Boss NS-2

[Hydrofly]

When I first plugged this in, I was not expecting much, being someone who turns his nose up at anything made by boss, I would think this is rather obvious as my 3 other pedals are an AMT Du Hast, an EHX Metal Muff and a Subdecay blackstar, nothing by boss or some other company reknown for digital whatevers. Well, needless to say, I was completely blown away.

Features/Build:
Boss obviously forgot the meaning of simplicity in designing this one, however, this turns out to be a good thing. The NS-2 tells your noisy pedal chain to shut the hell up based on your guitar on CLEAN. This is as the guitar goes straight to the NS-2, while the rest of your pedals go inbetween your send/return jacks. It's a little complicated I know, but this way, it is not a tone sucker as most anti-noise units are. It's definitely not as easy to operate as what is deemed as the BEST in noise elimination - the ISP Noise Decimator, but hell, it's simple enough, the threshold knob just sets the minimum threshold of what should be deemed as noise and the decay knob sets how fast it should cut the noise out. The mute function is useful too as it allows complete silence inbetween songs, if you're not using the pedal as a noise eliminator that is. Battery access is pretty typical of boss, unscrew something and shove the battery into the compartment below the big black bit that you step on. I can't say much about whether the pedal can take abuse or not as I take very good care of my pedals and all of my pedals are dead mint.

Soundwise:
I think I mentioned above, this pedal is ANYTHING but a tonesucker, the noise reduction function activates purely on the guitar on clean, this means that you can say goodbye to your hum and whatever noise is coming from your chain, without saying goodbye to your tone.

test equipment:
Jackson WRMG (old one with EMG H4s) with orange drop caps
Line 6 Spider III 30W
EH metal muff + Subdecay Blackstar

Verdicts?
Just amazed, never expected boss to come up with anything that was capable of blowing me away, but this one just did, demolished the MXR noise something and the ISP noise decimator in my opinion. Purely based on the fact that it DOES NOT suck tone.

Final Rating:95%

Dislikes : Complexity, separate inputs for guitar and pedal chain
Likes : Everything else, it works like a charm.

Worthy Contenders? I don't think so, everything else I have tried messed with my tone in a way I did not like.

 

[farhanians]

Woah. thats some review. btw anybody know the price tag on this? seems pretty interested as i got some hum and grounding problem

 

[subversion]

i've had some encounters with noise reduction units (this boss included). despite being tone friendly, a typical NR pedal would affect, to a certain degree, your original tone. this wouldn't be a bad thing altogether but it's fair warning to those who wish to incorporate this into their set up.

 

[ukulele]

i just wonder can the Boss NS-2 clear up the noise from my line-up of

[Guitar]->[Boss Ds-1]->[Boss OD-3]->[Boss CH-1]->[Boss DD-7]

esp when the DS-1 is on ~, ... Is it normal, when my palm not touching the strings, the feedback noise gets louder ?

 

[tyzjames]

i just wonder can the Boss NS-2 clear up the noise from my line-up of

[Guitar]->[Boss Ds-1]->[Boss OD-3]->[Boss CH-1]->[Boss DD-7]

esp when the DS-1 is on ~, ... Is it normal, when my palm not touching the strings, the feedback noise gets louder ?

yes it can.. you can loop your Ds-1 and OD-3 into the send/return loop. while your CH-1 and DD-7 goes in after the output. Basically what it does is that if you're not playing anything, or if the noise level falls below the threshold that you have set, it will cut off the signal to your amp, hence reducing the feedback noise that would otherwise be there.

and yes its normal

 

[ukulele]

Thanks ! great info for me~ :-D

 

[tyzjames]

there's actually a slight boost in volume when this pedal is set to reduction mode and when activated.

 

[Ized]

I don't use noise suppressors...cos they don't do anything for me! Tried them out in my rig and the tone suck was just horrendous...no to mention the hassle of having to turn it off when playing cleans.

Learn how to control and play with less gain.....rather than let the gain play you!