Boss NS-2 Noise Suppressor

Very easy. Two modes, two knobs, and two indicator lights, one for power, and one for noise reduction

It does its job pretty well. It acts a noise gate, and it does it well. Right now im infront of my computer playing, and it sounds just fine, so that is the perfect test. There are some bad things though. If you use to much distortion, or something that will cause a lot feedback, it does a little squel and then the noise reduction kicks in, so I have chosen not to invoke a lot of feedback! It colors the sound a bit. TO the well trained ear it compresses, and also cuts from the mids, to me this helped my sound, but it may not please somebody who had the perfect setting before.

Its a Boss made in Taiwan, it seems as though they change the casing every couple of months, sometimes its a little harder or a little softer. This pedal seems to be a little heavier than the GE-7 I bought a couple months back. Of course this is a Boss, they are tanks

don't try Boss's customer support, you can't get anything done

Its a good pedal, it serves the purpose for me. I use a Peavey 5150 which is very noisy, and this really helps it out a lot. I haven't compared it against other noise gates, but to my ears its a good pedal

It's only a noise-gate,it only has two knobs...HELLO??

Very good sound quality.It does shorten the sustain a bit but that doesn't bother me too much.For recording,I use it on my cymble tracks.
The NS-2 response well and doesn't change the tone of the crashes, rides or high-hats.I think it's better than the NS-50!But here's the real kicker.IT CAN POWER ALL YOUR PEDALS AND STILL ACT AS A NOISE-GATE!! Simply plug in the PSA adaptor(for juice),run a daisy chain to your other pedals(from out jack),but leave the NS-2 on reduction mode.COOL,ain't it??

Very dependable and versitile.

???

The NS-2 does the job very well.Depending on your settings it can take away some sustain,so be careful when using it on cymbles(I have a cheap set up).For guitars,I think everyone should have one.The noise reduction alone is very useful not to mention the "Pedal Power" function makes it soooo PHAT!! It has a really nice response for a stomp-box and has a very subtle decay rate.Two thumbs up!!

I wish someone had told me about this when I first started playing. This and an EQ pedal, two of the most overlooked effects. I'm a pedal junkie and have lots of old noisy effects. Put this pedal at the end and set the threshold to a setting that doesn't cut off quiet passages, and you're ready to forget about this thing and just play. There are some signal routing posibilites offered here that I love, and didn't know about when I bought it at first, so READ YOUR MANUAL. One thing I've done is eliminate an A/B box that switched to my tuner, and ran a line from this pedal to the tuner, which is on all the time. This is cool for writing, cause I can see what notes I may stumble upon as I go, but the signal isn't degraded. Also, it saved space on my board.

That's just it, there's no sound (unless your signal is just over the top end, which means you'll be getting major feedback once its turned off). My Ibanez RG goes to a Dunlop WAH/Volume, Electra Phase shift, Ibanez TS-9, ProCo Rat, Boss GE-7, MXR compressor, and then this pedal into my Carvin MT3200 100 watt head. Even in close quarters with everything up, this thing will stave off the nastiest sounds (just don't brush the strings, because it can be very responsive). Used with a volume pedal or knob it'll save you a few more years of hearing, at least. Like I said, brushing the strings or having a really shitty, noisy setup will defeat it, but why would you want your rig to sound that bad, anyway?

Put this thing in mute mode and leave it on all the time, you'll forget its in your chain. So, you won't be stomping on it, etc. Besides the fact that Boss pedals seem pretty sturdy anyway, this one will RARELY see any physical use. Probably will last forever.

I doubt anyone would steal it, cause people don't think about pedals like these as desireable. But I'd definately get another one. I guess I play rock music, standard stuff. I've been playing maybe 7 years now. To newer players I reiterate, check this pedal out AND check out a GE-7 or something similar. The EQ pedal can transform any crappy distorion you've got into something beautiful, and this Noise Suppressor will rein it back in. May not be for all players, but for experimenters and tweakers you get tons of new sonic possibilites.

This is essentially a simple Noise Gate inside a rugged metal stompbox. It came to me brand spankin' new from Grandmas Music & Sound in New Mexico and the salesguy told me that this was a very good addition to my setup to help get rid of the annoying noise. He said he ran this very same stompbox through his Marshall DSL-100 and that it worked very well. Needless to say the price was shockingly low and I snapped it up. It has 3 knobs, 2 of which control the Threshold and Decay settings and one knob to select either Reduction or Mute mode. Overall this pedal is very simple to use and the manual it comes with is not even necessary because of its simple layout. If you buy this pedal and cant figure out how to operate it, you are either 4 years old or need to spend another 10 years in grade school.

The current setup I am using this pedal with is a Gibson Les Paul Classic w/ EMG-81 pickups and a Mesa/Boogie Dual Rectifier Trem-O-Verb 2x12 Combo. This amp needless to say dials in some very heavy, high gain tones and needless to say it is very noisy as the volume goes higher. I moaned to my band and my friends on how annoyingly noisy it was and it was unpleasant to stop playing for 2 seconds and get hissing and feedback. I didnt resist much to purchasing this Noise Gate as would be expected. I plugged this box into the front end of my amp, turned it on and BOOM! the noise was gone. I decided to play it safe and I jacked up the volume to halfway on a high gain setting...NO NOISE! except for some light background hissing when the volumes are off all the bad noise is gone from my sound. This worked extremely well and it is effective just like I hoped it would be. Plus, I didnt feel like shelling out 2X my purchase price to buy a Rocktron Hush which would do the same thing. The only reason I did not give a 10 in this category is because of the still-present light hiss when the volume is off but frankly..who cares??

Ok..this thing is a Boss pedal. These things survive nuclear weapon blasts. No backup pedal necessary here.
The only reason this category received a 9 instead of 10 is because i hate flimsy little plastic knobs on pedals, or for that matter, anything!

I never dealt with them.

I play Metal/Hard Rock music and having my amps gain maxed and the volume cranked is necessary most times. I was sick of the noise I was getting without the gate and now that I have this pedal all of that is solved. I have owned a few Boss pedals in the past and i continue to own a Boss EQ pedal and they are great little boxes that are well worth the money. Try this thing out before you look at unnecessary rackmount HUSH systems and such. I think you will be surprised on what this little thing can do.

Fairly easy to use ... but does take some fiddling with to reach an optimum setting. Threshold and Decay knobs along with reduction/mute knob.

Well ... there is no perfect noise gate, or at least I haven't found one yet. All noise gates require compromise (between the amount of noise reduction, and the decay rate), including this one. I initially purchased this unit because reviews said it was the best of it's kind. It does reduce noise quite nicely, but it has a couple flaws. First, I have noticed that it slightly cuts off delay repeats and sustain depending on how you have the decay set. Second, after coming in from a period of no sound, there is a slight volume swell ... slight, but noticeable. This is actually a neat effect, but I don't like it all the time. Third, the unit slightly reduces the overall volume of your sound. Aside from that, it is very useful. I don't think it degrades the original tone too much (maybe slightly more metallic), but some people do complain of this. I am going to try and Ebtech AC Hum Eliminator and see how my rig does w/ that, but I will keep this unit around (I use a 5150, and these amps produce a lot of noise on high volumes). Like I said, overall, a pretty decent effect.

Like every one says, Boss pedals are pretty tough ... although some times the knobs get bent.

never delt w/ em

Pretty good unit, despite some flaws. I think in this technology age though, someone should be able to build a better noise reduction unit than this. Oh well, good enough for now.

Not a problem to use, fairly easy to figure out. Bought mine used so I didn't have a manual to refer to. Once I got the "loop" connection figured out (using this site, thanks guys), I set the Threshold, Decay, and Mute knobs, stepped on the pedal and the noise disappeared!
Although I think it's worth a 10 now (in this category), I gave it an 8 simply because it took a little while to learn it at first.

I play a Fender Stratocaster and use the NS-2 with the effects chain I run directly into my amp (a Marshall JTM60), namely my Boss CS-3, Boss SD-2 and Vox Wah pedals. The CS-3 and SD-2 were the biggest sources of my noise problem and this unit silenced the noise 100%. I do have one little "gripe" though and that is, it does "cut" my sustain a little but, hey, for the silence it provides, I can work around it.

I've only had it a month, but as I said, I bought it used and it runs great. Need I say more? One thing I might point out here, and this frustrated me to no end. It's a "no brainer" to know that you either need a battery or power supply to run this thing, but you also need to have it hooked up in your "loop" before you get any light indications that its working. It took me a little while to figure that out. I'd almost thought I had purchased a "dud"!

Didn't have to contact them on this unit, but I use other Boss effects, and when I needed something (ie, a manual), they were there for me.

I play mostly Christian Contemporary music in a church setting on Sundays so the quality of this pedal is proven in my mind. Yes, I would replace it if it were lost or stolen. It does what it's advertised to do and it does it well.

E-Z

It kind of works as a compressor the way I had mine set-up. I messed-up my amp and it was giving a loud hum. I ran the NS-2 between the pre-amp out and the power in.

I never had a problem with it. If you need something to get rid of an annoying hum Get One!

Who needs it? It is Boss!

Another simple pedal with a simple purpose and it does its job well but nothing special.

It has 3 knobs and is fairly easy to use

I bought mine used and it looks perfectly ok but I think it must be broken. I run my dean mach 5 to a metal zone with a few other effects but the ns-2 does not stop the feedback or due almost anything to the sound, I have tryed all diferent settings and there is no change. In mode 2 it mutes the sound completely but in mode 1 is does absolutly nothing. I'm not going to give my opinion because I think the pedal does not work properly

Set the threshold so that it sounds natural. Doesn't get any easier than that.

Natural sound without the noise

It's a BOSS, of course you can depend on it.

???

My music sounds 50 times better now that I have this.

3 Knobs - a damn monkey could use it.

Mine sounds great - it actually adds to the sound. I have it perfect cause when i turn it on it actually adds to the sound.

ITS BOSS!!!!! Damn things are tough as hell. I beat the hell out of mine and it still looks and sounds new.

Ive never had to deal with them - but I am sure they are great - most of the big companies are.

I play a really heavy groovy sound. I have a BOSS Metal Zone, Acoustic Simulator, Chorus Enseamble, Digital Delay and Noise Suppressor. Also along with the rig I have a New Digitech Wammy, Ernie Ball Volume/Pan Pedal, VOX Wah pedal and it is all being played through a 1978 Peavey Mark 3 Bass head with 2 412 cabinets. The sound is perfect. The Mark 3 has 3 Equalizers on it and a channel that I can mix all channels into one - so that helps too. This is my sound - I wouldnt go for anything else unless if it were John Petrucci's sound. My sound has a clean heavy sound to it and the NS-2 makes it sound alot better. It sounds fuller with it on than with it shut off.

Very very easy to use

I use the NS-2 with a Ibanez RG 270 with Di Marzio pickups and a line 6 pod.
It remove all the noise of my compressor, but doesn't kill the sustain.

Indestructible

never dealt with them

I play punk, metal, gothic rock and industrial rock I always get the sound I want.
I use it with BOSS Metal zone, compressor sustainer,Equaliser, chorus ensemble and Zoom 2100.
If it were stolen I would buy it again I can't play without it, the compressor is noisy.

If there's anything misty the manual will clear everytihng. Three knobs. Very simple.

I've found it best to connect my Washburn N-4 to Crybaby and then Boss ME-5,TR-2,OD-1,PQ-4 and Lel! Eq paralled with NS-2, then to Marshall 6100 LM. The humming decreases but NS-2 eats little of the sound too, I think this is a problem with all noise gates and surpressors. One very useful feature is a possibility to spread electricity to your other pedals from NS-2 9V DC output.When playing at higher gain levels this thing is a must-to-have. It's pleasing to hear the pauses as pauses not as ear-tearing hum or uncontrolled screaming.

This one is one of the most important pedals of mine, yet it's one of those that I hate. I have tried various settings but haven't ever been completely sattisfied with the results.

Easy, easy, easy!!!!!!! No manual needed!

Kills the annoying feedback coming from the amp when you are not playing or pause for a few moments. For me it's like I turned the stack off!!!!!!!

Well I've bought vintage Boss pedals and they may have scratches or nicks but they are indestructible!!!!!!!!

I bought this new, but it will still be in tack when aliens dig my body up.

No support needed.

It's a little steep on the price, but it's the best one around for home use or gigs. It has a mute knob which is very nice.

tricky to use read the manual.....three knobs.....threshold, decay, mode.....i use it on the reduction mode and have the threshold set at max and the decay at min......

i use it with the effects in front of my amp (not in the effects loop-more on that later)which is crybaby wah, dod envelope filter, digitech whammy reissue, dod gonkulator modulator and dod eq......works good with those pedals on the setting i have, except the crybaby....cuts off the tail end of note (surprised me)....no biggy though...i just turn it off when i use the crybaby.....helpful hint....if you have effects.....put them in the effects loop on the ns-2....cuz if you don't.....it does NOTHING......this means extra cords are floating around, but it's worth it......my gonkulator (ring mod) makes a fucking annoying noise when it is on and the ns-2 isn't......anyways.....i don't use the ns-2 in the effects loop of my amp for two reasons.....first, the delay is in there, and the ns-2 cuts off the end of the delay; doesn't let it fade out naturally.....and two, when turned on, it reduces the overall volume of my amp.....plus there's really not any noise to reduce in the effects loop anyway......the mute mode is very useful when changing guitars; you don't have to turn off the amp!! in reduction mode i keep the threshold at max and decay off.....in other words....the noise suppressor kicks in a millisecond after a note has been played....good for palmmuting shit......

i would gig without a backup.......

n/a

at first i didn't think it was useful......then i got the gonkulator.....it is a very practical pedal....kinda expenisive......but hey it can also power up to 8 boss style effects....when used with an adapter and the boss daisy chain.......haven't got that yet.........i play heavy and soft music......if it was stolen i'd buy another, just because of the noise the gonkulator makes(and i LOVE my gonkulator).......

Simple. Two knobs that get rid of noise. Threshhold sets the amount of noise that is allowed through the noise gate, and decay decides how fast the noise suppression snaps on.

This pedal does its job, and very well. At the moment I play through a Laney LC-50 amp that's blown one of the preamp tubes and has lost some volume. If set incorrectly, the pedal can chop off some sustain, but when you find your perfect setting forget about the pedal, crank your amp and play. I use a Yamaha Pacifica which is good, but I also use a Kackson PS3 Randy Rhoads copy, which is great for heavy stuff but gets feedback galore when I'm not playing. This pedal hushes everything, but I do still get about half a second of whistle every now and then at high volumes.

It's a Boss, so of course it's dependable. I'd use it without a backup simply because I can't afford a backup, but I wouldn't be worried about usingn it live cos I know it wouldn't break down.

Haven't every dealt with em

I play heavy music - lots of old sabbath, and heaps of metallica and Pantera. This pedal is a must for me. I wouldn' play anywhere without it, and if I did it would be sooooo noisy.
Give it a 9 for this, cos nothing's perfect.

It's a very simple pedal...doesn't take much time at all to learn. Only three simple and important knobs: Decay, Threshold and switch between mute/suppressor.

It's really great to take away all the noise from the effects...but it depends on how the settings are: if the "threshold" is on max it takes away all the noise, but it can also cut away the sustain from your playing....so you have to make your own perfect setting.

Hehe...come on, it's a BOSS!

Have never dealt with them...I've never had a problem with Boss.

I use this pedal with (in order): Boss CS-3 Compression Sustainer, George Dennis Wah-wah volume, Danelectro Fab tone, Ibanez Tubescreamer and a Nobels Tremolo. But I don't use my Boss CH-1 Super Chorus and Boss DD-5 Digital Delay with the NS-2.
Then I a nice black Gibson Les Paul Studio and a beautiful 3-color sunbursted Fender American Standard Stratocaster.
This pedal is totally excellent, but one thing that's negative is the fact that you have to use so many cables, so it takes a longer time to put everything together, but the quality of this pedal is great!

pretty easy. I got it used, so I was not familiar with some of the switch control knob, but for the most part it was easy.

This is basically a fancy noise gate. It does its job, takes out noise when you're not playing, and to be honest it sounds like it takes some out when you're playing too. It doesn't screw up the sound much, either. It will add a slight electronicy edge to it, but if you run it through an analog pedal or an eq pedal or some other effect it basically goes away.

Boss, like a rock

never had to deal with 'em, and lets keep it that way!!

This pedal was VERY useful when I used my Metal Maniac distortion pedal. It really does clean up alot of noise, although it can't get rid of all. I hardly use it now, as I have a Boss MT-2 Metal Zone and it is as quiet as heck. I have been using it in experimental pedal configs and have found it to be very useful.

Easy to use. The manual is ok.

It works great. It does what it's supposed to do,suppress noise. I don't use the Send and Return loop though i use it in line with my other effects. You gotta find the right position in your effects chain to make the sustain sound normal - so that it doesn't get cut off by the noisegate.

BOSS.
Perfect.

I bought the unit used. So i called the support here in germany and they sent me the manual within a few days.

Great,especially if you play live (loud volumes) and with lots of distortion :)
It's just a pedal I do not wanna miss.

It's very easy to use. It works as a noise gate or mute pedal. Mute is used for changing guitars without messing up the amp. or when you need total silence. reduction cuts off any noise when you are NOT playing. and it cuts feedback.

it makes no noise.. (as you guess)

it's cool..

no idea.. I've never heard a boss pedal broken down..

I played death metal for many years and it's really essential especially for that kind of music. if you turn it down for a second, there starts a terrible feedback. For concerts and studio work it's very useful. Not much use if you use it only at home. oh I almost forget the negative point.. the 'return' jack inlet is half centimeter below the input. if you are using more than one pedal (with cordless jacks between the pedals, I dont know its name, just think two jacks put together between two pedals) your NS-2 needs elevation. I put a small book under it.

Easiest god damn pedal I've ever used! 3 knobs: Threshold, Decay and Reduction/Mute. Just turn the threshold 'til the noise is gone! The decay decides how fast the noise reduction should snap on. When you use the mute mode obviously no sound gets through it!

My setup: Fender strat w. single coils -> BOSS CS-3 -> BOSS MT-2 -> BOSS CE-2 -> ZOOM 505 -> BOSS NS-2 -> Amp. Even though I use single coils on the strat this setup isn't noisy at all (that is with the NS-2, before I had some terrible noiseproblems!). I only use the 505 for the good reverb, I don't like most of the other effects!

BOSS rules!

I play alternative, grunge, metal and just about anything else that sounds good! This is great for low noise studio applications! Just be careful with the threshold or else you might lose some tone!

Just plug in and there you go. Manual helpful. This pedal is set up for a 2 years old. Easy as that

Soung Quality?? Best pedal I've ever bought. No Noise at all.I use a Gibson Les Paul and a Marshall JCM900 half stack.

It's a Boss .That's all I gotta say about that!

Good support.Boss effects rule

An effects must for us effects junkies. Who wouldn't want this pedal. Eliminates all noise and also a power supply. Whoever invented this pedal should get the noble piece prize. Wouldn't go without one for the rest of my life.

Turn the knobs where you want them...forget about it and go.

Not quite as good as the rackmountable Rocktron Guitar silencer. Will explain below.

Totally reliable.

Never dealt with them.

The way I use this pedal is a little different. This pedal is the FIRST thing in my signal path: Guitar - NS2 - Boss GT5 - Amp. I have the controls set to almost full. What I want is the capability of doing fast, snappy chords with NO sound in between the chords. This pedal does this for me but not quite as well as the Rocktron Guitar silencer does (see my review). The Boss seems to allow for the decay of the signal even on full. This can be bad or good...Bad for what I need when playing rhythyms, but great when doing solos so for me, it is a compromise. Also, when I turn the amp up very loud and turn the guitars volume on, there is no sound; the pedal does it's job. But after I play a few chords, the NS2 has trouble re-gating the signal. I'll get feedback when begin trying to mute the strings. Sometimes I'll need to hunt around for the right spot to stand in so the pedal can be effective (usually at a distance from the amp facing away) so this can be an inconvenience at times. All in all the pedal does exactly what it was intended for and I would buy it again. Aside from the very minor work on my part to get it to perform the way I want, it is a great value.

Pretty cool, does its job. Easy to use, the manual actually helped a bit. 3 knobs. Turn on all your stompboxes, set the Threshold until noise reduced/eliminated. Set decay to adjust how quick noise reduction kicks in. I must have a noisy set up cause i've got both knobs almost on max. The Mode knob allows a 'mute' option, where noise suppression is always 'on', and hitting the pedal mutes the guitar. before i got hold of the manual, i had to call to make sure i had it hooked up correctly, because the box has its own sub-effects loop. i run the NS-2 through my amps effects loop (in/out). all the other fx pedals (except delay/reverb) go in the NS-2's fx loop (send/receive). so you've got a couple of extra cables you've got to hook up.
Oh yeah-one last goody. The NS-2 saves you money! Why?-because you can run a 9V daisy chain from the NS-2 and power other pedals. So you can stop buying all those 9V adapters. That's part of the reason I bought this box relatively early in my buying plans.

Noise? that's its job - to eliminate it! i'm playing a '89 US Squire Strat into a 65W solid-state Fender. It's got its own Overdrive. The single-coils into the Fender O/D is pretty damn noisy. I also use a Stereo Chorus and Flanger. i don't think the NS-2 is designed necessarily to reduce single-coil hum; but overall (set at max) it does a damn good job of suppressing all that noise. it doesn't suppress as much while you're playing (that's not when you notice noise), but kicks in when you quiet down, or in between songs. Ya gotta play with the Decay a little, to make the phase-in of the suppression sound natural. Also, if you set the decay to low, it cuts off too abruptly - also chopping off your sustain.

I just started buying my stompboxes, but am quickly becoming a Boss addict. I don't care if i pay a premium. from what i've seen and what i've read in other reviews; Boss is Boss!

I've been doing a lot of research on various manufacturers. Boss has been very helpful. I go to their website frequently. They even have an on-line users group for Boss products. I wrote them a letter telling them i bought a used NS-2 and wondered if i might get a copy of the manual...and they sent it to me! no charge. i also ordered my 9V diasy chain from them cause i was having trouble locating it around town.

I'm just gettin back into playing after a LONG hiatus. I was rockin when Regan was President! Play originals, blues, 70's rock, spacey stuff, but may dabble in some newer rock & grunge. playing as a hobby, for the fun of it. this pedal is a nice addition to my (expected to grow) arsenal. the mute is a nice function, especially for you folks up on stage. the ability to power other boxes is a great feature, and a $ saver. i didn't try other brands. read all the reviews on Harmony Central, emmailed a few players, and ordered it without even trying it! i am happy with my choice.

There's only two knobs..Very simple. I don't even use the mute function.

I use this in the effects loop of my amp to cut back noise.. This is by far the best gate I have used and I've used alot of them.. including Rocktron's 'Hush' and 'Guitar Silencer', DOD's 'Gate/Loop' pedal and Rockman's 'Smart Gate' ..This is the only noise reduction unit that won't clip off notes (Unless you WANT it to), ruin your sound or create extra noise in your setup!! And it's cheap!!

I've had mine for 2 years without problems.. I even bought a spare one foir studio use and it works just as well!

Haven't dealt with them ...Haven't needed to

For $50 this was great.. I've often seen these floating around at this price ..One cool thing about this pedal (that I don't use it for..) is it will power other BOSS pedals.It would be cool if they made a rackmount of this also..