Vortex queries

[The Man Himself <altruist@shoko.calarts.edu>]

WARNING: This is a post regarding the Lexicon Vortex, and is not 100% 
loop-related.  Those easily offended by non-topicality are advised to 
delete now or suffer the consequences!

Anyway, I'm posting here since there's been much discussion regarding
Vortex on the list as of late.  I snatched one up at the legendary Guitar
Center "Trying Not To Lose Our Shirts Over This Fringe Technology"  $150
sale.  (When I went in to pick it up, the guy at the counter grabbed one
from atop a very large stack of Vortexes and quipped, "So how many do you
want to pick up today?")

At any rate, I'm not entirely conviced of the unit's possibilities.  It's
very nice sounding, but a lot of the distinctions between different
effects seem to be along the order of different sorts of delay tap
patterns and so forth -- pretty subtle things that would sound interesting
in a headphone studio mix, but not so useful in a more
performance-oriented application.  There are one or two wonderfully
hideous things I've run across (ring-mod and envelope-detune), but I'm
wondering just how deep the thing is. 

So if any Vortex users would care to share some editing/operating tips,. 
I'd be most grateful.  At the moment, I'm not sure if I'll hang on to it
or take advantage of GC's return policy.  Even at this cheap of a price, I
don't know if it's worth it for two or three cool effects. 
  
So please offer some hints if you have any, preferably by e-mail so as to
avoid taking up more bandwidth with non-topical material. 

Thanks very much, and sorry for the non-loop content,

--Andre