DigiTech RP-200A

It has, as said before, 3 knobs, 2 stompswitches and 1 expression pedal. If you read the manual and know what does what, I guess it's pretty easy to get a decent sound out of it.

The manual is pretty usefull and wellwritten.

The reason why this little effect-unit is only getting a 7 in spite of the praise is the following. In the 4 odd years I've owned it, I never got the sound I wanted from the pedal. Maybe I'm no good with electronics, maybe I get lost in the endless list of parameters I can edit, but I can't get a sound/tone I like from the pedal...

Also my expression pedal is waaaaa...aaay to stiff. You'd almost break your ankle while using some basic wah-wah... I don't know if anyone else has had this problem, but it's impossible for subtle use.

When I bought it, I was using a Epiphone Les Paul Standard and a Fender Champion 30. I plugged it in (the Digitech RP), the EQ was impossible, the Amp Moddeling was impossible but the effects were pretty good-ish.

Now, after 4-5 years of experience with tube amps (a very very very nice MesaBoogie F30) and some decent effects (a TS-9 ibanez, JH-1 wahwah, ED-1 Marshall compressor), I've realised the effect weren't that good. It's just too thin/tinny and not organic and nice and warm. The same goes for the Amp-moddeling. I found it impossible to get a decent overdrive sound, let alone a nice and creamy distortion.

I tried it a couple of times as a silent amp, using it with headphones. Still, no good sound whatsoever!

It's probably pretty reliable, but I wouldn't use it live. The expressionpedal is plastic and it could snap. The same goes for the stomppedals.

Never dealt with 'em.

I really really regret buying it at the time. I could've gotten some basic decent effects. I wouldn't have gotten all the effects this pedal has, but at least I would be using 'em and it wouldn't be collecting dust in a obscure corner in my room.

Hello. I'm from Belarus. My name is Andrey I'm 18 yesar old. This processor is very easy to use. I've played on it in music store and for some minutes I founded the way to tune it for me. I didn't see the manual cause I didn't need it :).

Some words I say about effects. When I wanna buy this FX BOX I looked throught many-many sites (russian\english) about rp200a\300a and that's why I came here :). In most of sites were good comments and recomendations. When I heared the sound myself I was great surprised of the sound. It was clean and live :). In zoom 707-|| the sound is very bad it's not alive not expressive. But in Digitech it it great. I don't have much time to check it completly, cause I haven't bought it yet.

I think this is a very reliable processor.

I can't have dealt with the company, cause I'm from Belarus. :)

I play the guitar for 4 years. 3 years i played classic music and a year ago I decided to buy an alectrik guitar for playing some rock'n'other :). Now I want to use a processor but I have a great problem. In our country it'is very expansive. It costs 240$. Nowadays I have only 170 :). In america in costs 130$. Maybe there are some persons hwo can help me with buing a processor or just making a consultation with american payment and others... Great thanks. Sorry for my English :) COntact on mail e-mail Anders-u3@yandex.ru

Once you get the hang of it its not to difficult.
The manual helps but , The best way is to experiment.

for what I need the sound is pretty good ,
I use it with a Marshall DSL 100 , So I keep the amp models and speaker cab options off . I tend to keep the compression off as well.
I think for the money the effects are pretty decent obviously the flanger for example is not as pristine as a MXR 117 Flanger , but that one pedal is just as much as this pedal with all its goodies..
Bottom line I think the effects are worthwhile and you get can a wide array of really usuable sounds.

seems solid.

I play heavy rock , old school , stuff like Trower , Hendrix , Gary Moore , Schenker etc.
For my needs this pedal is cool .
With some tweaking you can find some really cool shit .You definitely have to tweak this because some of the artist's sounds are way over the top ,but they are cool to getting a starting point.
The RP 200A is alot of fun creating different tones.

It's very easy to use. The user interface is very intuitive. It's much easier to work with than the Zoom 505 I used a few years ago. Editing patches takes only 2 minutes if you know what sound you want. The manual is excellent, everything is explained very well. It has a built-in tuner and drum machine, which are great. The firmware can't be upgraded though.

I am currently using this with a Marshall v8080 for rehearsing with my band and a Marshall mg15cd combo for playing at home. I must say I prefer the overdrive of both amps to the rp200a overdrive. That's because those amps colour the sound of the digitech too much. I used it before with a Laney 50 w combo and it sounded good for a crappy amp. Also, I used to play with it throught my computer and my home stereo and it sounded great. The other effects are superb and you can tweak a lot, this little box has everything! But if you're planning on using this as a distortion pedal, get a stomp box instead. I can easily get Iron Maiden sounds out of it, also Metallica, Marty Friedman,...
The amp simulators are not that good for playing through an amp, but are excellent for silent practice and recording with the speaker cabinet simulators. However, I think the amp simulators sound a bit too digital with distortion and the cabinet simulators could use a bit more treble. I really love the acoustic guitar simulator and the clean amps are very good too.

I've had this for a year now and never had any problems with it. I have played several concerts without a backup. It's made completely out of metal, it's not a plastic piece of junk.

I've never dealt with the company, 'cause I haven't had any problems, but they have a great website with forums and sound patches: http://www.digitech.com/soundcomm/guitar_product_start.asp?productid=170

I play mainly rock, hard rock and metal. It's a good pedal if you want versatility, but the distortion could be better. I have been playing for 14 years now. If it were stolen, I think I'd buy something else, not because it's bad, but because I like to experiment.

ok I wasn't sure if I'd revied this or not, but I will send in one now. It is quite a powerful instrument to use. I was a little confused at first on how to edit stuff, but about 10 minutes of playing and I had it down pat. Never used the manual except to see which amp models were which. You can easily edit every sound quite extensively, which is nice. Getting a good sound out of it is as easy as turning it on.

Sound quality is good (it IS a DigiTech). I use a Fender Deluxe Player strat thru a Crate (not sure of the model-its not mine) 50 watt amp and a Fender FM212 amp. The FM sucks bigtime so it doesn't sound as good through it, but the Crate it sounds way cool through. Its not a noisy pedal because of the Silencer function. My strat buzzes quite a bit when the silencer isn't on, although I can't figure out why. I don't really try to mimic sounds from other artists. I play a lot of U2 covers and have built effects for Vertigo, Beautiful Day, and Sunday Bloody Sunday that are fairly close to sounding like Edge's effects. Can't sound totaly like Edge as I lack the nice guitars that he uses. Can easily achieve blues, rock, metal, or clean sounds. I don't use a lot of effects (chorus, flange, etc), but use a bit of delay and reverb and both are suberb on this pedal. Many reverbs from arena, studio, church, hall, etc, and 3 types of delay: ping-pong, mono, and don't remember the third. Overall a good sound quality

Definately relieable. Treat it with care and she will treat you back with good sounds and reliability. All metal which is definately a plus. Would not use at a gig as it is a bit time consuming switching between effects if I need to. If I were to use the same effect the whole gig, would not think twice about using it w/o a backup.

Never dealt with the company

I play rock, blues, classic country, a little of everything. Works great for all of them. Would get another if lost or stolen, but may update to the next model higher. I would recomend it and would work great for studio work. Have been playing for 6 years and have an Epiphone G-310, Fender FM-212 amp, Fender Princeton Chorus amp, Fender DG-11 acoustic, Fender Deluxe player strat (I like Fender), this pedal, Alesis Multi FX pedal, a couple stomp boxes. Have a lot of experience with other guitars and amps and effects and this one is superior. Have used it at a small gig running it stratight to the PA system and not even through an amp and it worked wonderful. E-mail for questions but i'd recommend it to anybody

ok I wasn't sure if I'd revied this or not, but I will send in one now. It is quite a powerful instrument to use. I was a little confused at first on how to edit stuff, but about 10 minutes of playing and I had it down pat. Never used the manual except to see which amp models were which. You can easily edit every sound quite extensively, which is nice. Getting a good sound out of it is as easy as turning it on.

Sound quality is good (it IS a DigiTech). I use a Fender Deluxe Player strat thru a Crate (not sure of the model-its not mine) 50 watt amp and a Fender FM212 amp. The FM sucks bigtime so it doesn't sound as good through it, but the Crate it sounds way cool through. Its not a noisy pedal because of the Silencer function. My strat buzzes quite a bit when the silencer isn't on, although I can't figure out why. I don't really try to mimic sounds from other artists. I play a lot of U2 covers and have built effects for Vertigo, Beautiful Day, and Sunday Bloody Sunday that are fairly close to sounding like Edge's effects. Can't sound totaly like Edge as I lack the nice guitars that he uses. Can easily achieve blues, rock, metal, or clean sounds. I don't use a lot of effects (chorus, flange, etc), but use a bit of delay and reverb and both are suberb on this pedal. Many reverbs from arena, studio, church, hall, etc, and 3 types of delay: ping-pong, mono, and don't remember the third. Overall a good sound quality

Definately relieable. Treat it with care and she will treat you back with good sounds and reliability. All metal which is definately a plus. Would not use at a gig as it is a bit time consuming switching between effects if I need to. If I were to use the same effect the whole gig, would not think twice about using it w/o a backup.

Never dealt with the company

I play rock, blues, classic country, a little of everything. Works great for all of them. Would get another if lost or stolen, but may update to the next model higher. I would recomend it and would work great for studio work. Have been playing for 6 years and have an Epiphone G-310, Fender FM-212 amp, Fender Princeton Chorus amp, Fender DG-11 acoustic, Fender Deluxe player strat (I like Fender), this pedal, Alesis Multi FX pedal, a couple stomp boxes. Have a lot of experience with other guitars and amps and effects and this one is superior. Have used it at a small gig running it stratight to the PA system and not even through an amp and it worked wonderful. E-mail for questions but i'd recommend it to anybody

Sure easy to edit and get the sound you want. Manual is good, but unit is a breeze without it.

I actually posted a review in March '05, but wanted to give an update after 6 months' use. I run straight into the chrch PA, monitoring through an old TOA keyboard amp. Been using my Epiphone LP Special a lot more than the Strat lately, especially since replacing the pickups. I especially like the Tweed sound. I've even programmed a setting for my Yamaha APX10 acoustic. For this, the trick is to set the Amp Type to "AMP OF(F)"(no, you don't use the "ACOUST" setting, this is only for trying to make a solid-body electric sound like an acoustic). Then, a little reverb, light chorus + compression and EQ until it sounds right. My mandolin sounds good through it, too. Great sounding little box.

Again, it's a little tank. I'm not at all concerned about it failing. It's also cool that it's built in USA (rare these days).

I primarily use this in the Praise & Worship band at church. I've been playing for about 40 years, including many as a touring pro, opening up for acts as diverse as Tammy Wynette and Iron Butterfly. My only reservation about this unit is that I sometimes wish it was bigger. Once in awhile without knowing it, my heel will slip a little from the expression pedal and start cycling through all the patches until it stops on some totally innapropriate sound. Mostly just my own clummsyness I guess. Also, since I sing, I can't be looking down at it all the time, so it's easy to miss the right pedal. But I'm getting better! Would I buy it again? In a heartbeat (if I didn't upgrade to the 300 or 400, that is). This is a great unit. I've even used the built-in drums a bit for rehearsals. Absolutely can't beat it for the money. Highly recommended!

This thing has so many different effects I doubt I?ll ever come close to using them all. The more complex (and some just stupid) effects are fun to play with but not really that useful in the long run. The distortions are nice and I was amazed by the variations that you can have- from nice valve type G?n?R sounds to simply insane shred tones- brilliant! The clean sounds are really good with a lot of variation and with chorus are an absolute delight. The wah sounds are pretty good but if you want to have a sound like a JD crybaby just buy the separate pedal, there?s no chance anything simulated will suffice. The drum machine is very simplistic and the sounds do piss you off fairly easily, but it?s good for practising on your own and I did manage to use it in my GCSE music coursework! It?s fairly easy to use but sometimes I wish it had a ?banks? system like other multi-effects. The in/outputs are quite good you get your main jacks for guitar in and amp out but also a mini jack in and output for headphones and a CD player (or MP3player or whatever) a nice touch for jamming. Also for my ?120 I got a nice case, extra lead and headphones (with extra long cable so you can use them with the pedal when it?s on the floor)

Like I said it?s got so many combinations and variations you will probably never get to try them all but everything I?ve heard so far from it has been good. The distortions are great not fizzy like you get from some other multi-effects pedals (*cough* zoom *cough*). The only complaints I have on sound quality are the drum machine- and if you want drums for anything other than just bedroom practise get a drummer, or a dedicated drum machine because they?re cleverer. I did mention about the wahs earlier, the actual wahs are good but the thing is you can?t really emulate a crybaby they?re just so unique.

The whole thing has held together well despite quite rough treatment (I?m sorry) and the fact that I?m always lugging it around somewhere. The only thing I?m worried about is the power supply the connection from the cable to the plug isn?t looking too healthy but I?m sure it?ll be fine or else I?ll just buy another one. I?m amazed at how well the plastic (metal look) casing has survived it does feel and sound as though it?s gonna break (clanking away when using wah) but it?s never shown any sign of stress or cracking.

Never dealt with them really. I did register the pedal although it?s not very cleverly thought out- If you send the registration card back to the company it?ll cost you to do so because you have to send it to the states. I just did it online.

I play a lot of classic Rock and Heavy Metal and my band, Alcoholocaust's style is 'Satirical Metal'. This pedal is more than up to the job of giving me the right tones for this but I might buy a seperate overdrive/ distortion just for ease of changing to other sounds. If it were lost or stolen, I would either buy one of the higher end models or switch to a Korg AX1500 because of my hunger for more effects. I hear you can buy a multi effect stompbox where you can download the effects into it from the computer, well technology is moving so fast now it?s just impossible to keep up! There isn't anything I have found that I dislike about the pedal just the bit about it not having banks of effects, which is why I might switch to Korg, but it?s just a personal preference. Try one before you buy it definitely. And consider the price against other companies? equivalents. The one thing I will say is that it was a hell of a lot cheaper buying this pedal than thousands of single stompboxes!

Kind of complicated to use at first. Once you read the manual and get a feel for everything, however, editing patches is intuitive and easy. Footswitches are durable, but very sensitve; its easy to overshoot your patches when scrolling. Thus, it is difficult to switch "on the fly."

I used a Washburn X40 (H/S/H) with stock WB pickups. First, I played it through my Boston Acoustics 2.1 PC monitors. It sounded pretty good here. The amp models were quite nice and somewhat realistic. I especially liked the "Boutique" setting; it gave the most unique distortion I've yet to use on a modeling unit. The effects were decent, though I'm not one for modulations. The delays and reverbs are the real strength of this unit. The array and quality of each is great.

However, I soon got an amp, a Kustom Dual 35 DFX. The Digitech lost everything in front of the amp. It was easy to tell it was digital next to the comparitavley warmer analog SS tones of the Kustom. I sold it after having it two months because I wanted to build a rig around my new amp. So, if you are planning to run the Digitech in front of an amp, drop my score to 5.

Seemed reliable enough when I had it. Built sturdy and strong. I wouldn't gig it except maybe as a stand alone unit straight into the PA at a coffeshop or something. Most other situations would be too intensive for its archaic patch switching scheme.

I've been playing about a year, and the gear listed in the review is all the gear I have.

All in all, the Digitech is great as a starter effects unit or as a desktop practice unit if you can afford to have such. It gave me a good handle on the effects I needed for my music. I wish I had known that I was only going to use it to learn about effects, I would have saved my money and bought the RP50.

If the Digitech was layed out in a more versatile manner, I might still have it. Its sound quality is superior to the ZOOM GFX 1 I attmepted to replace it with but sent back to Music123. Combine the layout of the ZOOM with the sounds of the Digitech and you would have one usable pre-amp.

This pedal is very easy to use. The little manual has enough information to get you going, and just about everything is intuitive.

I use a Strat into a Marshall. The sound quality varies depending on what settings you select. Sometimes everything sounds great, sometimes the sound is a bit cheesy. On some variations it is hard to play at lower volumes. The best tonal qualities are the amp modeling, distortion, and reverb. The phaser and pitch shifter are decent, not great. Most of the artist and stylistic presets are worth trying out.

The unit itself seems solid, and I have never had a problem with the controls or settings shifting around. My only complaint in this department is that the expression pedal is very tight and not very responsive. A little loosening with a socket wrench will help a lot.

N/A

For the money, this is pretty good. For the cost of less than two Boss or MXR pedals you get a lot of choices packed into a straightforward unit. I would especially recommend this to someone just getting started on effects. Buy this, play with the various effects and combinations, and after awhile determine which effects you really end up using on a regular basis. For those that you use often, decide if this unit is good enough or if you need to upgrade to a specialized pedal.