DigiTech GNX3

Pretty easy to use..not to much of a learning curve...give it a few days and you pretty much can use most of its features easily.

The effects are really good..but the distortion pedals, amp models and eq kill this thing. I play 2 Different Schecter c1 classics and a charvel model a. The schecters have emg60+81, and seymour duncan jazz/jb pickups and charvel has sd metal lives. Amp wise peavey xxx 212 (which by the way rules). The gnx3 ruins all my tone and really was a waste...i dont think im going to try the amp model route again..i got a peavey xxx after owning this thing for a week and ended up putting it to rest for good then.

no

never dealt with em

Like i said..i like the effects...thats about it.

Well this unit has la lot of functions and buttons, if you dont have the manual it can be very very dificult to manage. After spending some time with the manual its prety simple and logic. There are endless possibilities when it comes to get a good sound. The clean sounds are realy good, but not amazing.

Currently i am using a Les Paul Standard through the GNX3 and then through a Marshall avt150 stack. Its not noisy at all, unless you want it to be. The effects are really amazing but the Shifter effect sounds weak for me, i dont like it much.

it gets really close to any sound you like. As i said the clean sounds are very good but not amazing. The Distorion Is Realy Good, the best distortion i have heard after the JCm models & Rectifiers.

Yes im currently using it but sometimes i get scared of presing the rong button, they are kinda close to each other, thats my only complaint.

Never Dealed with them.

i play rock 70's,80's, & early 90'. Also i play grunge and pop. it is a realy good match for every style. Iv benn playing for 5 years now. I also own a line 6 pod, but for live situations a prefer the gnx. If it were stolen and had the money again i would buy it.

What realy motivated me was the sound cualitiy and the features, its a must have for solo artists.

It would be nice if it had mor internal space for recording, or at least ship with a smarmedia card.

When I bought the GNX 3, it had been qute a while since I used a new processor, so I had quite forgotten the learning curve associated with one. I have two benchmarks for usability:

(1) An old BOSS SE-70 Stereo Processor that I owned for about 9 years (I've also reviewed this on Harmony Central). Compared to the BOSS SE-70, this is more complex to set up.

(2) A Yamaha DG 100 2*12 digital modeling amp that I have also reviewed on Harmony Central. This amp is super easy to use in terms of sound crafting (motorized knobs that reflect their saved settings, etc.). Unlike my Yamaha DG 100, I do not feel confident changing settings on the Digitech GNX 3 on the fly on stage.

One can obviously restrict oneself to the preset patches out of the box, but editing the patches requires a good look at the manual and quite some work (at least a few hours). I found the manual quite comprehensive, though.

I use this with the following setup:
- Guitars: Parker Fly Classic (also reviewed here on Harmony Central), Ibanez 2450 NT Prestige
- Amp: Headphones, House Stereo, Yamaha DG 100 212

I am very pleased with the sound that I can get out of this unit. For example, the Eric Johnson preset is quite a faithful reproduction. Also, you can get great sounds by using very simple arrangements (no EQ, single amps, cabinets that correspond to those amps in real life).

So far, I have only used this unit once on stage. I used it without a backup. The housing looks fairly reliable, but I am concerned about the knobs on the top. They look a little flimsy and that they could be easily damaged.

I have not tried contacting Digitech, so I cannot review this.

I play rock, ethnic music and some jazz. The Digitech GNX 3 is versatile enough for all these applications. I sometimes play through an amp and sometimes directly into the mixer. The Digitech handles both these situations very well.

Compared to my old, trusty BOSS SE-70, I must say that the Digitech GNX 3 does a better job in terms of tone, although not as easy to program.

I like the drum machine and 8-track functionality - makes this great for both practising and recording. One small niggle - I wish the drum machine was slightly more programmable.

This was an impulse purchase for me. I am kind of disappointed, but a little research would have managed my expectations better. The salesman in the store had me believing this was the end all to a pedal board and stomp boxes. My thought was that for what I would spend on a couple of pedals, I could have all of the effects and do some other things too. The truth is that it does some amazing things and is a very cool gadget to play around with at the house, (especially with the headphones and not the amp) but is't not going to take the place of pedals any time soon.
It took a couple of weeks of frustration and a couple of times through the manual to get the hang of it, but that's just because it has so many features. This is one of those products that you could probably have for years and stumble on something you never knew it did. Once you get the hang of it, its pretty easy. Digital recorder is fun to play with and probably worth the $50 over the GNX 2.

Sound quality? There is none. The factory patches are set extremely loud with way too much distortion to play through an amp. If I set a good volume on bypass then go to a patch I wake my neighbors with overdistorted noise. I am playing with a Fender HotRod Deville 212 and usually my Strat. I ended up taking out all of the amp modeling and turning down all of the gains and re-saving the presets and it helped a bunch, but it's still not good. It has a constant noisy hiss. I have hooked it up in every way possible and still can't get a decent sound. I would never play it live, not even just for the basic effects; flanger, delay, chorous, etc.

No real problems, the 8 track recorder failed when I first got it but the manual tells how to format the file and that fixed it. The finish scratches easy.

The summary is that the main thing this is good for is putting on some headphones and playing when you don't want to drag out all of your equipment, and by the way, it's great for that, I give it a 10 there. I just don't have $400 to spend on a cool practice gadget but you might. There are a lot of things I like about the unit but I should have used a little common sense and realized that if this thing could really do everything it does and sound good too that it would probably have an extra zero at the end of the price. If you are not in search of the "perfect sound quality" and just want to make some neat sounds you will love it.

It's pretty easy to use out of the box but there's alot of stuff and the manual helps to navigate through the options fairly well. I still have the 1.4 version and it seems to work fine. It takes a while to get the hang of all the features so that your time or else you might not be getting the most out of it.

The sound is very good except for the digital decay, it leaves a little to be desired in that area. The noise gate does a good job of supressing the noise when not playing, but when you start playing, there is some background noise that's noticeable through the head phones that gets a little bit annoying after awhile. The presets aren't bad, I found the Carlos patch, with a little wah added gets the Santana sound very well. There's a ton of effects and they are pretty useable...actually, the one's I have tried have been very good for a modeller. The Acoustic patch didn't fo it for me though, it sounded too much like a clean electric without any character. I use a fender Highway Tele and Strat. The quality of the recording was alittle disappointing, when re-played through the amp, the sound is muffled a bit. I haven't tried transferring the sound file to my computer yet.

too early to say, but I'm not sure about the plastic switches.

still too early to say.

I'd say the value is there. The amount of versatility and the tools you have at your finger tips to learn or work on new songs are great. The digital decay and the re-play of recording is disappointing but hey, what do you expect from an "all purpose" workstation. It'll meet most styles, it's got great heavey distortion to nice sweet tones. I don't think I would use it live...I just don't enjoy that digital decay sound.

I own the gnx3 for 2 years and for now it is very easy to get the sound I want. Editing patches are easy.
I mostly use the stompbox mode.
The Exp pedal only switches the wah on and off. After RP2000 it surprised me to see that
Manual is ok.
Firmware was 1.3 when I get it. But I upgraded it to 1.4. I had the same problems about the exp pedal but I think it loosens in time. So tighting it fill fix the problem.

I use a 96 Fender Deluxe / Plus to Gnx3 to Fender RocPro 1000 into the send input using the fx level button to set the volume.
No noise at all. It is silent for me to gig. The target system setting is boring me some times. I think a General EQ would do better.
Thinking of using the unit with a active monitor...
I play blues, soul, r&b, rock'n'roll, rock, pop and it fits them all.
The effects sound great and the amp models are satisfying.

I trust this unit. Digitech always make the best and reliable products for a gig. Not only the gnx3, the others are stoned to be under your feet.
I only bring my amps footswitch in case something happens but for now nothing happened except some audience spilled their drink to the stage :-)

No need too deal with the company because I live in Turkey and I have no chance to do this but I sent some mails about the things in my mind before purchasing it and they helped me a lot.

GNX3 is a good match for all kinds of music I think. Before buying it do not rely on the factory presets. Spend some time with it if you can. Do not forget the target system setting and don't forget that the amp you're using makes a whole lot of difference.

I play for 9 years and before GNX3 I had RP2000. Nothing else...

If it is stolen or lost I think I can't get another unit for now. But I sell my amp and maybe I buy a Fender Cyber Twin. It sounds awesome these days to me :-) But it is 2700 ? and must have the midi controller for 500 ?. Turkey is an expensive country and making music here is also hard with this situation.
I made no compare. But it is much more easy to use than GT6.

If Digitech fix the wah on/off thing, for example whan I switch the pedal on I want it to change the gain of the amp, when it is off, changes the volume, it will be the number one floor unit.

It helps me to make any type of music I need to do.

The GNX-3 (v.1.4) is usable right out of the box. Although initially, the large array of switches and knobs can be intimidating, a combination of playing around with it and reading the manual for special features should get you up and running pretty quickly.

I play a Paul Reed Smith Tremonti SE and I run the Digitech unit into my Randall RG-75 solid state amp. The noise gate (although sometimes a little unnatural, but can be turned down) eliminates background noise well. The amp warping function is phenomenal and can allow you to create any conceivable sound.

My expression pedal suddenly got a bit squeaky. It turned out to be the plastic locking nut that was making the noise, so i just tightened it up, and everything was fine. I'm not sure how it'll be in the long run, but it seems to be built solidly and should hold up under wear.

My contact at the local music store happens to be a product specialist/clinician for DigiTech, and he ran through the gamut of effects and demonstrated each one before I purchased my unit.

I play a range of styles, from bluesy rock to jazz to classic rock and modern rock. Because of the versatility of the GNX-3, I'm confident that all my bases will be covered with this little box.

I've been playing for a few years, so I'm relatively new to the world of effects. However, many people who have been playing for decades have been impressed with the GNX-3, which leads me to believe that it'll never be scrap metal, even as I improve and progress. The expression pedal is a great feature, since with other modellers like the POD, the pedal must be purchased separately, and essentially with the GNX-3 pedal alone, you're up to around a 300 dollar value. Add on the other smattering of features, and it's immediately obvious that the unit is great value for good quality.

Factory presets are for kids but by editing you can get good tone out. The manual is clear and concise. Give yourself at least a couple of days before a gig to program though.

The reason I went to this was to lighten' my load but I still needed a good sound. I play a Les Paul through it into a new Ibanez TB100R solid state 2x12 combo with a closed back. Modern rock covers

No problems yet(only 3 gigs on it)

Never had to deal with them

I play modern rock covers, 26 years with a guitar on my back so I tend to think that mine is the only correct opinion. I must admit that I was surprised(based on previous Digitech tone) with this animal. This is as close to the "tube" tone as you get with all the versatility of a processer. I would recommend this product.

It's tougher than people say to get a good sound out of it if you don't know what you're doing. The preset sounds bite. Only a few good ones out of what? 65? You have to start making hypermodels to get into the really good sounds.

Editing patches is cake. Once you go through the tutorial and make a few of your own patches, you'll have this thing down and it'll be very easy to use. You can do a lot in the stompbox mode. Then you can switch amp channels, effects, and anything you can think of to do.

The manual is very halpful but vague in some areas. The tutorial absolutely rocks. Most things you can figure out by tinkering.

My firmware version is 1.4 and the current version is 1.5 but I don't have a midi cable so I can't upgrade. All the upgrade does is fix some bugs which aren't even a problem if you do things correctly (concerning the SmartMedia card).

I'm using this with a Fender 100w mainly, a Mesa V-Twin sometimes, and my guitars are an Ibanez RG7620 7 string and a Jay Turser Serpent LP.

It's not noisy at all. In fact, once I used it just as a noise gate for the PA at my church when we had some noisy equipment running and lights causing noise. My friend owns an American Strat and as you could guess, it's noisy as they come. He took it out of his Crate (what is he thinking?? A Crate??) and put it in this and it was dead silent...so awsome. Noise gate wasn't even set very high.

There are some weak effects settings, but for the ones I use (chorus, delay, reverb, phaser, flanger, and pitch effects) I can get the sound I desire. Sometimes it's overwhelming having so much control over your effects though...

I mainly use it through my reeeeeally old (80s) 100w Fender solid state amp that has a new Line6 speaker. I bypass the preamp and it sounds fantastic (I LOVE Fenders!!!). I've played it through PAs (my church, etc) and the speakers kill any guitar tone, so I try to avoid PAs. I've played it through some other things too but I get the best sound out of real guitar amps with good speakers. I'm thinking of in the future getting a Roland JC120 or a nice all-tube Fender (hot rod series) and keeping my Mesa V-Twin in there all the time for a setup that is mostly tube and will give this thing even more character.

I don't spend my time trying to sound like someone else...and this thing was made with what it has so you can sound unique...but if you wanna be a poser you can find any sound in here that you want. You can go from scratchy and digital to smooth and organic.

When I use lots of effects or a stompbox or distortion (the DOD 250 is my favorite distortion box model on here) I use the Blackface amp model, and any distorted tones usually end up with the Mesa Recto model in there somewhere. I have 4 tones I use mostly: 1)clean and transparent with chorus for strumming, 2)mild overdrive for strumming and blues (use the sparkledrive model - I can get AMAZING tone with it), 3)a killer solo tone that is a smooth, fat, screaming distortion with delay, sometimes chorus, and 4)a HEAVY sound for my 7 string with tons of crunchy bass. I use a patch to make my guitar into a bass sometimes and use the pitch shifter sometimes too.

Oh yeah, almost forgot! The recorder when recorded in the "CD" quality sounds just about exactly like it does played through the amp like normal when played back.
Overall, you can get some serious tone out of this thing.

It's pretty solid. I have no choice but to use it without a backup. I've heard good things and it seems tough. I won't rate it though b/c I've only had it about a month.

Well, they have great support online for this unit. There is a forum on Digitech's site, you can download patches and software, so that's enough right there to get good marks.

I play rock, I guess b/c my tastes range from "pretty" to some kinds of metal. I've got a thing for jazz, too. This thing can do any style pretty well. Maybe not too good at country though... Pretty good for those of us that dabble in many different styles.

I can recognize good tone, and good tonal characteristics, and this can get lots of good tones, but is tougher to get the truely heart-stopping tones. I've owned lots of mediocre gear, so I can't really compare this to any top of the line stuff. Someone I know has one of the Boss GT-3 things and that sounds a little clearer than this, but I like the tones from this better. The Boss thing sounds cold.

If it was stolen, I think I would have to get this again, b/c it's the only thing that has the features I need.

I love the recorder, it's features, and just about everything about it. The hypermodels might be my favorite feature.

I compared it to the Boss GT-6 but got this b/c it has the recorder, which is a main reason I bought it.

The only thing I wish it had was a USB digital output. Then it would be perfect.

It helps me make music, does not get in the way. If I'm looking for a sound, I can get pretty close to what I imagined in a minute or so.

If you want to have everything you could possible need (effects, amp models with warping, recorder, drum machine, etc) all in one box and have it sound great, too...I highly recommend the Digitech GNX3. If you have questions go to the forum on Digitech.com, email me (just take out the NOSPAM part in front of my email), and you can email me if you want sound clips, too. Hope I can/did help in your decision about this unit.

You will have to study the manual and refer back to it several times. You simply can not get a perfect sound right out of the box. The pre-set factory patches are garbage and sound really lame. The whole layout and functionality of it is over the top. It could have been designed more user friendly. I had it for over a month and never quite got the sound I was looking for, so I shipped it back. The manual is really detailed and specific, but you have to read 80 pages of it. The one I got had Firmware revision 1.4 The patches can be edited but it takes alot of time and is very labor intensive. Be prepared to put in some serious overtime to learn this piece of gear.

I use Jackson, Fender, & Ibanez guitars through Marshal amps. It is a noisy pedal board and stole the beautiful bright tone from my guitars and amps. It has a very "over-processed" sound and left my guitar sounding like it was strung with rubber bands! I spent weeks trying to tweak it, but never got the crisp tone I wanted. Even in the "by-pass" mode it sounded like crap (hint - it's not a "true by-pass"). There were a few modulation effects that I liked (auto swell & pluck gate) but the rest were very weak and sort of silly. Very "amateur" sound from Digitech. This was my first Digitech purchase and probably my last. I will stick with my old friends Boss, MXR, & Marshall.

This pedal board came with the most annoying flimsy little piece of clear plastic over the LED's, I was perplexed at the horrible quality of materials they used. If you push on it with even the slightest pressure it will give way. It cant even come close to the heavy duty construction of Boss or MXR. Do not drop anything on that part or it will probably bust. Absolutely rediculous!

Never had to call the company. I decided to send it back to the dealer, and write these comments to educate other players, rather than call Digitech and tell them thier product sucks. Do not... I repeat, Do not waste your dough on this below average, over-processed, tone stealing, toy box. I have nothing against the makers and Im not out to defame anyone. Its just that this pedal board is a complete joke. I've been playing hard rock/metal for 18 years... trust me.

If you want a nice recorder go get the new Zoom MRS-802CD that just came out, it has all the great Zoom effects and all the trimmings. If you want quality stomp boxes or pedal boards go with Boss, or MXR. If your just starting out, and your tone deaf, then buy the GNX3.
Happy playing.