Volume Swells, Noisegates, and Threshold

What does the Threshold Parameter do? Does that have anything to do with the noisegate I heard about?

The parameter called "threshold" is only for starting a record when you actually start playing. It sets the level of audio required to start the recording. When it is at zero, the function is off and recording starts when you tap record. This has nothing to do with any noisegate.


So what is this Noisegate thing then?

The noisegate is different. It's on all the time and has nothing to do with the "threshold" setting. The noisegate is there to make Undo a much more usable function, so that each press of Undo takes away a real overdub rather than some unintentional noise. It also keeps the echoplex from squandering its memory. It should be transparent and you shouldn't ever notice it. It's there to help you.


I had a problem where tbe beginning of a volume swell was cut off in the recorded loop. (or:I heard there is a problem with volume swells.) Is this fixed?

With LoopIII v3.2, people often complained that the noisegate cut off quiet sections of their loops. It was fairly irritating. This happened because the threshold for our friendly noisegate was set too high. For the LoopIII v5.0 version, the threshold setting of the noisegate has been reset to a much lower value. Volume swells and such don't cut in like they used to. Hopefully this works for everyone. If you are using the old software and have this problem, make sure to get the upgrade.

Feedback Degeneration When Controls Are Set To 100%

I heard that loops on the Echoplex slowly fade away, which means it can't really loop. Is this true?

No, this is not true.


I have an old Oberheim Echoplex unit, and I sometimes have the loop audio slowly degrade when I leave the loop going for a long time. Can this be fixed?

This problem was definitely there on early prototypes, and was fixed in later software versions. It probably still occurred on very rare occaisions with LoopIII v3.0, which shipped in about the first 60 units or so. Even then it only happened very rarely. There was a calculation bug in the feedback path at fault. It could appear only after a lot of repetitions, and only if AutoUndo could not act, which in the early software versions means: Only if the loop is longer than half the memory. This was fixed by version 3.2. So if you have one of the first production units or you are one of the people who stole prototype Echoplex units from Gibson's R&D Lab, you should upgrade the software.


I have a stereo setup with two Echoplexes and v3.2 software. Sometimes the loop fades out on the slave even though Feedback on the master is all the way up. Is there a fix for this?

LoopIIIv3.2 had a similar problem where a stereo slave unit would get the feedback set mysteriously low. this problem is fixed with the latest software upgrade LoopIIIv5.0. If you are having any such trouble, you should definitely get the upgrade.

StartPoint moving with LoopSwtiching

"Lately, my problem has been the start point of the loops moving when I use next loop a lot. After creating 2 loops, and enhancing them with multiply and overdub, I nextloop from one multiple in loop 1 to a single multiple in loop 2, and repeat. Eventually the start point of these loops move, and I have to reset the start points manually."

This was a bug in the 3.2 version of Loop. It is fixed in LoopIII v5.0.