Electro-Harmonix Black Finger Sustainer

This pedal takes some getting used to. The instructions aren't very helpful. EHX seem to be scared of ever seeming too technical, but with a compressor, a little technical explanation would make everything a lot clearer. However, with time and fiddling, all becomes clear.

Setup:
Guitar: Aria Pro RS Knight Warrior (HSS) into a Mesa Boogie F50 and a Fender HotRod Deluxe.
Bass: Ibanez BTB470 into a Gallien Krueger MBS 3.

Okay - a lot has been written about how noisy this effect is. This can be rectified a little by tightening the screw between the tubes, but it still emits a lot of hiss. But this is only really an issue in NORMAL compression mode - which is a shame because you can get some lovely tones, but they are all ruined by the noise incorporated into your rig. BUT on the 'SQUSH' setting the hiss is all but elimintaed and the tone of your instrument is still vastly improved. I use the 'SQSH' setting all the time for electric, electro acoustic, and bass - and it is good for all of them. The output is a little lower, but that can be rectified with the pre/post gain settings. The tubes really warm up the sound of an electric either clean or dirty, provide body to an electro-acoustic, and really bring character to your bass sound. In my opinion the BF particularly shines with a bass. The thing that lets this pedal down is the fact that the 'NORMAL' setting is simply too noisy to be worth using (unless you've a high gain setup where a little (actually, quite a lot of) hiss won't be a problem.

This pedal is solid; the tubes are protected; it looks like it'll last. It's okay for gigging - although it is quite large and requires its own power supply and I'll probably favour a BBE Orange Squash for most live situations.

Haven't had to deal with EHX

I play a varety of styles from finger-picking folkesque stuff to blues to grungeier dabblings. I think this pedal is great for all of them - I just leave it on all the time to brighten up and even out the tone of whatever guitar I am playing. I've used a compressor almost since I began playing fourteen years ago, and I think this compressor is very good (if you ignore the sad fact the 'NORMAL' setting is unusable). In the studio I will always use it with a bass and with an electro acoustic, but I can't help feeling there's a better compressor out there for my electric sound. The BF is great at warming and fattening the overall tone of an instrument, but it doesn't really tighten up the sound in that funk-like way that you sometimes wish of a compressor.

If you know, what is a compressor, and why you do/don't need it - it's quite simple. If you have no idea, what is it for - you'll probably be dissatisfied ("Whaa?.. Why I can't hear any difference?")

It does what it should, and sounds really good.
I've used it together with Ehx LPB2ube with my bass guitar, and it had much more punch in the sound.

It's quite solid (even though not as solid as the other non-tube ehx products). Wwent through several gigs with me, including one which I have no memory of - don't drink before you play!
The lamps are weak part - you'll have to change them once in a while, otherwise the thing start to produce lots of noise.

Never dealt with them.

Great thing, but you should be really sure about what you want from that pedal.
I've enjoyed playing around with mine for a year, then sold it together with LPB2ube, and don't regret about it.
Tube sound is quite funny, but for the bass guitar I prefer transistors - they are much clearer sounding. For me.

there's enough buttons and options to get the kind of compression you're looking for.
as with all EHX pedals, you need to experiment a little before you get what you want. but if you're familiar with compressors you'll have fine results in no time. (forget the one-page 'manual')
what's there works well!

i bought this second hand pedal and noticed at home there was a serious static noise present, rendering the effect utterly useless! this seems to be a problem for many people who'd bought the black finger. the static goes away only when you touch the metal casing. sounded like an earthing problem to me. couldn't find a solution on the internet so i decided to mail EHX.. (surely they must have been aware of this noise issue since so many people were having the exact same problem)

to my surprise they actually replied two days later... and giving me a solution that would almost certainly solve the problem, so they said..

it did!

what you need to do:
remove the cap protecting the two tubes. you'll notice a screw between the tubes. you need to fasten this screw as tight as possible. (not that mine wasn't entirely loose, but it was actually possible to tighten it more)
problem solved! ... to my amazement!

the sound is very clear, warm and basically improves about everything you send through it.. guitars, bass, vocals, ...
i'm going to use it for live gigging (guitar) but especially during recordings..
i have the strong feeling this pedal is going to deliver well in a studio surrounding.
for now i'm giving it an 8... (i still have a lot of experimenting to do with this thing..)

EHX produces fantastic sounding pedals, but i find them hard to rely on.
they tend to malfunction quite soon... which -needless to say- sucks when that occurs on stage (nothing that you couldn't repair yourself though.)

the support i got from EHX in this particular case was fast and obviously extremely useful! (never dealt with them before)

i think the black finger will be a worthy asset for what i'd like to use it for: guitar compression on stage and studio recordings.
if you can find it somewhere cheap, go for it! it's the definitely one of the best compressor/sustainers around!

well, first of all set the input gain and the output gain. This will determine the sonic character of your signal. Try to level it so it sounds just as loud as the unprocessed signal. Then add compression with the compression pot.

The lamp will sound better at first because it lets some of the attack of your instrument through. If that??s what you want - fine.

I prefer the faster LED because it really levels out the complete signal and makes it more even. As long as you keep the compress pot near sane settings, it will sound fat and tasty.
The LED indicates the intensity of compression, in most cases you??ll want very little to no compression in the sustain phase and hard compression when you hit the strings.

I haven??t found any use for the squashing setting but y.m.m.v.

If you start with these tips in mind before you try to get creative, you??ll end up with a nice compression sound.

I was a little hesitant to buy this puppy after reading some of the reviews and after having had some trouble with a bassBalls pedal.

Right out of the box, the pedal worked well for electric bass but in every respect unnoticably. It compressed the signal, all right. It sounded just as good as the unprocessed signal. Alrighty. BUT I somehow found it lacking in fattening up the sound or giving it any charcter at all.

Well, I just recently swapped the EH tubes/valves for JJs. And I must say: if you haven??t, try this out yourselves! The EH ECC83s are really clean sounding, very linear and have a certain HiFi-Touch to them.

When I tried to overdrive them, I got all kinds of farting noises in return. Not really pleasant. The JJs however give me a thick sound. Now, the pedal is able to really colour my bass sound and give it some tube dirt.

This will give me another year before I finally have to add a real tube amp to my rigg ;-)

mmm... I don??t know, this unit may stand some abuse, although the tube cage doesn??t seem perfectly comfortable being stomped on hard. Which is its sole purpose. Which in turn leaves me a little uncomfortable.

I will put it in a case and this is one pedal you??ll keep on all the time so the stomping factor might not count that much after all.

I own two active bases and a MarkBass LMKII amp. The Markbass is a very clean sounding amp which is something I really like about it. Normally. But since starting to play in a punkrock band, I always felt some dirt was missing.

Now I think I have exactly what I need for this band. And the super clean sound is always one stomp away.

This box is easy however difficult to cary it is really huge box.
Manual could be better , there might be some seetings shown for diffrent types of effect you want to achive.
I've noticed promo book is 30 times longer than manual ?

I checked this pedal in a shop twice , I was astonished about the big sound you can get it turning this on. For the long time, about a half year the price was about 400$! yes guys this are european taxes, pain a lot, but recently it was drop off to 300$ so I decided to buy it.
My first impression at home was like a wow! but just after when I tried to record on norm with 50% pre gain and out I figured out sandy harsh kind of distortion. What is really wired that when I set pre gain to 90% it gone away and my simple soundgear fly away.
With sqash set up more or less everything sounds good.
I checked mic. and lead gt on it too, and I had same harsh on norm setting. So I haave to give 50% is for good.

Big box looks really great, EHX put lot of focus to details, paint, knobs, grind alu box maybe except taiwan voltage supply which where wire gauge is too small and plug looks funny (old DIN speakers connection system I guess)
Tubes must be russian for sure not becouse it is write down, but you can really listen to the russian radio station (my parents told it happend many times, I come from Poland)
Anyway all these issues should not happen it this luxury price range and could be just smaller to pack to your gig bag, especially if you have few of them and no tech guys to carry the stuff for you.

I will have to check it becouse obviously I try to exchange to one without harshy sound

Overall if was good I would be very happy, however it looks like EHX like most of companies have serious issues with quality.
This is not for the first time for "made in china" cheap stuff.
But for the first time with "made in USA" (maybe I had just one :-) )
Anyway the only diffrence is when you pay for pedal 300$ than you expect good quality.
I haven't gone through all of reviews but one you capture all, you come up with conclusion that there is something is wrong with quality inspection in this company they just limit check to operate no-operate, but this sort of check can be done in China by 10 times less money.

Bought in 2008 for GBP 119. The controls are relatively simple and self-explanatory, and it's very difficult to make it sound bad. Nevertheless, it's pretty versatile and you can spend hours tweaking and finding different sounds.

I use this with a Strat Plus, Tokai Les Paul copy and a Jackson Soloist Pro. The amps that I use vary, due to being at university, and that is the main reason why I bought this. In front of a good valve amp, it is what it is - a very good compressor. However, the main benefit it has for me is being able to add warmth and depth to any amp that I use. The two amps I own here are both smallish solid state amps. With my old Fender Princeton 112 (65 watts) it gave a little flavour of the old glory of my Twin, and with the Orange Crush 30R I recently bought, it forms a great combination.
I play in a ska/rock band and in a funk band. I can set this pedal to add some tight compression to funk picking, or by pushing the pre-gain, get a little bit of tube overdrive. The best tone I've found is to have the Black Finger on the edge of breakup, with the volume quite high to just push the input of the Crush. I haven't been able to get this kind of sound since I let my Twin at home.

It seems reliable: made in USA, a heavy duty metal box with a cover for the tubes, which are the only delicate part. Even then, they are only preamp tubes so they should last for ages. Replacing them looks like it would be a cinch too.

The power adaptor is of a very specific kind - apparently it needs to be in order to supply the required voltage. The only worry I would have would be the cable getting a break inside, as has happened with a few standard 9 volt adaptors I've used. Just have to be careful with it I guess. Using it at a gig, I would always place the pedal on top of the amp (since I never need to stomp it off), keeping the cable out of the way of the hordes.

I've never dealt with them. Haven't heard anything bad about EHX though.

Anybody who's never heard of compression should find out about it - it's a key difference between a harsh, messy tone and a nice smooth, pro-sounding one. One of the reasons valve amps sound good is because they impart natural compression - for these, the Black Finger can be useful for adding compression where you need it, eg sustaining solos or funk picking. Used in front of a decent solid state amp, pushing the pedal's tubes a bit, it is a fantastic "always-on" effect that is a key part of getting a good sound.

Lots of variations here so take your time and find the combination that works for you. I've only used it for guitar so far(is reportedly good for recording vocals) and it affects humbuckers and single coils very differently! It adds a little beef and snarl to my SG and 335 when I've got the amp cranked up. I love it with those two guitars. But it completely squashes and muddies up my telecaster on the same settings, so it takes some playing around with to get used to depending on what you've got it plugged into.

After having had this amp for a few months I've realized that it really isn't anything all that special. I use the controls to add a touch of compression to my sound, but no longer try to use it as an additional overdrive sound in my rig, which in all fairness to the pedal, overdrive isn't what it was designed for anyway. So if you'd like to add a touch of compression to your solos, this will do the trick. That's where the pedal really shines, it doesn't do much for chords.

One can really get a lot of different tones out of this pedal, so i see no point in getting rid of it. It's better than the boss CS-3 i used to play with.

So far it's been fine. I've gigged with it a few times and have transported back and forth to practice multiple times in it's box and I haven't seen any noticeable wear and tear on it.

Just be sure to unplug it when you're done. There is no on/off switch on it!

Haven't had to deal with customer support yet. If the pedal crapped out on me, I'd probably shelf it and I wouldn't look back.

I had extremely high expectations on this pedal and feel a bit disappointed. If you're looking for the ONE pedal to give you a killer tone, this ain't the one. It is good for a little bit of a flavor on my guitars, but takes a while to dial in what i'm looking for based on the guitar/pickups. I bought this to upgrade from a boss compression sustainer that i had been using. The EH Black Finger is a superior pedal to the Boss, but I no longer feel that compression is the effect I'm after. I'm very curious to try this in my home studio for vocals, however. It may prove to be vaulable yet...

The search for TONE continues!

Compared with other optical compressors that have a two knobs, this is a little more complicated. But it also has a lot more features, well covered by other reviewers. There was no manual, and EH's website is pretty bad. I just plugged it in, turned the gain and compress to 9:00 and had a great sound out of the gate.

The compression offered by the Black Finger is perfect for the bass. It is very, very transparent, natural and open sounding. I play a Lakland 54-94 through a EA Iamp800 through 2 Aguilar GS112. This already great setup has benefited greatly from the Black Finger. The B-string on the Lakland is so powerful, it overwhelms the sound and notes on that string end up sounding too loud compared to the other notes. The BF solves this problem beautiful,evening out the dynamics. My guitar players loves it because he can hear the melodic stuff I do in the midrange and upper register without me having to increase volume. I have actually lowered the master volume on my amp since I bought this pedal, but my tone is even more audible. Could you ask for more???
Also, if you crank the gain a little you get a great tube grind that is very AMPEG SVT like. Most distortion pedals sound horrible for bass, even ones meant for bass, but the BF adds great tubey sound that can very Jack Bruce-like if you want, or it can have no tube-crunch at all if you dial down the gain. It really warms up my EA Amp, which is very hi-fi sounding on its own. I can't imagine a more useful pedal for a gigging bass player. I give it a 9 because there is a little hiss but that is common to all compressors.

It is not as solid as a Fulltone pedal, it is aluminum with plastic knobs. It doesn have real tubes, that will some day burn out. So I wouldn't feel comfortable unless I had a couple of extra tubes which I will take with me at all times. This is a necessary evil of all tube gear, so there is nothing new here.

I have never dealt with EH. Their website could be better...

For a rock band, this is THE pedal for bass. Negative review of this product seem to be from guitarists who obviously want a heavy-metal type of compression. I have played bass for 16 years, and have used many products. This is the best compression for bass that I have ever used. I am comparing my experience with the Demeter compulator and I like it much better. The Demeter had an unnatural sustain that would cause the notes from my bass to swell a little at the end and I didn't care for that. This pedal has no setting to adjust sustain, but seems to be perfectly dialed in anyway. The compression offered by this pedal is so smooth, so natural that you don't even hear it as compression, it just makes your bass sound very very good. If that was all it did, I would love it. But what I really love is the tubey crunch I get when I turn up the input-stage gain and really grind with my fingers. It gets that Geddy Lee tone that I love so much-yet I don't have to carry around a 500 pound SVT.

This is a Black Finger Tube Compressor with 2 12AX7WAs. It's easy to not get a bad sound of it. The manual could include service directions and schematics. It isn't modded or upgraded.

P90 and HB equipped Gibsons, Marshall AVT50 & JTM45 through a 2x12 V30 cab, a pair of modified Valve Juniors with Eminence Alnicos. Originally, This thing hissed like a pair Brittney Spears' Boas. You expect this with tube devices, but not to this degree. I took it back and they replaced the EH tubes a COUPLE of times, and the hiss went completely away. The compression effect is excessively weak, sustain is non-existant. I'm trying to replace my 20 year old Rockman compressor/sustainer. This offers no where near the compression of the Rockman. There is no sustain increase what so ever on any setting. The only way to get any compression is with the SQSH setting on LED, which is very slight. The compression pot does nothing, except weaken the input signal. The post gain pot adds an oscillating distortion, quite unpleasant.

It's seems very sturdy and is probably reliable. The foot switch could be more rugged. Due to the lack of effect, there is no reason to gig with it. As a matter of fact. It will probably just go back in the box and put on a shelf, if the dealer won't take it back. Mayabe some day, someone will post a fix, or mod / redesign on the Internet and I'll retry it.

I've had other EH products, and they were great. The dealer replaced the faulty tubes without issue. I purchased it because of the reviews I'd read, and also the EH name. It was ordered for me because there wasn't one in stock to try. This was with the understanding that I could take it back. I have.

Maybe I'm just old fashioned. It's seems to me though that a $200 compressor / sustainer would compress better, and have some degree of sustain. The feature I would like to see with this is compression and sustain.

Its easy to get a good sound out of it.Takes forever to settle on a favorite setting.very versital.

I use a strat through a fender amp and I got this to fatten up my gain.Ive been able to turn my gain from 5 to 3 after getting this.Its wierd,either one by itsalf sounds pretty clean but when used togeather a little but of edge from each somehow creates the smoothest overdrive Ive ever gotten.I also use it as a recording tool for vocals and bass.Besides using it for drive it can get some pretty extream setting such as the squish.That sounds cool with vocals.I still almost never use it the way it was intended(the bf volume is set higher than bypassed)but it doesent matter.It basically just makes my od 100 percent gooeyer and round.Much more than any distortion pedal I have ever tried.

I have dropped a guitar right on the tube cage.A trumpet case fell right on it from my closet shelf and put a big shlash in it.Never stopped working.Same tubes for over a year.Sometimes it buzzes for a second after being turned on but I dont care(I leave it on the whole time I play).

Had to get a memo man fixed once.I had to pay 20 for shipping even though I recieved it brand new without a working blend knob.I blame the store who orderd it for me.After I brought it back the same day they told me it was supposed to be like that.I mean you couldnt even hear the initial note.Just the delayed ones.So I had to call eh.They were cool about it but to have to wait 2 weeks and spend 20 more on it before even getting to actually use it is just bogus.Someone dueshed me fo sho

If it broke or got stolen I would hve to get another unless I changed my whole setup.It does tend to add a bit of staticish noise when on but it doesent really make the original hum from the amp louder.It just kind of changes it from buzz to static.Whats the diff?

Read the other reviews.

Very good. Most reviews are similar. Nice warm sound. Good for direct recording too. It's basically a tube preamp with a compressor circuit. It shouldn't noticebaly change your signal much unless you run the preamp input all the way high, and than you will get tube crunch sounds.

It has a few annoying issues. First, it has two modes of operation. I have not found much use yet for the other "sqsh" setting yet. The only other problem I have with it is that it lacks a true on/off switch and requires being unplugged. RTFM there are some tips in there that explain what settings work best togethor.

I use this with a power tube amp and a fender strat.

It seems very delicate. Also, it does not have an on/off switch, which I find kind of odd, you have to unplug it to turn it off. Also, be gentle with it, it has tubes.

I don't know, probably sucks, but I'll give them the benefit of the doubt here.

I play mostly blues guitar, sometimes blues-metal riffs, rock and hard rock. If it were stolen, I'd probably buy another one, or find something to replace it. I don't know about the other tube pedals ehx makes but this one makes the most tonal sense to me. These pedals are probably all tube preamps with some additional circuits. If you run a distortion box into this you will get all the benefits of a tube preamp and a compressor.

I think it's a bit expensive, despite how much I use it. It is very fragile looking, won't take much abuse. Playing out with this, I can't imagine how it wouldn't get broken. This is mainly for studio work. It is nice because it is small if you have limited space. Lack of power on/off switch is annoying. It has alot of uses but fragile construction.

Not technically hard to use. It has a few knobs. What is hard is to get the exact sound you want out of it ;-) 5 knobs has quite alot of combinations.

This is a great box. Well worth it, if you are looking for a very warm tone. Doesn't add much noise at all to your signal. Great deal for the cost. I use this in a rack that loops through my PC. It has really done some serious beefing up of my sound through this rig.

Beat's me I just got it. Hopefully it will last a long time.

Dunno, never dealt with them.

I bought this box for an odd idea I had, and I am happy it worked so well! I bought this to use in between my CD and a small analog mixer. I also play guitar, and plan to use it with that. But the purpose was to see how it could 'warm up' my CDs. Wow! It took a long while to get the sound just right, but my oh my, my CDs sound so f**$@ good now. I dunno if this is technically the right way to use this box, but it sure as hell works! It takes quite a bit of tweaking to get the sound just right! I wanted to buy a Paia kit but I'd probably kill myself putting it togethor. For a $100 more I got this.

I haven't even tried it with my guitar yet. And I bet it is going to sound very sweet.

Easy to use.

79 Les Paul Deluxe, US Tele and an 04 Burns Steer. It's not noisy and the sound is fantastic into a Pod or a Cornford or a JC120. Best pedal I ever bought in 26 years.

I'm troubled by what i read regarding EH and reliability. I have an English Muffin, a Stereo Memory Man and a Guitar Micro Synth all of which work perfectly.

I try and play quite a few styles and avoid many more. I've been playing on and off for 26 years and I've tried numerous guitar compressors and they bored me. I've been recording for 10 years and use 16 studio compressors from TLA, Drawmer, Dbx, Behringer and Joe Meek and found plugging compressors from MXR, Boss, Aphex, Digitech, ZVEX, Marshall, Demeter, Homebrew etc has switched me off. They've all been shite. Dull and expensive toss.

I doubt I'll be using it with a dynamic microphone but I like the idea of trying. I'm sure the pedal purists with bad EH experiences suspect the Black Finger of being another valve-laden gimmick but to my ears it's beautiful, versatile and blows me away sonically and tonally. I'd nearly given up on my search for a compressor that I liked but tried one out. If it was stolen I would definately find the thief and relocate my pedal before writing a song about it and all the really cruel things I did to the thieving scum. I've had it for a week now and I dread it breaking as it sounds so good and I have a 'once bitten twice shy' policy with studio electronica and if it breaks before it's second birthday I won't be replacing it but I would try and repair it.

Compressors in general are tricky devices, and like other compressors, the Black Finger will take a little while to find the sweet spots. The catch is, it will probably sound different degrees of great all along the way.

I love it. I've only used a few compressors but I like this one the best.

I've owned two, and the intermittant static that has already been writen about happens on BOTH OF THEM. It drives me NUTS!!!!!

The customer support crew at Electro Harmonix can lick my balls!!!! I actually sent my warantee card in with the original receipt and everything like a good little guitar player and they sent my unit back to me saying that there was nothing wrong with it. Oooh I was so pissed. I had gone to great trouble to record the sound and give a detailed explanation of when and how it happened. And I KNOW they know what the problem is because A LOT of people have the exact same problem. They probably plugged it in for 5 minutes and didn't hear the noise and packed it back up. They CHOSE to be lazy and not to get to the bottom of my problem. The time and money I spent in shipping them a broken product was a complete waste. And at the end of the day, I have a broken compressor that I can't use to record. AAAAH so mad! And in case someone thinks that maybe it is really user error and that they were correct when they said there is nothing wrong with the unit, trust me, I'm not an inexperienced newbie at this stuff.

well, like I said, I love the sound but mine are COMPLETELY USELESS to me so I'd give it a zero. To have $300 invested in 2 useless compressors

Not so easy to get the hang of but definatley worth it. Pay attention to the pre gain and compression not the post gain as this is the major interaction. I use the post gain as the leveling device between bypass and the effect on. I use full compression and just regulate the pregain for tone that I want. This gives me the kind of sublte tone altering bring your sound forward effect I am looking for if I use the lamp and normal settings.

This thing is great that sublte pollished sound that realy makes you stand out. I use this right before my BBE Sonic Maximizer. If I could only have two effects that would be it (crazy you say...they arent like real effects eh...well they make your tone great and I would rather sound great with no drastic effect than sound not great with any noticable effect ) I dont care what you play if you stand next to someone with this and a BBE sonic maximizer in their chain and all you have is some stomps and an amp then you will notice a huge difference.

Well tubes alluminum housing and wallwart ehm not a fultone but hey sounds great and not exactly made out of cardboard either.

N/A

Super go get one of these...or dont hey its your loss and its ok if I have better tone than some people.

pretty easy to use...manual is the front side of a piece of paper.

has a great balance...not a very hot signal so not a lot of noise created. i have a '65 fender twin that i use w/ an xotic r/c boost, an xotic a/c boost and the blackfinger plugged into a '71 gretsch tennessean. w/ the addition of the bfinger i have the most impressive tone i've had in nearly 20 years.

seems strong.

have not had to deal w/ the company.

cant say enough good things about this unit. i've tried other compressor's and have been disappointed every time. for $185 you can buy a very nice, great quality compressor.

Really easy to use. Ive only owned it for a very short while, but I allready love it because it doesn't sound like a standard compressor. Standard compressors don't sound musical at all, they sound cold. This thing colors your sound greatly. All you do is adjust the knobs untill you find a setting that you like.

I have a mexican strat with a Fender Blues Deluxe 12 inch speaker amp. Its not noisy at all, but it doesn't sound good when used before my Tubeman distortion. What I mean is that it colors the sound so much before the distortion that the distortion ends up sounding wide and almost fuzzy instead of direct and punchy.
The Black Finger is mostly for clean channel sounds. It has the greatest clean sound. I liken it to the way a tube amp sounds completely cranked up on the clean channel. Imagine, if you can, a recording of a woman loudly stroking all the notes of a harp faster and faster. The notes all clash together and it sounds much much louder than it really is. Thats kind of how this pedal sounds.
You can hear a kind of distortion if you really turn up the pre gain, but I almost wouldn't characterize it as distortion because it is so subtle. Its almost like a white noise that ends up warbling and shifting with the different combinations of notes that are hit in unison. Much like a cranked tube amp on clean, when you play two notes in a chord, you hear a very beautiful colored clashing sound.
I can imagine that some people wouldn't like this sound because it is an almost vintage old kind of sound, kind of like a old 60's television show themesong. Even with the television turned down, the songs were created to sound like the speaker on the television is cranked to 11. Like when I Love Lucy comes on at 2 am and you think to yourself, "jeese, thats so freaking loud! I have to turn that down because its going to wake everyone up!!!", then you check the volume and its hardly turned up at all. Its hard to define, but thats what this pedal is doing. This isn't compression that makes your notes sing like blood spewing Metallica solos. Its more like playing a song and somehow its coming out of an old record player in the form of a classic, lo fi recording. I am referring maily to the "squash" setting because this effect is the most extreme setting and the one I like the most.
I have noticed that this pedal has a bit of a boost in the low frequecies because if im playing a fingerpicking tune and then hit a low string, it seems to overpower all the other higher notes (once again, much like a tube amp turned way up on clean). Im playing it through a tube amp, so maybe Im just getting too much tube sound. I still have to mess with it a bit more.
Ive never been fond of compression for guitar. I have a Dbx 160a thats great for drums and bass, but thats mostly for a "limiting effect." The Black Finger is a much much different kind of thing. I almost wouldn't catagorize it as a compressor because it does so much more to the sound. I don't step on it for compression, I step on it because I want to sound like an old Bing Crosby record or something. Once again Im using the most extreme settings. I imagine you could dial in very little effect if you wanted to, but where is the fun in that.
Im using in signal chain, right before my Whammy pedal. I think that this would sound good used with a microphone. I love the sound of a miked amp, but my amp is just too loud.

I haven't had enough time with it, but I think I can depend on it because I don't take my stuff anywhere. I don't know who these people are that can afford backups for all thier stuff. I guess we all can't be U2.

n/a

I would give it a 9 overall, but thats just because I know if I got ahold of a five thousand dollar tube compressor, it would probably sound amazing. I play mostly The Smiths,Sonic Youth, Nine Inch Nails kind of stuff, interspesed with thoughtfull tunes. Ive been playing guitar for about 20 years. I have a drum machine, a bunch of pedals, a bass guitar, a drumset etc.
The way the bass notes way overpower the high notes is what I don't like at this moment. I know that is what compressors do, but this does that a bit too much, but I guess I need more time to mess with it. I really have to watch how hard I pluck the low strings, or that will be all I hear. It may just be the settings im using and the fact that I have the compression turned to 10, but I think it would help to have a parametric eq placed before this just to suck out a little bit of the low frequecy honk.
I don't imagine this thing would work well for drums although I haven't tried. Im sure it would sound unique, but the compression curve probably wouldn't be fast or smooth enough for a sudden snare sound.
I wish it had a parametric eq on it so the user could adjust how much "ducking" effect the bass notes have.

Two 12AX7s. Controls Pre Gain, Post Gain, and Compress rotaries. Then there's LAMP/LED and NORM/SQUASH selectors.

I own several studio compressors and at first I missed the traditional controls (attack/release etc). I can see now however why they made it like it is; it's dead dead easy to use when you know it. Basiclly its got to dynamic settings and two voicings. Which for your average guitaist is probably enough anyway lol.

I have Mex Tele and Jap Strat guitars both modified. I have Fender Pro Junior and Orange AD30TC.

When I bought it I wanted to make recording/mixing easier and guessed that it would live it my cupboard inbetween.

I tried it with my old amp in the studio (Marshall 6100 into closed 2x12) and nearly cried because it seem to have no positive influence whatever. Then I tried my little Pro Junior and was suddenly impressed. I had the amp set on about 4 with the ECC83 starting to fizz. The Blackfinger was set to NORM/LAMP with 2/3 compression, pre on full, and post to suit volume. It seemed to pull it's output together acoustically, it was excellent. Maybe it was EQing the signal a bit and maybe it was the room but it seemed to change the imaging. I was using two mike and the results were improved by about 10%. So it likes open back cabs. It also improved my bass recording by about the same.

I think its fair to say that these improvements might be down to boost I dialled in but I do think theres something in it.

One things for sure this pedal isn't just about dynamic control. I've seen the *.wav of its output on guitar and let me tell you it adds all sorts of shit to the signal. Someone said "gooey" below and it is. My AD30 gets fuller and hotter with this on boost in a useable kinda way. I also use SQUASH with the Pro Junior all the time for practicing.

Cons

I think the guitar drive (turn compress to zero) is average.
Its not an LA2A and I've had no luck with vocals.

Fine all good. Though i've only had it a year.

Unknown

I like this product and I'm glad I bought it. If it was nicked I'd buy another. At the end of the day compression can kill a recording if overused and you know that most people don't understand how it works anyway. This is a valve tone colourer with some dynamic controls and it does that job well enough for me to bother to write my first review. I'd love to try it with a 65 Super Reverb and I reckon anyone could get something out of it. And if you care about how the drums fit into the mix then you'll find a use for it for sure. So maybe it is a studio tool after all.

Five knobs, tru bypass, two 12ax7 tubes, and comes with ac adaptor.
Two knobs serve as modes of preselected compressor operation.
One page manual which is useful but if you have never use a compressor you might catch up on your reading to really now how to use it best.

I use a Blackbeauty Les Paul Custom with a Marshall Valvestate head/Cabinet 100 watts, since my main amp is in repair. I tried this pedal directly to the amp. No noise other than the natural noise form any amp. With this pedal you do get great compressed sound, improve your gain/crunch and get notes to sound full and separate. However BE CAREFUL and BEFORE ORDERING ONE OF THIS TAKE INTO ACCOUNT THAT THERE HAS BEEN COMPLAINS ABOUT ANNOYING STATIC SOUNDS FROM MALFUNCTIONING UNITS. AND IF YOU LIVE OUTSIDE THE US.A THAT IS A BIG BUMMER.
I have been playing for ocer 15 years and I play MELODIC ROCK AND METAL. There is another great option instead of this pedal so check my review on the Aphex Punch Factory which is the pedal I am currently using. It hgas more note definition than the BFinger. However if you get one of this working perfecly then you might be satisfy. However the Aphex is so much adaptable to acustics sound on the same guitar setup you use for distortion sounds .There is a stagged too much compress sound you might experience with the BFinger and with the Aphex you get away with playing freely from good crunch and better define riffs/lead into great breathing yet define clear acustic chords and clean leads. It is far superior in that way but if you only want Distortion purely then I bet you skipped this las paragraph. I am generous and to do justice to this great company a nine is giving eventhough the price is high and still my pedal came with this annoying static sound which comes and goes when turned off only to retuyrn a feww second later when you are playintg. Is a shame I thougt this would be my ultimate compressor. BUt I got justice done with the Aphex Punch Factory.

Ahh. If your BFinger came functioning as it was intende to do then I assume it would realiable. The box feels solid and the tubes are protected. However be careful not dripping sweat on those hot tubes!!
I am not using mine as stated before.

YEs they answer my help call via email. But the solution was to send this pedal all the way to the U.SA. Dont you think aNOTHER way could be invented to assist customer overseas. No opinion on their support.

I play melodic rock and metal. YEs if it works without annoying static then yes it could help anybody playing this styles. On blues i cant comment since it aint my style.
Been playing over 12 years. I own the Clone Chorus by Electro-harmonix which is maybe the best chorus pedal out in the market and for its price it cant be beaten. I also use in loop form a Vox Wha 847
A Mxr Flanger(in loop also) a Whammy pedal (yeah in loop this tone sucker beast!!)
ANd in the end part of my chain an Aphex Exciterpedal and the Aphex PunchFactory. (the chain goes Les paul- CLone Chorus- Loooper pedal-(loop Vox/MXR/Whammy) then directly into Aphex Exciter then at last the Punch Factory Compressor into my Marshall. ALso I ve extensivley experimented o nwhich cables to use that give me the best clear, mid low definition and crunch possible.

If you know the rudimentary compressor controls, then you should be able to work this.
Not as many knobs as on say, the Alesis I've used before, but it's superior in sound.
Compress - comression level
Level LED
Post-gain - output level
Lamp/LED - changes the light source for the optical attenuator. The lamp has a slow attack and less compression on treble frequencies, the LED has a fast attack and a flatter frequency adjustment.
Sqsh/norm - By my reckoning, this is a ratio type. With squash being high ratio, and normal as normal. But the manual says it's an attack type being changed. Squash being long and norm short. I need more time to work that one out.
Pre-gain - Wet/dry kind of thing. Determining how much of the signal will be sent to the attenuator, and therefore compressed.

It's great. A bargain for the sound I'd say.
On both clean and dirty the tone is enriched, warmed, thickened. Currently I have a Peavey Dynabass, EHX Big Muff, Boss OC-3 Octaver and the Black Finger, in that order, going through a Carlsbro Viper 250W bass amp.
The Muff is especially improved, and the lamp setting allows me to play accents, or get a punch through while still keeping the sound. It helps when the octaver's on too, as it boosts the weak, very low frequencies.

I normally mess around with the lamp/LED and sqsh/norm knobs for each song, or each sound I want. There's also the possibility of overdriving it a bit, but I haven't used that yet.

One slight qualm I have with it is that the squash setting is so much quieter than the norm, as it's compressing a lot more. Or seems to be. The only rason I say that is because it means adjusting the output levels each time, but turning on extra knob isn't much effort.

It seems solid, like all EHXs. More so than the Big Muff, as it's all metal as opposed to metal and plastic. The tubes are well guarded too. As with anything tube, don't drop it.

It can't use batteries because of the high voltages involved, so no trouble with running out suddenly.

I can't see it breaking down, everything is strongly mounted etc.

I'd gig without a backup.

I should think this pedal would be good for most kinds of music, as it seems to improve the tone of anything put through it.
I use this all the time now, and I'll probably use it on other instruments when we do the recording in the summer too.

Overall, an excellent piece of kit, good sound and solid.

Could be easy to use if you like it

It lacks the punch seems to me there was no punch or sustain it's that bad

ok I guess I took it back

If you play country and looking for that sustain and punch then stay away from this product I found that the Boss CS-3 is the best for that buy it turn your sustain all the way up and attack almost off and keep volume under half way and you got that Nashville sound if you try this email me and tell me you found heaven Shawn@musician.org

dead simple.

excellent I use this thing on EVERYTHING! It's a nice gain stage, I try to keep the comp minimal most of the time, depending on what's going through it.

My first one was DOA, a tube was loose and after reseating it, it did nothing. So I had to return it. My 2nd one was excellent! I don't think the newer EH peds are built so well... but they are still cool. Once you get a working one. To be fair to EH I bought my from 8th Street Music and it HAD been opened. so perhaps they damaged it. No idea. Still, pedals should be pretty durable given their intended use.

pretty good, I found from another broken EH pedal that EH will at least fix CURRENT (NOT VINTAGE) pedals for a flat $15 fee. I'm about to send off my Qtron+ to see how long it takes.

There are five knobs. The main adjustment is the compressor knob. This is the most useful knob and is simple to understand. Turning it up increases the compression. There is a pre-gain, which can be used to "overdrive the circuit", as the manual says. The post-gain, which is the output volume. Squash/normal select. Don't know what it does, but squash sounds a little louder. And Lamp/LED select. To me the last two knobs don't do alot to alter the characteristic.

The compression is beautiful, non-intrusive ("passive" as the manual says) compression. You don't even know it's there (but it does work). The tubes do brighten up the sound, but there is one fatal flaw in my copy. There is horrible scratchy noise from the unit. I am using a strat copy with just this pedal (for this test) into a mixer with headphones. You can unplug the guitar and/or turn the pre-gain right down and the scratchy noise is still there. It is internal from the unit. The scratchyness is propotional to the output volume knob. This brand-new pedal from the States arrived with one tube smashed, (which I replaced with another genuine Sovtek 12AX7EH tube). So, it was knocked about a bit - maybe it was this knock, or maybe it's the 50 Hz here in Australia, or maybe the fact that my "12V AC" output transformer (what it takes) actually outputs 14V AC for some reason, but whatever it is I can't use it on stage. Aside from this I WOULD HAVE GIVEN IT a 10.
I wanted this pedal partly for it's "overdrive" feature. But the overdrive is mild and doesn't quite get to distortion properly, so DON'T get this pedal if you want tube distortion. Also, the overdrive doesn't really work in combination with the compression. ONLY get it if you want compression.

Don't know about the long-term reliability

I contacted info@ehx.com with a question about a week ago but they just got back to me now.

I can't afford to get the scratchyness fixed right now (if it is fixable), and I am reluctant to send it back to the States only to have it get smashed in transit again. The guys down at customs are probably having a big laugh right now. This was an experiment in getting an expensive, boutique pedal from the United States gone wrong, and I seem to be stuck with the consequence. I am devestated.

Easily the best compressor pedal I've ever used. Controls are pretty straight forward for a compressor. Input gain, output gain, compress (threshold?), Lamp/LED, and norm/sqsh (ratio?), and gain reduction LED. Gain stages are driven by 2 12AX7EH tubes running at around 300V. The power supply is only 12V but there's an additional pcboard mounted transformer inside. The wall wart uses a non-standard plug I suppose so you don't accidentally use the wrong power supply. That's fine with me, but I wish they'd mounted the jack between the in/out jacks rather than on the side of the pedal. It causes a loss of pedal board space when you can't put pedals right up next to each other. I may have to do a hack job and relocate it myself. The footswitch btw is a 3PDT, possibly a Fulltone, so it's true-bypas with an LED which surprised me coming from EH.

As I said, the nicest sounding compressor pedal I've ever used. Does it sound like an 1176 or LA2A? I seriously doubt it, but it is very smooth and warm compression. No harsh treble boost or extrme squashing that kills your dynamcs like a Boss compressor for example. The lamp mode gives a slightly different attack response from the LED mode which is faster. My favorite setting is lamp and sqsh with a high compression setting. It gives a great vintage sounding compression for guitar or bass. I'm looking forward to using it on vocals and other miced sources.

The metal box is bent aluminum and seems somewhat sturdy but somewhat flimsy as well. The tube shield also seems quite sturdy. Inside the pcboard look s very neat and well made. I wouldn't worry about it any more than any other pedal.

I can't imagine a better sounding compressor pedal. The only things I culd ask for are the afore mentioned different placement of the power jack, as well as continuous controls for attack and ratio. I'd certainly recommend this pedal to anyone who's looking for a great compressor pedal that doesn't kill you dynamics or totally alter your tone. At almost $200 is is a bit high for a pedal but woth it if you use compression frequently.

Took a little while to figure out the lamp/led and squish/normal thangs, but not that tough.

The best. Makes everything sound fat and round and succulent. This is the greatest thing ever.

I bought it used, and the idiot shipped loose in the box, so UPS bounced it around all the way across the country, the tube shield came off, a tube broke, the circuit board got loose, but a new tube and 2 minutes with the ol' phillips head it was fine. No problems with reasoneable care.

Power supply broke, you can only get a replacement from New Sensor, no probs there.

This is the best music related item I've bought in years. I play guitar, I have to go direct a lot, and it just makes the guitar sound real. Fat and round, controls level well without that wretched DynaComp midrangey squish.I actually waited a couple of weeks b4 writing this so I wouldn't be stuck in infatuation mode, but this is true love. Greatest thing ever.