DigiTech Whammy 4

Very simple, you know the setup, one pedal, one button and a knob to select the effect.

Ok so this website seems to be filled with arrogant "guitarists" thinking theyre better than everyone else, so this pedal is not good enough for them.

Lets set this straight.

I am a tone freak like normal, but anyone who says it colours their tone horribly are overreacting. Yes it does take out a small amount of tone, but its nothing that a bit of twiddling with the EQ wont stop. I have a behringer Ultra-Curve DSP8024 and a couple of tiny changes made it fine. For the person that said below "EXPERIENCED guitarists wont be able to use this" is full of himself. Experienced guitarists will be able to use this just fine.

The only other problem I faced was the fact that when you click it on the pitch moved up a bit or down a bit depending on the option. However I sliced the rubber feet off and it works perfectly now.

Im not a fan of any of the effects apart from the octaver. I bought it as a substitute for a whammy bar, as I dont use them, and it works fine for the quick pitch shifts.

My setups large, but basically a custom Schecter through a pedalboard of boss, vox and ibanez pedals, then into a rack with a Behringer EQ, DI boxes for my cabs to monitors, A Marshall Pre amp then a Mesa boogie Rectifier Power Amp out to 2 4x12 mesa's for dirty and 2 4x12 orange cabs for clean. Simple?

This thing isnt going to let you down. its a brick.

Horrible. I bought this pedal while on tour in america, and getting it back to the UK needed a UK power supply. Took them 6 months to get me one.

Its an amazing pedal if you have the correct knowledge to set it up properly. By no means a plug in a perfect pedal though.

Oh and finally I place it second in my chain, after my tuner (for obvious resons, leaving it on once, and re-tuning for a different song led to some horrible sounds!)

Maybe you need the manual if you intend to the midi option, but I would not know. Otherwise you dont need the manual. Straightforward.

I used to own a Wh-1, so I know what that sounds like. Usually I think its a lot of hype about old musicequipment being better, but I`m afraid that in my opinion the Wh-1 was a totally different sounding pedal, and much cooler. I can not get anything close to the sound from the Wh-1 with this pedal.
But, it is also true that my Wh-1 was getting very worn, and nothing lasts forever. I was forced to sell due to a lasting lack of money, but still I regret it.
I will however still stick with this Wh-4 since it is ok, and I dont use whammy a hole lot. A Wh-1 will not make you a better player, and the Wh-4 has what you need unless you`re a real fineschmekker in tone.

Have no reason to doubt it.

would not know.

You plug the guitar in, turn a knob, rock ur foot...even your drummer could figure this one out!

First off...I use this thing in front of a Line6 PODxt Live, into a Fender Hot Rod Deluxe, 1X12 amp. I play with a heavily modded Mexican Fender Strat, a Gibson Les Paul Studio, and an Ibanez RG 170 (my first guitar which I will never sell). This pedal is one of those toys that, as a guitar player, you don't NEED, but you definitely want. Sounds good. However when the effect is on, but you have the pedal heel down (therefore no pitch changes) it will colour your sound quite a bit. I was kinda on the fence about this issue, and then it dawned on me...who cares? you can have a hugely expensive set up, and if you have ONE of your pedals colouring your sound, it'll be different, yes, maybe a little tiny bit less attack, but if you're a good player you can make it up. Most venues don't have a good enough sound system to do your kick ass guitar tone justice.
I might as well add, this thing is GREAT at cutting through your mix. Once you bring up the octave and scream out some kind of doo hickey, people WILL hear it, even if you haven't changed your volume. It's like the kid in the school choir who's voice is cracking...he's not neccessarily singing louder, but when he cracks, EVERYONE hears it. This is the same thing...in a good way. I'm impressed.

This thing is probably the most solid Digitech anything....every seen the RP series of multi effects?? I'm scared to sneeze on those. cheap plastic junk. This is a tank.

You will read in other reviews about the issue of when you have the effect on, and heel down, it will bounce up a little bit putting the guitar sound out of tune with the rest of the band...the first thing I reccomment is getting a steak knife and cutting the little rubber pads off....leave a little bit so you don't chip off the red paint finish entirely....but that's all they're there for...cosmetic. you'll thank me later...you might eventually chip some paint there....but who looks at pedals?? I want to HEAR them.

n/a

this pedal is the balls. very cool. if you're on the fence about getting one, do what I did at first....buy one and return it a week or two later and complain that it just coloured the tone of the guitar too much. Only do this if you know it's a store that will give you a refund....you just rented a pedal for free. Then...you can decide for yourself....reading reviews will just give you cold feet....always positive and negetive. I say enough pros I respect use this thing...it's good enough for me. I give this pedal a 10 because it's really cool, and everyone thinks you rock if you have one of these on the floor....just use it right man...if you're a hack....don't buy it....that'll just give the pedal a bad name...

First things first:

#1--I don't like Tom Morello at all.
#2--I don't like Rage or Audioslave at all.

Now that the skeptics are back in neutral, this pedal is very easy to use. All of the options are very self explanatory, and it only has three controls to begin with: knob to select your effect, pedal to manipulate your note(s), and on/off switch. If you choose to buy one, I would definetly recommend calibrating it as soon as you take it out of the box; that way, you know it's correct before you even plug in and form an opinion.

I use an Ibanez S470 guitar, a Crybaby standard way, a Bad Horsie wah, and a Boss DS-1. I run everything through a TSL100 head and a 1960Lead angled cabinet with Celestion GT75 Watt speakers.

Contrary to what appears to be popular opinion among most other postings on here, I do not have any kind of problem with tone sucking(and I am truly a tone FREAK), and I run my whammy DEAD LAST in my effects chain! After everything else! Mine is one of the newer units though, so that could make a major difference...

I bought it because of how I have heard Satch, Vai, and a Florida guy named Bill Peck use it for.

The only time that I think the sound quality lacks is when your way up on the neck, shredding away, and have the whammy in the toe up position. This tends to create a VERY ear pierceing sound, and a very interesting (though not necessarily good) reaction from audience members...

Very reliable, I've only had two problems with it:

#1--one time I tried to tune and it needed recalibrated, thus throwing my pitches WAY OUT--very inconvenient, especially if you have a floyd rose type trem system.

#2--had the rubber foot pegs under the expression pedal come off minutes before a gig. If this happens, DONT PANIC--just recalibrate, and you're ready to rip.

Never had to deal with them.

I play rock, hard rock, instrumental rock, and metal, and the actual whammy function is very useful for all of these applications, especially the standard one octave setting. Would recommend it for any lead guys in these arenas of music.

Wouldn't advise using it with chords, though. The harmonizer and de-tuning options aren't very useful for me, though it could just be how it sounds to my ear--other people may have better luck.

Not sure if I would replace it if it were stolen or lost, as I haven't had it long enough to make it an integral part of my sound. However, I will say that it does give you a nice additional soloing option, besides just standard hi-gain and wah.

This pedal is increadably easy to use. I couldn't afford an optional midi pedal to change presets by foot, but I got this item on ebay called the Whammy Wheel for 6 bucks and it is just as good. I wish there was an equalizing feature on the pedal because when im using it as a bass, I hate the clucking that it makes when its trying to pitch shift the twang and buzz of the guitar strings. If you use this as a bass guitar emulator, then your allways going to have to use your neck pickup plus pick using your thumb. Otherwise the crappy cluck buzz of the strings ruins your sound. Also when using it as a bass emulator, the voulume drops significantly, so it would be a good idea to have a volume boost or something of the like placed right after the pedal.

Sound quality is surprisingly good. Once again I wish there was some eq on it because the high octave up sound is much too shrill and hurts my ears, but it does sound awsome if you use some sort of frequency weighted compression or if you just play quiet. But this thing will hurt your ears in the higher octave regions if you play loud. Playing two notes or more at once creates a garbling digital sound which is much more noticeable in the higher and lower settings. But if you use it to just shift down like 2 or 4 steps or up 1 or 2 steps, it sounds pretty good, allthough the garbling is allways somewhat noticable. Some people like this sound like Radioheads "my iron lung", but it doesn't sound so good when your trying to sound like a baritone guitar or a ukilele. A trick I use to smooth out the garbling digital sound is to use reverb after the pedal. This makes all the notes its trying to produce at once sound more in conjunction with one another because they will all be sounding off at any given time due to the nature of reverb. Its not noisy, allthough if you have the pedal on, and have it shifted to normal pitch, it noticably effects the sound by making it chorusy and thin. If your not using it, its not recommended that you shift to normal pitch and leave it there because it just doesn't sound right, like there is a doubling in the backround or something. Its best to bypass when not in use.

It is very reliable. I can't imagine being able to break this thing unless I got it wet on stage or something. I don't use backups of anything, but I don't perform, so I can't really say. Ive never had any pedal fail on me exept my tube distortion pedal, which it just needed it potentiometers cleaned with that spray you get at radio shakc.

Ive never used customer support for any pedal ever. I guess im just lucky or something.

Ive been playing music (drums, bass, guitar, singing,) for about 15 years. I play nine inch nails, pixies, the cure, beck, guns n roses type of music. I use this first in the chain of a multitude of pedals and through a Fender Blues Deluxe amplifier. I use a stratocaster with a hot rails bridge pickup and a vintage rails neck pickup (seymour duncan). I love how this pedal can imitate baritone, bass and hammer dulcimer sounds. I hate how it doesn't perfectly replicate two or more notes played at once. Im starting to wonder if it is even possible to make a pedal that perfectly does this. I also don't like how there is like a 1 milisecond delay before the sound comes out, but this is very minor complaint. Its much easier than having to clean my strings off, pick up my bass guitar, plug it in, then clean the strings off, etc.

Easy

Using a 1978 Marshall 50 watt Mark II head and matching 4x12 marshall cabinet and a 2000 Fender Statocaster American Series with maple neck and whammy bar.....

I didn't notice any tone loss at practice or during our shows and I play rather clean.

The pedal sounds are fun but not worth $200 to me.

The harmonizers are a bit frustrating.

The whammy effect is ok but cliches in the processing can be heard. Not good for recording but fun for a show.

Just not worth the money or the hassle of lugging around.

I would have kept it if it were only $70.

I've been playing everyday since 1979 and took pro lessons in 1975.

I have 5 vintage Marshall half stacks and a few old Fender and Gibson tube amps from the 60's and 70's.

I have a closet full of 70's Les Pauls.

Very easy to use. Turn the knob to dial in your setting and use the expression pedal to alter the note. My only problem is that it is difficult to see the settings on a dim stage - I have to keep a flashlight at my feet. Also, you can't use it in a daisy chain or with a Pedal Power or anything - it draws too much current. The original adapter it came with broke - it was 1300mA! I'm currently using it with an Alesis 9V adapter that's 830mA. Therefore, I have to use it's own adapter on my pedal board. These are minor concerns, but I notice these things because I gig with my equipment!

Excellent - it does what you expect it to do. You have to run this as the first pedal in your chain! Before everything, even wahs. You could put a compressor before it if you only use mild compression. It can't go in the effects loop, either. I don't come close to using all the settings. I like the "shallow detune" - kind of like a chorus/phaser combo. I use it like Tom Morello does to get the up an octave thing for "Killing in th Name". I also use it to harmonize single notes an octave up, an octave down, and a fifth up. It doesn't track chords well - save it for single notes.

Mine has taken a beating and still works great! Only once after about 5 years did I have to tighten the nut/bolt of the actual expression pedal because it wouldn't go completely "toe up" (over time it got loose, and the weigth of the actual pedal would not allow it to go completely "toe up". Like I said, I tightened it and it's perfect.

N/A

Excellent. It doesn't track chords that well but it's not supposed to. It does what it does and does it perfectly.

You have to have basic knowledge on effects or else you will be a little confused, but for the most part it's simple. The trickiest things are the detune, and harmonizers if you use them.

I love the sound, and before I got it knew the what I would get, so I was very pleased in that category. Now everyone says it ruins your tone, but for the most part when you're using it your making weird noises anyway. And for the bypass it works fine. I run it through a Boss Gt 6, Boss MT-2, Dunlop crybaby 535q, a morley crybaby cause with 2 wah pedals you can make some cool sounds, a Boss Flanger, a boss tremolo and a 2 channel selector for my amp. My amp is a JCM 2000 tsl, and its tone doesn't fade at all. I love Tom Morello, and thanks to this pedal I can play every song on the first album, bulls on parade, people of the sun, all of Battle of LA, I'm Housin, and Kill a man. I can now play all the solos because this is his main pedal. I love the sound of this pedal.

Let's put it this way it's made of steel, and it hasn't broken for me. And as for a backup I never have 2 of the same pedal, I can't afford it.

Didn't go to Digitech for it.

This pedal is a very creative pedal, and it works with my gear perfect. If you like getting weird, cool, and funky sounds like Rage, then you'll love this pedal. I recommend finding a nice one on ebay, and get it for what I paid for it. NO REGRETS ON MY PURCHASE!

Well the manual for this unit sorta sucks but you shouldn't need it because all of the effects are self explanitory and could be operated by a retarded monkey.

This is the part where I've seen some really mixed reviews, and yes I read them all before buying this unit. First let me say that I've played guitar for 19 years and am a major tone freak. However, I did not notice any change in tone when this unit was connected. I think that most people have a problem with this because they are not using the unit correctly. The manual says to put it first in the chain of effects, which is very important. I tried running this through the effects loop on my amp and I have to say I don't recommend this, while it worked good for the harmony presets, it did steel some volume and tone from while activated on the other presets. I'll put my setup at the bottom for anybody who really cares! first I won't to discuss the effects seperately.

Harmony: I find that this may be one of the most usefull effects on the pedal. Atleast for me. I've always wanted a harmonizer and I think that this pedal does a pretty good job.

Detune: Probably one of the least favorites, I actually don't plan on using this at all. It's basically a chorus effect. it can be shallow or deep (yuck).

Whammy: The actually whammy features are VERY fun, but I'm not sure how much I'll use them in a practical situation. I never really got into RATM and I never really thought he was that good of a guitar player so I have a different review than most people. The 1 and 2 Octaves up will probably get some live use somewhere in a solo but I'm not sure exactly where yet. The 1 octave down does a good job of sounding like a bass guitar. I might actually try to record bass parts in the studio like this and see how it sounds. So far it sounds good through my behringer V-amp pro. The 2 octaves down again is cool but I don't know what I would use it for. The Dive bomb effect is fun but also falls into this catagorie. The drop tune effect is actually the main reason that I bought this pedal. However, I'm not realy happy with this effect. It does change your tone a little when the effect is on-not really a big problem at all. but if you play clean and hold notes out it starts to get "warbley". This also happens when you play a low E or F chord with this effect. Again this effect is usefull but not in all applications.

Overall, I'm happy with the sound of the pedal but I wish that the drop tune didn't have any problems. That's really all I wanted, with some few extra fun effects. I was really hoping the effect to be that of the Digitech 2120.

My setup for anyone who cares: I use a music man axis, or Ibanez jem into the digitech whammy, then my crybaby wah, into my peavey triple XXX amp head with 5150 cab, through the effects loop I use a Rocktron hush, a Behringer V-amp pro (for effects), and a peavey EQ.

I haven't had it very long, but it looks dependable. I would gig with it-but I can't afford (nor do I need) a backup. Obviously, the idiot who is abuses this thing will destroy it. but I'm sure it will last a long time for me. The metal chasis feels like the same stuff that most rack effect have. so you decide how sturdy it is.

I actually e-mail the support because I thought I had a bad Whammy at first (cause of the drop tune problem). They said if that if the recalibration didn't help then there might be a problem with it. and to contact the dealer where I bought it. Not really very helpful but they did answere within the hour.

I play a little bit of everything from hard rock to punk to blues. obviously it depends on the music if you need this pedal but I recommend it. I like the harmonies, drop tune, and the whammy(oct up and down) features are fun. but again I wish the drop tune didn't have any problems with it. I thought about getting a digitech 2120 and a dhp-33 but they're old and I wanted something new. I also debated the boss ps-5 but it didn't have the drop tune effect. I may still get it for the intelligent harmonizer.

I was in a rut before I got the whammy and it has help inspire some new tunes.

If I lost it I would kick my own ass for throwing away $200. I wouldn't say I need this pedal but it sure is fun to play with. and it is helpful for coming up with new and different ideas.

Bought it for 1800 Swedish Kronor new 200 USD ca.
Userfriendly: one knob, one switch, many features. Immediate for lazy greedy players like me
It is the last generation of whammy: I remember trying the first models and not having the cash to buy one.
It still does the same job of its predecessors to my ears. Some claim it's worse, but I can't really say. Sorry.

I bought it for the whammy feature, not for the harmonising ones, which are entertaining but maybe not very usable.
The unit sounds good to me: like many said it steals some tone if U R a tone freak, which is why I have already bought a true by-pass. Problem solved.
I use it with a modded TSL 60 cabinet: it is noisy, but this pedal is meant to produce noise so I am not surprised with that.
Many claim it is not prfectly pitched: true. There is a slight difference in the tuning of the guitar when engaged.

You sure can get some RATM or even U2 (achtung baby): at the end of the day that is the pedal the used on some songs, so no surprise there

It is mainly a rythmical unit IMHO that allows to explore the neck of the guitar through a totally different angle.

In conclusion.....: noisy? yes - not perfectly pitched? yes - Fun? Hell yes, provided that you have enough fantasy to use such a unit.
If you do, your ears will not pay too much attention to the slight pitch differences or some of the funniy noises, as you will be busy having fun

I intend to use it live also...so many covers can be flavoured with this tool in my opinion.

Can't say. Hope I will never deal with Digitech

Again, can't say.
I have upgraded the thing with a true bypass.
Thanks to the guy who posted this site www.loooper.com!

I play everything I like: I can't do jazz, but that 's because I am not good enough to understand it...an play it.
Played for 16 yrs. Yes, i would buy it again, used or new, as long as I can "whammy".
Not many other products can offer what the whammy does, so - no - I did not compare w. anything else.
A true by-pass would have been good, so that I could have saved 50 bucks. Still I earn OK so as long as i can have some fun, I am not as worried about 50 dollars as I used to be.
It helps my creativity and makes me look for new rythmical patterns. The fact that you can go up two octave with a slight sweep w. opens so many possibilities.