Boss SD-1 Super Overdrive

Simple not much more to say

A nice tuby and also quite rich overdrive sound, it's quite good for producing a large proportion of david guilmour's sound

Seems pretty solid to me

As someone who generally plays lead id say its a goood one to have for those richer solos

your standard overdrive control parameters.. level, tone, drive

I have two.. I'm using them with a Gibson SG standard, a VP, a few delays and a chorus into a Fender RI Deluxe Reverb

I'm comparing the older SD-1, which I bought today, and the newer one, which I also own. In my opinion, while they do indeed sound different, they are both equally useful. The older one is cleaner sounding to my ears, with less gain and overall level, while the newer one has more volume boost and crunch. Both retain the same characteristic mid-hump and both do a good job of boosting my amp for soloing and providing overdrive for rhythm work. I think the older one is better for picking and arpeggio type stuff, while the newer one is better for chording.

These will not break... the older one is from 1986 according to its serial number (thanks bossarea.com) and the only thing's worn in is the spring underneath the footswitch; it detaches but functions perfectly. anyone know how to fix 'er?
i'm not going to give it a 10 because everything has its breaking point.

meh.. i've heard horror stories, but the 5 year warranty isn't too bad either

I play rock, experimental, acoustic, space, electronic.. this pedal shows up everywhere, both in my music and in my rigs

the one thing i don't like about the older sd-1 is the old-style adapter jack, which runs on 12 volts instead of 9. if you plug a wall wart into it, it's underpowered and the LED doesn't even light up.. but if you feed it through a daisy chain connected to a modern pedal before it, it works.. hm..

Has three knobs so it's pretty bonehead easy to use.

I was originally given one of these pedals by someone when I had a Fender solid state amp. I thought it was a piece of crap, but that would change one day when I got my first tube amp. This pedal is designed for TUBE amps. This is very important to know. It has never sounded good through a solid state amp as far as I'm concerned. I experimented with this pedal with my Mesa Boogie Rectifier and then later my Marshal DSL. It sounds wonderful with every tube amp I've tried. I find it really useful for two situations. First, it can act as a good rock distortion pedal if you have your tube amp on light "crunch" mode. This can actually make this pedal sound like a hard rock/metal pedal if done just right. Secondly, it can sound terrific as a subtle "boost" to a tube amps high gain channel. It works well to tighten up the sound of guitars with muddy pickups. The first thing I thought of when I tried this was "wow, I sound like Zakk Wylde's tone." A few months later I found to my surprise that he uses this exact same pedal. It's a cheap pedal that is worth well more than it's price. However, I've only owned one of the older ones from Japan which has that special chip they stopped putting in the new ones. I haven't tried the new ones yet. To my ears, this overdrive sounds just as good as a TS9, though it is slightly harsher (which I like) than the smoother TS9. This is one great pedal that is often overlooked.

The pedals last forever, but the knobs don't. I had to buy a replacement one (only 40$). The knobs fall off over time, but other than that, it's fine.

Never dealt with them.

Like I said, this is a great value for the money, but I've only used the older Japan versions. I found one of these for 30$.... few things have been such a great value. Not the smoothest overdrive pedal, but certainly a good one for raw tones.

Fairly easy to use. Level, drive, and tone knobs. Only so many sounds to choose from.

Through all my amps (marshal, fender, epiphone, even an off-brand guitar research amp) it sounds bad. It just sounds too digital, it's very obvious that it is a pedal and not real overdrive. Definitely not crunchy enough for metal. I don't play metal though. It just sounds so fake and digital. It is VERY noisy when you crank the drive past 12 o'clock. You definitely would need a noise gate while using this thing live.

Boss pedals last forever. Built like tanks.

I play alternative and punk rock. On a bright note, this pedal offers a smooth transition between clean and dirty if you set it right, so it might come in handy if you switch a lot during songs, but it just lacks any good tone.

Three knobs, easy to use. Suggest you start with the buffered signal first, then dial in the pedal to a tone you can live with.

This pedal gives a pretty okay tone. Nice, creamy overdrive, but it doesn't quite sparkle like some other pedals will, and certainly nothing whatsoever like a nice overdriven amp sounds like, which is what these pedals are supposed to emulate, really. Like any boosted signal, your single coils will get noisier.

Here's the warning part:

Tone afficianado's do NOT want to add this to their rig. It will suck tone like no tomorrow. Anyone using this with a tube amp is truly missing out on some of the nicest sounds that their equipment can produce. I discovered this when I added a Diamond Phase to my chain (downstream), but the effect sounded weak and pale compared to the videos on YouTube, when the overdrive was turned off. I removed the SD-1 from the chain and I couldn't believe what I was hearing. I had made the mistake of NEVER actually listening to my rig WITHOUT the SD-1, and had no idea what I really had, since I had the pedal before I had the amp. I've since replaced the SD-1 with a BBE Green Screamer, which is true bypass.

Like others have said here, this pedal does not like other pedals. Nor does it like tube amps, as it makes them sound dull.

I gigged with it for 2 years, and it's over 10 years old. Never broke.

Dunno.

I needed an overdrive for my rig, and this pedal came along through a friend. As cash flow was low, I didn't argue. However, given the opportunity to upgrade, this pedal will sit around waiting for everything else to break before it goes back into the chain. Sounds pretty good when it's turned on, but when it's not, it makes everything else sound like crud. And it's too much trouble to keep plugging and unplugging pedals from song to song.

In short: good for beginners, but upgrade to go pro, or for anyone looking for sweetness of tone.

3Knobs, so it's self explanatory.

If your sound is punk or hardcore metalheald, this pedal might not be dirty enough for you. For the rest of us, you owe it to yourself to try this. Mild to high-moderate driven distortion without appreciable tone loss. Lot's of headroom. Very quiet! I'm using this in a chain with Humphrey's modded compressor & delay, a Keeley-modded Blues Driver and a Korg tuner...this thing is very quiet AND true bypass.

No worries...the shell is still Boss so it's built like a tank. Plus, Humphrey Audio Mods stands behind it with a lifetime warranty. While I haven't had it a long time, I expect reliability will not be an issue.

Excellent. Mark is great to work with, prompt email replies. I emailed him one day with a question, left my telephone # and said please call me to discuss. He called me that day. Try getting that kind of service from the "big guys"!

If blues or rock is your style, I highly recommend this pedal mod. This is the 3rd pedal Humphrey Audio has done for me and I cannot say enough good things about the quality and service. If this pedal were stolen (I have to chuckle at the "...or lost,.."; gee, just can't remember where I put my gear) I would replace it the next day.

If you're looking for a great sounding pedal, extremely quiet that "plays well with others", try this one. I seriously doubt you'll be disappointed.
Bruce

The same Level, Tone, and Drive controls as nearly all overdrive pedals out there. The battery is easy to get to.

I classify the sound of overdrive/distortion pedals into basically 4 categories; creamy, gritty, fizzy, and raspy. The SD-1 is mostly in the creamy quadrant, with some fizzyness. I also run a TS-10 on my board. The SD-1 sounds EXACTLY like the TS-10. Not similar... exactly. I did A/B comparisons across all settings and I honestly can't tell the difference. They both use the 4558 JRC op amp, and there are mods available to bring it to TS808 specs. I have on set as mostly a volume boost with just a touch of grind and the other at about 12 o'clock, so I can have three levels of overdrive. It has a nice creamy drive that is quite compressed. Adds lots of midrange and sustain. The controls provide an adequate range of sounds. This is not the best overdrive out there but I haven't found one in the same price range that is better.

It's built solid as a brick like all Boss pedals. I would have no worries about reliability.

I play classic rock, blues, and I'm in a praise/worship band. I've been playing for 30 years and owned tons of gear. This pedal gives me the sound I was looking for. If I had to build my pedal board from scratch, the SD-1 would definately be on it. If I were rating it compared to other similar priced pedals I'd give it a 10. But since there are lots of high-end pedals out there that do sound better I'll give it a solid 8.

It's an OD pedal. It has knobs, two plugs, and you step on it sometimes. Obviously, quite easy.

I run either my Parker or my LP Studio into a handful of pedals and then into a rack consisting of a Mesa Quad Pre, G-Major, and Peavey Classic 50/50. I picked this pedal up on a whim, to give me a bit more versatility. I also have to remember that I *love* this box, so I have to be a bit careful to try and be objective.

I've experimented with the pedal a good deal, and some things seem to work significantly better than others. I know some people have had great results with using this as a boost, either for solos or for slamming the front of an amp, and it works fine that way, but it doesn't seem to be where this thing excels.

My main use for this box, and what I love about it, is for warm, singing overdriven leads. I keep it set with the level fairly high, the drive pretty low (about 25%) and the tone rolled back, and when I engage it on the clean channel on my Quad (which is set to be right on the edge of breaking up normally) it pushes it into a beautifully warm, smooth drive tone perfect for single note lead lines. I do want to experiment with a few of the common mods, but the overall stock tone characteristics in this context are absolutely awesome.

It's pretty easy to get a nasty tone or nasty noise out of this thing though, that's for sure. Higher tone settings, at least with my rig, sound like an icepick stabbing through your eardrums.

I don't know, I've been rockin' it a month or two, but only really put it through the road-warrior paces for a week or two now, having recently joined up with full-time touring band After the Crash (www.myspace.com/afterthecrash so you can see the general style I'm playing in. No bluesy stuff here, so if that's your intended use you'd be best served looking through different reviews. This is modern-rock with something of an emphasis on mood/ambience stuff)

So far so good, but I might have to revise this after a few more months of throwing it around.

Never dealt with them.

I've been playing for about 12 years, very seriously (and currently making a living on tour) and this thing is a great value. It's not the end-all-be-all drive/boost pedal, but it's pretty sweet. I was actually shocked: I bought this pedal on a whim, intending to get it modded right away, and as soon as I plugged in and fired it up a bit, I was scared that getting it modded might lose the tonal characteristics I love! For my purposes, using over a clean channel to push it and get a smooth sounding overdrive for leads, it's quite solid. Seemed smoother than the TS series ODs.

I bought this pedal several weeks ago at a very nice price from my local Boss dealer and so far, so good. It's very easy to use. I played around with a sample unit in the store for a good hour before buying it, so I had plenty of time to get acquainted.

I really liked the fact that this pedal does not compress my tone at all. It was easily the most "open" and transparent of all the Boss overdrives I tried. I really dislike effects that constrict tone, and this one does nothing of the sort, contrary to what the previous poster said. He must have problems with his hearing or something. It works fine in conjunction with my JangleBox compressor and other pedals. It replaced a Danelectro Daddy-O overdrive that I had grown to dislike. Anybody want a good deal on it? It's going up on Ebay. I may, at some point, try other boutique overdrives, but for now, this is a big improvement on the Daddy-O.

Boss stuff is usually built to withstand a nuclear war. I don't think this one will be any different.

I have dealt with Boss C/S before concerning another pedal I had that was defective. They were great to deal with.

All in all, I like the Super Overdrive just fine so far. Ask me in six months. I usually stay away from Boss pedals and prefer boutique stuff, but heck, it sounded fine, the price was right and it kicks the crap outta' the Daddy-O. One day, I might go for an expensive boutique replacement, but for now, the Boss is doing what I need it to do.

Fairly easy to tweak around to get different sounds but it takes a while to get the tone I like.

The tone knob is very useful. Helps you to get warm and smooth creamy drive to brittle overdrive.

Well, here's the thing. I got this pedal ever since I was a beginner. This pedal gives a very average effect. Good to use it alone but I like to stack overdrive pedals for creamier and fuller sound. This thing doesn't like other pedals. Besides its a super duper big tone sucker! I bought some boutique pedals recently with true bypass such as Fulltone Fulldrive 2 MOSFET and Diamond Pedals J-Drive MK3 and they sound sweet and warm when I plug my guitar straight to the these 2 pedals and to the amp. But when I put them into my whole effects chain with the SD-1 in it, they just sound crap cos the SD-1 has a super low quality buffer in it that sucks out all the liveliness of the guitar tone.

Do not get this pedal cos it will mess up your tone! I'm glad I've sold this on eBay and now my guitar sounds so much sweeter!

I've been using it for 3 or 4 years. First the switch died on me. Replaced it and it works normally. Then the battery connectors failed. The pedal just can't stay on constantly. I've to use an adapter to solve this prob.

Boss really has lousy parts in them. It's better to have a backup when gigging with this. But the quality and the everything of it make this pedal a backup pedal rather than a gigging pedal.

Didn't care dealing with them. Lousy pedal.

I've been playing for 9 years now and I play a wide range of music. This pedal is just a tone sucker with average or even below average sound with overrated claims by Boss on how good it is. Just think of Behringer. They are in the same range.

I'm glad this sucker has gone out of my chain.