BOSS ME-50 (guitar multi-effects)

[funky-one]

Here's my review on the BOSS ME-50..

imho it is a good multi effects pedal to get for beginners especially...really value for money...has almost all the effects you would wanna mess ard with!

Functions: 9/10
Basically it has a whole set of Overdrive/Distortion (tubescreamer, DS-1, BD-2, RAT and many more), Modulation, Delay, Compressor, Reverb, Tone Adjust(including acoustic guitar simulator) ,Noise Supressor and an Expression Pedal (can be used as Volume, Wah, Octaver, Ring Modulator etc. pedal). And a chromatic tuner too!

You can also store up to 40 presets in the memory bank if i'm not wrong.

In terms of functions i really feel it almost has all the things you can think of!!!

Ease of Use: 10/10

This is where the ME-50 really shines!! It's all knob based when it comes to tweaking the effects!! You can simply dial in the tones you desire just like an analog pedal.

One reason I don't really like multi-effects is because you will usually need to really read up the manual before you can really make use of the functions. With the ME-50 you just need to know how to store your presets and the rest is really intuitive imho!! Maybe i'm just lazy...:mrgreen:

Aesthetic: 10/10

As with all BOSS pedals, the ME-50 is built like a tank! Unless you are thinking of dropping it from the 12th storey of your HDB flat, this pedal will be fine while you rock out on stage.

Sound: 6.5/10

The downside of the ME-50 is the Overdrives/Distortions and the Wah pedal...

Although some of the overdrives actually sound ok when u are playin in your room, when you play with a band u just can't cut thru the mix!!

As with most multi-effects, the Wah always CMI!!..the sweep range is just too small...it sounds ok when it's clean but not when there's distortion together with it...

But all hope is not lost...THE MODULATIONS and DELAYS are pretty awesome!!!

The phaser, chorus, tremolo, flanger, reverse delay, slow echo etc sounds pretty damn good to me!! The Octaver (like a whammy pedal) is pretty decent...of course do not compare it to a Digitech Whammy...the tone is a lil sharp but it gets the job done!!

Overall: 7/10

Get this if you just started out and love experimenting with effects! Really worth the money!!

I used to use it as my Modulation/Delay/Volume/Tuner pedal together with other analog effects (overdrive, distortion and wah).

Hope you guys found this useful!

 

[theunknown]

yeaps, as with most multi effects, the drives are not up to standard leading a handful of people using separate pedals for their drive uses. only i'm not sure if there is an efx loop for this model.

good for beginners who want to explorer the different types of effects and drives available. and doesnt take much to adapt when one decides to convert to being stompbox user.

 

[Dime]

The distortion section is really good for boosting as it doesnt supply enough kick to be played through the cleans.But a very good pedal nonetheless.If you're a metal its best to avoid this as it wont satisfy the needs.

Great for blues.Best function is the tuner.

 

[floydfloat]

The disadvantages on this efx is I found that there is a time lag about 1 sec. when switching patches while in bank mode.
The other disadvantage is I could not set the volume pedal to my desired % when at min. Volume will be totally off at min. I tried KORG AX1500G and volume can be set in terms of % when at min. Anyway I still like this efx cause it can also operate on cells.