Boss NS-2 Noise Suppressor

Read the manual, it helps.
Once it's setup its easy to use.
I found it a little confusing for about an hour, then it all made sense.

Read my Big Muff USA reissue review for full setup.

My effects chain is pretty noisy - Big Muff, Electric Mistress, Phase 90, Dynacomp - are all pretty noisy pedals. This fixes all my problems. With the decay at 0 and the threshold about 60% all noise is eliminated. I would say that this pedal does alter my tone slightly, it almost adds a little bit more compression, but in a good way i think, it sounds a bit punchier with this in the chain.

Boss seem to be very reliable, i have had quite a few Boss products, with very few complaints

No idea

This pedal is essential to my setup. It works exactly as i want it to and is now the most important pedal i own.

I dont think i could improve upon this.

If you use a lot of pedals, and hate to hear loads of hiss and noise everytime you stop playing, even if only between phrases in your solo, then you need this pedal. buy it....love it

How about 1 minute setup time & fixed all my problems !!!. My wireless is noisy as hell ( Samson CR-77 Airline ) when not playing. This took care of 90% of the hiss without coloring the sound at all.

Awesome, didn't kill anything. I have the Thresh set at 1/2 way, decay all the way off, & use the Mute function for my Schecter Triple XXX. For my hollowbody ( you guys know how bad hollowbody's feedback when distored ), I have the Thresh maxed out, Decay off, & use the mute function. NO MORE HOLLOWBODY FEEDBACK. I use no other pedals & my head is a Marshall VS100. I'm so stoked about this thing you have no idea.

It's a Boss pedal, what else do you need. Have mounted in the back of my rack. Set it & forget it.

Once again, it's a Boss.

Perfect for killing that little bit of Hiss I was getting while not playing. Beautiful for killing my hollowbody feedback. Overall, this thing rules.

Very easy,never read the manual with BOSS pedals the're so simple.

Great,Noise gates and Suppresors are always a tricky one as you dont want them to take anything away from your playing but undoubtibly they will slightly how ever the amount they help is completley paramount compared, as i use a guitar with Soapbar single coil pick-ups an Amp with lots of gain and an epic pedal board the NS-2 is probly the most vital piece of kit in it second to my Boss Tuner.

Havent had any problems and mine is about a year old

dont know

Great pedal effects your sound slightly when picking lightly or using your amps clean channel but never the less is helps everything else an great amount, go out and buy one!

Well, not so easy to use, it depends of your problem.
#1)Quiet amp, quiet guitar, noisy booster/drive pedal: simple. Guitar-in NS2, send NS2-in pedal, out pedal-return NS2, out NS2-in amp.

#2)Noisy amp, quiet guitar, quiet booster/drive pedal: NOT simple. Guitar-pedal-in NS2, send NS2-in amp, send amp-return NS2, out NS2-return amp. Your amp must have a (serial)loop! Normally it's the preamp part of your combo,or head, which is noisy.
Note that if you insert the booster/drive pedal between send NS2 and in amp you'll get feedback.

#3)Noisy amp without fx loop: dead simple. Get another amp, fast!

#4) Noisy amp, guitar, pedal: well, Boss is not God after all. Still, with the #2 configuration it will be okay.

#5) Noisy guitar, quiet amp, quiet pedal: I only tried this with a booster as explained in #1 and waow is it quiet!

It gets a five, but please take note: it is the very nature of noise problems that makes it difficult to cure, whatever the machine...

The unit DOES change your sound, the ones below who tell you otherwise are deaf.

It does add a lot of low-mids, and the grain of your sound is thicker hence less defined, less "liquid". Uglier in fact. Still better than noise (your basic strat...).
In the #1 configuration this phenomenon is more pronounced than in the #2 configuration. It is because of the impedance (high before the preamp, low after the preamp), high impedance signal gets way more affected than their lower counterparts.

Yes it is reliable, as long as you are careful with your cables/jacks.
Mine is , what, ten years old and never gave problems.

I can't see a better noise gate for guitar. It rules, especially in the #2 setting.
I have a hush(in an intellifex rocktron), and a behringer denoiser, both more signal-destroying due to their lack of detection circuitry.
Note that the boss does handle direct guitar signal too, the others just can't.
The extra dc socket is the way to go, hats off.
I only wish it didn't change your sound so much, that's what I'm asking for the NS3...
A lot of musicians I know don't know how to set this unit properly, and are unsatisfied. Hence my report, hope it helps.
One thing: don't get this to reduce feedback when playing electro acoustic guitar, get a zoom 504 or boss ad3 instead.

hella easy to use. there's a manual, didnt have to refer to it.

i'd say its pretty damn transparent, i heard horror stories about how it altered your sound. so i recorded my amp with it and without it, made no difference. no noise as far as i can see. im using it with a peavey XXL half stack, eliminates the noise.

only problem is that you have to have the threshold at max and decay at 0 in order to get immediate response to the noise reduction after sudden stops without that "fadeout" sound. this effectively elimates quiet playing. for my purposes though (metal, hardcore, etc) this is a non-issue. it does take some sustain away too, but i used a stopwatch and got around 20 seconds, versus around 30 without it and having noise seep through.

only pedal ive ever known that doesnt have this problem is the ISP decimator. wanted to get one, having online ordering issues...so i demo'd the boss at GC, works great for $50 less. so basically, if you need those soft notes and extra long sustain, get an ISP. if not, get this.

ive never had a single issue with a boss product. no back up necessary.

never needed them.

i play metal, this is exactly what i needed. no tone coloring as far as i could see, only problems that it has are a non-issue with metal. if it were lost or stolen, i'd still get this one again because the ISP costs too much more for not much more (for my purposes). excellent product, sexy looking too.

Easy to use. It does what it says it should do, it supresses noise.

Um, maybe lack of sound quality, it's pretty good. the only problem comes into play when you want to play quieter phrases, because the threshold control will only allow you to cut the noise when you're not playing, but if you play quiet notes, the backgroud fuzz is immediatley present. It's more like a noise suppressor for when you aren't playing.

I just started using a Voodoo Lab Pedal Power 2, and this power source eliminates all that hum, making this pedal all but obsolete. I'm keeping it around as it will probably come in handy to cut feedback and such, but it's not a part of my rig right now.

It's a boss pedal. Always reliable.

Never called 'em.

Been playing 9 years, so I've been around the block. This is a good pedal until you have about 5 or more running simultaneously, then it's hard to play with softer dynamics, and I'd reccomend the Voodoo Lab Pedal Power 2, it's just worth it. But for feedback reduction of a 3 or 4 pedal setup, especially for a beginner, this is a great pedal.

Couldn't be simpler, really. I'd never used a dedicated noise supressor before, but I got to grips with this in a matter of minutes. Simply set how much noise will trigger the gate (threshold) and how long it takes to click off again as the sound level reduces (decay). Requires a bit of experimentation to find the right levels, which will be dictated largely by a) how much unwanted noise your rig produces and b) your playing style.

I use a Gibson Les Paul, straight into the NS-2 and then into a 50w Marshall JCM 800 Lead Series. My amp produces a fair bit of hiss, particularly on high gain settings as you would expect. I play a lot of staccato rhythm parts, so the NS-2 is there primarily to help keep that sounding tight by taking out hiss and other unwanted noise, and by chopping the chord off cleanly as soon as I mute the strings. It works great for this, and fans of Prong, Helmet etc will love it for that.

It does have a tendency to muffle quieter notes, though this doesn't affect me much with my playing style and this would happen with any suppressor. People who play more delicate styles would want to set the threshold relatively low to let those quiet notes through - however this needn't be a compromise as a player of that type will probably not be using such high gain (and therefore high noise) settings as I do.

It DOES alter the tone a little too, and at first I was a bit worried about that. But, as I've gotten accustomed to the sound I've noticed that the alteration is for the better - at least with my gear. The overall result seems to be a more focussed and punchy rhythm sound, which is exactly what I wanted.

Built well, like all Boss pedals. I don't anticipate any problems in that regard.

N/A

Can't fault it, so far. I'd almost certainly buy another one if this were stolen or damaged, though I'd consider other brands too. It adds quite a professional touch to my sound, by making it sound very tidy and tight. My only real complaint is that I sometimes roll off the guitar volume for cleaner passages, and the drop in sound level means that the notes get muffled or cut off. For some songs, it's necessary to compromise a little and roll the threshold down a little to let those quiter notes through.

I don't get it. Is it only me?A noise gates function is to remove hiss or unwanted noise at idle. You set a threshold, and anything below this is eliminated.Once you hit a note or go above that threshold,the peddle is no longer in the loop,and all the noise you heard at idle is there again except now the other sounds cover most of it up due to the larger noise to music levels.If the threshold is set too high,soft passages may not be heard,or may sound muffled.You have to experiment with it to set it right,then leave there.

THIS IS NOT AN EFFECTS PEDAL.

It's a Boss,could be a peddal,could be a weapon.

the knobs are very easy to use...just get your settings, and leave em there when the noise is gone. The cords on the other hand can be a hassle.
1) guitar to "input"
2) "send" to other pedals
3) if there more than one pedal, they have to be linked (obviously)
4) last pedal to "return"
5) delay or reverb must be between output and your amp.
6) "output" to your amp

for a boss stompbox...this is confusing...however if you have the manual, and you learn what goes where, its as easy as any other pedal. just make sure you have lots of patches.

this pedal is frickin amazing. i like my setup with a huge supply of distortion. when im playing a song with breaks, or have to stop playing for a minute, it is 100% muted. ive been told its more of a tool than a pedal, and this is true. however, now with the ns-2, i can link more pedals together, and it wont fuck my signal. it seems like the possibilities are endless now aha. also i find that my distortion sounds thicker which is good, but that could be because im listening too hard, who knows.

The ONLY problem i had was this...
whenever i played solos with toggle switches.(bridge pickup has volume, neck pickup is turned to 0...flick the toggle switch back and forth from pickup to pickup), there would be a short squeal when it was flicked to the pickup with no volume. although ive had this pedal for about 4 hours now, ive tried all kinds of different settings, and couldnt seem to solve this. although it could be improper use of the pedal, or my guitar.

i now own 5 boss pedals, some new, some used, and ive never had a problem with any of them. boss seems to make very sturdy, heavy duty pedals.

cant say...never had problems

i play mostly metal....if you play metal, you should get this pedal...its just inconvenient not to have it. i wish i would have got it sooner. like i said above, ive had it 4 hours, and its definately a permanent part of my setup now. i own 2 other boss distortions (ds-2, mt-2) boss flanger (hf-2) boss compressor (cs-3) creamy dreamer, shin-ei companion fuzz wah, and a snarling dogs wonder wah 2. i have tried these all together in some form with the ns-2, and it is beautiful. my signal doesnt turn to shit when i link 2 pedals or more at the same time. this is especially true with my snarling dogs wah and my creamy dreamer...sounds great, and no fuzz-outs or feedback taking over like before...only problems ive had i mentioned above
1) the mysterious squeal (probably my fault though)
2) the number of patches required, but there really is no way around this, and its a small price to pay for suck a kick-ass pedal...id give it 11 if i could.

set it and forget it. very handy mute feature. anybody could figure out how to use it (like every boss pedal)

les paul>morley wah>boss me-50>dano fab tone>Boss ds-1>ns-2>traynor ycv 80

totally takes out the hum from my effects board, with the exception of the dano fab tone (good sounding, horrible hum). was surprised when it even took the noise out of my amp channels.

it DOES change the tone when on, gives more mid-highs than i would like, but nothing a little EQ tweak can't fix.

built like a brick. i would gig without a backup because it isn't the end of the world if it dies.

no idea

the longer the effects chain, the more you need one of these. after playing with it for a while you forget about it (good thing i think), the noise just isn't there.