I humbly belive that EH makes some of the very best sounding analoge pedals out there…but, I also belive that EH digital pedals are not as good sounding as a unnamed other pedal maker…I am saying this because I truly love EH and wish that they would get/use better convertors…..I hope one day that all pedal makers will go up to 24bit/96hrtz…..just my humbly thoughts

I think the Pog, Hog and Hazarai are masterpieces of digital design. The 2880 is genius ......and the Cathedral is arguably the greatest digital (pedal) reverb ever made. I think they have a pretty strong digital line up, is there a specific pedal you are thinking of?

electro-melx - 29 December 2009 04:59 PM

I think the Pog, Hog and Hazarai are masterpieces of digital design. The 2880 is genius ......and the Cathedral is arguably the greatest digital (pedal) reverb ever made. I think they have a pretty strong digital line up, is there a specific pedal you are thinking of?

(first, I want to say, I see EH putting out more digital pedals and I worry that one day they will only be offering digital pedals so that is way I am even mentioning this concern of mine)

I do not mean to angry anyone…I am humble and do really love EH....in my limited experience…of seriously trying the 2880 and of owning the HOG…and checking out the holy grail…I have found that (once again in my limited humbly experience) the converters (I am assuming) are not as good as my high end gear….yes, comparing the two worlds are not fair but at this point I believe that the tech is so high there is no reason not to convert at higher rates….

also, another example is say between my TC nova delay and say the 2880….I still believe that the TC is a bit better in the whole analog to digital thing but, as someone who is very picky…I still believe that the TC robs a bit of tone…

now there is a: cost to usefulness to tone equation….

I love EH and I wish they would just get the conversion done at a higher rate and with as little jitter as possible…

peace

and I will have to check out the cathedral

I’m not angry, tis cool…. I just genuinely think the digital ehx stuff I’ve tried has been good, but then I haven’t used much other stuff to compare it to, I seem to remember reading the the digital conversion rate was higher in the POG 2 than in the original Pog, so maybe it is something ehx are addressing already with newer models.

ok, according to Scott Matthews the POG2 has “a 4x faster DSP (than the original pog) that now processes the audio in 32-bit”

I don’t really know what that means, but you might!

I recently got rid of all of my digital pedals. I prefer analog because they are easier to use on the fly. The biggest beef that I have with digital effects is that (1) they tend to have quieter signal outputs, and (2) they also tend to be only applicable to use with an electric guitar or bass. However my small clone and memory boy are fantastic with my acoustic, which pedals from other manufacturers that primarily produce digital modelers seem to not handle well.

That said, the pedals that EHX has made in the digital arena are remarkably hard to make and keep compact in an analog model—here I am specifically referring to their digital reverbs. I have looked in to building an analog reverb pedal but it always requires a tank. For what they are they are masterpieces. If I had to buy digital then it would certainly from EHX.

I have no experience of the reverbs but I agree that the Hog and Pog are digital masterpieces.  Completely “alive”, organic and responsive like no other pitch shifter pedals out there. The SMM w Hazarai and Stereo Electric Mistress are also excellent. The converters change the sound but that’s part of their charm. To compare them with high end converters is really like comparing apples with pears. They are guitar pedals for christ’s sake!

electro-melx - 29 December 2009 05:48 PM

ok, according to Scott Matthews the POG2 has “a 4x faster DSP (than the original pog) that now processes the audio in 32-bit”

I don’t really know what that means, but you might!

I am extremly glad to hear that

babymicrobe - 30 December 2009 06:29 PM

To compare them with high end converters is really like comparing apples with pears. They are guitar pedals for christ’s sake!

I humbly disagree…..I only say high end convertors because analoge still sound best IMHO…I belive that tech is getting really close…(I just got NI guitar rig 4 and IMHO it sound much better ther 3)...so, I still favor a amp and mic…or an analog pedal

and as we move forward with 64bit processing and we can get the pedals to run at a 32bit floating point and at 96 the digital stuff should became very close to the analog…

but, if no one says “hey X” we want great sounding dugital stuff…we could have a repeate of the late 80s when every one was so overtaken by the functionality of the digital stuff as to forgive the tonality of it…of course these are my thoughts (and worries)

(and eventhough I really like the HOG, I do find it a bit lacking in tonality…not enough to take it baxk but enough for me to wish it was a bit more organic…)

i do have to agree with others that the smmh is an amazing pedal, i really love it!

and from the demos i’ve seen, i really like the pog2 and really like the cathedral.

I know this debate will rage on til the end of time, however for 30 years I had a delux memory man as part of my pedal board.  This pedal was/is truly awesome, never had a problem, I loved it deeply.  Then….....SMM with Hazarai arrives , i’m blown out of the water!
The quality of the sound from this pedal is nothing short of stunning, I think the keyword here is clarity.  For years and years with the old memoryman I have been very happy to hear the woolly repeats with hiss, I know its all part of its charm and I love it (still do).  But I do know what I now prefer and that’s that crystal clear precise sound for delay.  Both pedals are a masterpiece.

I think EH digital stuff kicks ass! Its great, I used to be so anti-digital, then the BOSS RC-2 changed my mind on that slightly, then the SMMH made me not give a damn!*

*except for dirt pedals.

I prefer analog when possible, but ultimately I’m more concerned with writing a good song and performing it with feeling. I’m a believer that I can make any gear sound good as long as the song and performance are in place.

Fender&EHX4ever; - 04 January 2010 09:44 AM

I prefer analog when possible, but ultimately I’m more concerned with writing a good song and performing it with feeling. I’m a believer that I can make any gear sound good as long as the song and performance are in place.

getting down to the truth here…

any way from what I have heard EH is using 24bit Burr-Brown convertors in the cathedral…very nice…I will have to give one a try eventhough I tend not use verb with guitar being played live…

and this is why I started the post because I love EH and if they are really going digital I want to still have some of the best sounding stuff coming from EH…..peace

st.bede - 05 January 2010 09:50 PM

...and this is why I started the post because I love EH and if they are really going digital I want to still have some of the best sounding stuff coming from EH…..peace

I can’t really see EHX stopping making the analogue pedals, I guess they are just trying to do new things with digital stuff that you can’t do with analogue circuits. ... The thing that excites me about the new digtal pedals is that anything seems to be possible. There were features on the hazarai that were things I’d thought about for years. I guess as time goes on really high quality digital stuff will come down in price and EHX will start banging all sorts of craziness into pedals and making them for great prices. I think the cathedral and the POG2 are testament to that… and I suppose the deluxe memory boy shows that they haven’t given up on creating new exciting analogue pedals either.

I predict a rosey future for both.

I’m following EHX closely lately, and that’s the reason behind me going nuts wanting to get almost their whole line-up. Can’t afford it, so I’m keeping it down to five for the time being.

I’ve read an extensive interview with EHX somewhere the other day (don’t remember where), an extensive interview that even went into the technicalities of sound engineering I don’t have much clue about, but it was very enlightening…

This issue with analog-digital was also addressed in this interview, extensively. I understood that EHX is as committed to analog pedals as it has ever been since its humble beginnings. But they made it clear that some of the components that used to be vital and widely used in vintage pedals are not easy to get anymore, in fact some of them have been completely replaced by newer and more efficient components - which were never designed exclusively for guitar pedals anyway. Some of these components became redundant as they were combined/integrated with others to do their job more efficiently (i.e. making slim flat screens possible). Unfortunately for us guitarists, the world has been spinning to fast and those invaluable pieces of electronics are gone forever.

So this is a sign that even though analog pedals will always exist, their circuitries are not going to be necessarily vintage or close to the ones our guitar heroes used to use.

I do feel a tendency towards digital pedals in the industry. After all, modernization takes over and that’s a good thing. It makes me think of photography. Every professional photographer knows that analog photography is still far superior to digital photography. But in digital photography convenience meets technology and more affordable prices in the long run, so every professional photographer has converted to digital. Limitations in pixel resolution are still there (which we could compare it to audio sample converters in the context of this thread), but the flexibility digital photography gives by not depending on films and easy data transfer is incomparable to that of the analog.

Not to mention that, in the case of a digital pedal, if you put a lot of effort to get one right, you’ll get 100.000 just as right (that was actually mentioned on the interview as well). That means you buy a Cathedral now and another in 20 years, they will both sound exactly the same (in the same rig) and I think that’s a very good thing.

My 2 cents.