Behringer ADI21

This DI tube emulater/modeler unit has already been described. Great piece of gear! Incredible for the price actually. If I had to name a piece of gear that was a secret weapon, this would be it. Easy to use. Take some time to dial in the settings, listen to what comes out and tweek from there. BUT, you need to have some realistic expectations. It won't make your Strat sound acoustic. None of my electrics and even my Fishman Rare Earth magnetics don't sound great through this. But it will make many acoustic pickups sound much better, even fantastic! I give it a 9 for features. The only item I was wanting for is a phase reverse switch. And numbers on the dials would have been a good idea. But for $35 CDN - Well, Ok.

I use this only on two guitars - a K&K equipped Gold Tone dobro and a Baggs Ribbon transducer equipped Yamaha classical. These feed into a Mackie 1202 mixer. The sound of the Dobro is nothing short of stunning. And the same with the classical - very even rich tone. Keep in mind that both of these pickups DO NOT have preamps. They are both passive transducers - no batteries and hidden end-pin preamps. I have tried ALL the K&K preamps - the Behringer beats them. I have tried the Baggs Para-acoustic DI. Very nice but I think the Behringer is better. and for $35.!!

I have gigged with it for a few years and it seems pretty reliable. It has never let me down. OK, while it seems solid enough, don't start tossing this thing around. Behringer is not known for sturdy stuff. I've had my first one for 3 years - no problem - just take care of this puppy and it will treat you well. I bought a second for the classical just this week so there is the backup, if needed.

Not needed.

Its a great match for playing classical, roots acoustic stuff. If lost, I would pick up another in a heartbeat.

This little box isn't too complicated. It has really sensitive high/mid/low etc frequency pots so it's easy to get the sound that you want. That being said, I bought it to make my epiphone les paul sound like an acoustic, but after fiddling around a bit you realize that this pedal, despite it's name, is incapable of making an electric sound like an acoustic. It gets decent points, though for it's wide variety of tones that it can put out.

I actually use this pedal as a fuzz pedal most of the time. I set the Mids all the way up, MidFreq all the way down and Blend all the way up.

Then Lvl, bass and treble just adds some flavor to the distorted sound. The distortion is weakly fuzzy, not a lotta compression and over-the-top gain distortion...but it sounds very unique I think. It'll really fatten up your guitar sound and sort of get that jimi hendrix sound. Admittedly, I don't have much use for the fuzz pedal besides playing the occasional jimi, I also have a RP-90, that models a fuzz pedal, and I think the Behringer pulls it off better.

Oh yeah, I'm plugging an eiphone les paul into a fender blues junior

I've had it for 3 years now, don't play it 24/7 but it hasn't broken on me yet.

I'd probably use this as a backup if I were gigging, always have backups.

This is a decent, cheap pedal that can pull of some cool clean tones for whatever genre of music you play (i like to noodle around with all sorts of genres)

It also has the ability to pull of a pretty good fuzz sound which is a plus...so if you are looking for a cheap pedal to mess around on and get some weird/cool tones, this is the pedal for you. If it were stolen though, I probably wouldn't buy another one.

I just think it's cool that it can pull off a fuzz sound and have a lotta EQ'ing options for extreme tonal variety

Even tho some of the functions are counter intuitive its easy enough to use after an hour or so experimenting

With my tele with SD pickups I could make a nice mellow jazzbox sound. Couldn't really make a sound much like an acoustic guitar tho, so defeated the purpose in buying it.

During the second time of serious use started to make a noise like a bad fuzz pedal. the original sound is no longer available. I bought while travelling so could not return the item

I should have known better. I think with these pedals Beheringer are cynically causing a lot of heartbreak for young muso's and others with not much $. To be fair I must point out I had a v-amp for a while and that worked fine.

Very easy to use. The mid range sweep is powerful and is worth the price alone! I use it for my acoustic Violin fitted with a piezo pickup.

The piezo has way too high impedance, so the ADI21 lowered the impedance just nice to go direct into the mixer. A Violin has very nasty highs when used with a piezo...so the ADI21 tamed thoese highs and added a lot of warmth to it. The trick is to experiment with the all- powerful mid range sweep which made all the difference.

It has served me well for the last 2 years. I bought one more to use for other instruments. There's no limit on what instrument you can use it on.

Never had to deal with the local behringer co cos none of its products has ever broken down on me.

Buy this if you want a cheap but powerful acoustic processor. It really beat the crap outta other effects that cost 2-3 times more! Behringer has done it again with this impressive unit.

This unit takes more than one sitdown session to dial in. First, I used low guitar output and let the ADI21 do the boosting to a powered mixer XLR input. I still felt unhappy with the sound, a little empty. So, a month after buying it, I think I found the problem... I turned the -20 dB switch on and turned up my Peal Acoustic Electric Guitar to halfway... This way the ADI21 seemed to find the soundboard vibrations being driven TO the ADI21, not a lot fuller but noticeable... Now I am happy...

This unit is very quiet. I have used it both with the ground lift and without and like it without better (I guess this has to do with the PA setup and source). The effects do change quite a bit when adjusting the knobs but most of them I don't really need since I duo with a Yamaha keyboard and we both sing. I just needed a more dynamic acoustic. I will say you can fatten it up by boosting bass on the guitar and turning up the mid-freq about halfway (a neo-crunch type of sound)...

I have used this thing for about fifteen 2 hour practices and just changed the battery once, so, I guess that means about 15 hours or so per battery. I will buy an AC adapter but wouldn't use it onstage... I feel pretty comfrotable when we play gigs and don't bring a backup...

Never used... Would buy another if it broke but am brave enough to look into a different one at or below $50...

Acoustic duo with piano mostly covers... I wish unit had a chorus or reverb on it...

It took about a week of tweeking to get the sound out of this I was looking for. It was worth the effort though. I really enjoy the way
it sounds now. Much warmer, more expensive sound out of my cheaper equipment.

I'm using this with an Ovation Celebrity and a Behringer Firebird
practice amp. Without this the sound was alright, not bad at all.
With this the sound is bigger, fuller, more.

The blend part or the effect does more than expected, it's awesome.
The EQ with mid shift is also interesting. Well worth the small pricetag.

Everyone here knows it's made of plastic, get over it. Feels heavy
and well made. Don't expect any troubles. But then who does?

Don't need to worry about gigs, we're strictly a stay at home player.

I do not know.

No particular style, just have fun. I've tried to play for 20 some years. What I lack in talent, I make up with comedy relief.

I also own a Danelectro Fab Chorus and Fab Echo pedals. I sometimes
run these in a chain after the ADI21. Very nice.

I purchased and returned, a Zoom A2 before I got this one. The Zoom was amazing, but too much of a good thing. You could get thousands of combinations of sounds, but I wanted something simpler.

I bought this unit to add a mid-range control to my Behringer BDI21 Bass Processor. I figured I'd be able to cut the blend on the ADI21 and just adjust the mids, enhancing the sound of the BDI21. This doesn't work, but I am finding that I prefer the bass sound of the ADI21 to the BDI21!

There are only a few controls on this unit and they work well together. I found that trying out the suggested settings, even though most of them are geared towards guitar, gives you a good place to start from in finding your bass sound. I actually don't like the suggested "Bass" setting that much, but the "Jazz", "Country", and "Electric Guitar" settings work really nicely! The manual is short, but adequate for helping you know what to do.

The only thing I'll be doing to make this easier to use is to apply a little white paint to the notches that indicate where the knobs are pointed so I can see from a distance. Even though it would be a bit ugly, I think glow-in-the-dark plastic knobs with a black dot position indicator would be more useful. At least you'd be able to see where things are pointed on a dark stage for a while.

To be honest, it would be totally worth it to buy three of these to have three presets and chain them together.

I am truly impressed with this $30 wonder! I haven't tried it direct on stage, but it makes my amp sound very good. I've got a Carvin RC210/115 combo which is a good soudning amp, but a bit sterile because it's truly just solid-state. The ADI21 gives my bass a thick tubey sound on both the "Jazz" and "Country" settings, and an agressive sound when set to "Electric Guitar". The unit is very quiet - much quieter than the BDI21 for bass.

I've only owned it for one day, so I can't speak for reliability. It is made of plastic with a plastic foot switch. Just a light tap of your foot is all it takes to turn it on, and unless you're switching between one of these foot pedals to another it really should stay on all the time. I'm not worried about using it on stage, but then I don't jump or run around while I'm playing. If you have a tendency to trip on your pedals or stomp on them this isn't the pedal for you.

Never had to contact Behringer, but I've heard it's a challenge.

I play rock, classic rock, and contemporary Christian. I play on one of the worship teams for my church. This will make it possible for me to get great sounds in a short period of time and will be very portable.

I love the sound I can get from the ADI21! I would prefer it to be made of metal with a metal switch, and would pay $60 for it if it were. It's okay made of plastic, but I can see it wearing out fairly soon.

I do think this is a stunning buy for $30, and if you're careful it should work for you a long time.

It does what you expect it to do. The EQ is fairly easy to use, but there's no markings for reference.

The "blend" modelling effect supposedly makes your piezo pickup soudn like the signal from a condenser mic through a tube pre-amp, and it does a good enough job of warming it up- it apears to be a combination of EQ and a little compression. Beware you need to set this control before tweaking the EQ as it makes it very warm in the lo-mid area.

I play acoustic guitar in a number of lineups, am just starting to use mandolin. Both my acoustics are fitted with Artec magnetic soundhole pickups and cheap under-saddle piezos wired up in stereo. The mandolin has a passive piezo bridge. I normally go straight into the PA.

The ADI 121 does a good job warming up the sound from the piezo pickup . Unfortunately it can't handle the output from a magnetic pickup and clips horribly, so I only use the EQ/ effect when playing with the piezos only.

Otherwise I just leave it on bypass and use it as a passive DI box. It has a ground lift and phase reverse switch which is useful.

It eats batteries and the sound degrades really quickly when the battery's low. I must get a power supply.

Other than that, haven't had any problems, yet.

I gig with it without a backup, though not using the actual effect, just as a DI.

Never had to deal with the company.

I've been playing acoustics in a variety of styles, trad folk, jazz, acoustic rock to contemporary singer-songwriter.

I decided to get a pre-amp/ DI box so I could have control over EQ and levels on stage. Having looked at more expensive options I thought I'd give this a go first.

It does its job, which is to stop cheap piezo pickups sounding like broken glass. The lack of markings on the EQ knobs, or ability to use different input levels is a drawback, but at this price, I can't really complain.

I'll most likely upgrade to something more professional like a Fishman or Baggs pre-amp, but would keep this as a spare or for a second instrument.

Very easy. A little experimenting with the knobs will show you what it can do.

I run an acoustic guitar into this straight to a mixer for recording at home. It works quite well. I have the ZOOM acoustic (504 I think it's called) as well and the Behringer is actually quieter and easier to set. The ZOOM is good for effects, but this is good for just straight clean recording. The "effect" with the Behringer is controlled by the "BLEND" knob, which definitely colors the sound, which it is supposed to do. Sounds good. I think it's supposed to be a mic SIM, which is interesting. Sounds better than going direct without it, once I found some settings I liked. With "BLEND" on mild settings it can be just an EQ or DI box. But I like the "BLEND" feature a lot.

Clean and easy. I'm not super picky about acoustic tones, but I wouldn't use it if it sounded bad, obviously. Better than the ZOOM, which is good for drastic effects, but the Behringer is great for clean recording especially in a basic home studio.

Don't know. Seems sturdier than most anything else in its price range. More heavy duty than I would have thought.

Never tried them.

I like it. Perfect for the price. Doesn't do a whole lot but it's a great idea for direct recording. I like the extra control over the tone and EQ.

I guess I have a lot of home recording stuff. This is better than most cheap stuff, no complaints for the price. The mid sweep is cool. The effect is interesting, the BLEND works well. The effect itself is more imposing than I would've thought, but I like it now that I'm used to it, and the BLEND feature makes it easy to reel in. The XLR output is a quite cool too.

I compared it to the ZOOM acoustic pedal. The ZOOM is a little hissy and kind of a pain to edit, but has special effects like delay, chorus etc that the Behringer doesn't have. I like the ZOOM but the Behringer is better for straight up clean recording. Much easier to edit too. With the Behringer I found a sweet spot and rarely change it now, except the overall level control, you know.

Like someone else mentioned, a phantom power option would be cool. I can't find the manual (whoops) but I guess you need a wall wart. I bet it uses batteries fast, but haven't tried. Maybe not. The phantom power thing isn't necessary. Actually it would probably shorten the life of something like this that's priced so low. I think the SansAmp version might have it though. They make good products too, if you're looking to shell out more money. For the price the Behringer version is nice.

I tried it with a semi hollow electric and it was ok, kind of interesting but does not take the place of an amplifier IMO. I might try the "GI" version for that. This works very well with acoustic guitars with pickups though.

I guess it helps me make music. It's handy and easy and works as advertised. And inexpensive. A compression control would be even more useful. The "pad" is good to have. I haven't had use for the "lift" feature yet, but it's a good idea too. If you could mix this with the ZOOM and retain the quality without the ZOOM hiss it'd be perfect. But nothing does everything perfectly once you add too many features. And if it does it's much more expensive. The price is great. I didn't really need this, but had to try for the little it costs. I always use it now. This is good for what it does. Lot of bang for the buck. I'd buy another.

A breeze to set up and to get a decent sound from my acoustic guitars ans even a very nice jazzy tone from my electric guitar (Ibanez archtop). The manual is very short but a small complaint is that you have to figure out the marks for the settings. (a dot would have been nice on the pedal but also in the manual!!)

I use ADI live on stage ( just plugging it into the housemixer) for my acoustic guitar (seagull artist with Dean Markley Sweet Spot). The Sweet Spot asks for a preamp to get a nice acoustic sound from it. Nice feature is the para mid to get things right.
At home I use it connected to the mixer and into studio monitors with a subwoofer and the sound is awesome. (just add some reverb)

It seems you can depend on it but you have to use a Boss-style adaptor (eats batteries) and not an electronic one, so beware.

They emailed me the same day, so no problem

We do a kind a folky style with 2 acoustic guitars and bass. It was one of the best investments I did. I've been playing for 10 years now. I would buy this item again if it were stolen. I even consider to buy a second one, just in case.