|
please note-Yahoo sent my 1st message prematurely-UGGGGGHHHH...
question: Could you explain in short how the dl8 works, what its highlights are? My biggest question: can you turn the "time" knob and get that varispeed effect like with the old Digitech PDS/RDS delays or the SMM w/Hazari in loop mode?
answer:
honestly (& take my opinions w/ a grain of salt-i'm no "i can hear the difference in 9 volt batteries" kind of guy-ha!) the DL8 is similiar in most regards to the dd7
can it do the varispeed time shifts-no, sadly, but it warps the sound better than most other long delays that i've played w/-i HATED the boss dd20 b/c it's delay time manipulation seemed futile to me (yes, it could do 23 sec, but....). when you have 8 sec delay & zip it to 2 sec it gurgles/warbles the sound, and then when i like to do is then play something over the warble-to my ear-the sound is not really what you originally played accurately slowed down or sped up, it's just digital warbles/gurgles. but i find it usable (more usable than my old digidelay/dd20/dd7)...i should point out that i did think the ibanez de7 did a nice variaspeed fast/slow/slow/fast-but it's delays were only 2.8 sec and i think the most repeats i counted were about 10 (no infinite), but it's fairly cheap pedal (60$ new)-i used it a TON for a # of yrs, probably should have kept it, b/c i would use it and dump the results to a sampler (oh well)...
but man for that varispeed manipulation-the eh-smm w/ h-is AWESOME, and i've yet to look at the manual! it is quite the quirky delay & FUN!
as for differences between dl8 vs dd7-
they do basically same thing, except:
-dl8 goes to 8 sec of delay, dd7 has 6.4 sec in stereo mode-so you have to have 2 outputs (and in mono which is how i use it, it's 3.2 sec)
-dl8 is a bit bigger, so more space in the knobs-which i like for fumbly fingers & being able to see @ 45 is nice, probably not an issue for the under 40 crowd out there...
-dl8 uses 'clicks' in the knobs, dd7 is smoother in knob turning, but i like the 'clicks' (again personal preference)
-i have heard folks talking about "sound quality" and some buffering-and to my ear the digitech dl8 keeps the signal clean/clearer, and it's supposed to be true bypass-which isn't a big deal for me, i use lots of cheap pedals, but i do think the boss colors the sound a bit, so the dl8 wins on that for me.
-i don't use the sound on sound sample much, but the boss dd7 wins w/ time w/ 40 sec vs the dl8's 20 sec -for some this may be more important-and if you only had ONE loop option...
i hope this helps (or confuses you more?) if you're looking for a super all in one do everything delay/looper in the dl8-i doubt you'll be happy, but i like it's option of 8 sec of delay and the tape/analog/lo-fi options are fun to use...
honestly i do wish that there was a pedal out there that would be more "delay-based looping" that had great varispeed manipulations...sort of like what david torn demo'ed in his '93 vids-"painting w/ sound" w/ his old lexicon pcm42. the things he could do w/ that i thought sounded great. i know if such a thing existed, people would complain about how much time it would have (his had 19 sec, my old dod d12 had 12 sec of delay i thought was great!), how easy it would be to use, etc...and cost...i guess i need to look at the eventide delay pedal, but it's a bit out of my price range...over all i 'm happy w/ what i have now, but it would be nice to see more "delay-looping options" available, instead of the "phrase sampler model" that are becoming popular, and honestly when i joined this list back in '01 the looping options were very limited, compared to now, there is a lot of choices, which is nice....
happy new yr....sorry for the 1st premature send (damn yahoo & touchy buttons!)...
happy looping....
s---
|