Boss OD-20 Drive Zone

I think this unit is very easy to use, very straight forward.
If you can't program this, your an idiot. This unit will give you more distorsion than you will ever desire. The manual is ok, nothing great. i give it a 10, because its so easy to program.

ok, i know equipment pretty well !, i've had every effect known to man ! and i must say i like this unit. why you ask ? well, the trick here is to stick with one guitar and one amp. then, dial in and save your favorite, and don't forget to write down the settings. anyway, i set my amp to neutral settings ie. 5(1/2 way) then keep the volume on one level also. then go to work dialing in the favorites. The EQ, and Presence and the Ocatave really play a part in the shaping of the tones. I was able to get some great tones out of this thing, but when changing to another guitar, the tone changed and changes in the settings was required. so, just stick to one guitar for this unit. I wish there were more banks to save more tones, i could save at least 10 great tones instead of 3 or 4. I for sure think this unit is worth buying. The unit is quiet. i don't think you get the greatest tones in the world, but that subjective anyway, but for $150 i don't think you can complain. I'll give it a 8 for sound.

well, been playen it for 1 year almost every weekend with no problems.
i even hucked it as a heckler in the audience when he told me to take guitar lesson, that SOB.

don't know

for the $$$ you can't go wrong. it offers 30 or so different OD's
and with one guitar you can dial in pretty much anything.
add some delay and reverb and your set !
i love that its a all in one.......

quite easy, really... if you know what the parameters are supposed to do(they are marked, so if that helps, grab a dictionary....

i dont like All of the "types" i like the screamies, the crunchies, and the fuzzies(im not really one for fauxverdrive, i like to push amp for those sounds, it has two different gain voicings{marshally and mesa-like} so it is versatile)its a Randall RG200... i have even found a great little trashy fuzz setting on it. it sounds like your amp is an old transistor radio and your speker is a rusted through trash can(i enjoy unique sounds, especially when "purists" do not)... i am using this with all of the dano mini modulations and delays, fabtone and black coffee with various modded/customised stratlike geeters... it is very applicible to any style of music, from "blues" to ambient trash folk... all of the settings sound good, but not all are to my taste.. you can definitely acheive any distortion/clipping sound..

it is a boss, so i am hoping it will last atleast a year... and from what i here, it most likely will. the 10 is assumption.

dont know, dont care to know, if it breaks ill take it back to Zone music and throw it at the guys head...

i love it, no more stage full of distortions and clippers and boosters and what have you, just one that cn act as all of them, but i will probably still keep some various ones around as back up and boredom relievers...

There was no manual with mine... if you have any experience with these things then you really don't need the manual anyway; it's pretty self explanitory. Easy to change and save things... and the save option for four separate settings is a pretty cool feature on a distortion pedal.

I use a Schecter C1 elite with a fender princeton chorus also running through a digitech quad-4 and a digitech gsp 21. I'm all about versatility and experimenting and this pedal gives one a lot of canvas to paint on, which is a lot of the reason I bought it. You've got to be willing to take some time to play with the dials and your equipment in order to get what you want from this. You cannot just throw it in with your stuff and then flip through the preset distortions on this thing and expect what you're looking for to just hit you in the face. It is noisy but you'll have that with distortion pedals. If you've got a break in a song it's just best to switch it off and on as needed... which would be obvious to most. If you're in a wheelchair or just too lazy to press down on this device a second time then you might want to get a noise suppresser.

It doesnt always sound great... you can make this pedal suck... it won't change your life or do your dishes either... the point is you might have to actually work with it.

The sounds I've got out of this are weird and not metal or bluesy. The octave thing is cool but it only works on pitches below the f# on the 4th string. I have other pitch shifters on my stuff as well but it is still kinda cool just to have and you can make it feedback and get some weird sounds out of that along with other effects.

You can use this to play metal sounding stuff or to "shred" and the attack shape dial is really helpful for this. I've got some eric johnson and steve vai type tones just playing around with it but that's not really the style of music I play.

I know this is the age of ebay and shopping online but if it is possible (as it is with this pedal) always go to a music store and try this stuff out before you buy it... people used to do that all the time. You don't have to get it at the music store but at least you'll know what you're getting into.

so far so good. I'd use it w/o a back up. I still have the distortion on my processor but it isnt nearly as flexable as the OD-20

haven't used the customer support

I mostly play Darkwave/goth/alternative... (like: my bloody valentine, cocteau twins, curve, cure, LYCIA, the sisters of mercy, alien sex fiend etc..) This pedal is a good match for a lot of different stuff if you know how to work your gear. I was looking for a distortion pedal I could get the most from over all and this is above and beyond what most offer.
I've been playing for 14 years and my main guitar now is a Schecter C1-elite. I mainly use the fender princeton chorus amp through the two effects processors I listed earlier and sometimes boss and digitech pedals.

If I could find this pedal used and in the condition I got this one in then I'd get it again.

I love that I can get so many kinds of distortion out of this and that it allows me to play around with some of the more contemporary kinds of distorted sounds. The noise, as on other distortion pedals, sucks but when you're playing it isnt noticeable.
The Schecter I use has humbuckers and a ton of sustain and these things work fantastic with this pedal. I use a lot of effects and I've found that this pedal works great with the other boss effects I have as well.

If you like to be able to change and experiment with your sound then this is the pedal for you. If you're hung up on producing a certain type of sound(or sounds) and just sticking with that then you shouldn't get this; you'll be wasting both your money and the capacity of this pedal.

There are so many things you can do in the realm of overdrive/distortion with the OD-20 if you take the time to get to know it and use it. It is simple to use but that doesnt mean it's simple.

Very easy to use except the pedal mode maybe. A bit non-sensicle on the options with that.

Quite simplly, I had the obligatory TS-9 pedal and needed more gain for certain tunes in performances. Besides, the TS-9 had a somewhat mushy attack that always left me need more punch. This pedal delivers the goods - great punch. I like the Bottom control, which makes it tremendously warm. The TS-9 model on this is, for me, an idealized TS-9 sound with all the warmth + better punch using the Attack setting. This pedal allows me to cover vintage to modern and all points in between. Man, has Boss come a long way in the tone dept. since the GT-3 (which I have and probably will selwon't use much anymore).

Can't say but it's likely to last a while.

Don't know.

I play many styles of music and have been playing for 26 years. Get this pedal.

This babies easy to use just dial in your tone level botom drive and mode and your set

it sounds great to me

its very tough and made to last (mine was a blem but what the hell its BOSS not even a truck could bust this one)

I have never had to service it or any of my BOSS pedals(whats the phone # anyways)

I play mostly rock Ive got a line6 spider II 2x10 amp and the FBV4 footcontroller and a modulizer pro rack mount fx proseser I have octave, flanger, digital reverb, super overdrive, advanced EQ, and drive zone I am going to have the best distortion setup when I get a compresion sustainer I am going to put compression sustaner first for the sustain then super overdrive and Drive Zone then my advanced EQ

It is very easy to use, knobs to dial in the setting you want, and dual peddles to turn distortion off/on, then another for your own presets (four) where you push it until you want it on the preset, or your manual tweaking. I love it. The manual is great for me, and has great outputs, amp control, line out/headphones, input, output. Great for studio work.

Right now I use either a Fender Cyclone I (not the second one), or a 1985-88 Fender Mustang 1969 Reissue through a Peavy Butcher 120w tube head amp outputting to a Sonic 4x12. Works fine, I love the mustang. The sound quality is great, and you can tune in to get the sound of just about any artist with all 20 (21?) effects for distortion. I love the blues driver, the DS-1, and all the "fuzz" settings. I find the Big Muff modeler works great if you want to play Bush. The DS-1 or Blues Driver (BD-1), works great for Nirvana. Great for studio work to crank out the exact distortion you want. You can say if its a rough distortion, or edgey, the drive level, bottem level, tone, everything, it all works great.

I can really depend on it, I'd use it without a backup in a second. Very sturdy,

It's a boss product, I havent needed to repair it, and never had to contact the company.

Since I play Grunge, Punk, to whatever you want to think of as Alternative; I love this peddle. It works great, and helps when I'm learning a song because I can dial in the exact distortion I want. Havent used a better peddle for distortion.

Not hard to use. It's a stomp-box, isn't it?

Found this unit used. Did my homework and had decent expectations before trying it out. Tried it with a Tele Thin-Line through a Fender Silverface Twin at the store--a good test. Bottom line is: if it sounds better in bypass mode through a decent amp--don't buy it! Well, this thing didn't quite pass the test--it's sad when a stompbox makes a good amp sound shitty. It might be me, but I found that every single emulation emitted a shrill, paper-thin buzz that increased as the gain was turned up--like a deranged mosquito. I've found this to be true for many Boss COSM products.

I doubt I would have been so interested in this product if it didn't claim to emulate certain famous stomp-boxes, i.e., scratch off that little bit of paint surrounding the settings knob, and you have a whole bunch of BOSS sounds--nothing more, nothing less. Of course, if you like that buzzy COSM sound, then maybe this is for you.

It's obviously not for me!

Sure, you could depend on it--no cheap plastic used here.

N/A

I like to tinker and tweak as much as the next person--this pedal offers that opportunity at a very low cost. It does exactly what it says it will--attempt to model different pedals using Boss COSM technology--but it leaves something to be desired. I own a Roland Blues Cube, which is a fantastic clean sounding amp, but again, that awful paper-thin sound on the lead channel just drives me batty (you just can't use the bridge pickup without it sounding like a really cheap FX-processor). Oh well, I guess Boss/Roland just sounds the way it does within a certain price range, take it or leave it. No diamond in the rough here, though.

Ok let's take a look at this thing. It has a lot of knobs on it which is one of the reasons I bought it. I considered a multi-effect pedal (a.k.a RP-200, Me-33 etc.), but I decided I would rather have some good distortion before I start to get effects. I'll admit, you have to tweak the thing to get a good sound out of it. If you just plug in your guitar and play expecting to get the sound you want, it ain't gonna happen. You have to play around with a little, but when you do it, you get almost any sound out of it.

Right now I'm using this thing with a Godin SD and a 65-watt Kustom amp. It's not the best setup but it works for what I do. This thing is a NOISY unit when you turn the volume up, but ok people get this through your heads, ALMOST ALL DISTORTION PEDALS DO THIS! If you don't want it get a noise suppressor. I suggest getting a power cable with this, because it's just common sense to spend $25 dollars and get a power supply rather than spend $10 bucks a week getting batteries. You can definately get Kirk Hammett,Angus Young, Pettruci, and almost any other artist you can name out of this thing.

It's Boss, you know the saying. Built like a tank. Mine was a store demo, had a couple of scratches on it, but it's made of freakin' metal, so come on, it's not going to break.

I haven't dealt with them because it's so sturdy. I'm not sure anyone has dealt with them. Makes ya wonder if they really exist......

I play the good days of metal (Old Metallica, Pantera, Old Ozzy, Megadeth), a little blues now and then, and I'm going to get into some jazz soon. I'll admit I've only been playing for 1 1/2 years. But I practice a lot, and this has always been a reliable pedal. If it were stolen I'd go to the store immediately and shell out the $170 for a new one. Personally, I love the Metal setting on it (Not the MT-2, but the setting at 12 o'clock), just gives you a great overall sound. This thing has pretty much every boss distortion and overdrive pedal I can think of in it, and a few others to boot. If you want a good all around distortion pedal, you're winners right here.

Blindingly easy to use in comparison to most other Roland/Boss Products. Editing patches and putting thing together is a very simple process. The manual itself is VERY easy to read and understand. To me , this is a first for Roland/Boss. Normally they have absolutely terrible instructions that have absolutely no syntactical clarity of narrative. The are seemingly always direct, literal translations that make 0% sense. This is a massive leap forward for Roland/Boss.

I tend to use three differing amplifiers. There is a Soldano and a Crate VC 5112 2x12 combo that I use primarily for my band gigs in form or another. I am playing 2 Godin LGXT's and a Gibson Explorer through these amplifier. There is always a Boss GT 3 and a Line 6 Delay Modeler in the effects loop. The signal chain is an Ernie Ball Volume Pedal, in the Boss PW-10 V-Wah into the OD-20. Compared to the other distortion that I have used (DOD, Digitech, Danelectro) this pedal is very quiet and switches very smoothly. No pops. No clicks. No static. As far as distortions go, I have alot of different types I really like. I can very much like the whole Soundgarden/Metallica low end kind of chunk and it is right there. I am not a metal type guitarist, but I love having that right there as a possible piece of re-contextualization. The stack simulation is pretty convincing. The Tube Screamer and the Pro-Co Rat Simulations are to my ears, very close. They may lack a tad of the raspiness that those two pedals would individually have, but they are more than adequate to get the point across. The one that I love the most is the Muff Pie. I lovely that sustaining, smooth, Robert Fripp type of over drive and this delivers! Over all, it is a wonderful evocation of the pedals that it aims to ape.

The cliche goes "It's a Boss........... I am too stinking lazy to schlep around a back-up.

I have called Boss/Roland once. The phone menu was more convoluted than most International Political discourse. The site loads like my Grandmother drives, slowly and erratically.

I adore the reasonable ease of use that this pedals has. Should it disapper, I would definitely buy another . It is becoming a genuinely necessary part of my rig and sound. After almost 20 years of playing electric guitar, this by far the best combination of features, ease of use, tone and value, I have come across. It does more for a fraction of the cost and headache it would entail to own all of the pedals that the OD-20 evokes.

Very easy to use and the manual is helpful if you need it.
Sounds can be stored and accessed easily threw the 4 memory mode. If you need to tweek then just turn the real time knobs then press the write button to store

When your using distortion you'll have some hiss but this box isnt real noisy at all. Boss did a great job most all the drives and distortions are very usable
and imulate the actual stomp box very closely and good enough to use live or for recording. You'll find youre favorites and use them the most anyway. Some like the rockman really suck, but if you listen to the actual rockman it really sucks to, I think the stock ds-1 pedal sucks, so again boss immulated that pedal well too. Although with the deep and attack and tone knob you may tweek till you like it better. All in all this is a great box sound wise and user friendly.

Built well with the usual boss quality

Have never had any problems w/ boss pedals

I play all differant styles and this box suites them all well. I use a 57 strat and a les paul std. thru a Fender Deville. The GUV mode gives my amp great marshally tone, I like it better than the origional Marshall Guv pedal.