Boss DD-3 Digital Delay

the four controls are pretty self explanitory. this pedal comes with a well thought out manual so you shouldn't have any trouble getting the best out of it.

spot on sound wise. another good one from boss. the signal sounds a little metallic the lower you set the repeat rate but who buys a delay pedal and sets it so you can hear little or no delay. a few people have moaned about the sound of the pedal. these are the people who don't realise that with every new pedal you add to your chain you have to tweak your amp and guitar controls a little. nothing just fits straight in

well its made by boss, you could turn it on and off with a tank

never had to deal with boss as i've never had a problem with there gear.

well worth the money, even at brand new prices this is a total bargain

Only 4 knobs, comes with a manual with how to get a good delay sound. Just step on it to turn it on, step on it again to turn it off. It's not brain surgery.

I cannot really compare the delay sound to any other but the DD-6. To my ears, the delay is very good. It does what it is suppose to do, repeat every note the way it was played. However, I did not buy it for the delay. The only thing I wanted this pedal for was the HOLD feature. The sound I wanted to achieve was the kind of effect Eric Johnson uses on the beginning of "Soulful Terrain". I will say that this pedal does it PERFECTLY and I have no complaints as far as that function is concerned. The ONLY problem I have with this pedal is that you have to keep your foot on the pedal as long as you want the HOLD to last, which if you are on stage can tie you up when you want to change channels/pedals.

I have 2 other Boss pedals, a Blues Driver and Flanger, and both are indestructable.

It is a very cheap delay, considering the prices of most boutique analog, rack mount, and echoplex type delays. You may find a better deal with the Danelectro Reel Echo, Ibanez Tone Lok, or something along those lines, but they do not feature the Hold function. I love how this pedal can make someone sound like a one man band, and is also fantastic for practicing. I know it will make me a better player and sound better and that is what it's all about. Probably the coolest thing about it is how you can hit say, an Am chord, and explore all over the entire neck and find complementary scales and notes that you can use over the key of Am. Overall, a great pedal and a great price.

Ok, this baby is easy to use if you can read the lettering on the dials etc... Simple on off thing as well!

NO! Not good here. My main problem is that I play vintage music, so whatever famous sound I dialed in, it wasn't right. To start of with, Apache by the shads... each repeat was too clean and twangy when compared to the original input sound... I need warmth. Next up would have to be some Gilmour tones from through the ages, but first a little bit of Syd Barrett in there. Syd and Gilmours main delay for years was the Binson echorec, either set to wicked slapback (which tis pedal can just about do!) Or big long swells made of repeats all cascading around. Sadly this pedal cannot deliver. Gilmour used an echrec to flesh out solos (Think Cymbaline from the KQED bootleg DVD). Sadly the clean-ness of the repeats buggers this right up.

Ok it might be good for U2 fans or Radiohead, but I am unimpressed with this gadget. I own a Marshall Echohead which gets slated as a bad unreliable pedal. It might well be! Mine hasn't done a nasty on me yet, and it seems bombproof and much more interesting. This delay pedal is for shred guys afraid of putting emotion in their music.

Damn, this is 5/10 more because people THINK that Boss pedals are bombproof... they go wrong like everything else.

Didn't buy it.

Its on ok pedal for delay in the simplest sense of the word.

One last gripe! When you turn the time knob while its repeating the repeats speed up and change pitch, now this is common for all delay pedals and is cool. But speed up the Boss and yes the pitch changes, but bring it back to original tempo and the signal is depleated rather badly. Shame that this isn't an analogue pedal or anything.

It doesn't get much easier than this - very user friendly. There's nothing worse for me than to have some sort of digital screen that you have to scroll through to get different sounds - this one is as simple as it gets - four knobs that easily adjust everything you need to be able to adjust.

I find the sound quality to be excellent. I use this pedal as part of my acoustic and electric set-ups and it responds excellent to both. The sound for this model is excellent.

Seeing as it was made over 10 years ago, and I've owned it for about half of that - with no problems - I'd say that it's fairly reliable! I do not use a backup for this pedal (granted my night wouldn't be ruined without a delay pedal).

Never had the pleasure to deal with BOSS customer support.

Overall, an all around excellent pedal. If this one ever dies, I'll be on the hunt for another. I've been saying that for over four years now and it shows no signs of slowing down.

Bought it used with an included power supply. It's the older Japanese model. Quite easy to use. Set the deleay time, feedback, level and play.

I use this sparingly to reinforce my reverb and add a bit of echo. The repeats do sound a bit sterile. I modified mine with a tone control on the effect sound/feedbacks. Using this new control to get rid of some treble on the delay repeats helps this unit a lot. With the mod it sounds almost as good as a nice long analog delay (without the pricetag) and gives me a new option to tweak my sound. It's not particularly noisy but it isn't true bypass so it dulls the sound when used with more than a couple of effects in the chain. I use an enhancer at the end to clean up the mud on a long chain.

Very reliable. Never had a problem. I fix a lot of pedals and the only broken Boss ones are either abused beyond belief or are broken as a result of botched modifications. If you don't know what you are doing, please don't waste your time by opening up your effects.

I fix and modify my own stuff so I rarely deal with Boss support. Ordering parts from them is another story. Boss can be very difficult at times to get parts, especially for discontinued/older pedals.

Good quality delay for the money. Easy controls and above average tone (excellent tone with the feedback-tone mod). Boss has been making these forever even though they have made newer models. I would definately replace it if it was lost or stolen.

perfect setup - nice arrangement with the delay time ranges.

Unbeatable for its price range ($99) - any other delay at this price would not sound as good. If you are more advanced though - this will leave you wanting more . . . more something. You get what you pay for, this is ok for the bedroom but i want something amazing. Good sound but not amazing.

Looks fairly sturdy but i trust my digitech pedals much more - i wouldn't trust it traveling - kind of sounds like tin if you tap it. A little cheap if you ask me - i would probably buy something better sounding if i had a gig booked . . .

i play rock - i want a huge saturated stereo-chorus sound and this doesn't do it - this is too trasparent - i think i will exchange it for something else.

Takes a little experimentation to learn how to dial in. Very easy once you've got used to it. It's nice being able to snap to different ranges of delay time. Feedback knob is brilliant. You can go for infinate, noisey feedback by cranking it on full. Or be really carefull nd get it to just the point where it doesn't overload....and be in bliss.
Hold function is nice....but SHOULD BE A LOT LONGER!!!! then agin, its hold, not loop.

Ok.
I have a new taiwan made version.

It's stupidly noisy! even at the first rep. Set the volume on full, delay time long, and feedback to wherever and listen out for the first rep. You can instantly notice a hiss.
Crank the feedback on full and you can hear this noise build up. Now i paid for a digital pedal. So no noise please. If i wanted noise I would have bought an analogue pedal. But even then....the noise would sound awesome.

The processed sound is weak and lacks charecter..

because of its sound quality, I use it AS my backup.
But, Boss' sturdy, tank like designes have never failed me...the same cannot be said for other boss users.

Only for novice ears... or students.

It's worth looking into getting an older one...one which is made in Japan I believe. They appear to sound fantastic....and have no noise!

Get a second hand DD-6, or an old japanese made DD-3... don't buy a new one...

ive had this pedal for a while now and ive found it real easy to use. its really simple and just takes a little bit of time to get used to it when you first use it. there is so much you can do with this pedal and so many different sounds you can make. the more you play around with it the more you find out about it.

i use a fender strat with it and you can create some awsome psychadelic sounds with it alone. it ranges from some really creepy spacy sounds to buitifal magical sounds. its real awsome if you love that kind of stuff. its also great for sweetening up solos.

when using try hitting some notes with your finger and turning the rate dial at the same time, depending witch way you can make cool doiyng type noises or diehw type noises.

the sound is perfect. there is nothing special to it every note simply sounds how the played note was repeated. it is great for using other effects with. to me it can sound very white and dark blue, or it can sound very clear and watery/dreamy, or blue or purple with some sweet fuzz or something. great sound.

you can deffinetly depend on this pedal. it is extremely tough. ive kicked mine around a bit and its better than ever. it even lookes better to me the more i use it. the only thing is the black rubber thing has ripped a bit on the back were you screw the pedal in. but it doesnt effect it, it just means i gotta keep it screwed all the way in. but this is nothing to worry about.

you wouldnt need a back up at all. just maybe a spare battery.

i tried to get it repaired just after i bought it but i found out it was the adapter i was using.

its fine, i havent had any problems with it and the support was good.

this is a perfect match for my type of music. our band plays original music, and by that i mean original, not ripping off someone elses style but creating our own. its the way everyone who is serious about music and what its all about should play. i love this pedal for our band because it is just so needed. youl have to listen to find out.

been playing 7 years.
yeah id buy it again.
havent compared, dont need to.
the only thing i wish it had was a reverse option, but ill sus out something else for that.
it only helps, unless i over use it or abuse it.
my band is called luph, we are from adelaide and we are on: http://www.myspace.com

Dirt simple. Could have been even simpler if they didn't have the extra knob to select the range of delay time, but what this does do is allow you to have much finer control over the delay time than if you had one knob that covered the full sweep from 50ms all the way to 800ms. I haven't gotten the hang of the HOLD feature yet, but I really didn't purchase this pedal for fancy tricks, just a simply delay to fatten up the sound.

OK, I've been on a search for the Holy Grail of delay/echo pedals for about a year now. I was previously using a Line 6 DL4, which is a digital delay pedal that emulates different classic digital, tape, and analog delay effects. The DL4 has some geat sounds, but after a while I found I really didn't want or need a dozen different delay models. What I wanted was ONE good delay sound that was pleasing to the ears and didn't mess with my tone too much. I also wanted something with a much smaller footprint that would allow more room on my pedal board. In my quest I tried many analog and digital delays including the T-Rex Replica, Maxon AD-999 abalog delay, and Line 6 Echo Park. Well, I finally sucked it up and decided to try the common, garden variety Boss DD-3. The verdict: this is the perfect delay for my needs. My search for a delay is now over! I found that many of the (much more expensive) boutique delay pedals have special effects and tricks that I don't want. The Boss DD-3 is just a basic, simple delay that to my ears does not sound cold and sterile like most of us assume a digital delay will sound. If you check out the Analogman.com website, there is an explanation of the technology in the DD-3 and why it sounds "better" than many other modern digital delays. Apparently, the DD-3 uses the same compresser/expander circuit that Boss used in their previous analog delay pedals, which re-samples each repeat and accounts for the fact that it is "warmer" sounding than most other modern digital delays (including the DD-5 and DD-6) which just spit out exact carbon copies of the original bit-stream signal. Do I completely understand this technical talk? No. But what I do understand is that this pedal does not sound cold, shrill, or sterile to my ears. Sure, it doesn't have the warm, fuzzy repeats of a true analog delay, but after much experimentation I've decided that I really didn't want that kind of sound, anyway. Just a few soft repeats to add some spaciousness to my dry signal. For this the Boss DD-3 suits my needs perfectly. I also used to be obsessed with having all of my effects be true bypass, but what I've come to realize is that when I'm after a pure guitar sound I tend to just plu straight into the amp, anyway. So true bypass, buffered output, it doesn't matter to me anymore, just as long as the pedal sounds good. And the Boss DD-3 sounds good!

Have never heard of one breaking.

I currently play several guitars depending on my mood or the specific sounds I'm after: PRS Custom 24, Gibson Custom Shop '58 Les Paul, Fender Custom Shop '60 Strat, and Ibanez Prestige RG2550 (for playing Vai/Satriani type stuff). Amps are all low wattage, vintage style, single-channel, non-master volume types. When I use my pedal board I generally keep them turned low for a cleaner sound. My effects chain is GUITAR > Fulltone Clyde Wah > Fulltone mini-Deja Vibe > Fulltone Fulldrive II > Boss/Keeley DS-1 Ultra Distortion > Boss DD-3 > AMP. Effects are all powered by a Voodoo Labs Pedal Power 2 and cabling is George L's. Considering this is the cheapest delay/echo pedal of all the ones I tried, and in my opinion has the best tone with no extraneous features that I don't need, I consider it a fantastic value. If you want an analog sound, get a Maxon. If you want a tape sound, get a Fulltone TTE. If you just want a simple, clean sounding delay and don't need special effects or more than one second of delay time, this is the best route to go and will save you $$ for that next toy you just gotta have. After years of shunning Boss because they weren't a small boutique manufacturer, I've recently come back to them. Some of their pedals need some work to sound their best (the DS-1 is greatly improved with mods from Robert Keeley or Analogman). However, the DD-3 is a real winner right out of the box. My next purchase will be a Boss OD-3 overdrive. Very warm and natural sounding, with enough volume boost to push a slightly dirty Tweed Deluxe into SRV territory!

Easy 4 knob pedal to use, sounds good right out of the box! Little bit of tweaking will get you the sound and speed you want.

This pedal sounds very good to me and the amp I had before had on-board delay and this delay sounds so much better to have a separate pedal going through my Tele and Deville 212. This pedal is very spacy and atmospheric sounding, you can get all kinds of weird sounds from it and experiment with already existing songs you have. The thing about this pedal is that it doesn't take away from the tone of your amp or guitar, it sounds like it should on or off.

It's like any other pedal really as far as being sturdy. It also sucks up battery life so buy an adaptor for it because the sounds do change when the battery is low...

i dunno

I am very happy I bought this pedal over all. I was looking at buying an echo park but heard it was noisy and the boss dd-6 was too much and sounded the same to me anyway. I like playing this thing more than my Distortion pedals! Delay is very fun and this pedal was very simple to use to allow me to enjoy my first Delay pedal. I play alternative indie rock and this pedal would be made for anyone into whatever really, so go get a boss Duh Duh Duh, Delay! Today! (OK that was stupid) I also love the color of this pedal as well somthing about "white" going with what this pedal does...I'd buy another pedal like this one if I lost it, yes sir