Fulltone Distortion Pro

The stomp box IS NOT easy to use and requires lots of tweaking. Part of the problem is that what sounds good with single coils doesn't sound good with humbuckers (and vice versa). This is definitely NOT a plug and play effects box. However, people who like to tweek will have a field day with this unit.

The Distortion Pro would rate a "10" if you rated just how it sounds using the bridge pickup of a Strat. However, if you select the neck pup using the settings that sound good for the bridge pup, you get a overly bassy, wooly tone. I don't hear the "Eric Johnson" tone people talk about out of the Distortion Pro, even when I play in his style using delay. The unit is not warm enough sounding for this purpose. Also, there's a grainy quality to the distortion on most settings.

The overdrive-like tones you can dial in are not bad, but are nothing like a Tubescreamer of Fulltone Fulldrive II.

You can get a excellent fuzz tones out of the Distortion Pro. The unit cleans up nicely when you dial back the volume knob on your guitar.

The Distortion Pro is one of those boxes that you keep tweaking and tweeking and are never completely satisfied with. That said, its the ONLY distortion box I know of that allows you to use the bridge pup on a Strat and get a good tone. Its a sort of Rory Gallagher/Walter Trout Strat tone. Its not a warm, liquidy distortion sound (at least I've been unable to dial in such a tone).

NOTE -- It depends on what your taste in distortion tone is as far as the ratings go. I could see someone rating this as a "10." For me, however, its probably going to be more of a one trick pony (and an expensive one at that).

ps -- I've been playing for over 30 years (including professionally).

Not all that difficult to use. The manual explains it pretty well.

I use Gretsch guitars, a hamer phantom with rio grandes and a gibson classic pu through a bogner metropolis or a mesa boogie nomad. Unfortunately, I couldn't get a good sound out of this box. All in all very fuzzy.

I am sure it is reliable as are all of Fulltones units.

Mike and Fulltone are always great!

I have been playing for 21 years and play professionally now. I have had lots of distortion boxes. Maxon OD-808, Fulltone Fulldrive II, Tech 21 Sansamp Classic, Big Muff (a long time ago!), Jeckyl and Hyde, various digital pedals, etc. This is the worst distortion pedal I have used. It's unfortunate, because the FDII is an excellent pedal. However, believe it or not the Tech 21 pedal kills this one.

Pretty straitforward, a bit more mini-knobs than I would like - oh well.

Great sounds. This sounds like creamy tube distortion to me. I've heard soooo many different pedals in my day - this sounds by far the most authentic. I've got an Anderson Hollow Classic T w/ 3 single coils into a Fulltone 2, Distortion Pro, Line 6 Delay Mod. into either a pro verb. or a classic 30 depending on the gig. I like it a bit more cranked through celestions - it sings.

Looks solid to me. Not too worried here.

I did e-mail Fulltone once and never got a response which I was a bit dissapointed about. I'm guessing that if I had a major problem they would be willing to help out.

This violin-like super-sustain distortion makes me want to sing lead lines on the guitar. Not for every perfect sound in one box, but for what I'm going for it's a must. Fulldrive 2 is a perfect compliment on a much less driven scale. They make the best effects, I'm convinced of it. It will cost you indeed, but better to buy really good stuff to make music with once than a bunch of garbage several times, and in the process never really sound that good and save a few pennies. Eventually you'll have spent more on the junk than if you would have just bought quality in the first place.

This is not an instant gratification device! I spent several hours working with this pedal(not all at once)The manual gives you enough to find what you need, but it ain't easy.

Fender Pro Tube Twin,Clyde Deluxe wah, Fat boost,Fulldrive 2, Dist Pro,69 pedal, Am. series Strat. It is very quiet,and very sensitive. Once I found a sweet sound,I added the fat boost,then the 69 and I was getting way more than I hoped for!IMO one pedal doesn't always do it, but the combination of 2,3,or 4 can take you over the top. The Pro stands alone, but kicks ass with help!

I have 5 Fulltones, and reliability is one of the reasons why.

Never had any problems, but have emailed Mike several time and almost always got answer. No complaints here.

Its obvious I'm a Fulltone geek, the reasons are clear,high quality, dependable, and perfect for 60's and 70' rock.You can get some shit sounds out of this pedal,and lots of people have, but you can also get total power and great distortion as well.What some people are missing here is the versatility of the Pro. No matter what your style or your gear, this baby has something to offer. It is not generic, and it ain't easy,but it will take you where you want to go...mostly

A really easy to use pedal. Two large knobs (Volume and Drive), along with four semi-recessed mini-knobs right below them, with controls for Resonance (adjusts the unit's bass response), Voicing (a nifty tone control, which seems to morph between a more focused "scoop" and a broader mid-oriented tone), Highs (as it says, attenuates the highs), and Saturation, which I think is one huge key to using this pedal. I have mainly guitars that have humbuckers in the bridge position - or rather, I should say double-coil, because hum-cancelling singles are just NOT the same thing at all.

With 'bucker loaded axes, I keep the saturation control down almost all the way (counter-clockwise), as this seems to tighten up the loose ends just right. Now, if I plug in a guitar that has a bridge position single, I find I have to twist the Saturation knob almost all the way the OTHER way (clockwise), otherwise it will sounds REALLY thin and pingy. Now, even so, these are definitely different sounds with a single-Strat and clockwise Saturation settings, than those that you'll get with a bucker-Strat and counter-clockwise Saturation knob settings. This one knob drastically alters the gain structure of the pedal (all the knobs do, really, in their own way, but to a much lesser degree). Also, turning the Saturation up seems to reduce overall volume.

All in all, the controls on this pedal are VERY sensitive, and also very interactive. When you twist one, you may have to twist one or two others just to make that one adjustment. This kind of design is a double edged sword. On one hand, it takes a bit of time (not a lot, though) to get familiar with it, and know that if you twist "this", it'll sound like "that" - so it's tempting for strict "plug-and-play" types to get a couple of so-so sounds and figure it's not for them. But on the other hand, the level of overall control this arrangement gives is astounding - even if, ultimately, you get one sound that you stomp on or off.

Well, I wouldn't call the sound "pristine" (as it is designed to sound "funky"), but the overall sound quality is very good, and the Distortion Pro gets those rich, complex, 3-D tones you've always wanted. Well, the ones I'VE always wanted anyway. First, I want to address all the reviews where guys have said, "this thing doesn't sound anything at all like Eric Johnson's "violin tone". To which I just have to ask, is there, like, a "version 1.0" of this pedal that I missed the first time around? With both my pedal, and the one I tried out in the store, I can't get the EJ sound OUT of this pedal. Everywhere I set it, creamy sustain just oozes out of this thing, the mids squish just right. It even "kinda" sounds like Eric even on some of the raspier settings.

Okay, first up, I'm running this pedal with various bridge-position humbucker loaded guitars, Heritage "335-style" and a Strat with a Seymour Duncan Pearly Gates. Yes, you have to crank the resonance back some for the Heritage, but not as much as you might think. I run mine into a THD 2x10 Plexi combo, but when I was trying the pedal out in the store (plugging in every different guitar I could find), I was running it into blackface Fenders and clean Carr amps (also "blackface" style tones), and the sound was NOT very dissimilar than through my THD. I guess the main difference is that through the Fenders, the lead sound was "a lot like EJ", wheras through the THD, it just nails it. Now that I've got the EJ sound (or something very similar), I find myself trying desperately to NOT sound like him, especially since I learned several of his easier to moderately hard licks (though I don't really have "Cliffs" worked up note-for-note yet). Also gets a great "Jeff Beck x 10" type of lead sound, and with the volume back on my guitar some, I get a lot of older overdrive sounds, the big thick ones I've never been able to get, like Hendrix's sound on "Voodoo Chile (Slight Return)", and any Zeppelin song where Page gets that HUGE sound (possibly due to double tracking).

Now, if you're using a Strat with singles, you may find yourself turning the Saturation control up clockwise a good bit (the opposite of buckers), as the other way sounds like overdrive added on top of a rather "pingy" strat note. Still, the sound is definitely in a different space. I didn't get very EJ-like sounds out of the "normal" Strats, though I did get big, fat, smooth, and responsive gain out of it. Though, I will say that I haven't played a regular Strat through my very plexi-Marshall sounding THD, so maybe that's the ticket. But this pedal may be the ticket if you've got an old Strat, Super Reverb, and are looking for a pedal to get very Robben Ford like lead tones out of it. But, bottom line, if you're playing a stock 50's Strat through a Twin Reverb, you probably won't find very many EJ-like tones in this pedal. If you just HAVE to have that sound, and you have a good playing (but not particularly all that valuable) Strat, take my advice and get it routed and slap a humbucker in that thing (a Pearly Gates would be my recommendation). Also remember that Eric rolls of the tone a tad bit on his guitar's bridge pickups, rather than rolling off highs from the amp or pedal (believe me, there is a difference), so this is an additional factor that a lot of people are facing that are stricken with "EJ lead tone" fever.

Also, let me address another myth that has been propagated here with some of the more glowing reviews by saying that YOU CAN GET A BAD SOUND OUT OF THIS PEDAL. Yes, it is possible. And by that I mean that you'll likely get sounds you don't dig at extreme settings. And, well, that's just the nature of the beast on something that has this much control. The sound you want is most likely in there, you just have to dial it in, because this pe

Read the other reviews on this. I love Fulltone pedals, but always end up selling them for one reason or another, so it's hard to say from PERSONAL experience just how well these pedals stay togather. I will say that I have heard of no technical problems with any Fulltone products.

I never know what to think about Mike sometimes. He's always been very helpful in all my interactions with Fulltone, but I've never thought he was a very warm, friendly person like some claim (hard to guage from just e-mails, anyway). That's REALLY important to some people, but ultimately, I'm just happy when they're not overtly rude (you'd be surprised sometimes). They run a business, and are not running for public office.

But, to give you sort of an idea, one time I wrote a really glowing review of the FatBoost (which I no longer have), and Mike just wrote me out of the blue, and said, "Hey, that review deserves a free Fulltone hat or t-shirt". So, I wrote back, sent my address, and jokingly said, "If I trash another Fulltone product online, do I have to send them back (kidding<g>)?". He replied, "Yes - not kidding (well, kinda kidding, depends on how it's done)". So, bottom line, I dunno - It's been over a year, and I still haven't gotten my hat (hint hint, Mike). I'm sure that if I finally got it, Mike's "good guy" rating would likely go up a full 10, or so (he he he!!!).

P.S. for Mike - as far as hats go, I've got a big head (I just know I left myself wide open on that one...)

Yep, another overall 10 on a boutique product review. You've seen plenty, I'm sure. Some that deserve it, and some that I thought, "boy, that guy sure has bad taste if he gave THAT a 10". All in all, it's not in the rating a product receives, or even what I or anyone else says about it. What you have to figure out is if something is for YOU. (the rest of this is more of a general commentary on tone tweaking in general, a few places pointing out how that specifically relates to this pedal).

I've run the gamut over the years, as far as guitar gear goes. For a long time I was looking for the perfect channel switching amp. And I went through a LOT of them, Riveras, Bogners, Boogies - all kinds, really. And I've had plenty of single channel, non-master amps, as well, both vintage and boutique (old Marshall plexis, a late 60's Park amp, Matchless, Diaz, and many more I can't remember). Along with these, I always had an assortment of pedals. At first, most of them were TS-808 type designs, complete with crowded mids, plastic highs, and rubbery low end - when you got low end, that is. And let me say, for the record, that my Fulldrive II was probably the only Fulltone product I didn't like (I think it was this that finally helped me make up my mind that I don't like the 808 type sound - if I did, I'd definitely still have the Fulldrive II).

It's really hard to compare this pedal with anything that's out there, because there just isn't anything similar available. As far as I can tell, this is a totally unique design. I hear certain "tubelike" elements in its inherent sound that are somewhat similar to a couple of their other fuzz pedals, like the '69 Pedal, the Ultimate Octave, etc. But there are many, many other qualities to this pedal that are not in any other Fulltone pedal I've heard. For one, I haven't seen this level of control over one basic sound in ANY pedal. For another, this is a pretty unique overdrive sound to start with, so any comparisons to other overdrive, distortion, or fuzz units will ultimately break down. It's a unique pedal that fills a specific need. Please don't review this pedal here if you're looking for a scooped-mid death machine, as there are already PLENTY of pedals that do that on the market, and this is not one of them. Although, I will say that I've gotten it to "chug" in a very heavy metal-like manner, but true metalheads will most likely prefer one of the many units already on the market that produce killer, ripping sounds, like the Hughes & Kettner Tube Factor, or the Soldano G.T.O. Supercharger. Hell, even certain Boss pedals through the right Marshall will get those sounds, depending on what you're looking for. This pedal is voiced entirely differently (even when you set it for more of a "scooped" sound). It's for those that want to hear vintage, classic overdrive, but with about a ton more gain at their disposal.

I fully realize that most people's taste buds were whetted with the promise of EJ and Brian May tones. And, to a large degree, those sounds are in this pedal. But most people have no clue how Brian or Eric get their sounds in the first place. Brian May, as any self-respecting, guitar playing Queen fan knows, gets his sound by cranking up an already great sounding Vox AC30, and getting more gain by pummelling the inputs with a Pete Cornish treble booster. Eric Johnson gets his sound by cranking up (see a trend here?) his old 100 watt Marshall plexi, and slamming it with a Chandler Tube Driver (which, if you heard it through a clean Fender, you realize it has very little gain, and a "way too soft sound").

Now, I'm not saying it's impossible to get a very similar sound if you don't have their rigs (and not to mention their prowess on the instrument - if you suck, trust me, even the best gear won't help your sound all that much). What I am saying is that you HAVE to at least take into account how they got thei

Knobs all do exactly what they are proported to do. No suprizes here.Pretty easy to dial in a lot of different tones.

Not a lot of low end clarity. Seems to muddy up dissonant sounds. On the plus side the midrange was spanky tubie!!! Not bad thru my Naylor but pretty unimpressive thru a new Traynor 2x12(which by the way is an incredible amp for the dough).Great at low volumes but seemed to lose balls the louder the amp got.

Don't know. Only had it for about 72 hours. Looks tough. My Dejavibe II seems to be a tank too, so I'm supposing this one is too.

Havn't had to talk to Mike yet.

Don't know what to say here. I don't want to slag Mike but this was not the best thing I've seen him build. Maybe the distortion II will address these issues. If there is a Distortion II. Don't get me wrong. Its a cool pedal, but it doesn't quite live up to the hype. I think I'll hold onto my Matchless Dirtbox for a while.

6 knobs...Volume,Distortion are the 2 main knobs and Resonance,Voicing,Highs,Saturation,are the mini knobs, at first I thought this would be a lot to dial, but right away I got my sound and then all other little adjustments seem to bring out my desired tone even further , so I must say it is a pleasure to use also I understand there are internal adjustment to fine tune for pickups and different guitars , i.e. Les Pauls Humbuckers and Fender single coils etc. but I never had to change these , but it is nice to know that is available if needed.

Fender>Fulltone Clyde>Fulltone DejaVibe>Fulltone FullDriver2>Distortion Pro>Ibanez delay 2>Marshall jtm , I saw Robin Trower and he had these pedals so I figured I couldn't go wrong.

I Love all of my fulltone , I have had some for years and NEVER had one go down , and they all have a great warranty, no worries

never had to deal with them but with a transferable warranty and all my heros use their stuff ,I give a 10 10 10 perfect!

I really find it hard to believe any Guitar player would dislike this pedal for that matter any Fulltones they are made for Tone!You could spend alot searching or you could spend alot with fulltone , Your choice , choose Wisely

We got six knobs PLUS 2 inside trimmers (get here only if you know what you're doing). It's not the easiest job but not THAT hard.

Warmoth Custom and Fender Hot Rod Deluxe. I got great sounds just plugging in. When I started setting things I went to distortion heaven pretty soon.

The thing is damn well constructed. No prob this far.

Like said before, not a prob.

This pedal is, without question, one of the best buys in the market today. I was a little skeptical at first but once I tried it I felt in love w/ it. VERY "tunable".

Small knobs are hard to turn. Also takes some playing to find your favorite settings. But man, once you've got them ... see next category!

(Tom Anderson Classic w/ Fender Hot Rod Delux) FANTASTIC. I played tons of distortion pedals in my search, and this is the only one that gave me that "more than overdrive" but "less than Metalzone 2" distortion. The closest thing I can compare it to is the Boss OS-2 (the overdrive/distortion pedal), but that thing is a huge tone killer! The DP-1 is transparent as I've heard. I paid a lot to have the perfect strat style guitar, and I want to hear it when the pedal is on. The DP-1 shines here.

That being said, this pedal does what it does perfectly, but it doesn't do everything - specifically it doesn't do the "slightly overdriven strat tone" typical of a Tube Screamer, and it doesn't do the intense distortion typical in today's metal-rap. For me, I use my amp for the 1st, and don't need the 2nd.

But if you're into Eric Johnson, classic guys like Jimi Page & Hendrix, Brian May, or a host of other guys with a more middle of the road rock distortion tone, I would recommend this as the ultimate distortion pedal.

So far, no problem. Had it 7 months.

So far so good. Mike Fuller has personally answered several email questions about how to get good tone out of the pedal. He's also replied with settings he used on his own music, which you can download from www.fulltone.com.

However, he occasionally doesn't return emails. But I don't hold that against him too much as he appears rather busy making great gear.

For me, this is the perfect distortion pedal, given that I can't afford an amp that matches that great Fender clean tone while providing a great distortion tone.

Only other drawback is the price. You get what you pay for, and the DP-1 is worth every penny - but that doesn't make it any easier to pay $200 for a pedal.

Just plug it in and start dialing away. You'll soon find many distortion settings that sound great. It helps to know a little bit about sound though.

Dozens of good distortion settings. Many bad ones as well given the unit's tremendous flexibility, but these are easy to adjust out. This unit can stand on it's own. In other words, it sounds good without requiring additional distortion to be added by your amp.

Good all around distortion. I think the marketing line about Brian May tonality is a bit of a stretch, but could also be my amp. Never had a fuzz/distortion box that didn't sound different using different amps.

Currently I'm using it with a mesa/boogie MK2. I drive it with a variety of strats/LPs/PRS's. The DP definitely maintains the general tonality of the guitar you use. Strats sound thin while LPs/PRS sound thick. Does not make a strat sound like an LP like some boxes, though I consider this a good trait.

Overall this effect is a bargain for the money paid brand new.

Built like a tank. The case is especially well engineered.

My idea of customer support is that the manufacturer builds the thing so it never breaks and so I never need to call him. Nothing personal against Mike Fuller, but I never really want to have to talk to him. Appears to score well using this criteria.

I like most styles of distorted rock music with the exception of extreme death metal. I never liked playing clean. I've played for 20+ years and use distortion in a variety of diffent ways with a variety of touch sensitivity. I prefer a box for tone and one that let's me hear exactly what I'm playing. This box delivers. And of course, if you want a noise generator to hide what you are playing, there are settings here that will do this as well if you prefer, although this is not my bag.

Great bargain for the price although I have other fuzz boxes as well that cover some territory this one doesn't. Still rate this one a ten though.

Easy, sounds great on any setting but the controls are self-explanatory. The Internal Trimmers are very useful.

Can't say enough about the wide range of sounds. With the "Saturation" Control,you can vary the touch, attack, and feel making the notes more spongy or more firm, very cool!

It's a F-U-L-L-T-O-N-E, they don't break

ALways there, nice folks, I don't waste their time with my personal problems, requests for endorsements, opinions on other products, and I just right get to the point. ALways get an answer via email.

The last heavy distortion I'll buy, would buy it again if someone took it!

I got this from a well respected local Dealer,they carry all the Boutique stuff and know how to use it, They fired this thing right up for me and I was off , I have not had any problems getting many different tones with each slight tweak the pro yielded all the tones I was wanting and Have been looking for what can I say its easy !

I have a number of amps ,Marshalls , fenders , orange , and a DR Z , The Z is my main amp it is the 18watt maz jr. the Pro , sounds awesome in all of them , but it is truly magic in my maz ! It also works with all my other pedals with no problems ,I have many I try to get all the good ones and alot of other fulltone stuff too. It Rocks !

Well I think I have a very large collection of effects , you name it I own it , I also like to do my own soldering and repairing of my own gear and have a basic understanding of electronics so I will sometimes repair my own stuff ,having said that , I Trust everything by Fulltone it is the Finest Quality I have ever seen in any pedal , I never worry about it , and that peace of mind is priceless to me !

Fulltone is Awesome they Truly Support their products with the Highest level of professionalism , They have always answered my questions and needs !

I don't ever mind spending the bucks for the good stuff , you get what you pay for ! in the case of Fulltone It is a must have !!! I will always look to them for the best effects ,They always seem to make a box that makes the tone I have been searching for .

Although there are several adjustment knobs that interact with one another, I found it fairly simply to pull great tones from my Distortion Pro. The manual gets you started quickly, but 15 minutes of tweaking is more than enough to get you familiar with the unit. I'm just thankful the great tones ARE IN THERE for me to find!

My setup is: Prs Custom 24 > Voodoo Lab Sparkle Drive > Fulltone Distortion Pro > H20 delay/chorus > Maxon analog delay > Marshall TSL100 / 2x12 1936 cabinet. The Distortion Pro is silent (true bypass) and really gives me that sweet, violin type of solo sound. It has plenty of punch to cut through, and what does "cut through" is worth hearing. I went through a shit load of distortion pedals to get this tone.

So far it's been very reliable. It's part of my "permanent" pedalboard, and is very well built. I paid alot of money for it, but I sold a few Boss pedals, a Morley Wah, and an Electric Mistress to ease the pain of $219 for one pedal!

Have not had a reason to call for service or supprt (thank godness). I've heard some good things, read some good things. But have no personal experience to tell of at this point.

I play rock, neo-soul, reggae and funk. I've been playing 15 years, have gone through a ton of gear. The Distortion Pro is a great match for me, though a pricey one. Get rid of a few pedals to help pay for this one, though. It rocks. Sick tone. Before I purchased, a few guitarists and two retailers started off by telling me how difficult all the settings would be to tweak, but I have very little problems making this pedal sing, sustain, and 'bleed' tone. The L.E. D. light between the knobs makes it hard to see at times, but the on/off switch feels solid, the knobs are 'out of the way' when I do need to stomp on the pedal, and the housing is solid. Seems like it's built to last. Boss Metal Zone, Ratt type sustain without all the excess distortion and noise. I can actually distinguish my guitar's individual tone.

Not your ordinary distortion pedal here the EQ interacts with its self kind of like a Mesa Boogie amp Boogie players now what I mean, change the mids and the highs and distortion change also the DP is kind of like that. the rest of its use is well explained above.

YUCK!! this is the worst pedal Mike has made and dont get me wrong I'm not bashing him I love my FD2 and Fat Boost to death, but this thing is garbage. I'm using a RI Bassman stock & jumping the inputs on the amp and running a Strat and a Paul. in just the normal channel I got it to sound kind of OK but with the input jumps it was very fizzy and buzzy sounding and I really couldnt find any of the tones Mike says you can get, NO BOSTON TONES HERE BOYS!!! and I tried all the adjustmens inside as well and was really not impressed.
But I will say it did have a tubey kind of crunch and feel sort of.

Save the $200 and look else where kids.

Fulltone = Tank

Mikes always been heplful to me the few times I contacted him.

Maybe this thing screams in other amps but in a bassman I was not impressed. be sure you try before you by people

The pedal is very easy to use and you can get many different sounds from it. I don't really care about trying to sound like anybody but myself, so I can't really say if it does the EC thing or whoever else Mike Fuller talked about. The trim pots in the back are invaluable in tweaking the sound of the pedal, one suggestion don't mess with the mid setting on the internal pot. The gain pot is very helpful as it removes a lot of the fizz that people talk about in other reviews posted here.

I really like this pedal, it reminds me of a matchless hotbox I had but I think it's better(because it's smaller and I don't have to plug it in). I have a blackstone appliance pedal that I compared the distortion pro against and I would say that they are both outstanding pedals with different strengths. The blackstone is slightly more focused and even more sensitive towards volume changes at the guitar. You can go from clean to dirt just by raising the volume from 8 to 9 or 10. Sometimes this can be great and other times annoying. The distortion pro is not quite as sensitve as far as volume changes go but it is still very sensitve to dynamic changes, what I like about it as well as the blackstone is that they make the amp seem larger than life. Many pedals close down amps and really kill your basic tone, these pedals do nothing but improve it. I use these pedals with a tone king comet and I cannot complain at all. In the past I have owned, way huge llama, green rhino, fulltone fulldrive both versions matchless hotbox, and compared these pedals against numerous others, In my opinion not much out there beats these two pedals for obtaining good overdrive/distotion tones. Neither of these pedals is made for heavy metal although the blackstone can do the scooped mid thing very well if you after that kind of tone. I do think that with the humbucker guitar I used it ran too hot, but that was before I adjusted the trim pot, also I play single coil guitars so I don't care about that.

I don't know, probably will have no problems.

I heard the guys a total dick, but that's from other people aka. his dealers, I can't say.

I play jazz and funk and love blues, it works well for this type of music. I brought the pedal into a music store and three guys asked me what I was playing through and one of the guys wanted to knowhere I bought it, so I guess it must sound pretty good. I would by it again, in fact I'm thinking about buying a back up for they make any changes.

It isn't to hard, but it is a little tricky. the manuals suggested settings were helpful.

I play a prs ce 22 into a budda wah+, whammy 1(O.G.), FD2, Distortion pro, loop sataion, DD5, into a Vox AC30 with GREEN speakers(the green speakers sound awsome, I say this, because I couldn,t find any comments on the green speaker vox, only the almighty blue speaker) The distortion pro sounds pretty good it is comparable two the v-twin( I a/bed them) the dp was a little better in sound quality, and tone, and quieter. the dp was good enough to knock the v-twin out of my rig. the chords are kind of muddy , but the solo notes are smooth and eric johnson like, cool if thats your thing I suppose. I am going to give this pedal a low nine because i think there is something cooler somewhere, but I haven't found it yet. maybe I just haven't had this thng long enough

I play spacey rock type stuff. been playing for 15 years now, I don't know if I would buy it again, pretty spendy for a one button pedal. the v-twin is only about a 100 more and has two channels. I haven' really had it long enough, so the jury is still out. so far it sounds great, and cut throuhg really nicely with my band. over all I say 8 if it had another channel it would be 10, as far as sound goes It is really cool, I dont think you can go wrong with this pedal, it is expensive, but if you don't like it you can sell it on ebay and get what you paid for it easily.

this is a REALLY hard one to rate. This pedal has so many variations in tone by just a fraction of a turn of any of the pots. there are also two trims inside that adjust gain. this pedal is a noodler's wet dream. I'd have to give this pedal a 7 for versatility, but not all of the tones are well, "good".

Here is another hard spot. Tone is a very subjective thing. I have been playing since I was 14 (I'm 32 now) - but does that REALLY make a diference? I can certainly hold my own in any playing situation, and my quest for good tone is maybe beyond obsessive..so with that in mind, here goes...

this is my typical setup:

strat (72 strat w/ noiseless singlecoil pu's) - knucklehead rivera 100watt amp (high gain input) - marshall 1960a 4x12 cab.. the pedal seems to favor the "chunk" channel rather than the clean, although the clean channel is spiffo too.

effects chain:

ernie ball volume - fulltone clyde wah - Dpro! - fulltone ultimate octave - line 6 delay modeler - fulltone supra-trem - fulltone fat boost (can you tell I like fulltone stuiff yet??) - monster cable - george L's effect patches...

alright geek stuff out of the way...the pedal is pretty GREAT. the tone is very "smooth" compared to the rivera overdrive channel alone (very marshall-like). I have played this through my effects chain and alone and have achieved very similar results. my effects chain is VERY "transparent" to my ears. "true bypassed as much as possible..short cords...yadda yadda yadda

Now I can see why some of you may be dissapointed with this pedal as far as "crunch" tones go, this pedal was NOT made for distorted metal tones like the BOSS metal zone...blech!!! (why, why , why???), the pro co rat , or a big muff. Just listen to Mike's recordings...blues/rock. This pedal is perfect for that. Now, with MAJOR noodling you CAN get something SIMILAR to EJ's tone or Brian May's tone...well, sort of...WITH the right setup, and their technique (good luck!).

My first encounter with this pedal left me a little disappointed...yes, I am very american and impatient. i want that sucker to leap out of the box and practically play itself, Yes i am ashamed to admit that...but (BIG TIP HERE), you MUST NOODLE WITH IT....that's why Mike put all those damn switches on it!!
The sound is very "organic" to my ears, and you have to have good technique to make this pedal "shine". it gives back at you excactly what you put into it. If you want a pedal that will magically transform you to sound like the latest "therapy band playing through triple rectifiers" go back to the drawing board 'cause this AINT GUNNA DO IT. this pedal is not for you. this pedal requires PATIENCE...

This distortion (if you can call it that..really sounds like a smooth overdrive - not well named Mike!) is not a holy grail, but a very well conceived tone device, that can, if used as a tone device, can help create for some really interesting solo "tones" (yes, this pedal is better for soloing than rhythm work - it gets a tad "mooshy" in the lower registers if your not careful). So all in all the pedal is like a good amp...YA GOTTA NOODLE WITH IT!!!

One more thing...this thing favors strats (like Mike)..I've tried it with my les paul, and it favored the single coils for some reason...I see this pedal as a laboratory...somewhere in this thing is a magical les paul tone - I know it!!

Mike builds some seriously hardy pedals...with all the best parts. I don't see it breaking down for quite a long time...

N/A

I play just about everything, and i can honestly see using it in many situations where I'd have to solo (a rarity in music these days.. right?). This pedal shines in the blues and blues/rock genres. Anything harder than that it seems to not quite fit in. I have played through many distortion/overdrive pedals and this one has to be in the top three...now of course there are some new pedals out that i need to check out, but in the meantime. This one is my favorite. I would probably buy it again if lost or stolen...If I had the extra cash...this is a very "classy" (excuse the 70's vibey word) pedal. Like i said before this pedal shines with the more good technique you put into it..if that makes any sense.

Straight forward with the exterior knobs. You may need to spend some time with the internal trimmers to define your tone.

I use a '61 Strat (which I bought brand new in September 1961 at Manny's) into a Fender Blackface. Effects that I use are the Distortion Pro and a King Vox Wah.

I like the sound of this pedal. It works for me. I've recorded with it.

This pedal is well built. Steel enclosure, true bypass (DPDT switch)

Customer Support......Fulltone is a one person show.....if he's not around you get no support...if he is, you get support

Nice little stomp box, it comes with my recommendation.

OK, it has more knobs than a Tubescreamer. It's well worth the time and effort to tweak with for the control over the sound. The "saturation" control, as others have mentioned, is very cool, allowing you to dial in more attack or compression as desired.

This pedal sings -- just the kind of musical, full, non-buzzy distortion and sustain I was looking for.

Fuller's pedals are built to last. I've gigged solidly with a Fulldrive 2 for the last two years, no backup, no problems. I expect the same with this pedal.

Never dealt with them.

The best pure distortion pedal I've ever played. Would definitely replace it.

Very versatile pedal, it takes a little time to get familiar with all its features. But once you do.............watch out!

There is, hands down, not a better sounding distortion stomp box or multi-effect board distortion on the market today. This bitch rocks, very full-sounding, nice sustain. I'm a 60s/70s rocker (I started playing guitar in 1976) and this fits the bill to a tee. This pedal will not provide a good metal distortion (which is fine by me, since I hate that sound).

My main rig includes: G&L Legacy guitar, Peavey Classic 50 2X12 combo, effects: '69, FD2, DP-1, Sweetsound UltraVibe, RMC Picture Wah, BOSS EQ-7, Danelectro Delay, Marshall Compressor.

The DP-1 can conjure low gain distortion all the way to near fuzz mayhem. Those past reviewers that have stated that this unit is too fuzzy is beyond me. I've compared it side by side to my '69 and Foxx fuzzes, and its sounds nothing like them. In addition, out of all my overdrive/fuzz/distortion pedals (including my amp's distortion channel), no pedal works more fluidly with my wah pedal and UltraVibe. Also, the DP-1 engaged with my FD-2 sounds awesome with endless sustain and controllable feedback.

Excellent pedal for rock/blues. Metalheads keep away.

Will last forever, steel chasis.

I bought it from www.musictoyz.com, I'm not worried. Mike Fuller stands by his products intimately.

Best pedal I own. I recommend it.

Just plug in , there is not a bad sound in this thing , though it is a knob tweekers dream , it just sounds great with all my guitars !

Wow , I have been searching all of my 20 yrs. of playing for these sounds , I mean Hendrix , then onto EJ , then how about that Holdsworth singing lead tone , man this is a " Marshall in a Box " too , now I get my amp sounding awesome at lower volumes . again WOW !

I am the proud owner of several Fulltone tone machines , they all have been through hell and back and work perfectly I expect the same from this little armored box

I have had to deal with them for a broken pot that my singer poured beer into and they sent me their quality parts that day , and I also got a few choice tone secrets out of them :) They are so helpful I know they are so busy , but I want to call them everyday Mike always has the right answer , btw Thank You Fulltone

as I said I own several Fulltone boxs , but I did not hear about this one untill I read June 02 issue of Guitar Player mag. Their review was awesome and I got one the next day :) do your self a favor check out this issue , don't take my word for it , I think you will agree !

I was initially skeptical of the 6 knobs because of some of reviewers stated that it was hard to get a good sound out of this box...huh ?
I plugged it in out of the red box (w/ everything set to 12 O'clock), and was completely stoked out of my mind. Then I did some slight tinkering (11 O'clock here, 1 O'clock there, yadda yadda yadda) and have found THE SOUND. It seems to be hard to get a bad sound out of it...Because there are 6 knobs to fiddle around with, and they are all interactive, it does take a few more minutes to find the sound you like best than say a Boss DS-1, but that is made up in the sound quality department.

Wow !!! My set up is simple - Epiphone Union Jack Supernova, VOX wah wah, and Fender Champ 25 12" combo(w/tube power amp). I set the amp for a just slighly overdriven tone (my "clean" setting) and off I go. The amp has decent distortion (it was designed by Rivera), but it is low power and pushes one speaker...

I am striving for a sound combination in the vein of RUSH and TOOL... With my settings I am able to get the cleanish tone I like, and with the push of a button, the thick monster tone...beefy, if you will, The timbre of the effect is sooooo musical.

I cannot understand how previous reveiwers keep dissing this pedal, unless they do not know what the hell they're doing. I had never heard this pedal before, and am a proponent of the "tagibility factor" (see it/try it before you buy it) and took a $219 gamble hoping it would pay off in killer tone - I hit the jackpot. I have not been able to dail in a bad sound. A freakin' $219.00 distortion pedal had better sound good though...

This pedals tone kills my shrill DS-2, and puts my RAT ('81) to shame.

True bypass is the icing on the cake. Every note (with my settings) rings thru - not mushy at all, and power chords are HUGE !!!

I have not had any issues, and the pedal seems to be a little metal shithouse (weighs a ton for a little pedal)...fomr what I have heard from different techs and Fulltone users, this pedal will last a real long time. Again, costing $219.00, it freakin' better...

I haven't had to contact Mike, but th epedal comes with a five year, non-transferable warranty. Again, there shouldn't be any issues.

This is the pedal...fattens up my single 12" combo with a gnarly mean sound that have been looking for. Thru a Marshall 1/2 stack (1959 SLP) it was nuclear holocaust squared. Not a bad sound in this pedal, and tons of versatility. Perfect for what I needed.

I bought this pedal without trying it, and took a big gamble. In general, you get what you pay for. In this case, I did.

SCORE !!!

took about 10 minutes to get a very usable tone, suprising seeing how many knobs there were and how picky i am.

i run a early 70's strat through a twin reverb. effects include morley emerald echo & univibe. responds well to effects. very quiet. i am very happy with the dynamics of this pedal compared to other distortion pedals where everything turns to mush no matter what you play. distorion can get loose at higher gain settings so i choose to set the distortion knob at 10:00 o'clock giving me more gain than an overdrive but with a tighter sound.

this pedal is a thing of beauty. i would gig without a backup.

never dealt with M. Fuller.

i play depressing rock music. this pedal can murmur and it can scream, just what i need. if it were stolen i would have to get a second job to get a new one. these pedals aren't cheap, or maybe i am.
either way i don't want to lose this pedal.

Has Many controls, all very self explanatory:
"Resonance"=Bass, "Voicing" covers Low Mid to Treble, a very linear sweep...very effective! "Highs" is a Presence control it seems, and "Saturation" is AMAZING! This allows you to dial in or out compression, and to bring back in the "string" for a more focused sound. Quite amazing for such a hi gain device to have this kind of clarity. It has internal trimmer that allow for Pickup Gain compensation, and the #2 one is for RADICAL changes in the basic behaviour of the Gain/Midrange content.

A lot of sounds in this box, very old Marshall, Dumble sounding.

Like all Fulltone stuff, over engineered, built to last

Mike's always there when you need him. I have a different view of customer service myself....I don't call a prolific, busy businessman and ask him what amp I should buy of what order I should put my Boss effects in. I email him when I have a problem..period. And I can't fucking BELIEVE the whiny little highschool snots who cry that they didn't get their 20 minutes on the phone with Mike. For Christ Sake, these other boutique Frantones, Landgraffs, Barbers, etc etc cloning Mike's stuff have NOTHING but time on their hands, of course they want to talk to you for hours. They aren't supplying over 100 stores with top notch product. Get over it! (rant over)

Great pedal, especially if you use a quality Clean amp and want the most CONVINCING Marshallesque tones.....a huge pallet of tones!

With six knobs you have more to deal with of course. I don't like this pedal, so no... I don't think it's easy to get a good sound out of it. If you like this pedal, yes... it's probably easy to use and it looks cool!

Okay, I just think this pedal is way too aggresive. I mean when you turn the distortion down to zero and it's still very distorted there is a problem in my opinion. This creates a lack of flexibility big time. I think this pedal wants to do one thing and if you don't want to go that's too bad. I don't like to be dominated by a pedal. I have a great hardtail Strat and a Singlecut PRS as my main guitars. Mostly Fender and Marshall amps. Main amp. is a reissue Fender Bassman with a Hoffman point to point board kit, E.H. tubes, Fender stand alone Reverb Unit. I guess I'm a Tube Screamer guy. I don't like the E.J. Brian May ploy. That's just trying to sell a bunch of pedals which it probably has. I like the Fulltone line though!

I'm sure it's fantastic like most pedals....

Probably better than a big company....I don't know. I hear it's moody.

I didn't find the knobs that interactive. The saturation control is just mush. Why not call resonance, voicing, highs...lows, mids, and highs? I didn't think there was anything transparent about the pedal. It just wanted to be a club fisted brute with a ton of sustain. There's a place for that but that's all I thought it did well.

Regardless of the fact that it takes more time than usual to find the sound you want out of the pedal, it IS EASY TO USE. I say this because if at anytime you want it to sound slightly different, you can! Unlike most other pedals, this pedal has a WIDE array of tones.

Alot of people are saying that this pedal sounds fuzzy, well.... it does when the SATURATION control is past 1 o'clock and the gain is past 2 o'clock. But this changes to an EXTREMELY DIFFERENT sound once you turn the saturation control clockwise and you have to change the tone controls. But if you go from a 'Metal' or 'Fuzz' sound to 'Rock' you have to change to totally different HI/MID/LOW settings on ANY pedal. You have to have a TUBE AMP to get a good TUBE sound, and I honestly don't think that Mike was implying that you can get an exact Brain May sound without very similar equipment. I think what he means by "More tube sounding than any 'tube' pedal I've heard" is when it drives a 'Class A' clean amp, because if you drive a 'Class A' tube amp with a tube pedal you are 'OVER TUBED'. He built this to drive a GOOD tube amp, he told me himself, but it CAN drive a good solid state like a Roland JC-120. If you have a medium amount of patience, this pedal will give you the DISTORTION sound you want(Don't forget-a distortion pedal is not meant to sound like an overdrive) if you don't have a decent amp or want something other than a DISTORTION sound, don't submit a review!!! He is not claiming to be a Voodoo DOCTOR if you don't have a decent guitar, amp, and other effects don't expect 1 pedal to make you sound good!!!

Almost all of the reviews got a 10 since Fulltone changed their supplier of 3PDT footswitches, and think about the amount of good reviews of all Fulltone pedals. Now, think about how many people that have bought Fulltone pedals and have not submitted a review. The reliability average of all Fulltone effects submitted to Harmony Central is 9.5(I did the math) You tell me, can you depend on it?

Mike Fuller is HUMAN!!! If you spent all of your time building effects pedals, you would too would have a temper ranging from Bitchy to Angelic. I submitted a review on the 'Deja Vibe-2' with all 10's, Mike called ME when I emailed him and fixed a problem I had with a dealer, having a new DV-2 to me within 3 days(and this was on the weekend). Mike talked to me like a fellow guitar player, and he was calling me in Connecticut from south California, responding to my email within 18 minutes. To me the guy is a gift from 'GOD' after dealing with all of the con artists I have dealt with in Music Stores. If you have a problem with an attitude he has, keep in mind you are taking up his time and think about the demand on his pedals. I went to Manhattan and none of the 15 music stores I went to had the DP-1, that included Rudy's(the only fulltone dealer in NYC) and that's NYC, the biggest city in America!! Read the reviews, even if he has an attitude he still gives you valuable info. Fulltone gets a 12 for this from me, if he is snappy, give him the benifit of the doubt, he is VERY BUSY and is not trying to Con you.

The pedal gives you excellent distortion and I said DISTORTION! It works excellent with the Fulldrive-2 as a boost. I play all styles and if you combine the DP-1 with the FD-2 or other good overdrives you can get almost any sound. If you try this out in a music store, try it with your kind of amp first, then a good tube amp(if yours isn't). If you bring it home and WORK with it, you will get a good distortion sound.

It's got a lot of knobs so a little time needs to be invested to get the best out of it. The controls are interactive so that changing one entails changing another to compensate. For example, if you increase the saturation you need to increase the volume or if you decrease the highs you may also need to increase the volume. But on the plus side the extra controls allow for some crucial fine tuning and they aren't overly sensitive so it's hard to get a bad sound.

I've only had this a few days but I've been testing it with a Schecter Strat with Kinman traditional pickups and a Tele with Joe Bardens into my hot rodded Vibro Champ. The DP-1 generally covers the territory of the Fuzz Face, Big Muff, Rat, etc. only with a lot more finese. When the guitar's volume is rolled back the effect cleans up, but not as radically as a Fuzz Face. It's a more natural attenuation. I can roll my guitar volume back to 5 and get a nice rhythm tone then raise it to 10 and wail. I don't understand the reason for all the negative reviews as I love this pedal. I've been playing for about 38 years and I've had my share of distortion and overdrive foot pedals. I think that some of the previous reviewers may have been put off by the Eric Johnson, Brian May comparisons. From my limited experience I'd say it's closer to Hendrix, AC/DC, or even EVH. I really don't know why it matters unless someone's trying to EXACTLY imitate a particular artist. Anyway, I believe Eric Johnson's tone is hard to get because he uses extreme gain with an incredibly light pick attack and it's nearly impossible to acheive for us ham fisted blues benders. There are also a lot of very interactive controls which may be hard to negotiate for a quick try out at a music store. I like the resonance control almost all the way CCW. This minimizes the "loose bass". It sounds pretty cool to goose it's input with my Fulldrive 2 to put it over the top then step on the Fulldrive's boost to send it into very controlable feedback. This is a FUN pedal to play..very dynamic and versatile. I can get a lot of very different and useable sounds just by changing pickups and adjusting the guitar's volume. Oh, and it's VERY quiet.

Fuller had a problem with his supplier for 3PDT switches a few years ago, which he will quickly replace, but that's the only problem I ever heard of with any of his pedals. They are built like tanks, but then again I'd take a backup anyway. But that's just me.

I've had a few dealings with Mike and they were all positive. He responded quickly and fairly. Far better customer service than you will ever get from some huge multinational conglomerate.

I've been playing around with blues, pop, rock and whatever for 38 years. This is a welcome addition to the arsenal. I have no "buyer's remorse", it's a keeper. Some folks have posted negative comments about the high price of "boutique" pedals. As for the Distortion Pro, the custom chassis alone probably cost Fuller more than the total manufacturing cost of an Ibanez TS-9 reissue.

The thing I like best about the DP-1 is the carefully chosen design parameters, meaning that the six external knobs all cover USEABLE territory. There are no really hideous sounds waiting at the extremes of the potentiometers, whereas most multi-knob pedals have the dubious distinction of being able to take one into sonic screeching and booming hell and only with carefull fiddling can one occasionally find one or two decent sounds.

Turn knobs and listen,....... not too bad

Bogner Metropolis, PRS Mccarty, Suhr Classic, asst fulldrive pedals, old TS-9, Klon, Maxon 808, dm-3 etc.
I just got it a few days ago after having demoed it against some other dist pedals. I liked it the best by far. More transparest and dynamic that another almost $300 dist. I too did not find EJ's tone but I found one of my own that I like. The bottom is a little loose for my taste but useable. So far I like it.

Mike's pedals are built like aviation parts, very rugged, meant never to fail

Mike is funny (peculiar). I have talked with him about 6 times. One day he is a huge prick and the next he could not be nicer or more generous with his time. I prefer the generous Mike.

I have a pretty nice array of high end gear to much to mention. Suhrs, L-5, PRS, Mcinturff, Bogner, Victoria etc.

There are more knobs than the typical distortion pedal, and they are interactive, so you will have to experiment. This is not necessarily a bad thing.

Here's where it gets tough. Fulltone's website advertises that this is your ticket to Eric Johnson, Brian May, etc. tones. With a Strat, I couldn't get any useable tones out of it. There's lots of gain on tap, which is good, but the bottom is ultra-loose, the mids and treble are fizzy and buzzy. With a strat and a good Marshall I could only get buzz and fizz; with a Les Paul there was one generic fuzz sound that was pretty good, but I couldn't produce any other tones that I would use in front of an audience. I tried every setting. I was surprised, because all the other Fulltone pedals are very musical. Fulltone claims it cleans up nicely as you turn the guitar down, but it just sounds more constipated. I have to give it a one on sound because not one tone was pleasant to listen to. Really, it was useless.

Built Fulltone-tough. Should last years and years.

Never needed any. All Fulltone boxes have component names and numbers either obscured, or buried in big gobs of gray epoxy. This inhibits circuit thieves and modifiers, but if it ever quits, you can't get it fixed.

I can't recomend this pedal for any style of playing. It's too harsh for rock and blues, too loose for metal, and every tone it makes is done better by some other pedal. I was really disappointed. It's not like I'm here to dump on Fuller, because his Fulldrive-2 and wah are mainstays of my tone, but this unit doesn't do anything that he claims it will do, or anything any guitarist with any musical taste would want it to do. It sounds like a $29 pedal they sometimes blow out at Mega Geetar Chain. All the tones are harsh, fizzy, buzzy, and ultimately, not useful. It instantly makes a good rig sound bad. If you want to make a good amp sound bad, get a DOD Supra Distortion at Mega Geetar Chain on sale and save yourself about $190. The DP1 going back for a refund muy pronto. I can't imagine what Mike Fuller was thinking.

Overall rating is 1, a hunk of junk. I'm sorry but it doesn't matter how well it's made or how much tone range it has, if it doesn't even produce one useful tone, it's not useable. This is Fulltone's first bad pedal.

For years we've heard complaints about distortion pedals. Not one company it seamed, built a box that truly created and aided distortion. Most boxes out there seam to be color boxes with a few transistors thrown in the way of your signal. Well Mike Fuller certainly seams to be trying to create the end all amp-in-a-box with this red, bad boy. It is more diffocult to figure out than say a Pro Co Rat or a Tube Screamer but that's the point. This pedal acts like a good tube preamp. It is almost transparent, asuming you tweak it just right. This is a tweakers pedal, but I found that after I messed around for a while it became easier to operate than my clunky Rat ever was. The only sacrifise is a steep learning curve. Remember that all the controls are interactive, so boosting the mids changes the quality and level of distortion much more than say adding lows highs. This makes sense if you think about it as the midrange frequencies are what the ear picks up most.

Like I mentioned earlier, this pedal doesn't change the overall tonal characteristics unless you really try to make it do so. You will find it hard to make a Fender blackface sound like a roaring Marshall wall, but it is possible. Try to remember that this pedal will maintain the tonal properties of your amp and guitar as well as whatever other signal processers are in line. I found it near impossible to get Eric Johsons tone with this thing, but I'm not using a Marshall or an Echoplex(and I don't have his fingers which are the crucial ingredient). Ultimately you will find this to be the most natural sounding, brilliant distortion around. Since I figured it out, I haven't had any trouble getting cool tones instantly. With a little effort, I managed to get Dimebag death tones with a Strat!(not a replacement if you have a gigantic hunk-o-wood guitar and a monster fuckin' amp.) I found it much easier to get massive blues drive, and the sweetest, tallest, most moutainous lead sound I've ever heard. This is the one! One thing: try not to use standard Alkaline baterys. They discharge power differantly than theolder carbon-zinc kind. You find Danelectro Brand batery in many guitar stores. Use them! Use them in every distortion, wah(any gain effect at all), and try them out in your delays and filter effects. They will enhance your tone in subtle ways and just make more pleasent to listen to. Even if pleaseant is not what you are looking for in a tone, trust me on this, use your ears, and hear the difference.

Everything Mike Fuller makes will last longer than your average cock roach population. Construction is imaculate with an incredibly clean interior and true-bypass switching of course. Knobs are big and sturdy and turn easily(which may be a problem if you don't know how to use this pedal and wanted to preserve a certain tone which you just lost because you tossed it into your gig bag like a...). This pedal won't survive repeated blows with a sledge hammer, well the pedal probably would but the switch wouldn't. In any case, this pedal is reliable and Idon't worry about it.

Very prompt and to the point. I think Mike handles every case personaly.

I have played on just about every style of music at one time or another(I'm working on a trip-hop/dub project right now) and have found applications for this box for everything. I would definately buy it again if it were stolen. This pedal can aid you in your music making. This is the one!

The controls are laid out nicely and they seem to do what they say they will.

This always sounded farty and more like a fuzz than a distortion box. Like one of the other reviewers I was expecting more of a Boston, 70s rock, EVH type of vibe, but it sounds more like a fuzz with a lot more bottom end. I could never get the thing to ever get a Marshall type of rock distortion. It always sounded farty to me. But maybe I am using it wrong. The adverts are kind of misleading in that it gets more 60s fuzz than anything. I used this with a JCM800 set to a basic clean (for a marshall) tone and also a Fender Twin. It did retain the bottom end better than any other pedal I have tried, but the overall distortion sound was just to fuzzy and farty for me.

It looks like it last forever. All Fulltone stuff is built well, even though this pedal didn't work for me, you can't knock him for the overall construstion of his pedal.

Hes a little short and opinionated, a little tempramental, but i guess the line between genius and insanity is a thin one!

Pedal didn't work for me. I was looking for a tighter distortion sound, not a fuzz. Might work for some other people. I think I'll just stick with my TS-9 into my JCM 800 for now.

I had a difficult time getting a sound I was comfortable with. I had to adjust the dipswitches quite a bit to get a usable sound. I am still messing with all the knobs. Saturation all the down, Distortion all the way on, and volume about 4 o'clock. All the small knobs are all the way on. The knobs on top of the pedal except for the saturation knob are not all that interactive. I prefer something a lot easier to use, waaayyy too many knobs on this thing. Feels like I am using rack gear with this many knobs.

The sound of this unit is very good after you find a good setting. I am using a Hiram Bullock guitar heavily modified, with a John Landgraff Dee lux amp. The amp is amazing, but this pedal does not seem to do so well with it. The bottom end of this pedal is somewhat muddy, no matter what setting I seem to set it on. The mids and highs are where it shines. Very midrangy with a warm rolled off highend, for lead it rocks. For rhythym it sounds full but the low E tends to be fizzy. I am going to buy one of John Landgraff's pedals to go with this. This pedal does not clean up very well with the volume knob, Landgraff's are 200% better. If you are a lead player who does not mind a fizzy bottom end this may be the pedal for you. I will use it till the Landgraff comes in, then you can buy it.

Seems bullet proof, and I have heard Mike Fuller is good at rtesponding back. Very well made pedal, should last many,many years.

Again I have never dealt with Mike fuller but have heard good things.

I think this is one of the better distortion pedals out there, does tend to let the amps flavor come through. Fizzy muddy bottom end makes this a nonkeeper for me. Fulltone has a great reputation, and I have played several of their products. The true bypass is a big plus, and construction is top notch. Play it before you buy it, may suit your style great.

I am amazed at some of the reviews here... well, you don't have to be a rocket scientist to play guitar - OBVIOUSLY! This pedal has WAY more configuration possibilities than any other Distortion pedal out there - the price is a few more tweaking knobs... and they are EASY to figure out guys... you have to use your ear - to play guitar and to get tone - period.... put your guitars away if you can't figure it out man... sheesh - I apologize - don't mean to sling mud, but it seems that the competition has laced this column with it's advertising crew's reviews... I own almost every distortion pedal of note out there.... I have compared them all... TS808, TS9, DS-1, SD-1, RAT, RAT2 (talk about transistor tone!), realtube, bluetube, Guyatone (a better TS808, btw), and a couple self-built mod'd clones. The DP1 blows them ALL to pieces.

This pedal is the one. Throw away all your other distorion pedals - you don't need them anymore! Including those containing 12ax7s. Once again, I am amazed by some of the other reviews here. This pedal is so dynamic, it FEELS like an awesome tube-pre to me... and I own one. My current equipment: Mesa-Boogie Triaxis, T.C. Electronics G-Force and Mesa 90/90 tube power amp; a small, much-modified tube10 (Epiphone) with pedalboard; and a solid state Peavey "TransTube" thing... 60 watts or so. I play Les Paul/EMG;Les Paul/Gibson;Strat/Rio Grande;Hamer/Duncan;Charvel/Lynch S. Demon; Strat/Rio Grande HB's.... a wide array of guitar and amp-ability I think...
I have played the DP1 through pretty much ALL of the above... with a little tweaking here and there, I get awesome, useable tones, from dripping molten distortions (EVH, etc..), to in-between and to SRV-like gutsy neck/middle blues singing. My "sound quality" rating is based mostly on the tones I get out of the little tube amp and the solid-state (with emulated output tube compression and drive) sound of the Peavey. So, leaving the Boogie stuff OUT of the equation (with which the DP1 plays VERY nicely I'll add), the DP1 - through plain, not-too-gainridden combos, tube and solid-state, set for a nice, semi-clean blues tone to start... absolutely sings.. I can get any tones I could want with just the DP1 and a small, clean or slightly overdriven power amp... the controls allow for me to dial up pretty much anything. I feel that the DP1 lives up to ALL of Fuller's claims.

I own a Clyde-Deluxe as well as the DP1. These things are unquestionably the toughest enclosures I've seen. People complain about the price of these things - yet every piece is custom made... not just some circuit in a generic housing with a carling 2PDT switch on it... these cases are steel, welded into the perfect shape... that you could drive your car over (god forbid someone do that with these real works-of-art though)... You get what you pay for, guys! Even the switch is a Fulltone 3PDT - REAL full-bypass, LED's, case built for the circuit (rather than the other way around), custom or TOP-Grade components (no shortcuts in these things, guys... down to the resistors and capacitors...)... You can pass one of these pedals down to your grand-children's grandchildrens' grandchildren... and it'll still work!

Only dealing I have had is this: Dealer advertised in-stock (the Clyde Dlx)... but it wasn't... his webpage was outdated... he made a call and Mike Fuller sent it direct from Factory to my house in 3 days. This was an exception - these pedals are in high demand, and every dealer Mike knows is almost certainly calling him around the clock trying to get special favors... wonder why his rep. is that he's annoyed? He probably is ; Success yes, but these folks work their a**es OFF trying to keep up with demand and make everyone happy.

From SRV-like blues to Schenker/Lynch/Satriani styles... this pedal will allow me to carry my Triaxis/90-90 around in a small bag ;) I am amazed... I thought transistor/analog circuitry had gone as far as it could go... with the distortion/saturation controls... this pedal is about 1000% above any other pedal I have heard (and that's alot of pedals)

First I gave it 1. But after some effort I now would
give it 8.

Trying to make this thing work properly in my small home studio room was a totally negative experience. None of the manual suggested settings did help me out eather.
Desperatly i brought my gear to a normal size live stage for a last try, to let the amp (DC-30)and box work at proper levels in proper rooms ! So everything happened and I just felt stupid.

Some of the early fulltone effects had bad switches, but I believe
that is history.

My FD-2 had a bad switch, I sendt a mail to the company
and one week later the new improved switch was in my mailbox here
in Norway. Fastest way to do it.

I have been playing different distorionboxes since 1968, and this
is my man. I don't want a box to sound just like my amp. The DP-1 can really take the output tubes to other levels. That's why I love it
and would by it again.

I could not get a consistantly useable sound out of it. The manual was a little more than the usual one pager, and offered some sample settings that I could not even get in the ballpark with.

Decent gear, I think. I bought it for use with a Top Hat Club Deluxe, but it was far too harsh and fizzy. The TH is very unfriendly toward almost all distortion or overdrive pedals, so I also tried it with my Mesa Mark III and Budda Superdive; it sounded a little better, but still far too buzzy and thoroughly lacking any natural sustain. I got some good power rhythm tones out of it while gigging with the Top Hat, but it completely mushed and fizzed out for single note playing. I A/B'd it with my 2nd generation mid-80s Rat and the Rat was a whole lot more useful for my kind of playing.

Probably extremely dependable. Good components and built like a stone, I'm sure.

Not necessarily friendly, but very efficient and timely any time I've needed anything on other pedals.

Not a good match for me. I really lost patience quickly and don't qualified to make any sweeping judgements other than: Audition this pedal before you buy. It may or may not all be hype, but I REALLY wanted this pedal to be a wonder pedal, and I'm terribly disappointed with it. I don't think that it was all because of my high expectations.

No Manual, two internal tweek knobs, six external tweek knobs, good enough casing, cheap feet. The unit emulates a 'sans amp' saturating device with almost as much tone. It DOES NOT emulate tube distortion very well, but DOES emulates several other 'cheap' pedals well enough. It costs $199 and is worth $75 tops. Good Luck, as with all the Fulltone products, there never seems to be enough of what they're trying to sell in the pedal for the money they're asking!

VERY noisy and too distorted, even for metal!

It's built well enough, too small of a case though!

It's not THAT easy to use -lots of tonal variation in there, so some tweaking is needed to find the best settings.

This thing sounds really good, and alot of people have alot of things to say about it. I think the only other pedal that has had so much hype around it is the Klon. You'll notice there are a few reviewers who say that they are disappointed but that it's a really good pedal, so they give it a 5/10. To them I say MAKE UP YOUR MIND! I think too many are expecting one thing, and the reality is another, so they get frustrated. The long waiting lists didn't help at all either... Back to my experience, I wanted a heavy distortion sound. Up until I got it, I only had a Fuzz Probe, a Tube Works 901, a Klon, and my amp's overdrive (amp is Allen 80w. Tonesavor with 2 12" Fanes, 2 Weber 10's). I was playing mostly heavy metal-type stuff, and none of the above pedals could cut it. So I did my homework (like you're doing now, good boy!) and went for it. I got mine in 4 days (Thanks Terry!). I have had it for about a month, and feel I know what it can do. I play a Les Paul Classic with Rio Grande Texas/BBQ's, a Strat Ultra with Van Zandt Blues, and a stock Gretsch Tennessee Rose. Other pedals are Teese RMC-1, Univibe, Bad Stone, Purple Haze Octavider. The tones this thing can conjure are big and of high quality, but there are alot of mediocre sounds possible too. Naturally, the first thing I did was set the gain all the way up, then all the way down, and doing the same thing with the saturation knob in the said positions. It took me a while to recognize that the bass, mid, high knobs need to be fiddled with. I never did get to the internal trim pots, and I might, because I find there is a tad too much gain the way things are now. I get a big, crunchy tone with the distortion knob low (like 7 o'clock), and the saturation just above 12 o'clock. Crank the highs to 3 o'clock, bass at 12, mids cut a bit to 11. This is my favorite sound so far. I put the volume up a bit too. Loads of sustain, crunchy, tasteful distortion! Just what I wanted, anyway. For the heavier stuff, lower the saturation, and you enter some harmful monster distortion, and turned up, you CAN (with the right EQ settings) sound pretty tubelike/natural. Oodles of gain on tap, and all usable because there's alot of bass and it's a quality pedal. Watch the EQ however -some is too dark, some too mushy, some just not satisfying, but it's great to have alot available in one pedal. A 100-lb violin? I'm not sure about that, but if you don't have a channel-switching amp, this is a GREAT place to get yer high-gain sounds.

Nicely built.

Fuller got back to me fast about the major amplification of single coil hum, but his response was curt. It would have taken no more time to be classy, but I guess we're dealing with a "rocker" here or something.

A mighty fine distortion pedal. Better than any Boss I've heard, and everything out there seems to be overdrive or fuzz, wheras this is undeniably distortion, and I like it. This won't be much good for blues tones, been playing 6 years, favorite feature is the versatility (no it isn't THAT versatile -it's only one pedal for crying out loud). It does for distortion what the Zvex Fuzz Factory does for fuzz (I know it doesn't do as many sounds as the FF, but alot of the FF sounds are mediocre anyway, just like the DP-1). You can twiddle a few knobs and get something totally different for a bit of variety. Would concievably buy it again.

takes a fair bit of time to get used to how it works, and it is pretty sensitive to small changes. i think this is an asset though, well worth the trouble.

using an esquire, sg. jr, jazzmaster, guild sf-4 all through a matchless dc-30, 57 and 61 deluxes and it sounds great. lots of weight to the tone, compresses really nicely, is fun to play through. i think it's really a great pedal, and i haven't had any of the fizzy tone problems other people have complained about, even with an esquire through a matchless(no shortage of top end)

never had previous fulltone problems, can't see it happening on this one.

no idea

great pedal. lots of richness, weight, grease. tried a gazillion OD pedals and have fallen in love with this one. about as good as a pedal OD can get.

Lots of knobs outside, a couple of trim pots inside...but I haven't been able to nail the sound I'm hearing in my head. Everything seems to be so interactive, that if you adjust one knob, you have to adjust another, etc. The instruction manual has sample settings, but they are only a very basic starting point. Definitely a "tweak machine", but I'd rather spend more time playing than adjusting.

I'm using mainly a modified Tele (HD S90 bridge pup, Rio Grande Muy Grande Humbucker Neck, wired for coil tapping, etc.) thru a '69 Vibrolux Reverb. I get good tones with the DP. (But honestly, I've gotten the same tones with pedals I already have, & with a little less effort.) The internal trim pots really have a big effect on the sound...a little turn goes a long way. Out of the box, higher gain settings were a little "phizzy", if you know what I mean. It does have a great bottom end, something unique in my experience with distortion pedals. I think I've got it tamed where I can achieve a smooth, yet edgy distortion. It's about as noisy as you'd expect a gain pedal to be. It's definitely a good sounding pedal, though, in my opinion, not exceptional.

It's solid. Workmanship is excellent.

Never dealt with Fulltone.

Seems this pedal was built to cover a lot of styles. It is versatile; has the capability of producing a wide spectrum of tones. Only thing is, it's only come close to what I want...I wasn't able to nail it. I did A-B it with a couple of other distortion pedals, & decided to let the Distortion Pro go. Don't misunderstand me...it's a very good distortion pedal. Maybe I haven't given it enough time...and then again, maybe I shouldn't have to...

I have always scoffed at reviews that claimed a pedal is hard to use...until now. I'll say upfront that I bought this pedal hoping to obtain that amazing reed-like tone of Alan Holdsworth. After two weeks of fiddling with the DP-1, I feel confident that this pedal is good but does not meet the advertised claims.

Though is has six knobs, there are fewer useful sounds than I expected. I tried every concievable combination and, similarly to an other review, could not obtain tones that replecated Alan Holdsworth, Eric Johnson or Brian May. I have been a fan of each of these artist for nearly twenty years and know there tones intimately. I should have known better than to expeect a small FX pedal to re-create all of their gear but hey, Fulltone made the claim himself this thing was a "100-pound violin." When I think of a 100-pound violin, I want something as resonate as Yo Yo Ma's cello.
Now, it's not all bad. Once you stop trying to convience yourself that this thing will do what Fulltone claims it does, you can get some pretty good rock tones. I also own the Fulldrive II and find the gain a little sweeter and creamier than the DP-1. The DP-1 tone is thinner and more cutting than the Fulldrive II. My recomendation; If you are only going to buy one "gain" pedal, buy the FD II. If your like me and already own that than go for the DP-1 for a more gain option in your pedalboard.

Appears very well built

Ive been around too long and played with to many incredable artist to put up with a sourpuss. I have never talked to Mike Fuller but his reputation seems pissy at best.

Not the holy grail it claims to be BUT may still be the best thing out there.

It has six knobs and for a distortion pedal which at first can be daunting. But regardless its very simple to get an amazing tone. The manual is great and offers up some starting points with it sample settings.

Simply the best distortion pedal by far that i have ever played and i have owned them all. In fact when i first got this pedal i was expecting the holy grail considering how hard it is to get one, and was initially dissapointed.But that was because i was expecting angels to fly out my butt or something. But when it came down to it and I a/b ed this with tons of great distortion pedals that i own this thing blew every single one away. Usually pedals of these variety sound great at bedroom levels and terribly middy and bright when you get into a practice situation at loud levels. This thing sounded exactly the same, full of body and reacts so well to pickup changes and turns on your volume knob. I tested it thru my Tone King comet 40b which is very much like a blackface fender. I used a custom warmoth i have w/ humbuckers and a 335 with p-94s in it. Sounded great through both. Thank you Fulltone for giving my dirty tones life again.

built like a tank

Once again i cannot hold this pedal in higher esteem, a true tone machine.

Ease of use is subjective...dependent on your gear. In my particular case, I'm still tweaking the pedal to find my sound. Different guitars demand different settings...but I'm having a heckuva time finding a middle ground...

For the price & amount of time it took to get my hands on one, it should have knocked my socks off outta the box. It didn't. It's not bad...as a matter of fact it's quite good, but not exceptional to my ears. Not the be-all, holy grail of distortion pedals by a long shot. I can actually dial in the same tones with older cheaper pedals I already have.

Definitely built well.

Never had to deal with Fulltone. Hope I never have to.

I play Teles, Strats & Ernie Balls...with an assortment of pickup configurations (everything from stock singles to high output humbuckers), through Fender amps (Vibrolux Reverb) mostly; on occasion I'll whip out the Riveras (Jake Combo, Quiana). Been gigging regularly almost every weekend since '72. The pedal does what it's supposed to do...that is, it's a good distortion pedal. But there's a lot of 'em out there, & the DP blends into the crowd, sound-wise. I could make it work in my rig...and probably be happy with it, but I could do the same with a much less expensive unit. Overall, nothing really negative...but definitely not the standout I hoped it would be.

Took some getting used too. I think I've got the hang of it now, it came with a 3 page instruction manual with 1 of the 3 settings sounding good with my set up. You have numerous to choose from with the voicing, highs, saturation and other knobs I can't remember, but so far I've only found one that works really well for me.

Okay I got this pedal 8 days after I ordered it from fulltone, I was extremely pleased with the rapid delivery, and having never heard it I was going on the assumption it was going to kick ass. I play it through a 71 deluxe that has been blackfaced, and a crybaby with my clapton strat. For giggles I tried the high gain setting and was rewarded with massive clipping and all out noise. I was surprised but not disappointed since I don't play in that style anymore. Okay, next I tried a lighter gain setting kind of early rush. Once again, clipping was still noticeable and it sounded thin. Now, keep in mind that I use single coils and am using a very low distortion amp so I'm not expecting miracles. After two weeks I finally found a setting that suits me fine, a srv type lead tone that ventures into voodoo child slight return territory. Very cool, but not nearly as versatile as I hoped. I plugged in my friends les paul(I sold it to him) and got that thick distortion sound minus the clipping. Hmmph. Not my style anyway(sour grapes approach).

Seems to be built like a tank, superb design.

Never tried to contact them. I feel the pedal does what it said just not what I wanted it to do....exactly.

I've played 8 years and recently started into the blues. I love the sounds I get with my guitar and amp, but wanted a good distortion tone to boot. I can't say that it's important enough for me to buy another les paul, or another amp, but it'd be cool. I like the tone I get with the pedal, I just wonder if I could've gotten a cheaper pedal and gotten the same sound(Like a 69' or 70' fulltone). I will definitely try out other fulltone products, I can tell by the detail of their work that they put alot of pride into it. I'm keeping the pedal for those reasons.

The Fulltone distortion Pro is extremely user friendly.
Several Tone shaping features and the give this unit a vast array
of tonal possiablitiy's.

The pro is capable of FAT NASTY RAW TONE>:~)

WITHOUT A DOUBT(BUILT LIKE A MINNY TANK)

I've only met a few people that take the kind of pride in their work
that Mike Fuller does. A true genious and verry down to earth.

Currently running: Custom Shop fender>PE vibe>Teese Rmc3>Distorion pro
Analogman Clone>Mesa Nomad>Fender blues Deville
This pedal is amazing in any setup

Had a lot of noise at first but after adjusting the trimmers, now sounds very good. I lean more to overdrive than hard distortion, pedal will do both.

Useing this with Fender amps mainly. When I got the pedal, I set it up like the samples in the manual and was disappointed. The background noise was awful, tried other settings and was about to be sick. I remembered the bad review here and was thinking maybe I agree more with this guy but also thinking about the other good reviews I thought I'd give it another try. I looked at the manual and found the info on the trimmers (that are supposed to be left alone) and since they are marked thought I could try other settings and always return it to "stock settings". High settings of the 2nd trimmer effects the noise level and mine was set allmost on full, I backed it down almost a quater and the hum was gone. I also backed the 1st trimmer down like the manual suggested for hot pickups. For me this works very well now. I have a Fulldrive II, the Dist. Pro has a fuller sound. (no pun intended) Sounds good turned down, good turned up, I am as pleased as I was at first disappointed. In the event I find latter I was just not ready for the pedal I can allways change it back.

New but like other Fulltone stuff, dont expect anything but satiafaction.

Never needed it before but would like to talk to him about the trimmer adjustment.

Sounds good but had to "mess" with it. Expect Mike would't approve but this things on my amp and I think it sounds better than when it came. Like I said, I lean more to overdrive and this thing sounds more full and alive than the Fulldrive but I am not planning to give it up. Also the Dist. Pro sounds better than a Rat and I really like a Rat, not going to get rid of it either.

a little to tough to dial in the tone, but worth it... the manual is good. i set it to the brown sound, but since mike fuller uses this on his strat's bridge p/up, and i use the neck/middle combination, i had to adjust the tone so it was bright enough for me.

the sound quality is excellent. i have 7 fulltone pedals--fatboost, preflat mids FD2, suptrem, '70, soulbender, choral flange and the distortion pro. i think this one is my favorite. i set it as follows: vol.: 12 o'clock, dist.: 12-2 o'clock, res.: 10 o'clock, voicing: 12 o'clock, highs: 2-3 o'clock, and saturation : 5 o'clock. with my lindy fralin loaded custom relic strat into my top hat club deluxe this gives me plenty of distortion, sustain and saturation. my board now has an analogman orange juicer compressor>fulltone distortion pro>bareber elctronics tonepump w/out internal bass trimmer>barber electronics burn unit 2 set to british drive settings (one channel w/ burn at 12 o'clock and the other with burn at 5 o'clock)>voodoolab analog chorus set to fast leslie>analog chorus set to slow leslie> boss tu-2 tuner>ibanez ad-9 analog delay.
this is the sound i have been looking for all long. the only thing missing from my set up was a hot, fat, complex distorted tone. i tried a rat, bixonic, tube drive, my FD2 with the boost control on 5 o'clock and i wasn't happy with any of them. the distortion pro sounds like a jcm 900--ballsy, fat, defined, tight, complex and sustained. my friend used it on with his tele with barden's into a allen flame amp and the amp sounded like a great old marshall--only not at ear splitting volume!! Mike, you did it. the wait was worth it! so was the price!!

yes, this looks like the best built fulltone yet. the battery compartment is so trick!! 1 thumbscrew and the door is revolving and holds the battery secure and takes up very little space. the next best thing about this pedal after the tone is the size...for those of us with cramped pedal boards, a tiny pedal with giant tone is a G-d send. If this wasn;t so expensive, i would put 2-3 of them in my board!!

mike has always answered all my emails very promptly and replaced parts that were faulty.

i play blues and classic rock. been playing for 28 years. i mostly use a lindy fralin loaded custom relic strat> into a top hat club deluxe > my pedalboard now has an analogman orange juicer compressor>fulltone distortion pro>bareber elctronics tonepump w/out internal bass trimmer>barber electronics burn unit 2 set to british drive settings (one channel w/ burn at 12 o'clock and the other with burn at 5 o'clock)>voodoolab analog chorus set to fast leslie>analog chorus set to slow leslie> boss tu-2 tuner>ibanez ad-9 analog delay.

the only thing holding this back is the price...

Having 6 knobs adds a little effort to the necessary tweaking. However, it does not take long to dial in several good sounds.

I give this pedal a 9 for TONE. Great vintage sounds. Very quiet. PERFECT fade outs - no breakup at all when the volume dies away. Very sensative to guitar volume knob and pick attack.

Set up: G&L Legacy Special-->Line6 MM4-->MXR Dynacomp-->Ernie Ball Volume Pedal-->Fulltone Distortion Pro-->Switchbox (looped into Mesa DC3)-->Line6 DL4-->BOSS Chorus-->'68 Fender Bassman

Putting the DP in front of my modified Mesa DC3 produced an AWESOME tone. By itself, the DP gives serveral great tones.

I am not wild about the actual distortion and sustain of the DP. But the TONE makes this pedal a keeper.

Only had it 1 month. No trouble yet.

I give Mike Fuller a "10" for quick response. He has answered every e-mail I've sent him within 5 minutes.

I've been playing since 1969. I'm a serious guitarist - played for a living for many years & studied guitar at North Texas State. I could not get this pedal to produce the tones described at the Fulltone web page, however, I am very happy with this pedal and plan to keep it. One more thing - many distortion pedals make your guitar sound smaller, this one makes your guitar sound really BIG. I do wish the pedal produced better sustain.

It's easy to use. It's a distortion pedal. Any distortion pedal is easy to use and understand. Very cool layout and look to it. Cool color too. Getting a good sound was a different story. I'm not giving a rating here, because it's easy to use, but the sound ain't so hot, and mom always said if you can't say something nice.....

I mostly use a '66 strat all original and various amps Marshall and Budda. This pedal is advertised as a distortion pedal, but to me sounds more like a fuzz pedal. It's got that super loose fat bass sound that most fuzzes exhibit, and it's also got that thing where one note will lose out to another. In other words, the notes don't bleed together well. Sometimes one note will get chopped off because of another stronger signal. I hate that in a gain pedal. It IS extremely smooth as advertised. I guess a fuzz is a distortion pedal, technically. I think of them as different effects. I was expecting something like a Brian May or a Marshall kinda tone. Some old EVH style would be nice. The website says high gain sounds ala Boston. Well, there ain't no Boston or EVH or Queen stuff in that pedal. I don't know who's listening or defining those tones at Fulltone but they need to learn to hear differences in tones especially when trying to describe them.
It's misleading to call this a "distortion pro", it's border line fuzz with a hollow smooth sound and farty cardboard bass. It has a lot of nice controls and it looked like I could get a lot out of it, but it retained that farty bass no matter what the knobs were at. I was quite excited about this pedal for a long time comin' and this is what took years of refining?!! I have always hated fuzz pedal tone. I love old Marshall type tones like Michael Shenker, Gary Moore, Brian May and old VH, and old ACDC. So that is where I'm coming from. I was looking for a pedal to help get those tones when using clean amps like Fender twins. This pedal is a fuzz. If you like that fuzz thing, you might love this pedal. Low rating for misleading ad. I didn't want a sloppy fuzz.

Sent it back

I emailed the guy about a defect on the Fulldrive II switches and he sent new ones out. Very short and too the point when talking on the phone. Made it seem like I was wasting his time. So he's busy, so was the guy at Budda or at VHT but they were very helpful and polite. I called them several times.

I decided to give a review because I hate when I'm looking for honest opinions and find something with mostly all "10s". I guess I'm more critical on gear. I rarely if ever find anything that deserves a 10.
I wanted to give a little balance to the reviews here. I know that this being a LONG awaited hot distortion box, people are going to rave on it. This is my view. Because imo, it's advertising is misleading, I'm givin' it a low rate.

IMO very easy to use. So it's got a lot of knobs-did you get perfect tone out of your guitar amp the first time you turned it on or did you tweak it some? We're guitarists, which by default makes us tweakers. We're all looking for perfect tone or you wouldn't be reading this.
The controls are interactive so it does require some adjustment to bring out the best distortion for your amp/ guitar setup. With a little use, it's easy to figure out. The instruction sheet has some suggested settings which are all good and a great place to start.I haven't heard a bad tone yet, some are just better than others.

Using this with a Hamer Artist and Studio. Both have "traditional" PAF pickups - Seth Lovers in the Artist and Al II Pro and Pearly Gates in the Studio. Main amp is a Mesa Boogie Mark-IIC. Since it has true bypass, there is absolutely no signal loss when the pedal is off. The pedal gets slightly noisy when the distortion is maxed. There are two trimmers on the inside which allow for more gain, but also makes it noisier so I haven't messed with them. These are preset by Mike and crew and mine sounded fine without further adjustment.
Pure distortion tones from this baby. MUCH thicker and meatier than a DS-1, which was my old reliable until I got the DP-1. Somewhat reminiscent of an MXR Distortion plus, but much better. I've heard it compared to a Rat - never had one so I can't comment. Very crunchy and Marshallesque. I've seen people ask over and over "What's the best Marshall in a box pedal?". Well, here it is. Great for AC/DC rhythm, Rush-style riffs (nails Limelight), Free, you get the picture. To me the best feature is that the pedal has great sustain without any fizz. The note retains it's clarity and isn't masked by the effect. I've never heard an effect do this and I've owned 40+ pedals through the years.

It's brand new, but since it's Fulltone, I know it's reliable. My FullDrive had a switch go out after a year, which was fixed free of charge by Fulltone. IMO switches are the weak spot on any pedal. Anyone with the most basic soldering abilities can easily replace one on Fulltone pedals - a plus in my book.

Haven't dealt with them on this pedal, but have had nothing but the best experiences in the past. I have spoke with Mike over the phone on several occasions as well as many e-mails and while his replies are sometimes short, he has always replied personally. A couple of years ago I ordered a '69 pedal from Fat Sound (great on-line dealer,BTW). They were out of stock at the time and when my pedal was ready, Mike called me personally so he could send it directly to me instead of having it go to Fat Sound, then to me. That's exceptional service in my book.

I play mostly classic rock / blues rock. For pure distortion, this is the pedal for me. For smoother OD, I prefer the FullDrive and for the occasional fuzz, I like the PE Experience. I'll keep my DS-1 as it does have it's place and sentimental value.
I would replace the DP-1 if it were lost or stolen.
Mike kept us waiting a while for this one, but I think the wait was worth it.

It was easy to use, like a ham sandwich. There's that footswitch thing, and when I stepped on it, I was playing guitar! I did find that some of the complexities came from the sheer number of footswitches and knobs and what they did, but once I realized that I could turn them both ways, it was exciting, and relieved myself.

It sounds so freaking good. That's what's exciting.....the pure pleasure of playing it and feeling the totally stoked vibe of being jimmy page or mike fuller or brian may or even the captain. I own and play 27 guitars, most of them lunking specimens of 1970s living room history. Each has its purpose. So far, I've already plugged a couple into the DP, but I'm still looking forward to getting my hofner plastic strats into it but that'll be good, I know two of the presets will work well with those old 60s pickups. Forgive my excitement, I am just learning how to play the blues. Not that I haven't read manuals. It's taken a bit of time to figure out what each knob does to the tone. Marshall JTM-45, Fender Deluxe, Fender Twin, a few Ampegs I love, oh you know.

I have no idea. It's pretty new, right?

So super. Thanks bunches.

I play funk to flower, chunk to power, have been at it a while. Most musicians have experienced envy and compromise. Maybe now they can instantly plug into something that delivers like a nutritious meal. Distortion Pro is pretty special. Even though I'm not a "rock musician" per se, I do dig what it does to my signal before I run it to either of three amps I use during weekly gigs begging. Double Nickels fans rejoice! I can't support it any better than that. My stable of cheap junkers are so happy to be plugged into something that costs more than any of them. So super.

Not the simplest because of all the buttons. However these options allow lots of dialing in and discovering sounds. Easy the more you use it.

Fender Strats and Gibson Les Pauls through clean Fenders here. Infinite number of distortion textures with great variety. Can get very raw and almost fuzzy but using the saturation knob compresses and allows one to get the vaunted smooth violin tone. No other pedal gets this raunchy yet refined.

Case is very solid and compact. Excellent quality up to par with other Fulltone pedals.

Took awhile to get it but it was worth it. Give Mike a 9 here understanding how long the wait was.

A lot of anticipation for this one. Took some time to get used to it. It's not a simple easy thing right out of the box but that shouldn't be discouraging. The more experimentation leads to great things because there are so many interactive and complex tones in this unit. Many are comparing it to a Rat but there is no comparison. Also think it kills my Hot Cake for tone range. I waited several weeks before posting my thoughts on this so I can definitely say it is a great distortion box and accordingly priced.

Too many knobs for a distortion pedal. In addition to some very basic guitar amps, I have a rack the size of a small car that is easier to work with.

This pedal is either too fuzzy or too compressed...there doesn't seem to be a good middle ground.

It's already been sold so?

I've never dealt with this company.

I've been playing professionally for 25 years...blues, rock, jazz.
Any decent two channel tube amp will have a better sounding, more useable overdrive tone than this pedal.

Very easy to use and easy to dial in a good sound. The manual is pretty straight forward. The setting samples are great. They are BROWNER SOUND, JIMMY PAGE "Heartbreaker" TONE and CUTTING BLUES TONE. The manual also has a Blank Templates page so you can take note of your favorite settings.

I'm using this pedal in my Custom Pedalboard thru a Marshall JCM2000 DSL401 Combo amp. Guitars are 2000 Gibson Les Paul Classic w/ Seymour Duncan pickups, '97 Gibson SG Standard, '98 Ibanez RG320DX w/ Seymour Duncan pickups, 2001 Gibson Les Paul Standard w/ Gibson '57 & '57+ Classic reissue pickups. The pedal is fairly quiet. The BEST tube sounding distortion pedal i've ever heard ! This thing has got some serious TONE ! Amazing tube feel overdrive. Tons of Sounds. On the versatility side, in my opinion this is the MOST versatile distortion pedal i have ever encountered. Hands down. Just one of the things that i really like about it is it's ability to work great with my other pedals. Specially my Wah-Wah pedals ( Vox V847 reissue modified w/ Teese RMC1 Mod PC board and Fulltone Clyde Pot, Dunlop 535Q and Budda Bud Wah ). It sounds really great !! This one is a keeper.

I'm 100% sure i can depend on it. The quality and workmanship of the pedal is top notch. Built like a german tank ! It features true bypass switching with LED status light operation thanks to Fulltone's 3PDT switch. I just trust the American Made quality more than any other out there.

Never dealt with the company. The pedal was built to last a lifetime. Fulltone makes one of the BEST custom effects out there. Second to none.

I play Hard Rock, Metal, Blues and Alternative styles and this pedal is just perfect because of it's incredible versatility. I've been playing for 18 years now and owned a lot of guitars, amps and effects all these years. It's just too long of a list to write and mostly the vintage ones i still have and sold a few of them that i don't use anymore. This pedal is absolutely fantastic ! I love everything about it. No comparison so far to other similar units. It's got everything i need in a Distortion pedal and then some. For a little Box it's got six tone shaping knobs that works like the tone controls in a Tube Amp. Highly interactive. Controls are: Volume,Distortion, Resonance, Voicing, High and Saturation. It's now my main distortion sound and my tone just totally kicks ass !! My pedal is autographed by Mike Fuller on the bottom dated 12/01. My pedal is #0071 in the production line. I waited for two and a half months for this pedal and i would say it's worth all the wait. Mike, you've done it again ! Thank You.

Very nice pedal, sturdy excellent knobs and switch. If the four little knobs concern you that it's hard to dial in a sound, don't worry. Just set them to center, and maybe tweak "highs" to taste. My favorite setting so far is Resonance and Saturation at 2:00, and Highs and Voicing on center.

Very excellent sound quality. Sounded great in both a high end dumble clone, and a '59 bassman clone.

Built like a tank. Mine is serial #11, signed by mike with "Fuckin-A" written after his sig.

Mike is there for you.

Great Pedal. I finally found something to replace the pro co rat for a good hard edged distortion sound.

D'oh... In my previous review, I forgot to set the ratings.

With six knobs this may be a little more complicated than other distortion pedals, but not much. The knobs are Volume, Distortion, Saturation, Resonance, Voicing and Highs. The last three are more or less three bands of EQ.
The Saturation control seems like it sort of determines the distortion in the sustain of a note. It doesn't mess with attacks as much. The manual says that it is "an integral knob for dialing in the desired amount of 'tube' feel, additional clipping and sustain. This is interactive with the Distortin knob."
The manual is short and somewhat vague, but there doesn't really exist a good vocabulary for discussing the subtleties of guitar distortion anyway. Playing with it for an hour or two will tell you more than a manual ever could.

Mike Fuller has done it again! This pedal sounds great. Very quiet given the amount of distortion that it delivers. Lots of great sounds in this thing. The EQ is effective, the distortion is smooth yet distinctive, cleaning up when you back off on the guitar volume. This pedal needs to be tried to be appreciated. It can cover a lot of ground. The line that was on the Fulltone web site that went something like "turn any amp into a 100 lb. violin" has a lot of truth to it.

Fulltone effects are as roadworthy as they come. I've gigged with a Fulldrive II, a Clyde and a Black Box with no problems ever.

Mike Fuller seems to have a reputation of being rude. This has not been my experience at all. He has always been helpful when I have a question about his gear. Sometimes his email can be a tad terse, but let's get real: he's running a business, recording, and playing gigs. If he's terse it's probably because his time is tight.

I play mostly experimental, fusiony, progressive stuff, but I think that this pedal would work anywhere distortion is needed. It seems quite flexible. I have a lot of overdrives and fuzzes, but I think that this will occupy a prominent place in my sound. I will need to do a project or two to see just where it sits.
I really wish that all the jacks were on the top edge of the pedal (like TC pedals), but I can't really fault Fulltone too much on this, because most pedals are like it, with their jacks on the side.

Not anything that will hurt your brain... however, it's knobs are interactive so when you alter one it really changes things up. Has "resonance", "voicing", "treble" and "saturation" apart from the main volume and distortion adjustments. "Resonance" adjusts the bass it seems, "voicing" according to the manual alters various frequencies but really sounds like a midrange eq, "treble" of course adjusts your high end and "saturation" seems to be compression. Very nice.

Oh my God!!! Can I get an Amen somebody!!! This thing rocks like no other distortion/fuzz/overdrive I've heard. I have been really happy with my Full Drive 2, Rat, and Sparkle Drive. I would and still use my FD2 for light overdrive and boost to heavy overdrive when needed. The Sparkle Drive is used for nice clean but edgy sounds and my Rat was used for everything above and beyond. Not any more!! I A/B'd the Rat and D Pro and was absolutely amazed at how thin my once over the top Rat was. The Rat is still on my pedal board but is not being used. Maybe I'll adjust it down for lighter tones. The Distortion Pro just rips your head off!!! Any of you tone freaks out there looking to add something to your distortion rig need to look into this little wonder... I kid you not!

Fulltone = Tank... nuf said.

Never had to deal with Mike Fuller or a reseller on any of my Fulltone products. I can say that everyone knows how busy Mike is so leave the man alone and let him build pedals.

OK... there are dozens of pedals and multi effects out there that promise you the sound you are looking for and you buy them and replace them all in the search for your tone. Its called GAS (Gear Aquisition Syndrome) As a guitar player it comes with the territory. Hopefully, you'll stop here and buy the D Pro for rig. Nothing will ever even come close. I promise!