DigiTech X-Series Digital Delay

I had a quick scan trough the manual on my way home with the pedal. Got home, plugged it up and away I went. No problems and easy to use straight out of the box. I was getting great sounds in minutes....very warm sounding, not clinical like a lot of digital delay pedals. The tape delay is fantastic.

I am using this pedal with a Fender Tele 62 custom reissue and on my pedal board a Boss OS2 overdrive and a nice old Boss CE2 chorus. The effect sounds great to me. I used to have a Boss DD3, but this pedal sounds much more natural. I am using a Laney LC2 30 watt valve amp and it is not at all noisy. make sure you use a good regulate power supply and it will be as quiet as a mouse!! It works well in my existing setup.

I have had no problems so far. I know some other people seem to have had problems further down the list, but it seems to be fine so far. I would use it without a backup....how many people carry spare pedals to a gig? I would just manage without it for the rest of the gig!! It's built like a tank.....as solid as a Boss if not more so...

N/A so far!!

I play Rock/Pop covers and this pedal covers all my needs. I have been playing for 30 years and own a few electrics and an acoustic. If it were lost or stolen I would replace it with the same quite happily. What I love most is the ease of use and the natural warm sound....but most useful to me is the tap tempo. You can sync the repeats to the drums/tempo in no time. Nothing to hate about it personally. I did try the boss DD5 but prefered the sound of the Digitech. I find it inspires me....which is important!! all I would say is use it with a good power supply. I have a power block on my pedal board and it worked with it straight away, no noise. I think some of the people who have complained about this pedal may have been unlucky or not used a good power supply. I am happy with it and would recommend it to anyone. Especially at the price.

Delay settings are easy to use, the loop mode can get tricky.

modes 1-3 are pretty nice, you get the typical sharp digital delay sound.
mode 4 is the one i use most, great tape sim sound, lofi and doesnt interfere with what you're playing
mode 5 is a chorused delay, it can be used as a chorus if u set the time really low, pretty good i guess
mode 6 is a reverse delay, really whacky and hard to use!
mode 7 is the loop mode, after a couple of tries it gets easy to use.

Its sounds really good with my Small clone(chorus) and my distortion pedals(mt2 and shredmaster)

The switch is getting abit funny but its still working!

N/A

I play alot of styles, from Tool to led zeppelin, and mode 4 is just great with the music i play. Sounds great with my other gear.
I tried out my friends DD3 and he played my digidelay, next day he changed his dd3 for a digidelay!
I wish the reverse mode could be 100% wet, that would rock!

In conclusion, its a great pedal and specially reccomended for people who are just starting to get in the world of delay, like me!

Right out of the box it seemed straight forward. I tried to figure out the loop and got lost. Ended up looking at the manual and amazingly, everything made sense. Not too hard to understand for a delay though.

Gear: I play in the youth band for my church and for some strang reason, they discourage me to use an amp, so I plug straight into the direct box. I mainly play a Samick electric-acoustic and use the chorus setting for a more stereo sound. I have though, played several gigs with my Fender Tele and crate(crap) combo amp. I use this delay pedal at the end of the chain along with a Digitech metal master and tone driver.

When played by itself, the delay is reasonably quiet.

I dislike the short loop time and if I turn my "time" all the way around, the pedal stops working all together. The reverse feature is sad too. Well more like useless.

I do however, get some great sounds out of this thing. Setting 1-5 are great for any kind of genre.

How well can I depend on it? Well, I don't think it's gonna last forever. Little things like the battery connector wires breaking(happened on my Metal master too) and the time setting turned all the way up making it stop working, makes me think it's gonna fall apart.

I might go into a gig without back up but my sound would be lost. I think for the time being the pedal can stand up for itself.

I've been playing guitar for nearly 6 years. I play all kinds of music and this pedal helps me do that. If something ever happened to this pedal I would probably get something else unless I found this one at a great price.

I love the clean repeats/echos/delays. I hate the possible failure. I like the morph idea that digitech uses.

I compared this pedal to the boss dd-3 and thought the value was better with this pedal. Now I wish I would have sprung for the Boss.

Thre are some nice sounds. The manual is clear and the website helps. It is best, with digital delays, to get the newest stuff cause the software is most up to date. Sometimes the digital sound would come through, however. The loop wa useless, just started feeding back all the time and just too short for good loops; that was disappointing.

A korina carruthers' tele with voodoo pickups. a totem delta with jason lollars (the best!), through a silverface champ and a heavily modded peavey classic 30. I pay roots music. The slap back setting was nice, the delays were precise. The lopp was useless, fed back all the time, like a sine wave.

Well, here's the thing: it began to die on me! This is most unusual, I don't ride pedals that hard, but between the loop being so crappy and the very pedal beginning to not work, I lost faith in this pedal.

They may be fine for all I know; I didn't try to get it fixed, just dumped it.

Between the bad loop and the bad manufacture, a disappointment.

Very straightforward to use - I took it straight to a gig before I'd even tested it and my "best guess" settings were almost spot on. Sign of a good purchasem (I ain't clever).

Noisy? Seriously? I bought this to try and emulate a WEM Copicat I had in my youth and, be honest, nothing was noisier than one of those. The tape delay setting was EXACTLY what I was looking for. Loads of background noise and delay deterioration. If you want quiet stick to digital delays. Noise is what gives FX pedals soul!!!!!!

I've only had it a couple of weeks but it's built like a tank and I can't see it letting me down so I'll take a flyer on the score.........

Here's hoping I never need to use them

I love this pedal. Seriously. Anyone with noise problems - just send it to me - I'll give it a good home. I play anything - rock, pop, blues, country (poor), reggae (really bad). This pedal just does it. No questions. Everybody listen - NOISE IS GOOD. NOISE IS SOUL.

PS I love harmony-central - God bless you guys. I value all the reviews and read them all (yes I'm that sad person). I only post a review when I feel moved (see Tokai Metaldriver!!!!!!!! apologies for accidentally staying anonymous - old man versus technology)

Very easy to use...although I'm somewhat embarressed to admit I have not learned the looping function yet! I read with great jealousy about others who loop to their little hearts content. You would think after 30 years of playing, I could figure this one out. Anywa, other than my idiocy, this thing get's a 10 for it's bone simple operation. You set the knob to the appropriate delay function, twirl a few knobs and yer off!

I'm very happy with the sound this little gem creates. The vintage tape echo is wonderful....the solos dealy setting ( run stero with two amps ) is stunning and the chorused delay is very lush. Those are the three settings I tend to use the most and I'd be happy if the pedal only did one of them. There are quite a few more delay types on board, but these are what fit my needs. I'm sure there are much better delays out there, but for my needs and the pittence I paid for it, ( $55 new ) I'm very happy.

The battery problem others have mentioned is a bitch! A brand new Energizer of Duracell will alst about 10 minutes in this sucker. Don't even try a battery that is not alkaline or better. They just won't work. With the proper power supply however, everything is hunky dorey. I did not get upset as others have....I just popped for a power supply and went on my merry way. The foot pedal has become a bit microphonic...that is a bit of a worry. I emailed digitech support and the offered to fix or replace, but I don't want to be without it, so I live with it. It's not life threatening or detrimental to my tone....just a bit annoying! I've had it for over a year or so now and it continues to work well ( other that the above ) for me. I had read horror stories of digitechs reliability, but pooh-pooh'd them until I had the opportunity to try it for myself. It suits my needs and style of play very well.

They set up a web site forum for the X series pedals...but it kinda went by the way side ( I have not been there for a while, so I could be talking out my ass ) after many complaints regarding the power supply, etc. I figure they are cheap enough, if I get a year or two out of em and they die, no biggie. I'll just buy a new one or some new kid on the block. It's not like buying a new Les Paul and having it fall apart...it's a freaking pedal!

I am first and foremost a blues player. It seems these day's though, I am called to do more U2ish, ambient, atmospheric, type stuff. I love to do it too! While I would prefer to just play da blooz, doing the other stuff is fun. Using the delay in conjunction with my volume pedal, ebow, various fuzz pedals and overdrives really creates some beautiful textures. I'd like to try some ugly, noise type stuff, but it's the pretty stuff that seems to flow from my soul. I also play with the worship team at our church. We have a total of three guitar players, so I try to do something different than the other two and not contribute to the midrage moras that three guitars create. The solo setting and the chorus delay setting work wonders in this context creating space, ambience and distance from the other gutiar players. The digidelay really helps my guitar sit better in the mix. One of my favorite pedal purchases over the past few years. You know, I hate to give ratings as a 9 or 10 are thrown out so flippantly. For me..and for waht this pedal is..a stomp box, cheap delay.....it get's a 9. It does waht I need it to do.

Like any effect, it takes a little fooling around with to learn its palette of sounds, but this pedal is remarkably easy to use, and sounds great. However, Digitech should not claim that this pedal can be used with a nine-volt battery. In my experience, if the unit functions at all when under battery power--no matter how fresh the battery--it does so erratically, so I'd have to say that the pedal is literally unusable unless you have the correct plug-in poower supply, which'll likely run you twelve to fifteen bucks. With the plug-in, though, this pedal is as easy as pie--and, despite what some other reviewers claim, you can get some psychadelic, warp-like sounds out of this thing worthy of a trip through a wormhole that spits you ten miles north of the stratosphere. This thing sounds good.

Good, though knob-tweekers like me should be careful not to let this thing get too out of control--I've processed some digitally jacked runaway trains that could give even the hardiest amp or PA a run for its money.

All's well here, too, as long as you have the plug-in adaptor power supply. Becase of the faulty operation of this unit when under battery power (described above), I'm taking off some points here.

I emailed about the battery shortcoming, and recieved a prompt reply, though nothing th guy said could explain away the pedal's inability to operate with a battery. He sugested litium batteries, and/or the AC adaptor. Well, that's not what their ads or the unit specifications say.

Overall, I love this pedal, but I can't give it a perfect rating because it delivers optimum performance only when used with an AC adaptor, which is not how it is marketed. If you want a good delay pedal, though, and you don't mind this issue, the Digidelay sounds awesome, and it's become a cornerstone of my sound. I'd pit it against any delay unit I've heard or played.

It takes little effort to pull out good sounds out of this piece of work. At first, I wondered how it sounded so crude and basically, crap, but then I remembered that time based effects should only be used in the FX loop. Far enough, and I plop it in. Voila! Sounds incredible! With vigor, I started tweaking the knobs and immediately got some very nice sounds out of it.
Tweaking is easy enough, just dial a sound style with one knob, and set the repeats and time to appropriate values and you're good to go.
The manual is pretty good with some initial settings to test out and get a feeling for the pedal and the effect itself.

I've used the pedal on both my previous Peavey Studio Pro 112 65W and my current ENGL Powerball 100W and it sounds very good on both. My guitar is the Jackson DX7 7-stringer, and the sound is good with all combos.

After adding the pedal, the noise levels stayed pretty much identical, so props to Digitech for that, especially since I've heard that delay pedals in particular are very prone to adding unwanted noise. Not this one.

As I mentioned earlier, I can get a Satriani sound pretty easily from it. Not all of his, though, as he uses two or more delays to make a kind of reverb style delay sound.

Still, it wasn't an immediate mindblow, but then again, I don't have other delay pedals to compare it to and I figure most studio delays are post-recording effects added to a dry guitar sound, so it's not a good compare point. But it is still very nice, especially for Satriani style stuff.

These new Digitech X-series pedals seem to follow the path that Boss took with the majority of their pedals. Very sturdy that is. The knobs are also firm and well built. I don't see how this pedal would break under normal circumstances.

Haven't needed to deal with them yet.

Most of my stuff is metal combined with Satriani style leads. I also use it when jamming along to Satriani, Dream Theater and similar bands. As for my playing time, I've been playing electric guitar since January 2000 and acoustic since Fall 1997.

If this pedal would be stolen, I'd first file a theft report and then buy a new one. Once the original is returned, I'll first use it to maul the thief and then promptly put it behind my new one and get that Satriani-style reverby delay.

When I was considering upon delay pedals, I also checked the Boss DD-3, DD-5 and Electro Harmonix Deluxe Memory Man. I finally ended up getting this one and haven't regretted it to date.

One annoying thing in it is the reverse delay, which is effectively unusable as it first plays the note that you first played in delay, and *then* reverses it, effectively making 3 sounds, which spoils the idea. Without it repeating the original note first, I think the reverse delay would be very interesting.

As for creating new, I think it helps me give some new ideas, but I can't help but think of Satriani on whatever leads I play with it. Heh.

Definitely check this pedal out if you're looking for a delay pedal. Compare it to some others, like the Boss DD-3, DD-5 and Electro Harmonix Deluxe Memory Man, since they are some other popular delay pedals. Pick the one which you like the most. I might predict it would most likely be this one.

Easy. If you're familiar with any other BOSS-type delay pedal you'll play in a second.
Manual is ok, could be a little more complete and clear

I'm using it in a pedal board, after oc-2, 535q wah, guyatone od, small stone, ibanez flanger; it goes straight in the input of my Mesa Formula Pre + Marshall 20/20 power amp into a H&K 2x12 cabinet.
I like the sound, I find it very warm for being digital (even too warm in "analog" mode). The BIG problem is that this pedal is a bit noisy, especially (as other comments here say) in tap tempo mode, which is almost not usable, even if you are recording direct after the pedal into a mixer.
Noisy, unfortunately, but the sound is pretty good.

It seems very sturdy, but it does something strange with your signal path. Again: it's noisy

I play everything, mostly alternative rock and pop/rock.
It's useful, complete and inspiring (loop, reverse function can make for interesting riffs)
It's good and I think it has all that you need in a delay (not a big difference compared even to a Line6 modeler). The thing that makes it not useful for a "pro" quality/use is definitely the background noise...
That's why I'll keep it but i will use it to record demoes mostly for it's "cabinet simulator" mode and together with my old BOSS DSD2 that I'll keep on "fixed" to the pedalboard for live and rehersal...
Really bad: I'll probably will need to buy a Line6 as a definitive choice because I didn't like the new BOSS delay pedals.

For a fairly cheap digital delay, it sounds pretty good. It was somewhat noisy on my overdrive channel (even when switched off) but I have been using it in the fx loop where it makes some noise but not enough to make me care. I like the tape echo mode best. I use this pedal mainly for spacy guitar solos, and for an echo effect when playing clean.

Seems sturdy, rugged, like it won't break. Hasn't yet in the three months I've owned it.

Responded to some questions I had with decent answers.

Pretty good delay pedal although I doubt any professional would use this. Eventually I will probably get something better (i.e. more expensive). Until then, this pedal is pretty fun and I like it better than the Boss pedals (I've owned RV-3, DD-3, and DD-6 and sold them all) and other delay pedal I've owned (Rocktron Short Timer - annoying whistling sound whenever switched on, and Ibanez DE-7 - probably the best-sounding one but the switch on it would stop working all the time). In summary, buy it if you want a digital delay but if you want something super good and professional then you will have to spend more money.