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Yet another "weird, brittle, digital distortion" thread. I'm willing to track this down


soerenP
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Hi folks, 

 

so, in the past few weeks I've been searching through the forum for other users with similar issues and I found some threads, but still I'm not satisfied with the outcome. It is both too strange and annoying to not try to fix it. Some Helix user on the forum even went for another device of another manufacturer.

 

I'm gonna explain the problem:
As many other users, I am (extremely) dissatisfied with (many) tones at the edge of breakup. Some amps/OD pedals are worse than others and some are pretty usable, but I think in some way the problem exists in all of them. To me, said overdriven sounds sound quite brittle and fizzy, and decaying notes have artifacts that all of a sudden disappear instead of slowly fading away as you would expect from analog gear. Worst model I found in that context was definitely the Colordrive. 

 

I checked many different problem sources:

  • The input impedance hardware bug: Solved by using a buffered pedal in front
  • Firmware downgrade: Some people said they had experienced brittle tones appearing after upgrading to 1.40. But downgrading via Line6 Updater didn't change anything. Sounds stayed EXACTLY the same. 
  • Several "pro" settings on the amp (ripple, sag): nothing, wouldn't explain/solve pedal issues anyway

 

I posted some contributions to existing threads, trying to get some opinions and exchange, with limited success:

https://line6.com/support/topic/65860-input-distortion/

https://line6.com/support/topic/62618-input-level-question/
https://line6.com/support/topic/65711-distortion-characteristic-of-decaying-notes-is-chattering/#comment-458867

 

 

And last but not least, I did some research reamping different settings. I think the following example audio files are the most interesting ones. I'll provide a DI signal, a Colordrive SOLO (amp/cab/EQ disabled) and a HiWatt solo sample. Listening to the colordrive sample, you will notice the fizziness drop away really quickly, (I'm not expecting the bare pedal to sound great, but this sudden falling apart is just not what I expect from a hi quality analog overdrive. ) The HiWatt amp manages distortion much better, but if you listen closely, you will even find some fizzyness there, which also drops away at some point.
ow, what is almost shocking about those samples, is that the point of time when the sudden disappearing of the fizzyness happens is pretty much the same in both examples (at 2s) ! Even if they do not have anything in common, gearwise.

 

Do you people have similar problems? Do I have to live with it? Go to competitors? Any other ideas? 

Legend to the audio files: 1. Colordrive solo, 2. DI, 3. HiWatt+Cab

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To me, said overdriven sounds sound quite brittle and fizzy, and decaying notes have artifacts that all of a sudden disappear instead of slowly fading away as you would expect from analog gear. Worst model I found in that context was definitely the Colordrive. 

@soerenP

 

I've been messing with digital stuff since Line 6 first came out - the Axsys 212 - the first Green Delay pedal - the DL4, etc.

 

I'm going to give you my experience:

 

1. There is no way to get rid of the "crackle apart" decay characteristics on any drive like this that has them (your only solutions are to not use that model, "cover it up" in some way - more on that below - or sell the unit). They are "built into" the sound if you will. Some pedal models are worse than others. Way back in those old days, Fender entered the market with their first Modelling amp, and it was one of the first things I noticed about their drive sounds - they "crackled apart". Unlike a real amp or even drive pedal that smoothly moves from clipping to not clipping, many digital effects (not just L6 ones) can't seem to decide if the signal should still be clipping as it crosses the threshold from clipping to not clipping - meaning individual clipped peaks seem to be present in some random fashion, making what I'm calling a "crackling" sound that's not overdrive or clipping. It's more like the bad kind of clipping that happens in the digital realm when you go over 0 dbfs.

 

2. Some drives also have a noticeable "breath" on them - for lack of a better term. It sounds like someone exhaling into your ear as it plays. It's a high his that doesn't seem to be part of the tone or the clipping, and is just "there". Back when I had the old DM4, this was very noticeable on the "Overdrive" model.

 

3. These and other artifacts are "baked into" the sound.

 

4. As for Brittle during the sound not in the fall off, again I find that certain models are just that way and there's nothing you can do about it.

 

5. As for Fizzy, there are some things that can help, and those things can help to "cover up" these other artifacts.

 

A. Just try putting a Kinky Boost after your drives. I know you're eating up DSP, but try it and see if you like the sound better. Do it with NO boost, NO drive, and the Bright switch OFF. The Kinky Boost in this setting rolls off a lot of high end and adds some low mid warmth that seems to tame a lot of the Fizz. Just do it and see if you like the tone, because that tells you that what may help you is EQ'ing in a way that removes high end like the KB does.

 

B. Try stacking two drives, or running a drive into a driven amp. The Colordrive model on the legacy devices was one I REALLY liked the tone of, but the drive aspect of it was "brittle" - which wasn't an EQ issue - it's just the way the drive presents itself. So the problem with a lot of "crackle" is the clipping is too far apart in time and more random. If you max out a drive control and it's still "crackly" what you need is to "fill in the gaps" with other crackles - another pedal with some drive on it. Again you may be sucking up DSP but you might just try stacking two lower drive pedals rather than trying to get the amount of drive you want out of one. The crackles of one far-too-crackly drive will "fill in" the crackles of the other far-too-crackly overdrive to make a smoother drive tone overall. This can also help with the fall off as there will be 50% more crackles as it drops off making for a smoother transition again. Though obviously you kind of need to start with as smooth sounding pedals as you can.

 

C. I'm fighting with my TWO HX Effects right now. They DRASTICALLY change my tone because of the buffer, and the drives just don't sound good. They all have an upper mid-range "honk" that one of my bandmates said "ooh that's cool, sounds like a cocked wah pedal" - but it wasn't supposed to. It was a model that I used in the M13 - one of the Legacy models. That they changed. The Legacy models in the Helix sound NOTHING like the actual models in the M13 (or DM4, which sounded the same as the M series). I had a Pod XT Live and it sounded crappy, like the Helix.  I don't know what the problem is, but the Legacy drives are the "same" in name only. I put real pedals up against it, and the Helix just has this weird upper midrange honk and lack of warmth.  I've been spending a LOT of time trying to EQ it to get it "right" but at this point I'm really considering just selling them both. I said before I'd never give them another dollar because of the failed footswitches I've had on MANY of their devices, but I just couldn't find anything that would do what they do for the same price. But I guess, even at those prices, you get what you pay for.

 

D. That said, it works for many. There's a lot of people who just don't worry about stuff, for whatever reason, and they're happy. But sorry to be the bearer of bad tidings, but unless you can make yourself happy with it, or through some of the possible solutions I've given, you'll never be happy with it, and the things you describe are just things that can't be changed - only covered, sold, or accepted.

 

Good luck.

 

 

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Hey @z3albw1rr,

 

first of all thank you so much for your thoughts and suggestions. Both are really appreciated and I eventually agree with all or at least most of it. 

 

I would just like to share some of my experiences during last days research on the topic: 

 

1. There are better and worse models or, now I'd rather say easier and more difficult ones.

2. A lot of the artifacts we hear even exist in the analog world! This was VERY astonishing, but many "compare HELIX vs real amp" videos showed me that a real amp is not perfect and, using a digital model, we willingly select the "digitality" as a culprit. Listen to this one: 
https://youtu.be/wT_w9pL9_w4 As someone mentioned in the comments: YOu (or rather "he and me") would quite often choose the "real one" as the "more artificial one". Also Rhett Shulls Helix Stomp vs real plexi. The real "clean" plexi produces crackles!

3. Your ears play tricks on you. I installed the free ToneX plugin an immediately thought "so much better than my PodGO". I switched back to my best PodGo preset, than back to the ToneX and immediately revoked my opinion. I think they are both excellent, just need some work. 

 

THis all doesn't mean, there is nothing wrong with some of the models. I guess a real world Colorsound Overdrive reacts differently to decaying signals, but the tendency for the distortion to break away suddenly might be there, too. So sad, no CS Overdrive demos actually demonstrate it, but only keep on playing as many notes as possible ;)

 

I'll keep you updated on my thoughts and experiences in this thread.

 

Cheers!

 

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Are you using an amp block or IR?  In your 1st and 3rd clip almost sounds like you're not.  It's pretty essential that you do, or that at least you integrate some sort of IR/cab during your process.

 

Also sounds like you're clipping the signal, is your master & channel volumes both maxed or something?  Amp Channel volume is 'clean', so does not alter sound character in anyway, basically your volume knob, try lowering it and see if it makes a difference.

 

Your clips do seem to sound exceptionally bad.  Not exactly sure how you managed to get the Go to sound like that! 

 

And when you say "DI signal"... Are you getting the same results when plugging directly your guitar?  Might have to do with input levels also, if the signal you feed the Go is too hot, maybe that causes your issue?  Maybe trying lowering the volume your DI signal, or lowering the input block volume / noise gate block in your Go, again seeing if it improves things.

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Hi @grdGo33,

 

thanks so much for discussing this with me. 

 

My first example is indeed the "Colordrive solo", which was supposed to mean that it didn't use an amp/cab, sorry to not make this clear. I am absolutely aware that this a recipe for a bad sound. What I wanted to show is that the distortion behaviour is odd and thus wanted to keep the system simple, and make sure the distortion comes from the colorsound, not any amp or other part in the system. 

 

I am glad you think it's "exceptionally bad", because I think so, too. I just don't know where I could be clipping anything where it's not supposed to. My DI signals sound ok, don't they? Yes, DI and guitar sound the same. 

 

Another weird thing I found. Have a look at the waveform: 

You can see clearly that the audible distortion stops where you see the *upper* part of the waveform being suddenly "shaved" (blue waveform). This is not happening at all in the DI source and I cant imagine why an overdrive pedal would work like this (Though I learn a lot about audio processing phenomena things these days). This is pretty much like some sort of gating effect, isn't it, rather than an overdrive which I suppose should be more like compressing. 

 

On 2/28/2023 at 3:28 PM, grdGo33 said:

Also sounds like you're clipping the signal, is your master & channel volumes both maxed or something?  Amp Channel volume is 'clean', so does not alter sound character in anyway, basically your volume knob, try lowering it and see if it makes a difference.


I'll play around with it some more, but I can't imagine I did any gross mistakes. Any levels in the DAW seem to be fine/far from 0dBfs and since I have done quite some low/C++ level audio processing and ^have been in the computer audio world since the 90s, I consider myself not too noobish. (Though I know you never stop learning. I agree something gross might be wrong, it's just kind of not obvious)

 

On 2/28/2023 at 3:28 PM, grdGo33 said:

...and 3rd clip almost sounds like you're not...

3rd clip does if I wasn't too drunk to notice I had accidently switched it off ;)

 

On 2/28/2023 at 3:28 PM, grdGo33 said:

Maybe trying lowering the volume your DI signal, or lowering the input block volume / noise gate block in your Go, again seeing if it improves things.

I did some experiments like that. The crackling got less and stopped earlier, but since the crackling is the "wanted distortion" (which sounds bad without cab, but ok in front of an amp+cab) and only the sudden stop is the real problem, it doesn't help too me much.  

 

May I ask you try building a decaying edge of breakup tone with the Colordrive on your  device? I am so eager to know if one actually can get a proper decay out of it. 

 

I tried a "shine on you crazy diamonds" patch from the Customtone library, which sounds ok, but only hides the problem with amp distortion, reverb, delay and modulation... (If that's the way to go on the PodGo it's fine, I just would like to know...)

 

Thanks for your time and thoughts!
 

 

 

 

color_solo_fizzyness.png

di.png

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Addendum: 
I got some quite nice sounds out of the colordrive, using a really hot edge of breakup "US Double Nrm" (+Kinky Boost). Maybe I need to accept the Colordrive is something that needs to be  evened out afterwards in the signal chain. The less hot the amp is, the more brittle the Colorsound becomes.  

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On 3/1/2023 at 7:18 AM, soerenP said:

My DI signals sound ok, don't they? Yes, DI and guitar sound the same. 

 

You can see clearly that the audible distortion stops where you see the *upper* part of the waveform being suddenly "shaved" (blue waveform). This is not happening at all in the DI source and I cant imagine why an overdrive pedal would work like this (Though I learn a lot about audio processing phenomena things these days). This is pretty much like some sort of gating effect, isn't it, rather than an overdrive which I suppose should be more like compressing.

 

Yep the DI sounded perfect.  I think the clipping might be entirely natural, there are multiple forms of distortion, and all distort the signal in different ways, they may also distort differently at different volumes, that's entire how say tube distortion sounds; play softly and it's clean, but play hard and it'll distort.  So a power chord will go from loud and distorted, to soft and clean. 

 

So likely entirely normal that different distortions distort different ways; think even considered superior to have pedals that behave like tube distortion; so not 'linear' distortion; sort of variable depending on signal.  So yeah no idea if the colordrive is accurate or not.. Could be.. no idea..!  Also L6 often does not try to make 'optimal' pedals, amps, cabs, etc., but reproduce the characteristics of existing gear, very possible that there are artifacts; which is just the 'signature' of the gear..

 

But I think... Isolating blocks without cab/IR...  I don't think you should expect that it should sound 'good'...  Like I tried no cab/IR to output to speaker and it just sounds horrible, I really think this is normal behaviour; I would say that PGO distortion for instance, should definitely sound good with cab/IR, as used normally...

 

But to go back to your initial issue, you find that Go effects sound "weird, brittle, digital distortion"?    Have you tried the same process you're doing with a real distortion pedal to compare with Go?  Or with other units?  Like other brands?  It's possible that other digital processing pedals don't behave exactly the same as Go too, and sound 'better', but that might not be something as accurate as Go if that makes any sense!  But I'm pretty sure you'd get very similar results with real pedals! 

 

That said, I did see some complaints about Helix not being 100% 'digital sound' free as others; like vs real gear, or Kemper or Cortex or whatnot.  Maybe you're just more sensitive and have better hearing; more sensitive to that digital sound, where other people don't pick up on it.  To be frank, I'm somewhat an audio-hobbyist, lots of fancy headphones, speakers, etc., and do love great sound... But I can't say I have complaints vs Go; to my ear just sound great...  But others claim to hear that digital-ness.  Who knows!  :D

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On 3/1/2023 at 3:39 PM, grdGo33 said:

So a power chord will go from loud and distorted, to soft and clean

Yes, sure, but I'm used to see it more smoothly than in my former examples. I do not own analog devices that behave like this. (I play T-Rex pedals and an Ibanez FatCat in front of a Blues deluxe in my live rig)

 

On 3/1/2023 at 3:39 PM, grdGo33 said:

So yeah no idea if the colordrive is accurate or not

I don't care too much about real accuracy as such. I just think the model behaves odd in my understanding and somewhat hard to handle, which I would perfectly accept if the original was like that, too. If it doesn't, I would like to find out if something is wrong with either my unit, my expectations, my way of dialing in, etc. 

 

On 3/1/2023 at 3:39 PM, grdGo33 said:

But I think... Isolating blocks without cab/IR...  I don't think you should expect that it should sound 'good'.

As I said, I don't! THis was just for ("scientific") demonstration purposes. The effect is still very noticeable in front of a clean amp+cab. 

 

On 3/1/2023 at 3:39 PM, grdGo33 said:

That said, I did see some complaints about Helix not being 100% 'digital sound' free as others; like vs real gear, or Kemper or Cortex or whatnot.  Maybe you're just more sensitive and have better hearing; more sensitive to that digital sound, where other people don't pick up on it.  To be frank, I'm somewhat an audio-hobbyist, lots of fancy headphones, speakers, etc., and do love great sound... But I can't say I have complaints vs Go; to my ear just sound great...  But others claim to hear that digital-ness.  Who knows!  :D

Having listened to lots of comparisons between modelers and real miked amps, I wouldn't claim to hear "digital artifacts" any more. There are a lot of analog "artifacts" as well, but they are perfectly enough to think that something I dialed in sounds bad :D

I just think that it's much harder to get a good sound out of Helix or PodGo than out ofthe real legendary gear, because in my experience, you take a good amp, then a good pedal maybe and you cannot do so much wrong! (You can get better or worse results, yes, and you can mess up getting it on tape, but the amp sound itself will never be really bad, at least not with the equipment I played with.)

 

Let me take a last approach to show you about my colorsound experiences and what sounds disturbing to me. -Be it digital or not - This time amped!

 

I reamped the same signal with different drive settings of a US Double Nrm. (Which I love simply with a 100%Drive and a 100% drive kinky boost in front) 
The more driven results have a nice, creamy attack, but in front of the clean amp, there is this crackly distortion characteristic of the colordrive, which I want to find out about if this is what I have to live with and hide or if something else is wrong... So again my request to see if you can replicate it (I included a patch with the snapshots 1: hot, 2: less hot 3 clean amp, audio order is: 1: clean, 2: HOT, 3: less hot. And don't misunderstand me: 2+3 sound fine to me!):

 

 

ColorDrivve.pgp

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I played a little bit with the Colordrive  (Based on: Colorsound® Overdriver), and like you describe it's a 'funky' overdrive/fuzz/whatever, weird sort of tremolo effect, distorts weird, when volume goes down there's like a sort of 'wall' where volume drops significantly, some weird clipping sound as per your clip.

 

Really seems to be like the odd one out as it doesn't behave like a normal boost/overdrive.  If it's not the real pedal, maybe that L6 model is just funky.  Honestly, not something that I think is usable with a clean amp, but looking at the original colorsound overdriver, every clip I've found have had the amp's drive so that the tone is not clean.  So maybe it's just not made to match with a clean amp.  Or maybe like I said L6 model just plain sucks...

 

So it looks like you found maybe THE worst overdrive in the Pod Go.  ;)   I kid I kid, maybe others are worse, I don't know, I just tend to use the ones that sound good to my ears!  Like the Minotaur (Klon), Heir Apparent (Analogman Prince of Tone), deranged master for heavy stuff, etc.  There's quite a few great ones in there!

 

Do you have issues with the 'good' overdrives / distortion too ?  Which 'good' overdrive sounds 'bad'?

 

[edit]  For your patch just putting the kinky drive before the colordrive improves things drastically, your scenario is basically the worst, putting it after the colordrive makes its 'defects' sound worse!

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On 3/3/2023 at 12:37 AM, grdGo33 said:

I played a little bit with the Colordrive  (Based on: Colorsound® Overdriver), and like you describe it's a 'funky' overdrive/fuzz/whatever, weird sort of tremolo effect, distorts weird, when volume goes down there's like a sort of 'wall' where volume drops significantly, some weird clipping sound as per your clip.

Good to hear you can reproduce that behaviour!

 

On 3/3/2023 at 12:37 AM, grdGo33 said:

Really seems to be like the odd one out as it doesn't behave like a normal boost/overdrive.  If it's not the real pedal, maybe that L6 model is just funky.  Honestly, not something that I think is usable with a clean amp, but looking at the original colorsound overdriver, every clip I've found have had the amp's drive so that the tone is not clean.  So maybe it's just not made to match with a clean amp.  Or maybe like I said L6 model just plain sucks...

Yep, I'd like to hear it like this, too. Maybe some guy in an analog guitar pedal forum is open for an eperiment ;)

 

On 3/3/2023 at 12:37 AM, grdGo33 said:

So it looks like you found maybe THE worst overdrive in the Pod Go.  ;)   I kid I kid, maybe others are worse, I don't know, I just tend to use the ones that sound good to my ears!  Like the Minotaur (Klon), Heir Apparent (Analogman Prince of Tone), deranged master for heavy stuff, etc.  There's quite a few great ones in there!

 

Do you have issues with the 'good' overdrives / distortion too ?  Which 'good' overdrive sounds 'bad'?

I did some less scientific run through the models and put the ODs in three gross categories: 
"Obviously" brittle, Noticeably brittly (If you WANT to hear it), and not noticeable/fine (it doesn't mean the other ones are not usable, but you need to choose the right purpose)

Obviously brittle: 
Colordrive (worst), Valve Driver, Compulsive Drive, Deez One (both), Ratatouille, KWB, Obsidian 7000 (in competition to the Colordrive), Tube Driver, "Overdrive", BitCrusher (Ha-ha ;) )

 

Noticeable: 
Heir Apparent, Scream 808, Alpaca, Vermin, Deranged Master (Still fun to play models, I don't want to complain!)

 

Fine: 

Dhyana, Minotaur, Stupor, Horizon, KillerZ, Teemah!

 

All the fuzzes I tried worked surprisingly well on that matter! The overtones, just didn't stop at all ;) But still, the decay sounded natural to me. 

 

 

 

On 3/3/2023 at 12:37 AM, grdGo33 said:

[edit]  For your patch just putting the kinky drive before the colordrive improves things drastically, your scenario is basically the worst, putting it after the colordrive makes its 'defects' sound worse!

Hmm. That's interesting. I can't confirm that. Can you provide an audio file? 
 

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On 3/3/2023 at 4:00 AM, soerenP said:

Hmm. That's interesting. I can't confirm that. Can you provide an audio file? 

 

Not really sorry, might eventually try something but as I said sounds fine to me, ex;   https://youtu.be/Hnco7JtYK7k?t=1020

 

But yeah, correct me if I'm wrong, but initially

 

Quote

As many other users, I am (extremely) dissatisfied with (many) tones at the edge of breakup. Some amps/OD pedals are worse than others and some are pretty usable, but I think in some way the problem exists in all of them.   To me, said overdriven sounds sound quite brittle and fizzy, and decaying notes have artifacts that all of a sudden disappear instead of slowly fading away as you would expect from analog gear.

 

now

Quote

Obviously brittle: 
Colordrive (worst), Valve Driver, Compulsive Drive, Deez One (both), Ratatouille, KWB, Obsidian 7000 (in competition to the Colordrive), Tube Driver, "Overdrive", BitCrusher (Ha-ha ;) )

 

Noticeable: 
Heir Apparent, Scream 808, Alpaca, Vermin, Deranged Master (Still fun to play models, I don't want to complain!)

 

Fine: 

Dhyana, Minotaur, Stupor, Horizon, KillerZ, Teemah!

 

 

so some are fine, some are noticeable others horrendous. 

 

Maybe someone else can chime in, but I think it's safe to accept that for instance, colordrive is horrible when used with a clean amp used on the edge of breakup.  But that may very well not be its intended purpose.  So it may not be a reasonable expectation that all drives are usable for that particular usage...  Rereading z3albw1rr's comment, he explains many aspects of distortions and such.

 

The clip above about the Heir Apparent, personally, love it, and don't hear any issue really.  Will it work with 100% settings and 100% amps and sound perfect with all guitars & all?  Maybe not... Can you find use cases where it can sound bad?  I'm guessing sure, you're saying it's 'noticeably' 'bad' ...  Maybe it's just not the right OD/distortion for your intended purpose?

 

The Valve Driver is "obviously brittle";  it's the #3 in the previous clip;  https://youtu.be/Hnco7JtYK7k?t=750   Sounds fine to me...?  (maybe not 100% Go vs Helix, but should be very close..)   Scream808 is #2  https://youtu.be/Hnco7JtYK7k?t=522

 

 So yeah maybe you're more looking for particular 'great' drives for as you say; edge of breakup?  Rather then all od pedals 'having issues' because they don't work as you would expect for this particular case?   not saying there's no issue...  Or that you're not correct in your 'quest' to get to the bottom of it!  Just that...  The issue seems a bit like a 'special case' ...  Reminds me of the old:  “The patient says, "Doctor, it hurts when I do this."
The doctor says, "Then don't do that!”

 

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Hi @grdGo33,

 

first of all, thanks for staying in the discussion. I really appreciate that. 

 

On 3/7/2023 at 7:29 PM, grdGo33 said:

Maybe someone else can chime in, but I think it's safe to accept that for instance, colordrive is horrible when used with a clean amp used on the edge of breakup.  But that may very well not be its intended purpose.  So it may not be a reasonable expectation that all drives are usable for that particular usage

 

Yes, that's true. I'm beginning to realize, that quite a few of my expectations were not realistic. 

 

But I think, concerning my categorization, there have been some misunderstandings. Many, if not all drives and amps can sound very cool, depending on the style of playing and the settings. When judging something as "brittle" in my last message, I was mainly referring to the cleaning up of decaying notes, which is something that simply doesn't exist in most demos on YouTube, but which is important to me, because, if I dial in a sound, as many styles of playing as possible should sound natural and the behaviour of many ODs does not sound natural to MY ears. On the other hand: I've got no idea how the real pedal would behave in that situation! I just don't know this behaviour from MY analog gear, that's all. If the real things behave like this, of course, I need to live with it. AND: Of course I also need to live with it, if the models are simply not made for the settings I choose. But this is something I want(ed) to find out:

 

What can I expect?

What can I do better?

And - considering the PodGo has had at least one HUGE bug (input impedance) - is my device OK or is something else wrong? Even if I can accept that the Colordrive (digital model or analog example) is not made for the way I used it, I still think the behaviour (if not the sound, then the looks of the waveform) is so odd, I just still can't believe everything behaves as designed...

 

The dialog with you people already has answered a huge portion of these questions. Thanks so much! In the meantime, I have become quite happy with my device, dialed in great tones, even with the Colordrive. I'd still be happy with any input concerning e.g. the behaviour of the real analog gear or electronical explanations of the oddities I witness, because I like digging deep, but the big question marks have disappeared and I can finally focus on making music and creating great tones!

 

(By the way, I even started breadboarding my own circuits to learn the analog basics from scratch ;) )

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@soerenP - reading through your responses - I would say the Colordrive from the legacy collection was a pretty bad sounding model.

 

So, a couple of things - I play through a real Twin Reverb.

 

I once read an article where they were trying out pedals and they did it through a number of amps and they said "an unforgiving twin" - and it's true - they are unforgiving.

 

As I mentioned before, by "stacking drives" the sparse crackles of one overdrive can "fill in" the crackles of another, making for a smoother drive.

 

This is true of overdriven amps as well - you either add drive in front to "fill in crackles" or you add volume at front to make the amp drive more to produce it's own crackles!

 

Many Pedals were not designed to create drive before a clean amp - in fact most aren't.

 

There's a great That Pedal Show demonstrating this with a Plexi-ish amp, an AC-30, and a clean Fender. The same pedal can sound drastically different. They even demonstrate using one on the Fender clean, and then with it breaking up a bit, and again it's a big difference.

 

To me, many drive models in the Helices sound like butt into a clean amp. Most real world ones do to. Because that's not what they were designed to do. That Pedal Show also talks about a DS-1 and the same kinds of ideas - it was an eye-opening video for me. "So that's why I never liked DS1s and similar" - I was playing them into clean amps and they designed those at a time when people were going into breaking up amps.

 

And man, I think it sounds great goosing another overdrive - sucks on its own, but is great pushing another.

 

Tube Screamer type pedals and Rat Pedals worked great for me in real live an in my DM4 and M13.

 

The 808 in the HX is pretty good, but thank god the legacy one is there with bass and treble controls as well.

 

The Rats all suck now into a clean amp though...

 

The Kinky Boost also sounds great to me - because it "fixes" some of the coloration inherent in the HX and all the drives.

 

But I'd say MOST of the overdrives have "issues" that alone, into an unforgiving Twin, are going to be noticeable.

 

But when they are used either as intended, or how they more commonly got used - mixed in with additional drive, you get a level of saturation that doesn't have these artifacts.

 

It's true - a real Plexi doesn't really have that much drive, and is "crackly" on it's own.

 

I'd argue the "fall off" issue is a modelling issue - not present on all models but on many. But the "crackle" is present in many real-world overdrives when not running them into an already breaking up amp, or amp with certain speakers and frequency characteristics etc. (the mid-range scoop of a Fender can make drives sound "nasty" and adding mids back can help - which is why mid-heavy drives like Tube Screamers tend to sound better with them).

 

But it's not a failing of the unit. It's maybe a failing of the design choices, but many of those artifacts are just things people never notice because they're always running the things into other things that cover them up!

 

When you don't do that, you suffer the consequences :-)

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By the way, some more findings concerning this topic: 

 

1. The Colorsound Overdrive has got a second, modded model, the L6 Drive! I didn't expect something named L6 being based on a classic drive so I haven't checked that for a long time. It is really better than the Colordrive model.

2. Watching even more YouTube videos, channels like ThatPedalShow etc., I found out, that there are a lot of original classic tones I don't like. For example, I perceive something as unpleasantly hissing/fizzy very quickly, when there is some sort of original signal coming through a distorted sound. Which may happen in BluesBreaker type pedals e.g. and in the Centaur by design. I was very happy to see I'm not the only person to perceive it like this. The guys from the Andertons YT channel e.g. mention this behaviour in their video comparing 5 types of classic ODs and have a different taste on that matter.

 

 

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  • 3 weeks later...
On 3/13/2023 at 4:28 AM, soerenP said:

By the way, some more findings concerning this topic: 

 

1. The Colorsound Overdrive has got a second, modded model, the L6 Drive! I didn't expect something named L6 being based on a classic drive so I haven't checked that for a long time. It is really better than the Colordrive model.

Yeah, I'm not a Color sound buff but the L6 Drive might be the best pedal in the collection - the Mid Control makes it go from Fuzz to Metal with the Drive high. I also recall using that with the Bass and Treble set real low to get more mids for a Boston type sound. I don't get the Colordrive - it doesn't have very much drive at all on tap.

 

On 3/13/2023 at 4:28 AM, soerenP said:

2. Watching even more YouTube videos, channels like ThatPedalShow etc., I found out, that there are a lot of original classic tones I don't like.

 

I can see that. I heard "Strange Brew" today as a matter of fdact and I once asked if people liked that and the responses were divided. I consider a lot of classic tones to be thin and scratchy or bright and brittle and don't like them.

 

On 3/13/2023 at 4:28 AM, soerenP said:

The guys from the Andertons YT channel e.g. mention this behaviour in their video comparing 5 types of classic ODs and have a different taste on that matter.

 

Do you remember which video that is? I'm sure I can find it. I know that Captain doesn't like Tube Screamers because "the dry signal leaks through" but I like that, and so does Pete. But I think that's a separate issue from "fizzy"!

 

FWIW, I tore apart my rig after a really depressing gig last weekend where my tone was just horrible.

 

I've going to not use the drives and just use my own external drives in the FX loops where they sound way better than anything in HX Effects. I'm just going to use the HX Effects for Wah, using the snapshots to turn on those FX loops 1 at a time or stacked or neither, and then a couple of effects like some Octave/Harmony type things I like having on that first unit (I try to keep all the mods and delays/verbs on the 2nd unit).

 

I still kind of really like the Stupor OD, but like all of the built in drives, it's got this upper midrange honk that's annoying and I'm tired of trying to dial it out with EQ right now. My plan is to use my external drives for now, and then try to gradually dial in something inbuilt to match as a backup. I think I can get an internal Fuzz to work fine for me though. Also one of their drives into one of my drives is not so bad and helps them out a lot.

 

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