Boss ME-50

This Pedal is amazingly easy to use. I've had the full range or digitech, zooms, moderls, digital effects and amps, and this pedal goes great with my Peavey Valveking 112. The headphone jack is great for not upsetting the landlord! Patch editing is awesome, and HERE'S A NOTE ABOUT THE FOOTSWITCH: They do not sell it with a footswitch, and want over fifty bucks for the dual switch to go bank up/down. I have an old Peavey two button latching switch with "MUTE" and "REVERB" labelled on it. It's OLD. But it's simple and you can find them REALLY cheap. And it works just like the Boss version. Just remember to press the button twice to get it to do what you want (bank up/down in memory, compression/tone modify on/off in manual mode). This cheap peavey switch makes this pedal fully functional and at very little added cost (150 used with power adapter)

I'm a big fan of neil young, hendrix, ccr, led zep, muddy waters, warren haynes, pretty much anything with some distortion and balls! But also i love a nice clean ringing tone, something to make the angels cry with joy right? This unit can make the devil proud and the angels sing praise for sure. The distortions get pretty heavy/muddy but just tweak the tone or drive. I'm going from this unit directly to the peavey vk112 (great tube amp/great price) from a Gibson Les Paul Standard. No more need for my assortment of seven or eight individual pedals. There's less noise too, no more pesky hum/buzz from pickups/signal chain--you know, all those cables that are always gettin' in the way and shorting out. The chorus is excellent, just crank up that e. level if you can't hear it enough. Stereo effects are superb, don't have the dual amp setup yet but with headphones it's nuts folks. Sonic power from every direction! Overall the tones are adjustable from cold crunch to warm brown sound.

I got it used, but it's a tank like everything else I've had from boss. My Ibanez pedals always conk out at some point, and even a few DOD's (not the grunge, that thing is a panzer as well). I don't think I'll be experiencing any problems with this one, great heavy look, not the plastic crap all the companies want you to buy. METAL! It's the way to go, thanks BOSS for realizing this. We giggers tend to find beer in the most unusual places, and who knows when someone may trip over your kit... this'll take it all.

No need, no idea.

I play a range from folk rock to hard rock with blues and jam and jazz thrown in for good measure. This pedal can do ANYTHING. Lots of other multi-effects units on the market are hard to access/program tone. I had an ME-5 back in the day, it was pretty good for the age, but wow... the me-50 blows that and all the new zoom/digitech's out of the water. My amp sounds great, no need for amp modelling. Super easy to access tone, and none of the crap and space affects thatdon't even sound musical on this beast. Just what you need and tons of stuff you'd never know you'd need...but not too much. I've been playing for 15 years, had a LOT of gear, but finally am satisfied. For the first time.
My fingers hurt. I've been playing a lot more lately, it's inspiring to put simply. I've tried to think of something bad to say about it for fairness' sake, but it came with a power supply and i had an old footswitch that works perfectly on it, i'm a happy camper. Oh and the sustain.... between the les paul, tube amp, creamy overdrives (22 different distortions, all quite noticeably different) and sustain/compressor.... hells yes!

Very easy to operate and use. Most multi effects should be done in this way. Even in the memory mode you can quickly tweek your sound.

Even though ME-50 is often advertized in music stores as a collection of Boss pedals in one..... i'm afraid it isn't:-( I've always been a fan of Boss stompboxes and after using ME-50 for about 1.5 years I know that separate bos effects are a lot better a choice!

At the beginning I used numerous Teles->ME-50->Fender Hot Rod Deluxe. For some reason I don't like the sound of ME-50 in the fx loop. My observations:
First: it modifies your tone even in bypass mode. It's faaaar from true bypass

Tone modify: useless. The presets basically suck. A simple equalizer which allows you to shape your sound the way you want to would be MUCH better!

Compressor: good job here. Simple and responsive.

OD/DIST: perhaps the weakest point of the whole unit. The distortion fx sound... kinda thin. Most of the time I used the OD-2 preset for solos.

Modulation: Chorus(es) and tremolo are real nice. Simple and "to the point" I didn't really find much use for any other effects.

Delay: Well done and simple to use but exceptionally "digital" in sound. Only the Analog mode is acceptable to me.

Reverb: I like the "hall". The spring is not really "spring" but still sounds reasonable

Wah: Nice; both with and without distortion.

Tuner: Great! Love it. Simple!

Now, because of many of the effects sounding too digital I changed my rig to Teles-->Me-50 (for tuner, compressor and Wah, occasionally Trem and Chorus)-->Sansamp Tri AC-->Ibanez ADL delay-->Marshall booster-->Fender Hot Rod Deluxe. THis limited use of ME-50 gives me the "analog" feel.

I NEVER use the unit in MEMORY mode because of the almost-a-second pause when you want to change banks - this is unacceptable(probably the biggest flaw of the unit)

Tank! Real nice job here!

Never had to use their help.

As I said in the sound section, many effects are too digital. The CSOM thechnology does not really convince me much to be honest. Distorion/OD effects are of poor quality. The Modulation section and compressor and Wah are fine and very usable.

The Boss ME-50 is a very good unit - especially for live or jamming situations.
I bought mine 2nd hand, it did come with a manual. I had a glance at the manual to see the very basics and then just played around myself. It is VERY easy to set up sounds, and it is fantastic being able to set 3 tones per bank (more would be nice, but that's what the GT's are for).
Editing the patches is totally easy aswell thanks to having knobs instead of buttons. While jamming you can fine tune your tone during practise, meaning less messing about. And there is a hell of a lot to choose from.
The volume pedal is a very important addition - especially when playing live. I like to get my volume I want having the volume pedal set about 3/4 - this means if I need some extra volume to cut through during a lead part, it is easy to accomplish just by putting my foot down.
The only flaw I can see with the pedal is when it is in patch mode, there is a slight delay between switching patches - you need to time it right to let it go by un-noticed.
Also you can't switch banks by foot, it would be nice but isnt needed.

My band plays psychedelic rock/blues, but I am also into playing Opeth and Tool as well as the older rock.
I do a lot of Jimi Hendrix aswell, one of our covers is purple haze.
With the pedal, I set a bank for each song, Bank 1 is for Purple haze. Switch 1 is a ballsy fuzz for the intro riff, switch 2 is a more gritty fuzz with uni-vibe for the verse, and button 3 is octave fuzz, with extra octave through the harmonist function.
It has taken me some time to be happy with it, but that's because I really do try get perfect tones for the music I play.
Our own songs are overdriven rock and distortion, kinda ACDC tones, and one song has a dreamy smooth delayed clean sound, with smooth fuzz for the chorus. I really love the delay on this thing.
There are a heap of possibilites, for example the reverse effect. If you are into creating crazy sounds for lead-work, or just for fun, this pedal makes it amazingly easy.
There are a few pedal models I dont like for example the MetalZone and some other distortions, but that is my taste. For distortion I perfer the High Gain or modern distortion. And for overdrive, a driven Blues driver or tube screamer model.
The pedal built in is usefull too, the wah sound is pretty tame and stale, but it makes up with that by having octave mode. The wah would be fine for very simple use but doesnt compare to a real wah pedal.
The pedal also has a noise reducer and compressor built in, which has taken away the need for my CS-3.
It also has a knob for the guitars sound, example you can set it to change a Humbucker to sound like a single coil, or vice versa. You can emulate a hollow body. Which is great if you want the gain, but to keep that smooth tubular sound of a singlecoil.

Overall this pedal does everything I need it to do sonically, and then some.

I use this for gigs, and practise, and home use.
Never had a problem, and never will.

It is very sturdy.

I think it is the perfect size, between a entry-level multi effects pedal and the GT-6/8 or Tonelab SE ect.
Doesnt take up too much room on stage which is important sometimes.

I have been playing for about 3 years I think.
I play a custom guitar with H-S-S config - Vox wah - Boss ME 50 - Ashton Viper 50 Valve amp with a Boss Limiter (LM-2) in the effects loop.
I play metal, blues, rock, psychedelic, classical and all the tonal range is covered.
Quick easy tone creation/modification makes it great for social playing.
It's only missing a few things in my eyes, being able to switch banks by foot, and the delay between switching patches.
Sometimes when you want to just play you cant be bothered setting up pedals, they just get in the way and take time to set up. Well I always find the time to set this up, because if you are comming up with music, you need to be able to quickly come up with a sound to fit it. And it is easy to do.

All in all I think I made the right choice - I was considering the Boss GT-6/8 and the Vox Tonelab SE, all of which were a lot more expensive. But the Boss ME-50 really does everything you need for basics and more.

The sound is amazing for any amp. I haven't tested the editing side of it, but the effects are so good already and there is every effect there is no need for editing them.
The Manual is very easily used, and a less than ten minute read and I haven't had to go back to it.

The sound is fantastic, every sound imaginable can be made out of this thing. The clean and OD/DS effects are good and the mod and delay are also great. I am using a Fender Princeton 65, and makes it sound like a Marshall!
The loudness is good, but quite hard to get right. The effects are strong and it also has this thing called Threshold which gets rid of the pickup buzz, so you can't hear the flange flangeing if you know what I mean.

Can't really say as I haven't had it long. But yes it has quite good reliabilty at home

Haven't had to but it's Boss so they're bound to be good but the rating is based on the fact I ahven't had to phone them

I love this thing it's perfect for every type of music, it is a big step up from my last effects pedal Digitech RP-50, much much much better
I love the Octave Change it has.

Hey ya'll, i've had this thing now for about two and a half years and i think its finally time to write a review about it. not like my opinion counts anyway. I hope this helps out some people. This thing really isn't to hard to use if you know what everything does. this is a really easy pedal to use and isn't all digitalized and stuff like that like all the digitech crap. Trust me never buy digitech they are horrible buy Boss or MXR.

i have had thing almost 3 years now and it has never given me any trouble i have never had a problem with it. i guess i would gig without a backup if i didn't have backup. when i revamp my pedal set and get individual pedals i will have this around as a backup.

never ever have talked them or written to them or ever had contact so i can't comment the only complaint i have about this thing is that i spend $300 dollars on it and they can't even give me a dang power supply which i had to buy for freakin $20 bucks. but anyway never had to contact them.

this thing is adequate for a beginner. listen if your just starting and serious i would definately suggest buying this because it is very decent sounding and is excellent for a beginner to pick out what he wants to use and buy the individual pedals later like i'm doing. personally it doesn't have enough of what i need to play 80's metal like i want to but basically it's because of my amp i need to get a marshall or a mesa/boogie to get a really good overdrive metal sound but this pedal is adequate until after christmas which is tomorrow when i get enough money to replace this unit with individual boxes. if you play modern metal it's got a good distortion for that even though that music sucks and i wouldn't reccomment playing it and it is also good for playing classic rock like you know zeppelin, clapton, skynrd, all those good bands. i do wish that it had a better distortion for 80's metal but that's life. i also wish it came with a power adapter cause it takes like 6 AA batteries who the heck has that many laying around. if it was lost or stolen i wouldn't buy another one because it is inadequate for me now because i need really good pedals cause i'm gonna start playing gigs and stuff but like i've said a million times it good for serious beginners like i was. i would like to say also if your gonna play 80's metal don't buy this just buy like a boss or ibanez delay pedal get a boss or mxr compressor get the seymour duncan pick up booster (only if you have a tube amp that's the only way it sounds best) and get a mxr dist + or a ibanez tubescreamer
but other than that it's good for mostly anything you want to do

Very easy to use unit and got my tone instantly,very easy to edit and manual was very easy to understand.

Very easy to dial in any tone I want with out being a sound engineer like some units GT6/Gt8 sorry guys!All the effects are great flange is a little overpowering but thats it.

It's a Boss built like truck would never gig without a backup no matter what it is.

I play rock,metal and blues lead guitar and this unit is perfect for those styles.I have been playing for 5 years I own a Musicman Axis and Sennheiser headphones to go with this unit.I would definately buy this unit again if something happen to it.I love everything about this unit its tone quality,ease of use and durability.I habve compared this unit to GT6,Gt8,Zoom 707 II,Tonelab Se,Podxt,and digitech rp50 and this unit IMO blows away all those other units away!I have owned all those other units and was never happy with tones I was getting from them,1 minute of owning this unit I loved its tone!This unit is perfect it doesnt need anything else and it isnpires me to play instaed of tuning knobs all day!

this thing is so easy a baby could use it. you don't even need an amp, you can just plug your head phones in or use the shittiest speakers imaginable.

the distortion some times seems a bit dissttorted. the peddle is okay but its a little sticky nothing a few thousand times stepping on it wont fix i guess.. also the peddle to turn it on you just step on it hard.. sometimes while using it you get can get a little excited and step to hard and it turns off, which kind of stucks because all they had to do is make a damn switch on the thing..

no idea.. it's not made of plastic or anything.

no. and if i had to guess I would say it sucks

bottem line you can not easily switch between programed settings,
stepping on wah wah to hard turns it off

Here's the real story: THIS THING SOUNDS GREAT IN THE FX LOOP! IF IT DOESNT SOUND GREAT WITH YOUR AMP, DON'T BLAME THE ME-50, BLAME YOUR AMP.

A surprising number of high end amps ship with sub-par FX loops. Thats the sad truth.

On the Peavey XXX, you can adjust the send and receive levels. With both knobs at noon, levels are set perfectly. Bypasing the FX loop from the PV switch shows that the ME-50 is transparent and does not muddy or color the tone.

I use this two ways. In the FX loop of the amp. Into the return of the amp using the COSM amp sims.

Turning off the delay there is a natural decay. Very nice.

Boss deserves to be rewarded with a perfect 10 for ease of use for the ME-50. There is a knob for every control. No need to scroll through any menus!

I have owned other multieffects units and the worst part of them is always the user interface. For any new multieffects units, all companies should follow this standard! Give me a knob for each and every control. It makes it easy to dial in the sound I'm looking for.

I'm playing through a Diezel VH4 with a high-end Les Paul style guitar.

I give it a 7 mainly because the ME-50 sounds awful in the amp's effects loop. That is disgraceful because at the very least the time delay effects (Delays, Reverbs) should be used in the effects loop. This thing will degrade your tone severely if used in the effects loop.

That being said, it sounds decent in front of the amp (Guitar -> ME-50 -> Amp). I can notice a degradation in tone from my guitar, but not to a large extreme.

Here is my opinion on everything, section by section:

Tone Modify: 7. This feature lets you select different EQs to modify how your pickups sound. It's a nice idea, but the settings don't sound like they have a very big effect on the tone of the guitar. It's almost unnoticeable when used through an amp's distortion.

Reverb: 5. Sounds ok, but the ME-50 is only useable in front of the amp. What's the point of having a reverb on this?

Distortions: 4. Most of the distortions are unusable. I have a Big Muff and the ME-50's Big Muff setting sounds nothing like the real thing to my ears. These are very brittle distortions. Even my DOD MetalFX pedal sounds better, and that's not saying much. I am very disappointed in these.

Modulations: 9. These are awesome! This is worth the price of admission alone. You can get 90% of the effects that are heard in any modern song with what the ME-50 has. I'd like to see one more knob though. Most Boss modulation pedals have 4 knobs now, so it would be good to have the extra control that is missing from each effect.

Delays: 9. Also done very well! But what a tragedy. These delays sound great and are easy to dial in. But since the ME-50 sounds awful through the effects loop you can forget using these with your amp's distortion.

Expression Pedal: 8. I like it for the most part! The Wah is good enough for what I need. I also like the Resonance and Voice settings. The +1 and -1 Octave settings sound pretty poor as you roll the pitch up and down. But all other settings are very good.

Other Issues: There is a very noticeable period in which the sound drops out (about half a second) when switching between saved patches. This is absolutely unacceptable. Forget about smooth transitions from wet to dry settings while you're playing live. Boss should have figured out a workaround for this.

There is also a volume level difference between wet/dry on some effects (flanger, phaser). This can be resolved by saving a different master volume level with the patch, but this is something Boss overlooked. They should have been able to balance the levels.

It looks reliable to me. The chassis feels very strong. The footswitches seem to be designed well. The only part I would be concerned about is the expression pedal.

Never dealt with them directly.

While there are several downsides to this unit, it also signals hope for the future of multieffects. Here are the main suggestions for improvement in the next version:

1. This unit should be able to work in the amp's effects loop. Better yet, implement the "4 Cable Mode" which the GT8 (unofficially) supports. Add a switch for each effects section (Modulation, Delay) which controls whether the effect comes before or after the effects loop. Easy! And it would instantly turn this into the best multieffects unit possible.

2. Fix the tone sucking. It's not terrible in front of the amp, but it is noticeable.

3. Greatly improve the Distortions or remove them altogether! I didn't buy this for the distortions. I mainly wanted modulation and time-based effects on the floor. However, I was unpleasantly surprised to find out how bad the distortions are.

4. Reduce the time period in which audio drops out when switching between patches. Better yet, eliminate it altogether. This is VERY noticeable and is a major issue for live performance.

In all, I can't tell if Boss was trying to make something like the floor POD with this product because it is only useable in front of the amp. But the distortions are so bad that this is NOT useful as a standalone pre-amp. Boss should leave that goal to the GT series.

The ME could be a real winner in the multieffects only type of product. The user interface is awesome (a knob for everything)! Add the 4 Cable Mode from the GT8 to the ME-50, and it would be perfect.

But as it stands the ME-50 is a good product if you want to be able to quickly dial in effects for just about any song you can think of playing. It's also good for prototyping ideas, as a starting point for later buying higher quality independent pedals.

This product is very easy to use. Very user friendly

I was originally running this through the parralell effects loop of my Marshall AVT275 and it sounded great. I recently upgraded to a high end all tube amp (budda superdrive 80). The thing sounds like garbage through that amp. It totally kills my tone. The sound quality of this amp is so great that anything other the high end true bypass effects don't cut it. Be careful. This thing can be a tone killer depending on the amp you're using. I give sound qulaity a 9 or 10 when running it through my Marshall AVT 275. Through my Budda, I give it a 1. After upgrading to all true bypass efects, the budda just sounds flat out sick!!

Very reliable I have had no issues with the reliability of this unit.