I've been lazy so I haven't been posting my incremental progress on this. When we last left my rack project over on the former site, it looked like this:
It was a start but I knew I'd be adding to it. I've been working on acquiring a variety of items that I wanted back in the day. After a slew of purchases, here's what it's like now:
(Top to Bottom):
Digitech GSP-21 Legend
Digitech GSP-2112 (chip upgraded to the GSP-2120 Artist Edition)
Roland GP-8
Roland GP-16
Art SGX 2000 Express
Apparently they had Plate Reverbs back in the 80s/90s. Suck it, Neural DSP! I have the footswitches for just about all of these units except for the two Rolands. I wasn't using the footswitches so I decided to pull them out of the rack space so I could fit MOAR into the rack. Also, I still have the GSP-2101 but it doesn't have the second SDISC board in it so I'll just use the 2112/2120 instead since it is dual SDISC. I tried to clean up the backend as much as I could but- I'm no Brad Bradshaw
So far, I've been using this setup in a very crude manner- plug into the front input of whatever rack unit and then use a stereo pair of jacks from the back of the desired unit into the JC-22. I know some sort of audio switcher is the way but I was hung up on what to pursue in a rackmount switcher. The more I looked at rackmount products, the more I found them more expensive and more limiting than the floor switches for use with pedalboards.
I was looking at two units- the Boss ES-8 and the RJM Mastermind PBC 6X. I *really* liked the PC editor for the Mastermind far more than the Boss Editor software but the Boss switcher was just far more flexible. The ES-8 can store hundreds of patch settings, has two couple stereo switches and both MIDI In and Out. To tip the scales, I found a used ES-8 in a local shop for $450, which is a nice chunk of change below the average price you'll find them for on Reverb. Even better, the unit didn't have the AC adaptor so the shop just knocked $20 off the ES-8's price to offset the cost of me having to buy one. Local shops rule.
I can't think of too much more I'd realistically want to add. I still might pick up a Korg Tuner and maybe some day I'll be able to pick up another MP-1 (I stupidly sold one in the late 90s) or maybe a Triaxis because Awake era Petrucci is God tone. In the meantime, I have a lot of hours ahead of me as I attempt to connect everything to the ES-8 and set up my presets. I found at least one YouTube channel with a lot of good videos about the ES-8 and the editor so I do have some idea about what to do. I just preferred the patch/song/setlist concept that the Mastermind editor has. It's really slick and far more understandable that the more sterile and generic layout of Boss's editor.
The ES-8 is a little daunting but I was able to get most things working at a basic level in one evening. The two stereo loops on the ES-8 are a little weird in that one loop is mono send/stereo return and the second loop is stereo send/stereo return. If the stereo send/return loop doesn't get stereo as input, it won't return stereo. I wasn't sure what to do about that but I finally realized that the ART SGX accepts stereo inputs and the GSP2112 only accepts mono input. That pretty much decided which unit connects to which loop.
I need to do some research to see if I can just solely use the ES-8 or if I still need to combine use with my X15 Footswitch via MIDI. I mean, the X15 does work with all rack units and the two expression pedals on it work with any patch that has that capability assigned but it's a lot of floor real estate. The ES-8 has some additional footswitch & expression pedal capability that I'm not currently using so I could use some Dunlop mini expression pedals for minimal floor space but I don't think I would be able to manually browse all patches on a given rack unit with the ES-8. The ES-8 switches have 2 modes- preset and manual. In preset mode, you program which loops are active (and order, etc). In manual mode, you manually turn on or off those loops but this doesn't allow you to select a patch using the patches (using bank, switch 1, 2, etc). I think that still requires the additional midi pedalboard but I dunno..
It was a start but I knew I'd be adding to it. I've been working on acquiring a variety of items that I wanted back in the day. After a slew of purchases, here's what it's like now:
(Top to Bottom):
Digitech GSP-21 Legend
Digitech GSP-2112 (chip upgraded to the GSP-2120 Artist Edition)
Roland GP-8
Roland GP-16
Art SGX 2000 Express
Apparently they had Plate Reverbs back in the 80s/90s. Suck it, Neural DSP! I have the footswitches for just about all of these units except for the two Rolands. I wasn't using the footswitches so I decided to pull them out of the rack space so I could fit MOAR into the rack. Also, I still have the GSP-2101 but it doesn't have the second SDISC board in it so I'll just use the 2112/2120 instead since it is dual SDISC. I tried to clean up the backend as much as I could but- I'm no Brad Bradshaw
So far, I've been using this setup in a very crude manner- plug into the front input of whatever rack unit and then use a stereo pair of jacks from the back of the desired unit into the JC-22. I know some sort of audio switcher is the way but I was hung up on what to pursue in a rackmount switcher. The more I looked at rackmount products, the more I found them more expensive and more limiting than the floor switches for use with pedalboards.
I was looking at two units- the Boss ES-8 and the RJM Mastermind PBC 6X. I *really* liked the PC editor for the Mastermind far more than the Boss Editor software but the Boss switcher was just far more flexible. The ES-8 can store hundreds of patch settings, has two couple stereo switches and both MIDI In and Out. To tip the scales, I found a used ES-8 in a local shop for $450, which is a nice chunk of change below the average price you'll find them for on Reverb. Even better, the unit didn't have the AC adaptor so the shop just knocked $20 off the ES-8's price to offset the cost of me having to buy one. Local shops rule.
I can't think of too much more I'd realistically want to add. I still might pick up a Korg Tuner and maybe some day I'll be able to pick up another MP-1 (I stupidly sold one in the late 90s) or maybe a Triaxis because Awake era Petrucci is God tone. In the meantime, I have a lot of hours ahead of me as I attempt to connect everything to the ES-8 and set up my presets. I found at least one YouTube channel with a lot of good videos about the ES-8 and the editor so I do have some idea about what to do. I just preferred the patch/song/setlist concept that the Mastermind editor has. It's really slick and far more understandable that the more sterile and generic layout of Boss's editor.
The ES-8 is a little daunting but I was able to get most things working at a basic level in one evening. The two stereo loops on the ES-8 are a little weird in that one loop is mono send/stereo return and the second loop is stereo send/stereo return. If the stereo send/return loop doesn't get stereo as input, it won't return stereo. I wasn't sure what to do about that but I finally realized that the ART SGX accepts stereo inputs and the GSP2112 only accepts mono input. That pretty much decided which unit connects to which loop.
I need to do some research to see if I can just solely use the ES-8 or if I still need to combine use with my X15 Footswitch via MIDI. I mean, the X15 does work with all rack units and the two expression pedals on it work with any patch that has that capability assigned but it's a lot of floor real estate. The ES-8 has some additional footswitch & expression pedal capability that I'm not currently using so I could use some Dunlop mini expression pedals for minimal floor space but I don't think I would be able to manually browse all patches on a given rack unit with the ES-8. The ES-8 switches have 2 modes- preset and manual. In preset mode, you program which loops are active (and order, etc). In manual mode, you manually turn on or off those loops but this doesn't allow you to select a patch using the patches (using bank, switch 1, 2, etc). I think that still requires the additional midi pedalboard but I dunno..
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