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What You Can Expect From The Pod HD500 Guitar Pedal

Friday, March 30th, 2012

The Pod HD500 is currently at the leading edge of amp modeling. It’s the sole state-of-the-art multi-effect guitar pedal to provide 16 Line 6 amp HD models, an incredibly extensive analog, and 100+ class effects both contemporary and classic. It’s an amazing model, and one that is difficult to ignore.

The Pod HD500 offers it all with regards to complete connectivity. It incorporates a mini-jack stereo input (for Mp3 players), a quarter inch input jack designed for guitars, an XLR microphone input which has gain trim, and also a quarter inch aux input jack. Also, you’ll find MIDI connections and also a digital Line 6 Variax Guitar input. It in addition includes a lot of outputs, such as a stereo effects loop, two balanced XLRs for right and left channels, and a quarter inch headphone jack.

The Pod HD500 contains a USB port which permits easy and direct connection to your computer. You can employ this connection for both playback and recording. The no cost POD HD Edit application enables you to control the guitar pedal from the computer. This application can be found on Line 6′s official web site.

For recording, the HD500 has a 48 kHz internal sample rate. However, you can sync it to sample rates from 44.1 kHz to 96 kHz. The audio output is at 24 bit. Together with the Line 6′s driver software you have the ability to hear your guitar sounds (with effects) when recording. You will not suffer from any minuscule processing time or latency delays on the pedal itself while recording.

You can tell that the developers have placed a good amount of effort into this product, since they concentrated their knowledge on making the 16 classic amp models absolutely perfect. On top of that, the pedal comes with a vast inventory of preset slots. There are over 500 of these preset slots, and you can overwrite and alter the majority of them.

Guitarists very much appreciate the amount of control the Pod HD500 features. It features 12 foot switches that are organized in two rows. It also features a set of amp control knobs, made up of Drive, Bass, Mid, Presence, Treble, Master, and Volume. This allows simple and fast adjustment to the selected amp model. There is in addition an LCD display where you can manage all the controls. With this screen you will have the ability to scroll through the wide range of presets.

Furthermore, the high end technology within the guitar pedal is effectively protected by a very tough metal housing. The expression pedal and foot switches also are made from heavy duty metal. The Pod HD500 is able to handle a good deal of punishment and will last for many years.

Are you looking for the best guitar effects pedals? Be sure to visit Best Guitar FX Pedals for a Pod HD500 review and Line 6 M13 review.

Posted in Electric Guitars | No Responses »
Tags: arts and entertainment, electric guitar, Electric Guitars, Guitar, guitar effects pedal, music, Pod HD500

Guitar Compressor Sustain Effects Pedals – 5 of the Most Popular Used

Sunday, March 4th, 2012

Compressor Sustain pedals are possibly the most owned Effects Pedal, owned by guitarists. Although the most useful, these pedals can also be the most difficult to use, due to its ability to produce either a bland, or at the other extreme, noisy performance.

The main function of the compressor is to enable the guitarist to perform possible extremes of playing, from loud solos to calm backing rhythms, while at the same time maintaining a constant output volume level from the guitar Amplifier. This ensures that the overall balance is maintained throughout the song.

Another great function of this type of pedal is the ability to produce long sustained notes, so typical in rock music.

Five of the most popular and best selling Compressor Sustainers are briefly described below.

Electro Harmonix Black Finger

The Black Finger is a dual photocell opto-isolator incorporating two light sources. The design is such that one light source controls the compression, while the other, Gain. As a mixture of Valve Preamp, Compressor and Booster, this pedal is ideal for both Bass and Electric Guitar.

By use of five individual controls, the Blank Finger is capable of producing a wide range of tones. A drawback to this however, is that the pedal can be quite difficult to master properly. The rewards of persevering with the settings though, is well worth the effort you put into it, thus making the Black Finger the best loved compressor among many guitarists.

MXR M102 Dyna Comp

This is a very simple to use pedal and is great if you are on a budget. There are only two controls for output and sensitivity, and although the Dyna Comp does not have the tone shaping capabilities of the Black Finger, this compressor produces a nice clean infinite sustain and can be easily controlled live.

With a high average rating of 5 out of 5, this makes the MXR M102 very popular indeed. Two rubber caps are supplied with the pedal, which makes it possible for the guitarist to change the compressor settings by using their foot.

The MXR M102 is an extremely simple to use pedal, ruggedly built and reliable. This compressor is ideal for cleaning up hiss and noise from other pedals, and is great for live use.

Boss CS-3 Compression Sustainer

The CS-3 has four controls to adjust Attack, Sustain, Level and Tone. As with the Boss, this pedal can also be a bit more difficult to use effectively without effort, and has been commented as such by musicians who have used it. However, this level of control does enable the compressor to boost clarity and punch, plus deliver a smooth sustain.

However, the Boss CS-3 still manages an impressive 4 out of 5 average rating, as musicians who persevere with the settings, end up loving the performance of this good value for money compressor.

When using this pedal, always use your effects power supply, as the battery consumption is high. The CS-3 is brilliant at cleaning and tightening up your sound. Also, when used in conjunction with your distortion, you are able to produce some awesome feedback.

The Boss CS-3 is good value at under $100, and is reliable and rugged. For those that have persevered with the settings, this compressor has become quite popular and is ultimately a very nice pedal.

Keeley Compressor

You will be hard pushed to find any criticism about the performance of this award winning compressor sustainer. However, you may see some comments over its price, as the Keeley is at the higher end of the market.

The Keeley compressor incorporates an innovative circuit design, which eliminates unwanted distortions and produces a perfect compressed signal. This is due in part to the high spec resistors and capacitors, which are matched to within 1% of each other. The sustain is superb, and the pedal is ideal for cleaning up your chord work.

Power consumption is extremely low, only 5mA, so this could be used on battery, only if you wanted to. The pedal is also great for studio use, and very effective in use with other instruments such as Keyboards, Drum Machine etc.

Simple to use – only two controls – rugged and reliable, the Keeley is a very high quality compressor which is popular with guitarists, despite the higher price.

Electro Harmonix Freeze

Although not a compressor, the Freeze can definitely sustain, and that is its purpose in life. Unlike the method of sustaining of other sustainers, the Freeze is more like a real time sampler.

A way of describing the use of the Freeze would be like adding a piano type of sustain pedal to your guitar. Pressing the footswitch after producing a chord or note, will hold that note for as long as you keep the switch pressed down. A nice by product of this, is that you can play a chord – then while sustaining that chord via the footswitch, play another riff over the top.

When using this pedal, many musicians have commented that it’s like having an extra musician join the band. From the first time that the pedal is turned on, it seems to inspire the creative juices within you. So for songwriters, the Harmonix Freeze is a boon.

This simple to use rugged pedal has a level effects control, plus a 3 position switch which is used to select slow or fast delay, plus the means of turning the momentary footswitch into latch mode. This is a popular pedal which produces a clear and crisp sound

Conclusion

So there you have it, five of the best selling Compressors on the market. Of course, many more are available, but hopefully this article gives you some insight into these five, and helps in choosing the right pedal for you.

If you would like any more information on Compressor Pedals then please visit Electric Guitar Effects Pedals for Videos, Reviews and price comparisons. This article, Guitar Compressor Sustain Effects Pedals – 5 of the Most Popular Used is available for free reprint.

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Tags: compressor pedals, effects pedals, electric guitar, electric guitar effects pedals, Electric Guitars, Guitar, guitar compressor, guitar effects, guitar playing, guitar sustain, music, Musician, sustain pedals

Guitar Pedals Strengthen The Rock And Roll Sound

Saturday, March 3rd, 2012

Rock and roll owes its soul to the electric guitar. Yes, there are various other musical instruments that make up the rock and roll style however the foundation lies in the sound of the electric guitar. Movies like “Wayne’s World” and “Bill and Ted’s Adventures” paid a fairly irreverent homage to the musical genre and lifestyle. Both of those movies put the guitar in the forefront of the movies. The unmistakable hot licks of Chuck Berry’s Gibson 335 right up to Metallica’s shredding wall of sound, the guitar has defined them both.

The unsung heroes of the rock and roll community that provide every single band and guitar player a special but unmistakable rock sound are the guitar pedals. These particular devices produce the sounds that clearly define rock and roll. These technical marvels have not only defined the guitar sound that is rock and roll but the musicians themselves. Pedals have furthermore developed subcategories of rock and roll. These sonic wonder devices have often gone unnoticed while at the same time defining the electric guitar.

The rockabilly sound was defined by overdriven amplifiers and heavy echo machines which gave Scotty Moore and Luther Perkins the revolutionary sound of the rock guitar. Today the music and the sound lives on with a lot more mobile devices of delay and echo found in stomp boxes compact enough to put in your pocket. The prior versions of echo machines were so substantial that a lot ended up being placed outside of the studio. Today exactly the same sound developed during the genesis of rock and roll may be placed inside of a compartment of a guitar case along with others plus the guitar.

That specific overdriven sound was found in the earlier rockabilly manifestations of rock music. Tube screamer and overdrive pedals allow contemporary solid state amplifiers that very same sound. That broken up sound became the archetype sound of rock music. The sixties and seventies saw the morphing of this particular sound from fuzz to complete distortion. Fantastic Rock anthems of all sorts ended up being defined by these kinds of sounds and guitar pedals. “Smoke on the Water,” Canned Heat’s “Spirit in the Sky” and “Voodoo Child” all put the crunch into rock music.

Jimi Herndrix turned the sonic world of rock music upside down. His use of these sonic manipulators found at his heel and toe redefined the guitar, the music, and the boundaries that were permissible to investigate as a guitarist. The “wah” and fuzz took the rock and roll guitar into fresh areas of expression and opened up the door to other sonic possibilities.

Guitarists like Jeff Beck, Zach Wilde and David Gilmour have taken the rock guitar to many different places, yet are all considered rock. They’ve also developed and employed guitar pedals that permitted them to create these exhilarating locales within the sanctum of rock and roll. The guitar is the lord of rock and its foot soldiers would be the pedals making for a conquering ruler.

Are you looking for guitar pedals? Be sure to visit Best Guitar FX Pedals for a Boss ME-25 review and TC Electronic G-System review.

Posted in Electric Guitars | 1 Response »
Tags: arts and entertainment, electric guitar, Electric Guitars, entertainment, guitar effects pedals, guitar pedals, music

How to find a great Canadian guitar.

Friday, February 24th, 2012

Archtop guitars offer an aura of ambiance and tradition that leaves large numbers of guitarists yearning for their very own. But for flattop-oriented players who cannot afford an acoustic guitar to accommodate every single impulse, they can be impracticable from a tonal and financial perspective. Even though archtops have been around ever since the 1890s when Gibson pioneered the design and were popularized by early jazz and country greats such as Eddie Lang and Mother Maybelle Carter, the genuine acoustic archtop has had much less impact than its flattop cousins. There has been a variety of well thought of archtop luthiers through the years, including John D’Angelico, Jimmy D’Aquisto, and Bob Benedetto. And a period of time during the 1950s and early 1960s saw companies like Gretsch, Harmony, National, and Guild produce some prosaic but easily affordable instruments. Typically, however, the acoustic archtop’s tremendously high price level and dry, barky tonal signature have made them a luxury or novelty instrument over and above a small coterie of addicts.

Though with the development of the Godin 5th Avenue, the low-cost, superior quality acoustic archtop’s stay in limbo may be over. Godin Guitars’ founder Robert Godin-whose first instrument was an archtop-has long thought of producing a low priced version for modern day players. And with a $520 street price, quality build quality, coupled with a voice which will fascinate different types of guitar players, this acoustic guitar will be interesting to anyone that harbors hopes for archtop ownership.

While the 5th Avenue is also accessible in natural and black finishes, the orange-to-red hued cognac burst that ornamented our test instrument brilliantly presented the wild cherry laminate used for the top, back, and sides. The pressed top is arched nicely, having a consistent radius from one side of each f-hole to the other. A cream binding accents the burst on the back and top, and combined with a rosewood fretboard and adjustable bridge, black peghead overlay, and satin finish, the entire effect is classy but understated.

The high level of care and workmanship that goes into the 5th Avenue’s engineering is clear throughout. And with the exception of the very small opening between the back of the heel cap and the body (which was more of an aesthetic issue than a design one) fit and finish were fantastic.

The look is not without any quirks that will motivate double takes among archtop neophytes. The floating fretboard is located on a portion of neck that bends upwards and away from the body at the 16th fret and the neck alone narrows on the 15th fret, creating a fretboard overhang of about 1/16th inch on both sides. This permits the pickguard to easily tuck in under the fretboard on the treble side.

The 5th Avenue’s sound wouldn’t make acoustic archtop diehards desire to trade in their vintage L-5s, but it does possess a classic archtop’s trademark chunky midrange honk in addition to a little more high end that offers balance and nice tones in all registers. Generally, the 5th Avenue responded better to a gentle touch rather than a heavy hand. With light strings it makes a great swing rhythm guitar in a tiny group setting-of violin and voice, by way of example. A switch to medium strings (.013-.056), however, boosted the guitar’s volume enough to cut through a big band in the style of Freddie Green.

Fantastically, it’s not hard to think about the 5th Avenue excelling in settings other than swing and jazz. It sang with authority when playing full, open-string chords, which undoubtedly aren’t the first thing I am inclined to try when presented with an archtop. It gives a sexy bluesy vibe to simple Travis-style fingerpicking and will make an outstanding midrangey partner for a soprano voice. Flatpicked melodies, though somewhat quiet, are sweet and singing, most definitely on the treble strings up the neck. This is a guitar that’s prone to record nicely too, because there are no overamped peaks to worry about, and so it remains warm and full when played delicately. Need to add a jazzy lead sound to a track? Here’s your ax.

The neck is cut in a cozy U-shape that, with its 1 11/16-inch nut width, 2 1/8-inch string spacing on the bridge, and short 24.84-inch scale, will be suited to smaller hands as well as players who make use of a pick. I left the adaptable bridge where it was when it arrived in the Acoustic Guitar office, since the action was set for trouble-free fretting in all positions without buzzing.

The 5th Avenue is going to catch the attention of a great deal of players who’re struck by its fine look; hooked on its silky, easy playability; and lured by its almost-too-good-to-be-true selling price. But players stoked over finally discovering a cost-effective “jazz box” shouldn’t restrict themselves to extracting jazz chords from this guitar. Certainly, you’ll have a blast with a few standards or swing tunes. But the real joy of the 5th Avenue is experiencing what its unique voice can lend to the music you commonly play.

Best prices on Godin 5th Avenue guitars

Posted in Acoustic Guitars | No Responses »
Tags: acoustic, Acoustic Guitars, Canadian guitars, drums, guitars, instruments, music, Musical, pianos, strings, violin

Some Tips To Help You Select The Right Beginner Electric Guitar

Monday, February 13th, 2012

When the time comes to shop for a beginner electric guitar, you will do well to address a few important issues that will help you pick the right item. You should not mind investing your hard earned money in buying a proper instrument. The money that you spend will be well spent as then you will get more out of your attempt to learn to play the instrument in the proper manner.

Before you actually choose a beginner electric guitar, it is important to look for factors such as quality of its wood and also the type of workmanship that has gone into the making of the instrument. Too many manufacturers are cutting costs by sacrificing on quality as well as workmanship. Therefore, be sure to avoid the low quality options and look for those which have proper hardware and which are made in the best manner possible.

It is also a good idea to purchase a stand because it allows you to place your guitar outside of its case and so will be in plain view at all times. This in turn helps to keep you motivated and you will want to play much more.

You should also think about leaving the cord plugged into the instrument and it should also be plugged into the amp. If you would like to pick a suitable instrument, be sure that you pick one that suits your preferences and also the music that you intend on playing.

You will find that there are numerous models available that provide various benefits to the beginner. There are some that are constructed very well and they provide you excellent value for your investment. Though you will find hundreds of different options out there, you must use your common sense before picking one.

There are far more options available to you when you start looking for electric versions. When selecting these items, look at the price and also quality of the instrument. However, the cheaper versions cannot produce the most pleasing sounds and so should be avoided as much as possible.

By spending a little extra, you will end up with a better option and whether it is the acoustic or electric type, they will provide you with more value and so are good options. The nice part about investing a little extra is that the items that you get for a higher price normally also have good resale values. This means that once you have become accomplished and you want to get rid of the old instrument, you will get a good price when you find a buyer.

A majority of beginner electric guitars are very affordable and will generally not cost you more than 200 US dollars. There are many that suggest that it makes more sense to buy an item that was made in America. So, if you find one such item, be sure to give it careful thought and buy it if it is also affordable.

You can get tips for beginner electric guitar purchases and a summary of the factors to consider when buying electric guitar strings, now.

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Tags: arts and entertainment, beginner electric guitar, electric guitar, electric guitar strings, Electric Guitars, music

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