Pedalboard Switchers - Tell me about them

I use the Voodoo labs Px8. Stoopid easy. Quiet as hell. I have power supply under the board (also by voodoo) hidden away. Controls my amps if needed, fractal if needed, all pedals, midi etc. any of them that do it all is really nice. One button—> BAM
 
I used to have a Loopholic 5 pedal switching system. It was pretty basic. Five presets arranged over 32 banks. The ability to send 5 midi PC and CC messages for presets across banks or individually for each preset. A stereo output - from which one of the outputs could be routed to a tuner - a volume/FX loop and a tap tempo input. 10 loops, out of which loops 9 and 10 could be used for amp switching functions, with the option for the loop to be open or closed.

It really simplified my life when I had a pedalboard. Definitely worth getting something more modern if you have more than three pedals or your pedals are not in one row. Completely eliminates tap dancing.

They used to be quite expensive way back then. Now they've become a lot cheaper and have far more functions, so a great time to snag one.

If you're getting one, my recommendation would be the Boss ES-8. The ability to reorder loops is worth the price of admission.

Funny story: I had a megathread about pedal switching systems on thegearpage, which was running into 10s of pages. Someone saw fit to remove my handle from the first post and put someone else's name in its place.

Crazy bastards, I complained and they reinstated it. Not sure if they deleted the thread when they banned me. That place stinks of Shiteratti.
 
I have had many switchers and they are fun to mess around with. I was attracted to the concept of 1 button to hit for every sound I need. But there were always issues as not everything works together seamlessly and there are many other considerations in terms 4CM and dividing up your signal path etc. In the end, I just went back to my pedals - I realized (after all the money I spent) that I really only use 2 sounds in my band and the pedals are pretty much used for colors. Of course no player is the same in terms of what they need or want. Another thing I had issues with was switching my amp's channels. If you are using Marshall style latching type switching, most switchers can accommodate that. For my XTC, I had to order the RJM module to interface with my switcher etc. More hardware to make it work like I wanted it to. If I ever did it again, I would probably buy a Gigarig G3 as they are the best switcher out there I think. There are many products out there to choose from. I tend to like the simpler ones myself. But to each his won - good luck in your quest!
 
Yes, adding a switcher to you setup is going to be more complex. You will have to think about the routing and how you want to control things. I use an RJM Mini Amp Gizmo to change the channels on my EVH 5150 IIIS. I find that it is very easy to program. Unfortunately, RJM doesn't make them anymore. Though I understand that Voodoo Labs makes a good one now. My switcher allows me to either run eight loops before the amp, or four loops before the amp and four in the amp's effects loop. I run the 4x4 with my setup. This way if I don't want the Eventide converters in my tone, I can close that loop and remove it from the signal path. The only pedal not in a loop is my wah. You lose the ability to just turn things on randomly, but the music I play doesn't call for that.


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I currently use the Boss MS-3 effects processor which has 3 loops. I run mine 4 cable method and use Loop 3 going to the amp's effects loop. I use Loop 2 to run a XTS GE-7 midrange modded pedal for lead boost. The effects on the MS-3 sound great and can also switch amp channels via TRS cable or MIDI for channel switching.
 
Kapo_Polenton said:
Steve's pedalboard thread is making me notice these 4 or 8 spot switchers. I'm wondering for you guys who use them, what is your main motivation for having them? Is it for real estate? Sometimes it does make sense to have pedals on their sides or in corners. I am thinking those are sometimes hard to reach. Another is tone suck. Sometimes there is that one pedal that sucks tone in bypass. OR, you just want less between you and the amp. Am I on point here? Anybody start with a switcher and then go back to old school pedalboard tap dancing? I notice this varies on pro rigs as well. Some guys just have them all lined up and they tap dance as needed. My motivation would be that I want more variety on my board for my home studio but i don't want 8 pedals in line.

So with that said, what is low profile and good? Is Joyo's switcher any good? I'd love something very slim that can hug the bottom of a pedal board.
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For me it was the full midi control where I didn't have to tap dance. I could either program a bank by song or generally what I most relied on was about 8 different presets which were just variants of each other. Say straight rhythm tone, then same tone with a hint of delay etc... My GX board back in the day was bone simple - midi pedalboard, tuner and wah. That's all that was out front. The rack had my rack delays, racked pedals and the GCX loop system.

It got my front of amp pedals in the loop to avoid tone suck and even did channel switching on my old amps. My current amps have built in midi.

The down side...programming. For some it's no issue, for some it's a freaking drag. Also the units themselves could be deep dive hell or rather simplistic. I personally thought the GCX / Voodoo Lab rack stuff was incredibly easy as everything I needed to program could be set to Omni midi channel. The it was just programming my effects to whatever preset number and then the pedals off/on depending the loop.

Whereas my Boss ES-5 is a deep dive and to program my delays, verbs and amp to certain midi channels. I even have to assign a midi channel for bypass to essentially turn them off since they are not in the loop to simply bypass.

It's sorta why I'm putting my new board together that doesn't have a switcher - I'll have both boards but for me I'm at a point where I just want simple. Which has been the trend for me for several years now of de-racking and my GCX switcher, to midi loop switcher on my board with all my pedals to just a basic pedalboard.

When putting my board together my first consideration was size. I wanted to duplicate my rack setup but I also wanted it to be easy to haul. I can assure you, after years of hauling a rack around, a pedalboard, amp and cabs my back is shot. I wanted to eliminate the rack. It came down to the Musicom Lab, the Boss ES-5 and cost. Literally while my board was being put together RJM came out with the RJM PBC6X. I would have gone with that because I like the screen better and has bank up and down. The ES-5 can only bank up unless you go in...yep, program the mute button for down...actually that is my only real beef with that unit and it's the typical Boss programming which IMO, is a little cumbersome.

Anyway lots of good units out there - Boss, Musicom Lab, RJM, Providence etc... Fender even has one out now.
 
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SFW said:
I use a MusicomLab EFX MK III eight loop switcher on my board. I came from the rack world. I like to hit one switch and have multiple things happen. I hate tap dancing on pedals. I like the ability to control my H90 and SDE3000EVH presets and functions with the tap of a switch. It allows me to have five different tones at instant reach on by board at any given time within the bank of presets that I have called up. It makes playing live easier.
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Musicom Lab is just a great company. All their stuff is built military grade and just works. Can't recommend them enough.
 
DanTravis62 said:
Depending on what your amp is, IMO 300$ ish for a used es3 or es5 is well worth the extra dough :dunno: I've owned and used both

The phase switching, volume boosts on patches, midi control, and all of the extras on the boss, I found myself using as my rig evolved through the years
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Pedals are for puseeeeeyyyysssssss







So











You probably have alot.

😿
 
I love my ES-8. I control my boss dd500 and md 500 via midi. The buffers are handy also. The switches are so smooth so instead of stepping on and off of my evh flanger or phase 90 which the switch is more clanky, i am stepping on the nice smooth switch on es8.
 
I run a fairly simple true bypass looper on my board, mostly to deal with noise & tone suck, but I like that it gives me some versatile switching options as well.

I've got a saturnworks unit, with 4 "loops" and a master bypass. Currently I'm running phaser in loop 1, dual OD in loop 2, fuzz in loop 3, chorus in loop 4. The delay and reverb on the board usually go into the amps fx loop, but I can also run them from the bypass loopers main out easily enough. I had a more intricate setup with it for a short while, but so far I've been really happy with how I have it.
 
I went to a Morningstar switcher to avoid tap dancing and then replaced any non-MIDI pedals with a HX Stomp. Made life so much easier for gigs. Zero regrets.
 
Bronco said:
Musicom Lab is just a great company. All their stuff is built military grade and just works. Can't recommend them enough.
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If you don't mind not having a fancy screen to look at, the EFX MK III can be had for very reasonable prices.
 
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