzz factory or blue box in my album.

    i do custom builds already, the motherfuzzer was designed for somebody else, but i didn't like the sound of the circuit. so we're starting from scratch on that one.

    did a germanium transistor based big muff with a couple of mods - very versatile, cleans up breathtakingly to a singing overdrive, and has a softer attack than the silicon counterpart, but is still aggressive as hell - the muff fuzz character remains. was thinking of doing a super limited run of those (limited supply of the NOS transistor type i need), perhaps 10-12 pedals, but i've seen that the market does not really demand it.

    the other consideration is that i do want to leave to do a masters next year, and won't really be around for a couple of years. while i design and conceive my stuff to be sturdy and generally indestructible, i'd like to be around if service is ever needed. if it wasn't for this fact, i'd have announced my business already...

    anyway, for your headphone amp, let's communicate by mail....
     
  2. ultrabot90

    ultrabot90 Like fishes need bicycles

    An amp for the list.
    ALPHA 77 modular guitar amplifier.

    It's SS. It looks like a rack straight out of Reason. It's as modular and mod-able as a Reason rack. It looks b-e-a-utiful. And there's only one of it in the whole world. xD
     
  3. metalmonke

    metalmonke New Member

    ^_^

    Respect. Never seen anything like this. This goes to my dream amp list for sure (to be precise, it'll be on top of my list)

    @Flood
    try to make these kinda amps! and play in millions!
     
  4. flood

    flood New Member

    what... just a FRAC modular system? that impresses you? go over to the MFOS site and buy yourself a couple of synth modules and you're pretty much done. no disrespect to mathias, who is a genius of the highest order and a GREAT guy, but this is something i'm relatively unfazed by. it would have been impressive to me in the 80s, i guess.

    i wouldn't bother with this sort of thing at all. i'd make my life easier and just buy a netbook and a decent interface and autostart revalver or GR4 on it. probably the latter.

    contrary to what you might think, that setup is really not as fantastic as it sounds.

    for one, the distortion is generated by an overdriven 741. i've played overdriven 741s, and they sure do not sound pretty.

    secondly, this stuff was "cutting edge" technology at the time, when musicians were going ga-ga over the suddenly cheaper solid state devices and decided to forsake tubes, only to be sorely disappointed and come back to tubes later.

    keep in mind that this amp was designed around a very specific type of guitar with the objective of getting a very specific sound for a very individualistic player. amplifier technology has moved on since then. if i was the head of a large amplifier corporation, i'd probably want to build an amp with high quality 24/96 ADDA converters and a badass µC (or even a 486 or pentium chip?) inside. seeing that EHX already used the AD blackfin processors in the stereo memory man and holiest grail, i would say that µCs have gotten even cheaper since then. make the whole system modular, and use a lemur/ipad-like touch screen as an interface. class D output stage and an SMPS power supply and lo and behold, a 100W amp that weighs less than 2 kg.

    of course, a project of this sort requires many millions of dollars in research and is still limited by the fact that class D amplification sounds completely shite for guitar, particularly when you see the return of the tube amp these days. BUT: it would be pathbreaking, and show the way for future amplifier designs.

    dude... sorry, but i don't get half the stuff you say. now what does this mean, play in millions? :-/
     
  5. ultrabot90

    ultrabot90 Like fishes need bicycles

    ^I was considering saying something in that vein (but obviously not THAT informatively).

    Sure it looks cool; but it's just a rack. Albeit horizontal instead of vertical. Most pros have them. They're all like that - modular, customizable, easy to understand once you get the hang of it, each is unique (because the player builds it up as per his/her) preferences). Nothing to go that OTT over. =|

    I didn't get it either, until I reread it in your post. I believe he may have meant 'roll in riches'.
     
  6. flood

    flood New Member

    lol. nobody would buy that sort of thing. nobody bought it then, nobody is buying it now. even the randall semimodular tube amps have only achieved limited success. digital works best for this sort of thing, IMO particularly now that we have a lot of good technology available fairly cheap and reproducible.
     
  7. ultrabot90

    ultrabot90 Like fishes need bicycles

    Semimodular tube amps? What were they for? (this may be relevant for an idea of mine).
     
  8. ironman12

    ironman12 New Member

    @flood...are u talkin bout the randall MTS??
     
  9. flood

    flood New Member

  10. rickkkyrich

    rickkkyrich Guest

    i saw the demo video for KH signature series modules... but it didn't sounded the same... any reasons for that..
     
  11. ultrabot90

    ultrabot90 Like fishes need bicycles

    @flood - So basically its like a modeller, but modular (you've to replace the...preamp?). Not what I was thinking. Thanks, though. (I'll mail you on this once I've done sufficient research/HW)

    Edit-
    I was looking into using a laptop for VST work between the guitar and amp these days, and look what I found.
    https://www.boingboing.net/2010/04/16/computer-built-into.html
    WTF?
    The comments there stated my exact fears. I was afraid of keeping a laptop ON the tube amp to save space (separate table would be fine though) lest it be shaken/vibrated up real bad, and the thing about hard drives being susceptible to vibrations and magnetic fields. And then, enter more insightful and philosophical words...

    "Does it go up to 11?"
    "what, no camera?"
    "Amp. Laptop. Duct tape. Done!"

    ...and finally,

    "This article is wrong. ..."
    https://www.orangeamps.com/features.asp?ID=163
     
  12. ironman12

    ironman12 New Member

    the randall MTS series is really too good...u can have a vast array of tones from different preamp modules.. but overly expensive i think...1200$ for head which can house 3 modules...n each module is for $200...practical only for pros...
     
  13. shailm

    shailm New Member

    @flood-
    off the current topic but
    I want fuzz! Im not going to lie, Im a germanium wh**e. Howd the fuzz factory clone turn out? just got myself one, along with an analogman sunface(nkt)! though been having issues with the fuzzfactory(might be a bad switch)! Now im GASsing for a nice tonebender clone, a woolly mammoth. Probably gonna get an EQD hoof to satisfy muff cravings! Could you do muff/tonebender clones?
     
  14. flood

    flood New Member

    now we're talking :D :D :D

    i'm a fuzz whore myself! did a fuzz factory clone, a woolly mammoth clone (drummer broke a pot though :( so i need to go in there again... soon baby), a tonebender mkII clone which sounds a bit too unruly for my taste, not really satisfied with it yet, and a GERMANIUM muff which is legen -



    wait for it -




    - DARY.

    the germ muff originated out of a build order from a delhi based guitar player who wanted a pig mine clone/workalike. so i set about reversing it from whatever little info and pics i could find, and finally approached something likable. i still wasn't satisfied though.

    i had socketed the transistors, so upon a whim i decided to try a bunch of germanium transistors with a gain too high for vintage fuzz circuits... and was shocked to say the least. it sounds quite awesome. i'm still debating whether i should do a very limited production run of these (10-15 only) or not. the difference mostly lies in the attack, which is a bit softer with the germ muff, as well as the way it cleans up. i find the cleanup a LOT better than in the silicon version.

    the first clip on the page is a clip of the germ muff. it's a friend playing, my RG with stock pickups (yeah, barf, i know) into a bogner XTC. https://www.soundclick.com/bands/default.cfm?bandID=1046495&content=music

    the "swine flu" clips are the silicon version of the same circuit.

    the fuzz factory is, well, pretty much exactly like the original - weird, uncontrollable and unpredictable depending on how you tweak it! i used slightly different transistors though - AC151 as opposed to the AC128 but i couldn't tell any difference in the function as such. i read on a german board that the exact type of transistor used in this circuit doesn't really make much of a tonal difference at all, it's not like there's anything to be tonesnobby about.

    anyways, i lurve fuzz :D that's what semiconductors were made for, not for gay pedals like the MT-2. and i love the big muff circuit too, there's a lot of stuff hiding in there.

    if there's one claim i can make... my fuzz factory is certainly ***ier than zvex' stuff, i don't particularly care for most of the myrold-fingerpainted-paintjobs, they aren't particularly durable either. here are my pedals: https://s812.photobucket.com/albums/zz44/flood81/Stompbox DIY/
     
  15. shailm

    shailm New Member

    Good god!i think i wet myself thinking about this germanium muff!!!!!Seems like a device made to be on the end of a Jazzmaster(wielded by anyone from Sonic Youth) Have you seen this?-
    ehx.com/products/germanium-4-big-muff
    Saw a video of it .... sounded kinda meh..supposed to be more overdrive/distortiony than like a muff(which is disappointing).With a muff im looking for more like Mogwai, huge sounding chords, or then My Bloody Valentine balls to the walls fuzz. My biggest gripe with the BMP w/ wicker (and i assume most of the reissues) is that at higher gain settings chords just get lost.

    Im not gonna lie,Im a sucker for the Zvex hand painted stuff(it doesnt justify the prices though). Are your pedals available for sale?If so prices and how would i go about acquiring one? more sound samples?

    On another note, theres this interview from mark linkous, the dude behind Sparklehorse, on a really interesting way he uses the mt2. He attaches a cheap mic to the bass drum pedal(or some other way of micing it), runs that signal through the mt2 and then through a noise gate. I think its a genius way to use that pedal!
     
  16. flood

    flood New Member

    i didn't particularly care much for the EHX germ muff. i'm guessing it uses the new production chinese germs...

    my muff isn't thought of for mayhem as such, the buyer specifically wanted a more refined muff sound. he's a david gilmour fan and wants the gilmour sound, so we worked around that. it does have the ability to get super aggressive though and retains the muff quality, as you can hear.

    i do build stuff for sale on a custom basis, don't have the time, demand or setup required to do production runs. prices depend on the work involved, whether you want an etching or not, etc. i don't lowball myself, but I'd say i place my prices fairly. will PM you my email address, we can discuss this further on mail.

    i can do better than that - run the mt-2 in a feedback loop. it self-oscilllates and squeals like a pig. squeeeeal! squeeeal!

    if all else fails, the doorstop mod woorks great too.
     

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