Home › Forums › Review Your EHX Gear › Signal Pad, Anyone?
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February 21, 2009 at 9:48 pm #77784liveatsixMember
Just wondering about them and nobody anywhere online has a review of them… yet. I’m mostly interested is how it “breathes life into your favorite pedals” like the description says. So, yeah, fire away, please.
March 15, 2009 at 12:06 am #94520John JMemberI don’t know how it breathes life into your pedals, but it seems like a great idea for running before distortions or after pedals which give you a weird volume boost like the Clone Theory. I guess it would make it SUPER easy to handle a Fuzz Face; with the flick of a switch you can go between OD and fuzz without having to try and find that sweet spot on the guitar’s volume knob every time. Same goes for dirty amps.
I’ve yet to see one in store or catch a review online, but honestly it seems like something you either could or couldn’t use. There’s not alot of mystery to it, except for how it could breathe that life…
March 15, 2009 at 3:41 am #94529thegpMembervery true. Still, I too would like to see a demo of all sorts of different applications for which the signal pad can be used.
March 15, 2009 at 5:11 am #94530julianModeratorit’s a very simple effect, being able to attenuate volume in places is always a nice thing for tweaking your pedalboard
I don’t have one, but I can definitely see how it would be usefulJuly 16, 2009 at 2:57 pm #99519alfonsoParticipantI got one this morning. The true bypass works very well. What left me speechless is the amount of tone sucking when it is engaged. I have a single coil strat going to a Suhr Badger 18, few effects through a Voodoo Lab Pedal Switcher and I must say that while the strat volume does a quite nice job and doesn’t steal a significant amount of treble and without having any treble bypass cap added (I noticed a very good performance in this sense with both my Cathode follower amps, the other one a Ceriatone 5e3), the Signal Pad engaged makes the sound veiled and muddy. I had a look inside and it has something more than a switch and a pot, but I can’t hear why. I’m not going to use adjectives for now….too early.
July 19, 2009 at 11:43 am #99711alfonsoParticipantI used it some more…..it definitely sucks tone so much that I found a new use for it. used after a cry baby it helps to smooth its output and the hiss allowing for a soft but clean wah sound when you’re using a tube amp in a slightly crunchy setting which normally gets dirtier if you engage a wah pedal…
I wonder if it would have been better with just a 250k pot and an effective treble bypass circuit, maybe switchable….
I would be really curious to hear from someone else and from EHX themselves if there is a variability with different guitar pup – amp set-ups….
September 24, 2009 at 4:29 pm #101730elburromjfMemberI got a signal pad last week. I wanted to check out the “2-channel” theory by putting it in front of my tube overdrive (Radial Hot British). It works well with some things to keep in mind.
When the pad is active, you lose a little tone (its not really colorless), and you lose some tone sculpting capability via the volume knobs on your guitar. I recommend rolling guitar volumes back to about 1/2 (5). This gives you a little room to adjust the gain (not much).
When the pad is not active, its virtually transparent.
I’ll be trying the Signal Pad out at rehearsal this weekend. I’ll let yooz know what happens.
My current signal chain …
* Boss TU-2 (Chromatic Strobe Mode)
* BBE Boosta Grande (10db)
* EH Signal Pad (set at about 11:00)
* Radial ToneBone Hot British Tube Overdrive w/12AX7 (I set this gain really high)
* EH Small Clone (Classic)
* DigiTech DigiDelay (set for tape echo)
* EH Holy Grail Classic (Room Reverb at around 2:00, sometimes use FLERB)
* Morley Little Alligator VolumeEBMJF
April 23, 2010 at 3:26 pm #109303ewmarsupialMemberHi there,
I’m a new user – this is my first post.
I know it’s been a while since anyone posted on this thread but since there isn’t much info on the Signal Pad out there, I figured I would add my 2 cents.
I bought the Signal Pad specifically to hit a sweet spot on a fuzz that I can get by using the guitar’s volume control. I figured a pedal-based “set and forget” volume control should be able to do this job.
And it almost does – unfortunately as some previous posters noted, the signal pad seems to reduce treble at the same time as it reduces the volume. So while I can get the right amount of fuzz, I also get a muddier tone, which isn’t ideal for what I’m trying to accomplish.
There are 2 more things I noticed about the Signal Pad:
1 – When engaged, I also got additional noise in the chain – which really shouldn’t happen considering I’m reducing my total output.
2 – I opened up the pedal and expected to find a pot, a switch, an LED, and a battery – but there are some caps and transistors in there as well. I’m wondering if they’ve over complicated what should be a simple circuit and lost something in the process…On the upside – as other have noted, the true-bypass works fine and the pedal is transparent when it’s off, and it sure is built solid enough.
I think the idea of the Signal Pad is good – but the execution is a little flawed. If you’re not too picky about losing a little treble (like if you want to tame a trebly distortion maybe?) then you might find it worth buying considering the low price point.
cheers,
ewApril 23, 2010 at 4:03 pm #109266Mr.GrimMembermy answer to the signal pad, complete with no tone sucking guts!….lol, and optional optical control.
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=150435922678&ssPageName=STRK:MESELX:IT
April 23, 2010 at 4:11 pm #109267Mr.GrimMemberi dont intend to “advertise”, im only sharing ideas, its a simple project, really just a pot and two jacks, power is only needed if you want to have an LED indicator. although in mine i added a toggle switch to go from knob control to optical control like an expression pedal.
April 23, 2010 at 4:14 pm #109268elburromjfMemberUPDATE:
Now that I’ve experimented with the EH Signal Pad in various locations in my signal chain, I have concluded that it really falls short in the tone department. Basically it sucks the life out of your top end no matter where you put it. Even used as the very last thing in the chain (where I usually put a volume pedal), it sucks the life out of the signal.
Unless I can modify this thing to not do that, I can’t really use it. A really great idea, but poorly implemented.
EBMJF
June 9, 2010 at 7:26 am #106770wullyMemberhello,
I was wondering if the ‘signal pad’ could be used in the effects loop of my Peavey Classic 30 JUST as an attenuator, rather than as an A/B switch type of thing..?
Here’s an ebay link to what I mean. I live in the UK, so if it could do the same job, it’d be easier to get the ‘signal pad’..Thanks!
link:attenuator
September 15, 2011 at 2:17 pm #116022CryabetesParticipantanyone know the resistance value of the pot in the signal pad? is it 250K?
December 18, 2012 at 6:08 am #118549flennertzMemberQuote:anyone know the resistance value of the pot in the signal pad? is it 250K?Cryabetes, I have no idea whether after a year youd still like to know the resistance, but taking my chances, seems like its a 1 M log pot with a 220 pf cap. theres also a diode 1N4004 to keep the current flowing away from the battery/dc ground, but thats it, the rest is for the led. i dont know why it sucks the tone like ppl say, the cap should do the trebble bleed i guess. but maybe a better option is using a booster (like the lpb1, or the screaming bird:)) instead of the pad to not lose the trebble when cutting volume? i dont know.. if anyone has a better option im all ears
July 25, 2013 at 3:45 pm #119279kenalMemberso, for what there is a cap to the ground in the signal pad? any ideas?
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