Boss GT-3

Editing each patch is incredibly user friendly and easy. I often throw my shoes off and edit the patches with my toes.IN THEORY one should be able to get any sound out of the GT-3. There is the COSM, an EQ, a SUB EQ, amp simulators, multiple distortions, utility settings, etc. not to mention their online advice and tutorials. But if you're like me you don't want to spend hours and hours perfecting one patch much less multiple patches. I have spent many evenings sitting down with my Marshall VS100 and headphones and (four years later) finally created a patch I like. So if you don't mind the headaches of fine tuning and tweaking numerous variable of each of your patches then it may not be as much of an annoyance as it has been to me. I find stomp boxes easier to edit; I find it confusing to not have knobs but just numbers on a screen. The manual is very large at about 80 pages, but I would have liked for it to go more in depth with the effects and uses.

I play a Gibson Les Paul Standard and a Fender Strat to the GT-3 and through a Marshall VS100 valvestate (big mistake) combo. I am a fan of BOSS sounds. Always have been, since I started playing 11 years ago, and always will be. I like many bands from Smashing Pumpkins to PropellerHeads to U2, but I'd say the sounds I most like to replicate would be bands like Delirious or Tom Petty or any good crunchy rhythm sound. The only way I've found to get this is with the MS1956I amp simulator and I just adjust the VOLUME and GAIN settings. While I love the SD-1, BD-2 or even the Metal Zone pedals for some nice rich warm distortions I DO NOT like the distortions of the GT-3. They are all too shreddy and high pitched; I won't use the distortions even when I'm just having fun in a jam, they're terrible. I always use the LINE OUT setting otherwise I feel that I will kill my ears. As with BOSS single stomp boxes, the modulations, delays and other effects are beautiful.

Built like a TANK! Never had any technical problems.

Never had to use them.

I've been playing for 11 years and have managed to use the GT-3 for 4 of those years, but now I'm looking to get rid of it. The GT-3 just helped to solidify my belief that no digital module can fully replicate any good analog sound (the only thing to change my views has been the Fender Cyber Twin) Possibly if I had a tube amp I may find that the sounds of the GT-3 may be de-shredded. Very nice if you want it just for the delay and modulation effects. In fact, its great if you don't ever want to use the amp simulators or the distortions. The amp simulators sound nothing like they are named and the distortions all sound like death metal shred. Now if you want to spend hours and hours and hours studying and modifying each parameter then this is a great project for you, but if you want to "set it and forget it" Invest in some single pedals. If it were stolen I'd collect the money and put it towards a Mesa Boogie. Happy shoppin!

easy if you just go with the preset settings, and fairly easy if you want to tweek the parameters of each effect. on some effects there seems to be an excess of parameters to tweek, e.g there only needs to be 2 or 3 parameters (i.e. 'depth','rate'&'level' virtual knobs) for chorus but there's about 6! i can't get the external overdrive pedal socket thing to work either - i've tried various ways at plugging in my route 66 pedal to no avail.

average. i originally bought it to use as a fancy headphone practice amp but have even given up on that idea. even after months of tweeking i couldn't get any sounds i really liked. 98% of the factory presets are awful - no subtlety whatsoever, a real mess of too much fx piled on each cliched preset. i ended up spending so much time tweeking that i didn't have time left for much actual playing practice - so WARNING! This unit will cause your playing chops to go downhill! i feel that they should've left out the silly fx that no one uses ('slicer' anyone?) and concentrated on better quality 'bread and butter' fx. btw, the delay on it is better sounding than a dd2 but there's no 'hold' function.

well built. hasn't broken. but then i hardly ever use it.

don't know

had for 4 years and only get it out the cupboard every few months or so. not bad value if you want all the fx without the price tag of buying individual pedals or racks...but at what price if you you don't like the end result? you'll find yourself buying those good quality individual pedals eventually anyway when you start to become more savvy about 'tone'. multi fx is not the all in one solution the manufacturers would like you to believe.

It get easier to use with time. When I first got it I was just excited to fiddle with the effects, so it was a little confusing, but after about a month or two I had it down to a science.

Over the years I've gone through a few different rigs, but now that I've found my dream rig I can say this thing is a monster. I've got two Kustom Quad 100 Heads with two Kustom 4x12 cabs, and you really couldn't tell the difference between this and a Marshall. I grew up on analog and tube amplifiars, so I'm a huge fan of vintage sounds (such as old Fenders and Marshalls from the 60's and 70's.) I play mostly metal but I love havin a vintage hard rock sound. After some work, this thing gets me a great vintage sound with new componants. I will admit though, as much as I love this unit it's really hard to get an internal distortion sound that sounds really good. So I added a Metal Zone and a lot of EQ and got my dream sound. Virtually anything is possibly with this unit if you apply yourself. The really cool thing: switches sounds almost instantaniously. I've heard so many pedals take a long time (upwards of half a second) to switch to another sound even within it's own bank. This thing switches sounds fast. Also, worth noting: the acoustic simulator is pretty damn good, and the delays are amazing. Great phaser/flanger sounds too, and the EQ is one of the best. Only thing I'd like to see more flexability in is the Wah sounds.

This thing is a freakin beast. Hands-down the most dependable effects box on the market. Been using it almost every day for the past three years, no problems. Has never died on me and works perfect every single time I tuen it on.

Haven't had to talk to support. This thing rocks.

This is hands down the best pedal on the market. Most guitarists preffer to use individual pedals, and yes in most cases that's the best way to go. But this thing does a great job of creating a beautiful and natural sound for any style of music. But, here's the thing: you have to make it sound good. If you know how you want to sound, then you will sound that way, garaunteed. If you just mess with it and try to find something cool you may be disapointed.

Its quite easy to use after you are familiar with it.

I play this unit on my CS Strat and Les Paul,I find this processor sound too digital & crispy to my ears.Modulations are good,reverb & delays are not so bad,Distortions are not impressive.Amp simulations are bad except for the clean tones,they're ok.acoustic sim,wahs,comps,limiters are average,lots of sfxs(not useful though).

I must admit that this thing is very reliable.

never dealt.

I mostly play rock and blues & been doin that for almost 15 yrs.I think this gear is for beginner/intermediate guitarists who seeks for a wide varieties of effects/sound for his/her live showsThis unit is user friendly and you can create a lots of sounds with it,has a large memory capacity(banks) and there are many useful functions such as the assianable pedal,control switch,manual function,eff.chain set etc.this thing would be great if the amp sims and the distortions sounded better.The worst thing about this gear is it reacts totally different to a headphone and to an amp.this thing is great for headphone practicing at the middle of the night.I wonder if this gear sounds great for a versatile player.Anyway a good player always rely on separate pedals than these all in one type multi effects processors.

Very easy to use, although narrowing down to an exact tone can take hours. There is a very useful GT-3 yahoo group though which can help those who are stuck.

I have a mid-high range Ibanez and a Marshall AVT100. I put the FX unit infront of the amp and use the clean channel. Doing this takes alot of my amp's sound away but when I have a good effect I don't want the amp messing it up :). This thing has so many FX and parameters that you could spend a lifetime tweaking. The distortion is a little poor on it's own but if you have it low with the amp simulator it can sound very good. I've nailed an 80's Metallica sound on it so it can't be bad. The time effects (Delay, Reverb, chorus etc.) are excellant. I now wouldn't get rid of this for the world (maybe for a newer version).

I haven't gigged it just yet but soon will. I've had it for 5 years and it's still in good as new condition. I've never had any problem whatsover with it.

Never needed to contact Boss.

I've been playing on and off for 5 years and I mostly play metal but I also play some other stuff. This machine can get some excellant blues tones too as well as heavy thrash and the like. If it were stolen I'd probably go buy a newer version (GT-6 I think we're on now). What I love about this pedal is the amount of FX you can have going at the same time and the fact you can use the cntrl pedal to change parameters/fx within each patch, it's like you have 4 patches in each patch. The only thing I hate is that it has so many things that it takes along time of tweaking to get what you want. Anybody that has the opportunity to get one of these cheap should get it. It owns any other multi-FX machines I tried in the price range (when I bought it that is in 99).

Easy to get great sounds from the presets. Editing is fairly simple for basic parameters if you have exp. with multi FX. The manual is confusing and incomplete, even though it is huge. It took me years to figure some things out. Didn't know about upgrades.

Mostly I use my fernandes dragonfly pro(awesome gtr!) into gt-3, into fender hot rod deville for gigs and it sounds great and has every effect. Only pedal I use is a crybaby. This unit sounds great with every amp I have, peavey classic 30, fender princeton, carvin x60 tube head, epiphone galaxy 10( really cool tube amp for practice and recording) and my peavey rages. The fx all sound good except for wah but thats with all multis and I wouldnt want to wear out the exp. pedal anyway. You can get close to almost any sound and if you cant practice more. It has a global(effects all patches) eq and reverb levels for quick changes to work with different gtrs, rooms. Nice feature!

TANK. PERIOD. Never a problem in 7 years and never a backup.

Don't know.

I play all kinds of rock and blues. Been playing 13 years. I own a few other multi fx, zoom, korg and boss that don't compare to the gt-3. also boss pedals metal zone,comp.,delay, eq, ds-1, and ibanez tubescreamer, fuzz, chorus. this pedal would be good for any style, level player. Just take some time to set up some patches and build from them. this is also the best way to set cuz' the factory settings vary in volume. Manual mode is handy for stomp box style stomping. Now, WHY such a small volume knob and WHY on the back!? Hate that! I might buy the gt-6 if lost just cuz its got knobs instead of buttons. I play in bar bands doing covers and originals and it helps me simplify my set up and make quick and extreme sound changes required when covering a lot of styles. If you stick with one style just get a couple stompboxes cuz you don't need all this and I think individual fx generally sound a little better. It does have extension dist jacks that allow you to put your fav. boxes through the gt-3! You can also use this for tube pre-amps! My deville's pre-amp can be patched thru the gt-3 then the unit's out put goes to the power amp/fx return in!!! this requires 5 cables but is great if you want to use your amps distortion or the gt-3's dist. or amp modeling. I wish it had true bypass function, and a master volume KNOB on front for quick adjustments cuz the patch volumes are hard to even out. A great unit, especially for less than 200 ebay price.

Slightly low score on this 'cos it takes a year or two to get good at setting & editing patches. Also don't expect to get killer valve-type tones when you up the gain. The COSM amp modelling is quite good for clean but doesn't cut the mustard for producing that clipped tone that you get from those dodgy old glass tubes. I've found a tone that sounds a bit like plugging straight in to an Orange and turning the volume up to ten - a typical British Noel Gallagher style overdrive, but that's about it. Something else I've noticed - the crappiest amp model of the lot is "MS1959" - which we all know is supposed to be a Marshall stack. It's just about unusable, & given that Marshall is the sound most guitarists aspire to, why feck it up so royally? Sour grapes from the boys at Roland? That might explain why "JC120" is one of the best! The manual is pants (long johns, with one of those cat-flaps & porcelaine buttons). Your best bet is get on the internet & google it for loads of info from other users. I'm not sure what version of software mine has but I reckon it's about 4 years old now - I bought it used.

I'm using a Telecaster & an Epi Les Paul. If you thought the difference in tone between guitars was subtle, try using a patch for a Les Paul & playing a Tele through it, or vice-versa. Any high gain stuff set for the LP will buzz like a bastard with the Tele's single coils, and anything else sounds thin & reedy. The other way round everything just disappears in mush. I don't often amp the GT-3, & this raises another point. If, like me, you normally use headphones for practice & set the patches that way, as soon as you put it through an amp - any amp - as Boss recommend, your patches will sound bloody awful. I've heard the best set up is straight into the power amp of a Peavey Bandit using the line out (headphones) setting & this will allow you to keep the settings you've got & sound pretty true to what you were trying to achieve. Never been able to try it, though. If I amp it at all I use the guitar amp (combo) setting through my crappy Kramer 15W solid state doo-dah. It sounds OK-ish. Apart from the poor distortions (which I've already mentioned) the wah is pretty awful, too. It sounds better on clean patches, but who ever wants to wah-wah without plenty of sustain? I set a patch recommended by some website or other to supposedly improve the pre-set wah, but it's still too sudden & shallow. The delay is quite good - I've got a killer patch for playing Waterfall by the Stone Roses - sounds like you're on the opposite side of the grand canyon. Reverb is quite nice for a digi-box too. Oh, & the acoustic simulator. I've got an acoustic guitar & I'd like to know how this sounds different to an electric guitar played clean with the EQ tweaked for bass & treble - the only realistic simulation is when you put some chorus on to sound like an electro-acoustic. Oh yes - there's some effects here which I'll probably never use, but there's a pitch shifter which I've used to play the intro to Radiohead's My Iron Lung & it sounds exactly right. Dunno what Johnnie's using but my bet is it's more expensive than 2% of a GT-3's capability.

This is built like a brick shit-house.

Never dealt with.

As I'm a relative novice playing indie-rock style stuff for my own entertainment through headphones, the GT-3 is ideal for giving me all the sounds I want without the expense & complication of seperate stomp boxes. On the odd occasions I've been jamming/rehearsing I spent as long trying to get a good sound as actually playing the damn guitar, much to everybody elses frustration. In the end it was easier to plug straight into the amp. I briefly owned a Laney VC50 valve amp & it was a total waste of the GT-3's abilities & the amp's natural tone to try to pair them up. If you're gigging, either set it up through a solid state power amp and get all those lovely sounds cheaply, or go for the real thing & use a valve amp with stomp boxes. I doubt wether your audience will notice the difference or give a toss, but I'm inclined to think the GT-3 is more of a toy for the bedroom guitarist than a serious pice of kit.

For as much as you can do with this unit, it's actually really easy to use (with help from the manuel of corse) everythings laid out in a very user friendly fassion

the versitility

The versitility of this unit is Amazing. Surpassed only by the GT-6.
There is so much you can do. You can efect parameters of effects that you didn't know were there. The internal pedle controls make for even more versitility. I seriouse. Ive had this thinf for about 4 years now and it still amazes me how crazy of sound you can make.

The tone

The tone is another matter. All though all the effects are pretty cool sounding, this thing does Tone suck. It's not the worst in the world but if you have a good amp you'll notice (i run it through a Rivera M120, killer amp) In my opinion, the versitility far makes up for the lack in tone. And In a live situation you'll never notice.

I wouldn't suggest using this for extensive studio use though. It's good for making wierd sounds and unique effects, but not for it's tone

One thing, the noise gate is pretty good and, if using the built-in pre amp models it's almost silent

This thing flew out of the back of my friends truck and smashed into a curb 3-1/2 years ago and put a big dent in it but the thing never stoped. It's built like a freaking tank man!!! Not a single glitch. The pedals still work and everything.

Rad unit, but not exactly pro quality. It's close though. I use it for strange sounds and radicall effects but not much else. It's a killer unit for pre or post effects. the effects sound really good. But the thing sucks just enough tone to start to be anoying.

it's practically IMPOSSIBLE to get a decent sound out of this piece of shit on it's own;
if ya use the knobs on the guitar, ya can hear the terrible noise gate working...high frequency artifacts that sound fuckin' HORRIBLE, and if ya turn it off, the thing has all the background noise of a waterfall!
Editing patches is a pain, and the manual is THE WORST PIECE OF SHIT I HAVE EVER SEEN!!!
it has every bauble and bead you'll prolly never need, and most of the "analog (not) " stuff sounds horrid.
the delays are ok, i like the tap function, tho i rarely use it...
some of the reverbs are ok, the harmonizer is adequate but difficult to program realistically, and EVERYTHING sounds digital, in a BAD way.
the "cosm" sims of various preamps totally suck..i do amp tech work , and most of the models just don't cut it unless you run the shit around half way up...then they SOUND KINDA like what they represent, but in a very harsh and sterile way.
the comp is noisy, the gate sucks, the preamp models suck, the overdrives/distortions suck, but i DO use it live...

live, i use what seems an insanely complex rig with this thing;
i DON'T use any of the cosm or distortions at all, they fucking SUCK.
anyone with ears will notice that, unless they've been raised on "digital models" and have never had the chance to play thru any of the amps this thing lamely attempts to model.
i run it like this, i've seen it since called the four cable method, but mine is a little more complex...
the signal path goes like this:gtr> hot rodded crybaby wah (thanks to Geofex' R.G. Keene for the jelp, BTW!)> dano french fries auto wah > dano chicken salad vibe > Boss Super Overdrive > Big Muff Pi > GT-3 input >GT-3 send > Roland GP-8 in >gp-8 send >line input, Marshall 9001 tube preamp >marshall send >gp8 return >gp-8 outs to Marshall stereo returns > marshall output (mono) >GT-3 return > gt stereo outs > left goes to market electronics echoplex >input marshall valvestate 8008 power amp, right to other input on the power amp.
By turning off the cosm preamps, and setting the distortion to external and having the marshall in it's place, i don't need that lame ass digital distortion/preamp modeling, i can use actual TUBES to get my tone, and use the good sounding digital stuff after the tubes like they belong.
i like being able to put the "loop" of the GT anywhere i want,
and expressive control on the thing can be the bomb, if ya can figure out the exceedingly cryptic manual.
heavily processed, the accoustic sim is good, i use it live a couple times a night.
mostly i only need like three patches live.
versatility wise, there is an awesome amount of stuff ya can do with this pedal...but there's a lotta bullshit in it, too....
arranging effects however you like is handy tho, gotta admit...
you can do things "wrong" to great effect!
tho by itself, i can't stand this blue piece of crap, it's been a great addition to my live rig...once i turned off all the bullshit!!
seems to run best on the "line/headphones" setting.
but honestly, if ya want TONE, yer better off with an old ME-5, unless you're bonged outta yer mind or play with so much distortion ya wouldn't know a decent tone if it bit you in yo ass.
if yer not very discriminating, this thing could be your wet dream.
some of the shit in there, like the humanizer and auto riff function, just sound...well, DUMB!!!!!!!

it fucks up frequently on gigs, and pisses me off!!
prone to oscillation, doesn't like sitting in the truck.
very susceptable to atmospheric moisture and to a lesser degree temperature.
every couple gigs, i need to completely unplug it and repatch it to get it to work, seems prone to oxidation.
it lives in a pedal board, so it's not being unpatched unless it fucks up...
which again, it does every couple gigs.
but it IS a boss, and can take some physical abuse.

never dealt with boss on this one other than to ask why the manual sucked so very, very hard!
they couldn't tell me why, and were reasonably clueless when i asked about specific functions.
again, they dropped the ball on this thing IMnot-particularlyHO

i play classic rock and blues.
it's adequate for my uses with an assload of outboard gear.
been playing since'69, own a buncha gtrs, mostly strats and gibsons.
use fender and marshall amps most of the time, depending on my mood and the gig.
if it were stolen, i doubt i'd buy another, honestly.
just not worth it; every sound but the RIGHT one, tho you can tweak it eventually to be usefull.
i don't love anything about it; but it DOES have enough options to keep ya busy for a while before you realize just how badly BOSS dropped the ball in so many ways.
i just wish it could sound good on it's own' cuz MAN, would it be useful!!
i wish Boss would go back to using an ANALOG front end, and the noise gate they had in the ME-5..then it would be useful.
by itself, without serious tweaking, it's difficult to really get a useful sound out of this thing, but it shines for the most part in my setup; but mostly i use it as a hub to control my rig, and use the verb and ddl.
using the exp pedal as the master volume for a cranked up marshall is a gas...
but them digital high frequency aliasising artifacts ruin the things tone, they are incredibley noticeable and annoying if ya use the volume knobs on your gtr.
for what it is, it's ok, but by no means is it a holy grail of gtr tone like some may lead you to believe.
ya gotta jump thru hoops to use it , and the manual just plain sux pud.
BUT.....it DOES have some useful, meat and potatoes effects, and a buncha shit most will probably never need, like the arpeggiator auto riff thing, the slicer, stuff like that.
basically, what SHOULD be digital sounds pretty good, but what SHOULD be analog sounds like doo doo.
and don't make the mistake of trying to use the cosm preamp models as an overdrive into a distorted amp.
FUCKIN' 'ORRIBLE!!!
yech.
might as well be a zoom pedal.
yes, that bad.
but creatively programmed, and with a decent preamp, it can sound really good if your gain structures are right.
but getting any tone you can imagine?
hardly..
keep looking!
need i say more?

It is a little bit hard to use this petal in the begging but as soon as you experiment some days you can make everything.

the sound is fake. very bad sonic character. the simulations of the preamps are not very close to the real ones. the fx s have a good quality but nothing is close to pro gears.

it is a boss that means that you can jump on it and it does not brake.
very good support of the manual and the internet.
it is really the hardest petal in the market.

i was playing with boss 1 year ago but now i have rack gear. i loved this petal. now it is not something special for me. for the amature players it is a magic unit.

Its a Sweet Processor! I had one oce before and sold it while in a fit of buying and sell rage(STUPIDITY).......
Some may say its dificult to edit the patches but I say its a breaze!
Roland manuals are known for being bad.
Not shure of the firmware, never try to find out...............

I love the sound quality its very clean. I never had to add any further noise supression.

I like the effects thay are usable for me and my music(Electronic ambiant crazy).

No amps just direct into the mixer.
I never try to emulate artists thats left up to the cover bands in my opinion.

Delays are awsome and modulation effects are very usefull.

I have gigged with one in the past as did my friend in our band we both used them without a hitch.

No need for a backup.

Roland is alright when it comes to support.
Never delt with them any more than to ask a dumb question.

I play very odd and effected stuff with under layers of regular sounding guitars. This effects box works well for me.
I would hunt down another if mine was stolen, or get the GT-6 to replace it.
A digital out would be nice, but the GT-6 has added that so........

THIS UNIT IS NOT FOR KIDS OR IMPATIENT WANKERS, IT CAN BE MADE TO SOUND ANYWAY YOU WANT IT, SOME OF THE FOLKS WHO HAVE HAD PROBLEMS WITH GETTING A WARM TONE OUT OF THIS UNIT WOULD BE BETTER SUITED TO HAVE METAL BOX WITH A BIG RED BUTTON THAT SAYS GO! ON IT AND NO OTHER FEATURES,

THERE HAS BEEN NO TONE i HAVE HAVE NOT BEEN ABLE TO RECREATE,

GREAT DO IT ALL UBIT, I CANT HELP BUT LAUGH AT THE PEOPLE WHO COULDNT GET GREAT TONE OUT OF IT, YOU CAN ONLY IMAGINE THEIR PATIENCE TO LEARN ANYTHING NEW,

IF IT WERE SUPER INCREADIBLY EASY TO USE IT WOULD HAVE NO OPTIONS

AND IF IT HAD BAD TONE BOSS WOULDNT HAVE PUT THEIR NAME ON IT,

IF YOU DIDNT LIKE THIS PEDDLE OR FOUND IT TOO HARD TO USE, KEEP WAITING FOR FISHER PRICE TO PUT OUT THEIR UBIT! :)

Somewhat involved to use...you definitely have to ead the manual to get to some of the more subtle tweaks. Once you get the hang of it, its quick to change fo your needs. Editing patches is easy.

A quick use guide to this unit: (1) AVOID THE PATCHES - build the effects yourself so you can appreciate each effect's capabilities; (2) Don't use the COSM preamps - they are pretty sterile - certainly don't use the COSM peamp in place of your own amp's pre-amp as the manual suggests. (3) Set up your distortion patches - the Distortions/Overdrives on thie unit are not COSM, but actual analog circuits and they sound really nice. These alone are worth the proce of the unit. Chorus, Dely and other modulations are OK - not awesome, not bad either. The Wah capability is nice. The compressor is only OK at verry low levels...too high and it begins to sound plastic.

I've had this for five years - its a tank.

Though I love separate effects boxes, they are a pain. You can't go wrong on this box.

this box sucks! ive had it for 3 years and can hardly get a good solid tone out of it, this thing is all about tone! pipsqueaky shit tone in fact! its good for intermediate players who havent experimented yet or if you cant play and want to hide that fact behind a wall of distortion.

not very good sound quality wise.

it is very reliable though

dont know

if you want to experiment with all sorts of sounds and modulations then sure! go ahead but for the serious player this unit will not 100 percent satisfy you, i,ve tried alot of different single effects lately and theres a couple i love! they are the dod juice box and the 308 box, now the juice box is not manufactured anymore so i got 2 of them! you may be saying to yourself at this particular moment.... dod is shit! but as a matter of fact i believe they kick boss, ass! i used to own a few individuals of those pedals and was never satisfied, try logging onto the dod effects database in harmony and just see for yourselves how the overall ratings are so much higher than boss gear plus has anyone ever heard of a pro player using the gt3 before? i,ll leave with that, bye all, p.s dont take this inscription to heart if you alredy have a gt3 im only speaking my mind and trying to help.

Well, it's not so easy to program this thing. I really had a problem with the reverb and spent two days finding what the problem is. Even a person from I bought this didn't know the answer... the problem was that in Global options reverb was set to 0. Who did this difficulty in the factory, I don't know, but this is quite stupid for me.
Anyway in general it's not so easy to edit this gt3 machine, mainly becouse it has a lot of options. It's good from one hand, and bad from the other. Basically it takes time to do sth with it that makes sense.
The manual is usefull to some degree, but mostly you will have to use your brain...

Generally speaking you can do a lot from gt3. It just take some time to combine it with your particular amp.
Basically it lacks mid frequencies and that can be a problem if you wanna get the sound of VH for example, but in my opinion anything can be done with gt3, it just can take a lot of experimenting. I got this thing about a week or so and I think that it may take me a year or so to really get the balls out of this, and undestand everything that's there inside.
It's not noisy unless you use some compressor over distortion etc. That's normall. Actually I don't use any distorted thing out of this, mostly it sucks for me. But the amp simulations works fine and you can get a lot of it combining with the amp, but as I said before it takes time to find 'the sound', a lot of experimenting with the amp and gt3 together...
The effects are good, although I lack for the knobs in delay etc. Forget about the synthesizer thing, it sucks, too much delay in what you're doing and what you get, and also you will have some strange sounds comming out of this, without the reason :-) But this is not the guitar synthesizer... 2'nd BUT I don't have a clue why they put this inside the gt3 knowing it doesn't work...
The main guitar effects like chorus, flanger, reverb, etc. even the wah are good, so for me it's better to have one machine doing this, than jump over thousands single effects with your foot.
Good thing is - you have a lot of space to do your own combinations, so you can create a separate banks for each piece of music you play, having it under your foot just changing the banks. For example one bank for heavy distorted sound, combined with the wah sound on the next peadal and flanger and chorus. The other bank may be for jazz kind of stuff etc.. Plus you can program the CTL pedal for certain thing (delay, flanger over basic sound etc).
Basically it's a good machine to explore, but you have to spend some time to understand how it works, and how to get the most of it.
I use jcm 900 combo with it but mostly connecting it directly to the PC through music card to be able to practice at night. I don't know right now how it sounds in gig situation...

have no idea

never used customer support

I play different styles for 14 years mainly using distorted sounds, but also some more simple jazz kind of stuff. Gt3 is usefull, but don't expect miracles from it, it's just some machine, quite usefull, nothing more.

I got mine used w/o the manuel. I figured it inside and out in a matter of a day. With the green screan and red lights it is simple to see what you have on and what dose what. The wheel is a good feture to scan.

Now given the fact that the patches when you first get it sound very very high and tigy. If you have any creativity in you at all. You can make anything sound awesome. I play alot of rage against the machine, tool, and othres so I need to have a wide range of sounds. I can go so far to even make synthesizer come from it (witch can sound like crap or like an actual keyboard granted you play one note at a time). Some of effects can be chopy or sound funky ie: pitch shift, but can be fixed with some pushes of the right buttons to set a tone you want. It dosen't hurt to have a good amp either. You name it. The gt-3 can make it posible if you are willing to sit down with it.

I have had few problems with it. Two time I turned it on to find that ether it didn't save what I worte on to the patches. Metal casing though. Could more or less suvive a atomic bomb.

I never had to get it fixed. Looked on line thoguh for a manuel. You need to pay $10 for it. Ha. Who needds it any way.

Nothing is perfect. But for studio, and yes even... live. The gt-3 will make you sound like the guitarist you want to be. I like to play Rage Against The Machine, 311, Tool, Led Zepllin, Fugazi, Dream Theater and many more. I have been playing for 4 years now. And play a Schecter 006 Elite with Di Marzio DP-100 brdige and a kramer dual rail neck out of *sight* a crate gfx-212t (a am on a budget. Will next TRY to buy a mesa boogie). I was debating between this and the korg ax-1500. Even thoguh it can do almost anything it is hard to make a guitar sound different than a guitar is suposed to sound. But all my friend were impresed with its effects and flasy looks (purple and yellow). I don't think I will ever sell it. It make a world of differance. If it was stolen I think I would have to get the same one back no matter what the cost b/c of all the time it took me to set up all the patches (witch was well work the one day it took).

This unit is very easy to use if you just wish to try the different presets, and tweak them with the EZ functions to control parameters. However, I did not really appreciate the versatility of the GT-3 until I began to delve into different types of guitar effects. (This was my first guitar effect, as I had never used stomp boxes before, and indeed bought this so I wouldn't have to.) The manual can be deciphered with continual reading, but the supplements to the manual available on the web were a real eye opener. If you have one of these or plan to buy one you can save yourself a lot of time by doing a bit of research. Once I understood more about how different effects worked, effect order, assign functions, etc. I found the GT-3 very easy to use to set up custom patches. I tend to set it to a few patches, and leave it for months, then try something new every once in a while. The possibilities are endless!

I currently use the GT-3 in the effects loop of my amp as follows. Les Paul Standard - Boss CS-3 -Boss P10 V-Wah - Boss GT-3 (into parallel effects loop) - Marshall JCM 601 combo.
After much research and effort trying to use the 4-cable hookup method which allows you to separate out your amp's preamp and take advantage of the GT-3's preamps, I had to admit defeat. I and others have found that this method works great with some amps, but does not seem to fit the Marshall tube amps in general. It just sucked too much tone no matter how I tweaked settings! As I prefer to use my Marshall amp's sound anyway for distortion this was not a great loss, but I would encourage all users to try the 4-cable method as it definitely allows the most versatility and access to the widest scope of sounds from the GT-3. Because the GT-3 runs after the preamp stage in my amp I purchased a separate compressor to keep at the front of the effects chain. Proper level matching in patches is essential to keeping volume consistent between patches, and also makes this unit very very quiet in use.

The following effects I use all the time: Reverb, Delay, Chorus, EQ, Com/Lim, Harmonist. I find the sound quality good to excellent.

I do not use some of the other effects such as the synth sounds, special FX, and modes as they don't sound too good through the effects loop. Also, the tracking on certain effects is poor - I think I need the software upgrade which is available. The pickup simulation offers a few possibilites, but I haven't found a great acoustic sound in the GT-3.

The wah function does not have adequate range or depth, in my opinion. The auto-wah can be used with some success. The tremolo effect is weak.

The available distortions and preamps are difficult for me to judge, as I haven't tried a lot of other amps. The clean sounds such as the JC 120, and Fender Twin are excellent, but most of the distorted or hi-gain preamp models sound just okay. I think a high quality power amp would open up a lot of possibilities, judging by what I hear playing only through my own power amp stage. I do like the MT-2 emulation using my amp on the clean channel.

I don't really try to copy other people's sounds, although I am a big Tom Scholz fan, and have tried to replicate the "Boston" patch with my amp. Still working on this one!

Overall the sound quality is very good, and I often play with the guitar and GT-3 into earphones just to play with different sounds.

This unit really shines in two areas: 1) giving you access to many of Boss's best stompboxes/sounds in one compact pedal board. 2) being able to push one footswitch and having subtle changes made to a number of effects.

My unit is set up for playing at home as follows

Main bank: all patches set up to switch into manual for 7 seconds when footswitch is pushed, allowing you to turn effects on or off individually. Expression pedal through assigns controls rates and levels of delay, reverb and chorus (heel down is everything off or very low, toe down increases levels, rates, etc). Effects used are Delay, Chorus, Harmonist, EQ, Com/Lim, Reverb. Most rates set to Master BPM and controlled through CTRL switch
Patch 1: clean patch except for Master volume and Noise suppressor (essentially bypasses GT-3)
Patch 2: chorus and reverb for rythym parts (usually on clean channel)
Patch 3: delay and reverb for distortion parts- delay time controlled by tap tempo at CTRL footswitch
Patch 4: delay, reverb, limiter, Eq with boost for leads

Other banks set up to different parameters of the same effects

I've used it live many times with no problems. I buy good stuff and take care of it, so I don't generally have backups for any of my gear. (I don't play for crowds of thousands, either :))

Boss reliability is a cliche. Great reputation for tough stuff.

Dealt with Boss a couple of times. No problems. The Toronto repair center is only 1/2 an hour away, so I am going to try and get the software upgrade to fix the Harmonist tracking problem. Had other stuff fixed quickly under warranty.

I stick to basic rock and bluesy type music, and have been playing on and off for 25 years. I don't play out that much anymore, except at church. I would definitely consider another GT-3, or a GT-6 if this one were stolen. As it is with the wah and compressor, and amp footswitch I have enough to fiddle with. I can't imagine adding several more pedals to my rig. I looked at several other products available when the GT-3 came out such as the Digitech line(originally I was going to get a GT-5), but the Boss product seemed sturdier and had a better array of features. (Remember I didn't know much about effects when I bought this) User reviews were also very positive.

My biggest complaint with this Boss product is that the manual itself is not sufficient to give you a complete understanding of the unit's capabilities. I spent a lot of time reading about effects in general before I really knew how to take advantage of the good things in this pedal and work around the less useful stuff. I think many of the reviews which rate this product poorly are due to this lack of background in the manual (ie needs more why as well as how-to.)
Also, I wish you could have 6 different effects available for control through manual mode for each patch, instead of the global setting which only allows the same 6 effects for each patch.

The pedal's best feature for my money is the ability to control so many effects' parameters with one push of a footswitch. Once you realize the GT-3 is really just a bunch of stompboxes in one unit with widely variable parameters, it is easier to understand. Instead of having to bend over and tweak 4 pedals, just push a switch and you are off! At first I was trying to set up patches according to specific songs, but now I set the patches up as "flavours", and use the manual mode to further tweak sounds during a song or set. This saves having to switch between banks too much.
Also, if the 4-cable method works with your amp, you can place effects in any order in the effects chain, use the amps' or the GT-3's preamps, and take advantage of the complete range of effects.
Overall I have been very happy with this effects processor, and recommend it both for new players trying to get a sense of what effects they would like, and experienced players who want to simplify their rigs. No product is perfect, but the GT-3 can be made to perform very well.

OK heres the deal. This is a great sounding pedalboard but you have to work at it. The menus and patches are not hard to edit but there is so much stuff in this pedal if you dont know what you are doing you can get lost. I had it for about 2 days and got it to sound great.

I use a Jackson with a EMG 81 bridge pickup,Ampeg vh140c halfstack, BBE sonic maximizer and a Rocktron hush/limiter/compressor. Like I said it takes time to get it to sound good and if you plan on using it for stage, test it at quite and loud settings. The effects are great with some signature mods like Rhaods pan. The wah is decent and the foot volume is as smooth as can be. Amp models are very almost to exact sounding and this thing is very accurate and the ODs and Distortions by BOSS. Plus the ability to mix 2 Marshalls with a distortion box is just insane. Couldnt be any better for a Metal player.

Dude if this thing was ran over by a semi it would still probably work. Ive seen on all jacked up and twisted dented you name it and it still worked.

boss gives you a free issue of guitar world if you regester your product. Boss has always been generious.

Been playing metal for 10 going on 11 years. Everything form Metallica,Slayer,Megadeth,Overkill,Testament and Ozzy. Im really happy that I got this pedal . It is like having every single boss pedal and then some to your disposal. I have heard some reviews saying its tinny,sucks and it dosent make my $20 dollar amp sound good(dosent that tell you somethin'). You need more than a great processor to get a great sound dont you think! Trust me ,you can do anything you want with this pedal. Marty Freidman(Megadeth Lead guitarist) uses the GT-6 witch has the same COSM processing engine as this pedal. I like the GT-3 over the GT-6(wich I also think its great)because its more compact and not so overwelming. Other than that there the same trust me. Boss GT-3 kills everything without mercy and makes Zooms pedals,Digitechs RPs and GenX series sound like crap.

I've own my Boss GT-3 for over 6 years now and it has gone in and out of my rig. In the late 90's I played Limp Bizkit, Korn, No Doubt, and Greenday covers. Now I play various Christian praise bands, AC/DC, Radiohead, and U2 covers. This item is pretty easy to get use to. First play around with the presets, who knows, you might like them. After that I recommend you sit down with the manual and run through the manual. Understanding the theory behind the different aspects of each effect is essential and will make you a better musician. Once you get use to making your own sounds programming is easy. One downfall is that it's hard to change settings QUICKLY, LIKE ON THE SPORT in a live environment because you have to use the big jog wheel, at first it didn't bother me but now it annoys me, I wish there was a faster way to dial in sounds. I believe the new Boss GT comes with a bunch of knobs instead of a big jog wheel which is what I wish this thing had.

I play a Squier Pro-Tone Strat w/ a Seymour Duncan JB pickup in the bridge through a Fender Blues Deluxe.

The sound quality for this thing is very good, but not great. I recommend the Boss GT-3 for people who are new to using effects or to people who need to cover a wide range of sounds. Like I said earlier I use to play Limp Bizkit and Korn which required good distortion as well as a lot of mods and effects. Now I play more U2 which requires a lot of mods and effects.

Preamps (clean and dirty preamps), OverDrives, Distortions: Generally they sounded okay. I personally love the clean sounds especially the TWIN preamp sound. As for the overdrives and distortions my favorite tones where the Marshall SLP sounds. I love British overdrive and the Boss GT-3 did a really impressive job at replicating those tones. Honestly because of the Boss GT-3's ability to replicate great Plexi tones, I now am a fan of AC/DC. The GT-3 does a decent job at replicating American distortions (Mesa, Soldano, etc.). I give the cleans an 8 out of 10, the British overdrives & distortion a 9 out of 10, and the American overdrives and distortion a 6 out of 10.

Flanger, Phaser, Chorus: Again the GT-3 does an impressive job of making good sounding mods. I give it 8 out of 10.

Tremelo: sounds okay but kinda weak. I give it a 5 out of 10.

Delay: Sounds okay but also kinda weak. I give it a 5 out of 10. I had a hard time making U2 delay sounds with the Boss GT-3. The delays even when set at its max volume could not cut through the rest of my band's mix. The only way for the delay to cut through the rest of the band was if I increased my amp's volume, which will not make the rest of the band or the sound engineer happy.

As for the rest of the effects that the Boss GT-3 offers, I really have nothing to say for them because I do not use them too much nor do I have much experience with other pedals or processor that do the same job.

This thing is very Reliable. Mine has not blackouted or erased my presets or anything like that in my 6 years of owning it. I consider this product to be physically and electronically very consistent and reliable.

Never had to deal with them, I have no say.

If you need to cover a wide range of tones and effects and do not have a huge budget then I recommend the Boss GT-3, you may want to use something else for your delays/echo sounds.

Again I love the Marshall Plexi tones and the Fender Twin tones on this thing. I think the Boss GT-3 does an impressive job at replicating these tones.

Also, this thing has helped me make music. It's got so many effects and sounds that it definitly will inspire you.

Also, this thing will cut the tone in your signal. I recommend that if you wanted to use your amp's clean tone and the Boss GT-3's distortion, you'll recognize that your clean does not sound as good if the Boss Gt-3 is in the signal path, that is why I recommend the Fender Twin sounds.

Editing patches is a hell!The manual is clear enough, but a lot of of functions makes everything so damn complicated, I don't need to spend 25 minutes to search a suitable sound, my inspiration dies.

I use Ibanez Musician '79, ESP eclipse, Yamaha AES 620, Fender Squier (for nasty sounds)and what I care more is distorted tones and this unit doesn't satisfy me at all. Crappy digital compressed distortions, almost all of them are worthless. Crappy, thinny delay, you can't use it to create atmosphere. Useless amp modeling section, neither good to play with an amp nor for recording direct. ZOOM processors take care of that! I don't comment on Wha, Whammy, Pitch-Shifter, Tremolo. Compressor, pick-up simulator,detune, chorus and reverbs are ok.

Very sturdy but heavy... also the adaptor is heavy as a rock

I play alternatve metal with melodic and atmospheric parts were delay and warm distortions are mandatory to be good. Been playing for ten years, know something 'bout tone. Good for pop rock, though, but wha is a big disappointment so you are very limited anyway. For the price I paid it 2 years ago I expected the ultimate processor, but now I will trade this 80% piece of shit for a ZOOM product, easier to edit, better distortions (I heard the gfx-4 has analog ones.

The unit is EASY to use. It's sure not comfortable and the wheel is a bit sensitive; but there are no mysteries, everything is clear as water, so I'd say it is easy to use.
If you're familiar with the concepts and the effects and parameters and what do each of them do, there'll be no problem with editing patches.

The sound quality is very good.
I'm using a very crapy amp. It's a EP10, which is very small, but the thing is that the speaker looks like a Pac-Man (the body of it being what is gone!!!) and with the GT-3, I set the output level at half (6:00 PM) and the amp's Master loud and sounds just terrific -if you like the sound you're playing, that is-. Of course the sound I get is not out of this world considering that there's no much speaker left. I set the amp's Treb=0, Mid=10, Bass=0 as it's recomended in the manual and I handle the tone easily in the GT3
Now about the specific sounds:
- The O/D sound good in the upper frets. As for downfret playing, it's very noisy.
- Reberb: does its job very well
- Delay: Not so good, a bit clumsy.
- Chorus: Great, my fav. I use to play songs of The Stone Roses -the early era- and you can get that fantastic clean, crunchy sound, and with the GT3 chorus you can get almost the exact sound.
- Modulator: Is complete, you can do about everything you need. e.g.: 3-part harmonies to play many Queen songs. I also use the Slicer instead of Tremolo when I play "How Soon Is Now?" by The Smiths.
These are the effects I use the most.
The CONTROL switch is incredibly useful and easy to program and so is the EXP PEDAL. I only hope I could change the attack of it instead of linear, maybe exp.

Very reliable.

Concerning the complexity of the gear it is very easy to use. The concept is very clear.

The effects are good. I bought it because I like the boss effects. The amp simulations are not imprtant for me. Almost in all Presets I use a Fender Twin or an Soldano simulation. My prefered effect is the ring modulator. I have a Digitech WH-1 for pitch shifting, it sounds more natural than the pitch shifter in the GT-3. But I like also the synthetic pitch shifter (Harmonist) of the GT-3 and it offers you more possibilities.

For the price I payed I got a good effect processor. For the above mentioned Digitech WH-1 I had to pay almost the same amount of money as for one GT-3. I use it with my mac, my gamboy, my drumcomputers and also with my guitar. Sometimes I use it as a midi controller. For me it is a very use- and helpful gear in a compact size! At least I also like the blue color and the yellow inscription.

I am adding here to add to my previous review, because i got some of the facts wrong.

the reason being, i didn't have the manual for this product.

first off, you CAN set your own user prests for each effect (up to four) this may not be enough for some effects in my opinion, such as pre amp and od/ds, but it is better than none.

secondly, after doing some research on the web i found some saying that the gt 6 does not have this function. also it seems the gt6 does not have some of the assigning capabilities of the gt 3. like assigning effect parameter changes to the expression pedal.

i personally can not confirm any of the info on the gt 6 because i have never used one, but if you want these functions, i strongly suggest you look into it. the gt 3 may be a better unit for you.

i also wanted to post a link here that was extremely helpful to me for anyone who may own a gt 3 and thinks it sucks to check out before they wright it off;

(copy and paste!)
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/GT-3/files/

here you will find downlaodable patches, the owners manual, and some tips on getting a usable sound.

i like my gt 3 even more after i learned more about it!
it's still not the "perfect" tool, but all things considered i.e. price, versatility, sound quality, volume control, it's a great unit.

if you just want to plug in and rock, this may be a very frustrating product for you though (see below). you MUST tweak to find your sound, patience is the key.

this is the most ridiculous thing I have ever owned. I bought because it has everything, literally just about every effect you can think of. BUT, to get a good sound involves lots of reading and head scratching. There are so many parameters to adjust in order to get each patch usable. You need a degree in something very complicated to operate this thing

modulation effect are great, the slow gear effects is great, as is the feedback. The delay are not good, they sound very artificial and its difficult to create atmospheric stuff with it. The expression pedal is amazing, whammy effect, ring modulation, all sorts of clever stuff. But the overdrive and distortions effect are rubbish. I know this for definate because I got rid of mine and now have stompboxes and the sound is 4000% better than when I was using the GT3. It makes you tone sound really rubbish, and in order to try and get a good tone you have to faff on with parameters and setting and buttons and all sorts of crap. with stompboxes you plug in, turn a knob, of you go

built like a tank, would never break

Boss are always good

to complicated, rubbish overdrive. makes playing the guitar an unhappy nightmare nuff said

Preset are terrible, manuals are quite superficial. Still the interface is good! When u know what to do u can do it fast also on stage!!

Preamp are quite good but i still prefer a valve than a microchip!
standard effects are quite good!
harmonizer&co sounds like a toilet even after hours of configurations!

it's very HARD!!!!!!!!!!!!

The worst on the world i think!
I once broke a switch and i waite 3 month to have it back with the wrong repair then one month more to the right repair and payed a LOT of money!!!

It's a good cheap compromise if u want to rock without taking a container of Pedals! and moreover it's versatile but i still think that POD's better