BOSS MD-500 / DD-500 / RV-500

[BROCKSTAR]

So @JiveTurkey said "Not much Boss talk because they are stupid"... So this thread is for him lol.

Anyway, who has these and what are your opinions on them?

I have all 3 and they are great, especially since they can do so much like 2 at once and also can hook up aux/expressions pedals and there's a lot of tweaking available if needed.

Only complaint is the 10 sec max decay for the rv-500, but there's tricks as in using 2 of the reverbs to get 20 seconds or adding the built in delay low in the mix to carry the decay longer with high feedback etc..

The other small complaint that many say is that boss didn't get the series option correct with the dd-500.

 

[JiveTurkey]

I'll take it! Love the sounds but certain things drive me nuts about them as a whole.

 

[BROCKSTAR]

So no one owns any of these?

 

[JiveTurkey]

I think the usual suspects have at least one of these (if not all 3 )

 

[spawnofthesith]

I don't have any of these, but I do have an RC-500 and an RE-202 taking up most my board lol

 

[Jarick]

I was definitely tempted by the Boss units last year. I picked up a GT-1000 Core and then a GT-1000 to play around with them, but ended up returning both. For me there were too many limitations such as not enough amp/effect models or flexibility in routing. Although the effects were good quality.

Then when I was putting together a pedalboard, I was really intrigued by the 200 series pedals. I liked the idea of having knobs and not having a menu, but also with the flexibility of presets. But the units seemed to be missing models from the 500 series, and I wasn't particularly blown away by the effects from the GT. Also, most of the delay effects were mono and not stereo which is dumb for a $300 pedal.

I wasn't interested in the 500 series because it seemed like a lot of work to hook up three digital pedals with separate menus and no ability to coordinate across them unless I went down the MIDI rabbit hole. At that point, there's no benefit over the GT-1000 which I already had tried and returned.

I think if there was a Boss RV-200 I'd be more intrigued, but for some reason they don't have one. Seems like a really weird omission. The Stry-fecta is modulation, delay, and reverb. Boss has the MD-500, DD-500, and RV-500 to compete. But then they had this cool smaller version of the MD-200 and DD-200...but no RV-200.

Anyways, I ran the HX Stomp XL for a while to handle my effects, then decided to stay all in the box with the Axe FX 3 because there's way more power and flexibility without having to route a bunch of cables and deal with MIDI. And then I started collecting simple little analog effects. So I have a Carbon Copy and a Nano Clone. I'm thinking about getting the MXR Reverb at some point and maybe one of the mini phasers too.

 

[Boudoir Guitar]

So @JiveTurkey said "Not much Boss talk because they are stupid"... So this thread is for him lol.

Anyway, who has these and what are your opinions on them?

I have all 3 and they are great, especially since they can do so much like 2 at once and also can hook up aux/expressions pedals and there's a lot of tweaking available if needed.

Only complaint is the 10 sec max decay for the rv-500, but there's tricks as in using 2 of the reverbs to get 20 seconds or adding the built in delay low in the mix to carry the decay longer with high feedback etc..

The other small complaint that many say is that boss didn't get the series option correct with the dd-500.

I've considered the RV-500 like a thousand times but never pulled the trigger. I like the idea of having delay and reverb in one pedal, but for whatever reason can't ever get over the hump to pull the trigger on one.

 

[Jarick]

I've considered the RV-500 like a thousand times but never pulled the trigger. I like the idea of having delay and reverb in one pedal, but for whatever reason can't ever get over the hump to pull the trigger on one.

That's where I get caught in a loop. A single pedal at the end of the chain for delay and reverb seems like a great idea. And then I get thinking "well the HX Stomp could do delay and reverb plus more in a single pedal". And then it goes from there.

That's why I just decided to go carbon copy on the little board. No temptations.

Of course I'll probably end up with an HX Stomp again someday.

 

[Boudoir Guitar]

That's where I get caught in a loop. A single pedal at the end of the chain for delay and reverb seems like a great idea. And then I get thinking "well the HX Stomp could do delay and reverb plus more in a single pedal". And then it goes from there.

That's why I just decided to go carbon copy on the little board. No temptations.

Of course I'll probably end up with an HX Stomp again someday.

Yeah, but for a long time the Stomp 'verbs were garbage.

 

[Jarick]

Yeah, but for a long time the Stomp 'verbs were garbage.

I dunno about garbage, but they weren't as good as the competition for sure. I actually like the legacy room, tile, hall, and plate a decent amount. But the new dynamic ones are way more interesting and three dimensional.

I guess if I have any issue with the HX Stomp, it's that I don't love the tiny screen and the little knobs to control it. I really prefer turning real knobs like on analog pedals or the Strymon stuff. But I know there's not a good practical way to do that with all the features of the HX Stomp.

 

[BROCKSTAR]

I love ganymede reverb in helix! I used it all the time until I got my Strymon Bigsky / Nightsky, and i still like the ganymede but I can't stop using the strymon ones now lol.

I like the ones in rv-500, but I still think i like the bigsky / nightsky more right now but still need to play the rv-500 more. But different things for different applications!

 

[Eagle]

I have the RV and DD and they have issues but they do dry through and have decent sounding converters . I like the menu approach because it lets you get to the other parameters without an editor. On balance they are still good options.

 

[Orvillain]

I have the RV and DD. They are a bit noisy, but not as noisy as @Eagle 's favourite pedal

The RV has some great reverbs in it, but the modulated hall isn't as nice as the one on the RV-5 IMO.