Boss GT-3

I've had this thing for about 5 monthes now and I have to say that getting rid of my Boss ME-30 was well worth it...The maual is kinda dry and very...should I say scientific. The maunal mode is very usefull...The way I doit...I create a patch for an entire song then go to maual mode to use it. Farely easy to use.

For my setup I'm running this pedal through my effects loop on my Peavy Bandit 1x12 and my Ibanez S1520BP Prestige through the high gain. Most of the Modulation effects like flange, phaser, and chorus are very noisy but if you mess with the long enough you can get a good sound out of them...as for the distortion...they suck bad...I use a MT-2 Pedal from boss for my distortion. But for the most part the sound is better than some other effect units I have used...You just have to sit down and tweak with it...The only thing I have to say about this that I hate is the fact that it does not have a middle sweep function...But Like I said over all...I've been able to get Tool, Staind, Creed, Alice in Chains, Metallica....even the pefect Sound for Pantera...So I have to say that this thing is really good....

I've never had a problem with is...what can I say...It's heavy...solid and It's a Boss!

The people at boss are freindly but never had to deal with them.

I mainly play heavy metal and Rock and this thing suits me pretty well...thats all I have to say on that.

Well of course it takes a few hours to get used to, but for the amount of features it has it is VERY easy. Although it is easy to use it is also vey hard to master, but it just takes getting used too. Anyways the presets are excellent, plentiful and they cover a wide variety of styles for beginners.

The pedal sounds great! Every effect is flawless except for the distortion. The overdrive, grunge and such are okay but when you want to play metal, the distortion lacks punch, but for that, just purchase the Boss MT-2 Metalzone and plug it in as an external distortion and you have the perfect setup.

It's Boss

Never had to deal with them.

Okay so it might not look very professional, but when you see someone with rack effects that he paid over $3000 for and you have this small pedal with as much or even more features that sound almost as good it's worth buying. Excellent quality/price ratio.

The gt-3 is a little bit complicated to program. It just takes alot of tweeks, and alot of time to get an effect sounding exceptional. It's a simple floor setup, you just step on the effect pedal. Getting to the bank controls is a little bit hard, but i make a bank for every song so i don't have to change banks in the middle of a song.

I use a Fender Roadhouse Stratocaster guitar, with a few modifications such as Locking tuners, and a Hipshot Trems-setter, so the modifictions don't effect the pickups. My amp is a Fender Stage 100 with the Celeston speaker in it.
The Gt-3 can go from clean chourse with acoutic sound to heavy, high gain distortion. The distortions are a lil' noisy, and not what i expected from boss, but they still ROCK! if anybody is reading this that has one, i like to mix a Jc 120 preamp, with Distortion 1...it sounds really good after you do alot of tweeking. I"m sure you'll like it.
The effects always sounds great as long as you don't but a chores rate on 100 or flanger depth on 100 or whatever.
I can get the sounds of all my favorite artist. I mainly play Nirvana, Bush, Foo Fighters, and stuff like that. The Gt- 3 is perfect for those bands when i use a Boss Mt-2 Metal Zone Stompbox before my processor. Then here is where the versitility of this pedal comes in (sorry for the spelling), I can take a few banks for bands like Nirvana and stuff, then i can have banks for bands such as Lynyrd Skynyrd, and other classical rockers. It certianly is a great processor.

It is boss, or course it's reliable
I would use this a 10 year world tour, riding in the back of a Volkswagon Super Beetle, WITHOUT a back up!!

I've never really delt with the boss corporation, but i've been to a few conventions that they have sponsored, and they spare no expense. Everybody i talk to tells me Boss is the best guitar effects company.

If you don't have a Gt-3, then get a job, save up, and GET ONE!! it's jsut that simple. The Lcd display is awsome and its just a really really great processor. I can't say enough about it. I've compared ti to 3 different processors, and it rules over all of them. I compared it to: Digitech Rp-7 (great processor, great distortions), Dod tech8-G (piece of CRAP), Yamaha Gw-50 (most ppl don't remember this one).

Bottom line..GET ONE! well worth the money

I have had for about a week and I am now just feeling like I understand it. It is quite easy to get a good sound out of it,I just took a while. I am constantly updating my patches.

I am playing a gibson SG through a Marshall JCM 900 w/ a marshall cab. I am running it through the effects loop. Some of the presets get a little digital feedback. But backing off the output of the unit usually takes care of that. I think everything sounds fantastic, however the acoustic sim. is a little funny. But if you're thinking of buying a chorus, flange, phaser, delay, noise suppressor, compressor, tuner, limiter, eq, auto wah or volume pedal...BUY THIS THING!!! By the time you bought 4 of these things you could've paid for this. The distortions and preamps are ok. Finding a good distortion for hardcore/metal (hatebreed,buried alive,madball)took a while but I finally nailed it. This thing is the sh*t.

Since a play mostly hardcore w/ a jcm 900, the amp is my back up. But, it is a boss. So I'm not worried

Never dealt with them

I've been playing for more than 10yrs. and finally have equipment I am proud of, the gt3 was just the icing on the cake. I've ditched a case full of pedals, and am very happy. I compared this with the newest digitech rp2000 and it smoked it. I'd say the delays are sweet. the noise suppressor a huge benefit, and options a huge bonus. Since I've bought this I actually get up early to play.It has definitely inspired me. And as far as disliking anything on it, I'm a retard without a graphic eq.(no offense to any retards)(oh and definitely check out the site listed in another review a few posts down)

I have had for about a week and I am now just feeling like I understand it. It is quite easy to get a good sound out of it,I just took a while. I am constantly updating my patches.

I am playing a gibson SG through a Marshall JCM 900 w/ a marshall cab. I am running it through the effects loop. Some of the presets get a little digital feedback. But backing off the output of the unit usually takes care of that. I think everything sounds fantastic, however the acoustic sim. is a little funny. But if you're thinking of buying a chorus, flange, phaser, delay, noise suppressor, compressor, tuner, limiter, eq, auto wah or volume pedal...BUY THIS THING!!! By the time you bought 4 of these things you could've paid for this. The distortions and preamps are ok. Finding a good distortion for hardcore/metal (hatebreed,buried alive,madball)took a while but I finally nailed it. This thing is the sh*t.

Since a play mostly hardcore w/ a jcm 900, the amp is my back up. But, it is a boss. So I'm not worried

Never dealt with them

I've been playing for more than 10yrs. and finally have equipment I am proud of, the gt3 was just the icing on the cake. I've ditched a case full of pedals, and am very happy. I compared this with the newest digitech rp2000 and it smoked it. I'd say the delays are sweet. the noise suppressor a huge benefit, and options a huge bonus. Since I've bought this I actually get up early to play.It has definitely inspired me. And as far as disliking anything on it, I'm a retard without a graphic eq.(no offense to any retards)(oh and definitely check out the site listed in another review a few posts down)

Right out of the box, you can gig with it. Its very simple to setup your own patches as well. It might take a couple of hours to get the hang of it, but after you do...you will be editing like crazy. I dont use the EZ edit, and dont recomend using it. Its not that hard to edit or create patches without it. You get alot more control of the sound if you bypass the EZ edit. But if you are someone that wants a digital preamp processor, and dont like tweaking...the EZ edit may be just for you. Anyways...very simple to use.

I play a standard Fender Strat, and an Epiphone Les Paul through a Peavey Bandit 1x12 100 watt (with 1x12 speaker extension cab.)...80 watts without. Its definately not the best amp...but at the time i bought it...it was very decent for the money. I run the signal from the guitar to the GT-3, then into the Return input for my amp's effects loop. I found i get a cleaner sound that way. I have read posts on the unit's clean sounds, saying they are too noisy. I dont agree at all. SOme of the preset patches are a little noisy, however, those use modeled pre-amps which may be a characteristic of the noisiness. I have created patches with a super clean sound. No noise at all. I find that all the effects sound very well. I mean...come on...the unit costs 400 dollars...not 4,000. What are you expecting. If you want top of the line effects....buy top of the line studio equipment. But you get alot for that 400 dollars. I have found its fairly easy to re-create many sounds of your favorite bands. It does have some weak effects. Like the auto-riff (pointless...will NEVER use), and I dont think I will ever use the ring modulator, or synth sounds. But thats my opinion, and my style of play. The point is try it out for yourself first. You may love it....you may hate it. Great sound. Period. I love this thing.

Built like a tank. Boss pedals have never failed me before. Previous to playing through the GT-3, I used a string of Boss pedals for my effects. Very reliable. I gig without a backup right now mainly because I dont have the extra 400 dollars to buy another one. But I feel very safe.

Havent had to use it...but their website could definately use a facelift.

I have been playing for about 5 years now, and play a wide variety. Blues, alternative, classic rock, metal. I have found you can get great sounds to match any style you might play with this unit. I compared it to the Digitech RP-7, and then to RP2000 when it was released. In my opinion, this unit sounds cleaner, and is easier to edit. And just when you think you know everything it can do....you learn something new. If it was stolen, I would definately buy another one. There is not one single thing I do not like, except for it doesnt have a Jam-along-jack. It would be cool to play along with a CD through the headphones like on the Digitech units...but then again, this unit seems a little more professional than those. I can look past that without a problem. If you dont have one......GET ONE!!!

for my 2 and a half hours of fidling around and jamming on it at a music store i couldn't keep my eyes off the prested banks they have (200 Manufactured presets 140 user patches). It wasn't that hard to make your own patch, simply by deleting a preset and making your effect. but to do it properly you would have to sit down with a jug of coffee and take the amazing edtitng ride.

From bluesy distortion to an amazingly heavy pantera distorion, it's all there.

Such a stupid question. It's BOSS what do you expect.

I play all sorts of alternative rock/punk. Anything from the Tea Party to frenzal rohmb.
I don't actually own one but i am looking for a job to get the money to buy one.
As i have said on previous reviews, If any on stole it i would find them and rip their fuck'n heads off.

I found it is hard to remember where what is where... but other wise the setup is perfect.

There isn't more than 4 effects I don't like the sound of. I have an american kramer vangard and a fender princeton chorus amp it sounds great and i love it

It is very realiable

.....

good for all music
tone of distortion and overdrive
amazing

I personally found this unit very easy in use for it's complexity. It's also rather flexible and can be used in most possible setups.
The one great thing for me was full Midi-support which allows you to store patches on an external sequencer or PC or to use GT-3 as a
MIDI-Controller for other units. But on the other hand you have to tweak a lot to get a good sound out of this machine. And the manual sucks because it gives you only few usefull infos on how to get started or how to work with Midi-features but doesn't really help you in creating your own patches. So I had to spend some hours to get familiar with all the effect-settings.

I use very cheap guitar with single-coil pick-ups with my GT-3 and go into PWR AMP IN of my PEAVEY Keyboard Combo or into PA-Mixer. I also use fo direct recording on my PC... Well, let's talk about all these effects and presets. Most of the effects like MOD-section, delays, reverb, preamp & speaker are realistic enough and new features like Acoustic Sim. and electric-acoustic effects are usefull. But some of the effects are totally unusefull: Auto-Riff or GUIT-SYNTH, that tracks to slow for example. The Harmonizer should track played tones faster too. I found only one good patch for the Ring Modulator on the WEB - "Sitar"... Clean sounds are awesome especially sounding in stereo. Crunch sounds with light overdrive are O.K too ! But high gain lead sounds are too noisy for my ear and noise suppressor doesn`t help here much. It just kills the sound. Maybe this level of noise is O.K. for live-gigs but for Recording it's too high. I'm still
trying to avoid this problem but it seems not to become better in the nearest future... I'm still looking for patches which implementate typical sounds of several artists (Brian May, Satriani, Vai etc.).
Feel free to contact me if you want to exchange any infos on GT-3 or patches or so !
And here are some interesting web-ressources on GT-3:
User's sites:
http://bossgt3.tripod.com
http://members.xoom.com.bossgt3

Software:
www.kagi.com/amcsoftware/gt3.html
http://members.tripod.com/Gt3Banker

It's very solid metall construction, built like a rock. I didn't think about buying any backup for gigging ! I trust boss to built dependable gear. You must try very very hard to break it.

I haven't to deal with them and I hope I will not too ! But their web-site doesn't offer any support for the unit. It should be better !

I play already for a couple of years in a school-band all styles from blues to metal and GT-3 does it's work when I play live but for Home recording it is a bit too noisy on some patches. But I compared it to other FX-units (ZOOM, DigiTech, KORG...) and for the money it's still a best buy I think. I plan to buy ROCKTRON Prophesy and better guitar to use my GT-3 as MIDI-Footswitch for it. But GT-3 will remain a good tool for clean patches. I really don't know whether I would buy it again if it were stolen.

I picked my GT2 up at 11:00 in the morning and used at a gig that night at6:00 PM.
so many parameters so many tweaks that can be applied it is almost overwhelming most of the editing is easy for those who have worked with digital gear before but there is still more I don't know then I do.The whole thing about the internal pedal system is beyond my grasp.
I use the unit for both my acoustic and electric setups and it is obvious that much tweaking of volume needs to be done to make the GT3 more usable on stage.
The EZ edit is fun when I am just goofing off it is so easy to change parameters on the fly!My favorite is to sit with GT3 in front of me is to build a patch from the ground up find a Pre Amp and go from there sometimes I end up somewhere I never imagined.
When gigging I leave the unit in manual mode I like being able to have control over the individual effects.
Like most manuals it sucks .They give you enough information to get started and there is a nice description of all they effects and there parameters but really I have read parts of it well every time I go to the bathroom!:)and parts are still not clear.

believe it or not I bought this unit as a Pre Amp for my acoustic guitar.I have a Martin2 W/ a Fishmen Goldline+ pickup that I was running direct into a Mackie 1402 mixer a crest audio 900 watt amplifier and either my JBL TR225 Cabs loaded with 2 15s in each cab or EV SX100 for smaller gigs.I was looking at different Pre Amps on the market(and there are a lot).In my acoustic setup I have not had one problem with the sound Quality they the factory Pre sets worked for me that first night I used it and since I have done some tweaking and came up with some great patches(except for some minor feedback problems.....how does that anti feedbacker work anyway?)My electric setup is a Charvell Strat copy with a H-S-S pickup arrangement plugged into old reliable Marshall JCM800 50 watt combo.I don't play much electric anymore but sine I got the GT3 I find myself spending more time ( remember a good effect box can make a crappy guitar player sound good and a good guitar player like shit......JUST PLUG IN AND PLAY FOR GODS SAKE!!!!)I have no use for the special effects included with the GT3 and can see no place I would ever use the ring modulator but I really have not got into the electric end of the GT3 to give a good opinion of it
For the acoustic the 2by2 chorus is great I also use the limiter/compressor,reverb,DDL and have got some really interesting pad effects I use on some instrumental numbers. Sometimes I get weird requests for old rock songs(can you play smoke on the water?)and it cracks me up to switch on some distortion and play that crap on my martin.....heheheheheh....I had to do some tweaking to find a good distortion but it works.Again overall I find for my purposes I find this unit to be very quiet for what I use it for and I have a number of compliments on the way my acoustic sounds on stage.

built like a tank 6 months later I still carry around in the original box and I have only dropped it once!!!!!I average about 15 to 20 gigs a month and since my purchase 6 months ago I have had no problems with it.
I gig all the time with out a backup.

I have not had the need to deal with the company as of yet.There is a lack of info at the Rolandus site about the unit.

acoustic folk rock and I think the GT3 is a perfect match for what I do.I have been playing guitar for 26 years.I have a home recording studio with a track cassette and the computer W/Cakewalk and Sound Forge and the various outboard gear that goes with that.
Yes I would definitely buy another.
I love the basic sound and ease of use with a guitar and the GT3 I can gig anywhere and get my sound.
I hate that I did not have one of these when I was 15 years old(I was gonna be the next guitar god)imagine getting all those great guitar sounds in your headphones and not a peep from the neighbors.
The one that surprised me and got my attention was using the GT3 in the manual mode I like being able to turn the effect blocks on and off it is like having 6 pedals on the floor.it would be nice to have a dedicated switch for the tuner/bypass mode.
I compared to every acoustic Pre Amp product on the market and feature for feature it just gave me more bang for my buck.
The only thing I knew is that I did not want an on board Pre Amp in my martin.I did look into L.R. Baggs,Fishman,BBE and a lot of the tube style pre amps on the market.
I think it very much helped me with my music I love the way my Martin sounds through my system I would gladly compare it with anyone's.
I would very much like to hear from anybody anywhere who is using the GT3 for there main acoustic Pre Amp(or am I the only one?)
For me the GT3 is all I wanted and more thanks for you time