Boss DD20 Gigadelay Review
Contents |
Information
Original author: Ivan Milenkovic
Weapon: Pedal
Make: Boss
Model: DD20 Gigadelay
Price: 200€
Introduction
Hi there GMC, welcome to my review for Boss DD20 GigaDelay pedal. On the beginning we have a picture of this pedal.
I bought this pedal for a price of ~200e, but here everything is expensive, i think that it can be found on an eBay for 150-200$ dollars. FOr that price it is one hell of a pedal let me tell you. It is the new generation of Boss pedals (Twin Pedals). It has two pedals and functions as a digital delay proccesing unit.
EASE OF USE
(1 -very hard to use; 10 - very easy to use): 5 when you buy it and 8 later on
This pedal is packed with proccesing possibilities and it can pass some time until you get all the sounds you want from it. Even today, after almost 1 year of constant use it can still surprise me with some new cool sounding effect. THat is my friends a very positive thing with this effect. Manual is little confusing at start, but very detailed. THey didn`t left anything out and if you read it carefully you will know this pedal inside and out.
SOUND QUALITY
(1-terrible sound; 10-awesome sound): A strong 8
And here are the features:
- Up to 23 seconds of delay : okay, this much of delay time you will never use. Even 1 second delay time is just too much. BUT you can use this baby as a sound looper pedal very effectively with its sound on sound option. Ill explain it later.
- LEVEL, TONE, FEEDBACK Controls.
- DELAY TIME PUSH-KNOB (push it and it moves the dealy time in bigger increments - practical).
- 4 memory slots + 1 manual slot (you can memorise settings for all mods eccept for SOS mode )
- 11 delay modes:
1. SOS (in this mode pedal acts as a loop station, givin you 23 second to record anything you play. You can overdub the recorded sound also an infinite number of times. Unfortunately thats about it. You cannot sepparate the layers and save them for later use. THere is no built in metronome of any kind also. This option is nevertheless GREAT. It serves me well and is one of the reasons I bought this pedal after all)
2. TWIST (same as regular delay only it makes soem weird effects when you hold the pedal. interesting but i never used because i haven`t found the use)
3. WARP (same as the above only when you push the pedal feedback is maxed and you get overwelming sound effect that is not very pleasant. i haven`t found a use for this too)
4. TAPE (based on a Roland SPace Echo Unit, it emulates tape delay effect.
5. ANALOG (emulating an analog delay effect, where sound is gradually kind of loosing certain frequency while it rolls off)
6. STANDARD (standard delay effect, very similar slightly warmer then on DD3 and DD6 epdals)
7. DUAL (something like a dual standard delay effect woth sepparate delay time settings)
8. PAN (ping-pong stereo effect delay)
9. SMOOTH ( standard delay effect but they added some digital reverb. The sound of the reverb alone is relatively sintetic, but very nicely matched with a delay. I must say i use this mode 95% of the time as it has the warmest and fullest sound)
10. MODULATE (modulating dealy effect. you can even make a little chorus effect from it, and a very deacent one to. Not a match for a real chorus unit but can come in handy sometimes)
11. REVERSE (very interesting mode, but i rarely use it, you can make those 70ties hendrix type effects with it, or just make some original lines. I have even managed to make something that sound like a pulsating-rotary effect from it.)
- Changing delay modes seamlessly (when you go from one setting to another the old delay rolls off nicely - it does not end sharply, very nice feature )
- Stereo in and out option, phones out, external pedal out, 9V power, can run on 6 1.5V batteries
Sound effect is great, i use it for gigs and for studio recordings. It has very nice and warm sound to it. I use it wiht HSS pickups guitar and a Marshall AVT50X mainly. Using some distortion pedals too. It can be noisy when i`m at home practising, but thats not bad. I think it has something to do with the fact that it has a +4dB output setting (you CAN choose a -20dB if you like ) because my amp has a +4dB FXloop return input rating.
RELIABILITY
(1 - not reliable; 10- very reliable) : 10
It is a Boss pedal and I am sure that nothing will happen to it in many years to come. Maybe of I throw it from 2nd or 3rd story building some part will be damaged, ut it is not made for that obviously I could definately use this baby without a backup whole my life
OVERALL RATING
(1-what a hunk of junk!; 10- fantastic value) : A strong 9
I play mostly blues, rock, jazz, progressive rock, some fusion and heavy too. I have a HSS Peavey guitar, Marhall AVT50X among others and played for some 9 years now, 2 years professionaly and over 40gigs. If it were stolen I would buy it again surely because it acts as a Loop Station pedal too, and i like the fact that i can serve me as a loop. I would think about getting a RC2 and DD6 maybe, but that is only a thought. I comapre it to Line6 Delay proceessor, but i think that this one is maybe better in sound quality and looping time possibility (23 seconds instead of 14 means a lot). I wish it had more control of the effects, like line6 has tweak and tweaz kind of options where you can adjust for example flutter of roland space echo. but hey, for the price it is still great.
It helped me a lot while composing and practising as it has a loop options so i quickly became depenndent of it, because i can record some backings and play over it, jamm, make stuff up, or just practise. And yes i can use a delay effect while the loop is running (but unfortunately I cant record while the effect is on
SO TO SUM UP:
- 1 for not having undo option while looping
- 1 for not having more control over delay modes
+ 1 for having big dealy time - 23s
+ 1 for being a BOSS
+ 1 for having a LCD backlight display
+ 1 for having a loop option
I forgot to mention that it has a tempo signature function that is displayed like little notes on the LCD screen and a TAP TEMPO function which is very handy on giggs, because you can tap the tampo with the pedal.
