MINIMAL SET UP?

[TonyC]

LMAO!! Just imagine Angus trying it!

[gtrman]

Very interesting discussion ...
Personally I can live with a mild "tonesuckage" / alteration of the sound if that enables me to use pedals to achive various sounds
and effects that will enhance my performance .. IN A LIVE SETTING !
Playing live you also have to remember that your amp is not what comes out of the PA speakers.
It has to be mic'ed - sent to a mixer - somebody has to do the tweaking of the guitar track - and then finally sent out through the PA system...
That's a whole lot of potential screw-ups ... so you might have excellent tone & sound standing next to your amp but you will be the only one experiencing it.

I love using various pedals live .. makes it more fun playing .. I try to use mye ears and do experiment a lot with how I end up using the pedals (in front - loop - switching the pedals around).

[sugarkane]

Personally I can live with a mild "tonesuckage" / alteration of the sound if that enables me to use pedals to achive various sounds
and effects that will enhance my performance .. IN A LIVE SETTING !
I love using various pedals live .. makes it more fun playing ..

In a live setting it's got be a fact of life. Even if a stadium act preserved the purity of the signal path with the best cabling known to mankind ... they would have to have long cable runs for a big stage. Yep, that would be a suckage issue. Wireless systems likewise aren't for everyone but they have improved a lot I'm told. Longer runs from a studio live room to control room isn't great either but is often practical.

Man, I wish I could get onboard with extensive pedal use - I'd be having more fun as well. Although I do find a great Strat or Tele, one cable, straight into VM LDR always puts a smile on my face.

BTW - does anyone remember the name Bob Bradshaw?

[C0ldFart]

Guitar on one end, amp on the other. About as true bypass as you're ever going to get but a bit impractical due to proximity effects and mechanical pitfalls.

LOL - good one, need a double strap over my shoulders and a portable fuelpowered generator

[sikter]

Personally I can live with a mild "tonesuckage" / alteration of the sound if that enables me to use pedals to achive various sounds
and effects that will enhance my performance .. IN A LIVE SETTING !
I love using various pedals live .. makes it more fun playing ..

In a live setting it's got be a fact of life. Even if a stadium act preserved the purity of the signal path with the best cabling known to mankind ... they would have to have long cable runs for a big stage. Yep, that would be a suckage issue. Wireless systems likewise aren't for everyone but they have improved a lot I'm told. Longer runs from a studio live room to control room isn't great either but is often practical.

Man, I wish I could get onboard with extensive pedal use - I'd be having more fun as well. Although I do find a great Strat or Tele, one cable, straight into VM LDR always puts a smile on my face.

BTW - does anyone remember the name Bob Bradshaw?

The pedals have come to stay. Bob Bradshaw is using them properly.
I always tried to go to the same direction but after a while I get a new toy and have to test it before
it is looped through true bypass system.
I'm testing J&H pedal by Visual Sound right now.
I love Jeckyll part but I don't really like Mr Hyde.
sikter

[Slashwannabe1]

I think people put waaaay too much into expensive cables. I think no matter the price or brand the cable should be of a nice thick quality to withstand abuse and the ends should be shrink wrapped to preserve the jacks & inside soldered connections. Gold plated isn't nessisary though it looks cool, but like I said useless due to the fact our amps don't have gold plated circuts.

Some of the best tones I've ever gotten have been with this really thick 10 foot long Peavy Cord plugged from my guitar direct into the VM....I hate Peavy tube amps in general but their guitar leads & cables are made very well. I do notice a tone difference when comparing that cable to other brands, even expensive ones, its a great value for the money especailly at $10 for a 10 foot cord and its extremely tough.

If I had money I'd go Monster across the board, because they are the standard. But for most people I think finding a decently made one is the key as the money spent on expensive brands could easily be spent on equipment that makes more audible difference. $700 for cables somebody said...wow insane unless you're touring stadiums.

[Beston1]

Well that opened up a can of worms didnt it, cheers to everyone who replied or got involved!

Quick one here though.. I tried my tuner (TU-2) in the loop and when its depressed to tune, its not a total signal cut off as I can still here it quietly through the speakers as I tune, yet when its through the front its doing its job properly and its totally cut the signal from the amp when tuning.

Any thoughts?
PS. hope we`re still all mates Ha.

[SteveD]

There must be a little bleed through going on somewhere in the loop circuit.

Another option would be to send a signal from the FX send to your tuner (set the loop level to -10dB) but don't return it to the amp. The FX loop does not get interupted unless you plug something into the return, so the signal still passes through the amp as normal, it just feeds the tuner as well. This way you can leave the tuner on all the time for 'anytime checking' while playing. Just have it near your amp and when you want to tune up between numbers just turn the Master Volume to minimum.

[MKB]

The whole tone suckage thing is a bit misunderstood by some guitarists. What you are really hearing is the different loading effects that many pedals have on the signal source feeding it (be it another pedal or a guitar). These effects can be good or bad depending on a host of factors.

In the case of Hendrix, he had a specific chain of effects connected to his guitar with curly cable. I don't recall what the first effect was, but as I recall it was a fairly low impedance. Now that low impedance, through the highly inductive and capacitave curly cord, caused a low pass effect that improved the tone of his Strat. Swap that first effect with a high impedance buffer and a high quality guitar cable, and his tone would have turned to a tinny screechy mess. Also note when he plugged a Gibson into his rig that sounded good with a Strat, the Gibson had no treble at all. Humbuckers do not at all like to feed low impedance sources, in fact the first thing to go is the highs and chime.

Many players rave at the tone improvements of a tube Echoplex or Fender reverb tank. What happens in that case is the guitar is loaded with basically the same load as a standard tube amp (the grid of a 12AX7). This has different characteristics than a solid state buffer circuit.

Nearly every Boss or Ibanez pedal (the non-bypass versions) has a built in buffer that will color the tone by its loading effects on the guitar. Not only that, but much has been made on how vintage Tube Screamers have a lower impedance output than the newer ones, and they can drive the input of the amp harder.

Even the folks at Radial make a device that attaches to a wireless transmitter and simulates the pickup loading of an amp input. Most wireless transmitters have a high impedance, and that along with the short cord used can make for a very bright sounding guitar. The Radial device can tame that a bit.

[sugarkane]

I'm trying hard but I can't quite buy into your Hendrix example - to assert definitively "low impedance ... caused a low-pass effect that improved the tone of his Strat". Improved?

Your hypothesis depends on an assumption that frequency changes are the only factor in play. I would argue that the loss of dynamics is an equally important hit to guitar quality. So you lose top-end (which requires over-compensating at the amp stage), the difference between loud and soft notes gets squashed flattter and ... voila ... that's an improvement?

"Swap with a high quality guitar cable and his tone would have turned into a tinny screechy mess". That's true. But you know the simple solution? Turn down the over-compensation at the tonestack stage and get the amp working more simply and therefore with greater clarity.

If I'm w-a-a-y, w-a-a-y wrong on this then why did Hendrix not have all of that high/low-pass pedal garbage in the signal path in the studio for "Little Wing" etc.? When going for the definitive studio version of beautifully clear tone it was not corrupted with any unnecessary cheap links in the chain. Eddie Kramer knew what he was doing - and everything I'm saying literally goes double with the equivalent microphone paths and principles.

Hendrix was a tone genius - but, like all of us, he had to make compromises for live purposes. He always got amazing results when compromising but it doesn't follow logically that problems therefore should always be in the signal path. I'm sure he didn't like some of the live realities such as Strat tremolo/humidity tuning problems or unintended police radio bands coming through his Marshall stack. But he wasn't out-of-tune or fighting LAPD vehicle chatter in the optimum environment of a studio. Likewise he didn't put garbage in the guitar chain when putting down tracks for keeps that we know best and love.

"Nearly every Boss or Ibanez pedal (the non-bypass versions) has a built in buffer that will color the tone by its loading effects on the guitar". Okay, this is really pushing my luck with pedantic semantics but I've gotta say for clarity's sake that these don't "colour the tone" - IMHO they reduce the "colours" of great guitars and amps. Yeah, the spectrum changes tone so you are literally correct, but the change is a washed out spectrum. If these missing frequencies are no loss then why do amp and guitar manufacturers put them into their products in the first place? They put lovely high/low-end and big dynamics in HOPING that they'll all dissapear?

I say all of this knowing that many of you love your (I'll say it - "tonesucking") pedals and hey, all power to you and the famous players who feel likewise. Of course I get the upside. But I've yet to see any sense in overlooking obvious side-effects that have a downside.

Remember, conventional wisdom has gone so far that the Original Poster of this thread doubted the evidence of his own ears. A clean signal couldn't sound better?! Could it ??!! Sure it could!!

[sikter]

There must be a little bleed through going on somewhere in the loop circuit.

Another option would be to send a signal from the FX send to your tuner (set the loop level to -10dB) but don't return it to the amp. The FX loop does not get interupted unless you plug something into the return, so the signal still passes through the amp as normal, it just feeds the tuner as well. This way you can leave the tuner on all the time for 'anytime checking' while playing. Just have it near your amp and when you want to tune up between numbers just turn the Master Volume to minimum.

My guitar signal goes to both Tuner and Drive/Dist pedal. From Drive/dist pedal it goes to VM input.
LS2 and Delay are connected in Loop.

Is there any disadvantage in it? I like to listen it while tuning. (I can always turn down master volume when it hurts others)

[sugarkane]

As I and others indicated, not for every one but ... disadvantage?

If you can hear a tonesuck - Yes. If you can't hear tonesuck - No, don't worry about it.

IMHO.

[sikter]

OK, I was aiming mostly to that Tuner connection.
I don't hear any "disadvantage" but still I would like to know what theory says about splitting signal before the amp.
Regarding suckage, I am not afraid to share my experience:

That Jackyll&Hyde seems to have nice buffer.
I'm still testing it and if it turns out to be keeper I’ll mod it to be true bypass.
(But only because I love to that kind of things)

My delay pedal is not good. It really sucks and it's noticeable. I am going to replace it.

LS2 pedal is special:
Theoretically it sucks BIG time because I use it to decrease signal volume what comes out from preamp while I am in HDR.
BUT! What comes out from the cab is exactly what I wanted.
So somebody's disadvantage is my advantage.
I turn Detail and Body higher, LS2 decrease its volume and I get smooth and soft rock sound out of cab.
That means low overall volume as well and once again that's exactly what I wanted since we always mic everything to powerful PA
Higher setting on Detail and body gives me wonderful sound when I switch back to LDR.
It's difficult to put definition on "suckage" but I can define it like losing sustain.
Still if somebody gets wished tone and plays staccato on particular song he probably wouldn't care of losing amount of sustain.

I don't know if I came with proper example but I am sure you'll know where I am aiming to.

[Yaff]

There must be a little bleed through going on somewhere in the loop circuit.

Another option would be to send a signal from the FX send to your tuner (set the loop level to -10dB) but don't return it to the amp. The FX loop does not get interupted unless you plug something into the return, so the signal still passes through the amp as normal, it just feeds the tuner as well. This way you can leave the tuner on all the time for 'anytime checking' while playing. Just have it near your amp and when you want to tune up between numbers just turn the Master Volume to minimum.

Thanks Steve, nice idea.

The bit that surprised me, was it worked best with "Bypass" on and "10db" selected. When I select "Loop", there appeared to be a bit more hum. I would have thought that it would only work in "Loop" mode!

Anyway, you have saved me the cost of decant cable. Although my Tuner has true bypass, if I am using it front of the amp, I need to match cable quality with the one between my LP and the pedal. This way, I can use any cable, as it has no impact on my tone.

I like to keep my set-up as pure as possible; Les Paul - Quality Cable - VM - Quality Cable - 425B Cab - Electricity Conditioner = Ultimate tone.

All the best

[SteveD]

It should only work with the loop enabled to be honest. I suspect that your tuner is sensitive enough to pick up the bleed signal. I would say this could be construed as a bonus.