Hughes & Kettner Warp Factor

It was very easy to get a solid sound out of this pedal. I turn all knobs half way its perfect for me. You can get a wide range of distortions by tweaking the knobs.

I was looking for a poor mans Mesa Boogie rectifier pedal. I read some reviews about this pedal and was floored when I saw how cheap I could pick one up for. I absolutely think this is the best sound distortion unit I personally have played. I have tried many. I was not looking for vintage tone but it can be had if you want it. This german made pedal is a real gem and I will be buying another to keep on hand in case this ever dies. And they no longer make them so they will slowly become harder and more expensive to buy.

Very well built. The push button is a bit small and seems to be meant for hand switching. I have not owned it long enough to rate this.

Have no Idea.

I play hard rock and metal as far as electric goes. This pedal will make any amp sound much better than its onboard distortion ( unless you can afford an expensive head or combo ) which I can not. I have owned many Peaveys both tube and ss. I have owned a few marshall combos and one head which was pretty cool. Had a real Tommy Victor of prong tone. I have owned a few crates with the celestions. I have owned some nice Yamaha's. Never let anyone tell you yamaha cant make quality musical stuff they have made some of the most underrated and best equipment I have owned. I think this pedal will please anyone who wants a fat, deep, rich and powerful and heavy distortion.

Very easy use of controls and whatnot. If you know your equipment and cabinet, the "warp" knob makes sense... tuning the mid frequencies.

I only give it a 9 because of the silly swapping of the input/output jacks. It's opposite your usual guitar pedal. Silly really...

Follow the advice of the previous reviewer and remove the paint from the enclosure where the ground is supposed to connect. Scrape with a razor blade and then sand down to finish the job. Easy fix to clean the hum up a bit.

Other than that, I'd say it ROCKS!

For you guys experiencing issues with the switch...

It has your standard PCB board mounted switch (like an Ibanez TS9 or similar pedal) with an overblown push button mechanism. It really just pushes a little spring down to operate the switch. I've found that cleaning the switch with DeOxit or other contact cleaner once every year or so will keep it in good health. A little bit of time every now and then really makes the difference in performance.

Also, keeping my pedals in a clean environment helps a lot.

If I use it a lot, I would consider rewiring in a new heavy-duty switch.

I didn't get a power supply with my pedal, seeing as I bought it SUPER CHEAP at a pawn shop. So I emailed H&K about the PSA... they emailed back within three or four days. Sounds reasonable to me. I got something of a canned answer about checking with my H&K dealer, but they got back.

$2 at the Goodwill found me an appropriate power supply. Just look for something that puts out 12VAC 50-60Hz and more than 300mA (mine is 500mA... H&K sells one at 750mA).

For $9 and a $2 power supply from the Goodwill, this pedal wins my "deal of the month" award. Initially I thought that it was broken and I planned to used the enclosure and any other parts I could salvage from it to make a custom pedal. After getting it cleaned up, I definitely plan to keep it and use it. It rocks!

I'm never dropping the money on a triple rectifier or anything, so this pedal may actually come in handy if I want to enter that territory. Drive my amp clean and then push this pedal in front of it. Instant doom!

Stupid easy just take the time to tweak your amp and this pedal!!
And follow these instructions on ending the bloody noise in the background!!
See Sound.

Hey $30.00 M/F cheap let???s try it, it sounds like a mid scooped bottom driving power cord noisy stomp box from China!! But yet all things can be useful I found this pedal to be noisy and out of control but where is the noise coming from?
Taking the bottom plate off reveals the main problem you will notice there is a small wire coming off the PC board that is the ground wire, then you notice it is attached to the cast housing of the pedal VIA the plate screw you will also notice there is paint on the housing and on the back of the plate where the ground wire is sandwiched in between!!!
Take sand paper and clean the paint off down to the bare metal and slap the plate back on and WoW!! It cleans up like a new pedal.

Now I can use this pedal, first off I noticed it sounds like the Scorpions using my Les Paul I started playing Rock you like a Hurricane I had my friend busting at the seams laughing it sounded dead on Scorpions. This pedal and Fender amps don???t sound good at all, othe amps as my 20 watt Bonepicker Halfbreed just sings, tweaking your pedal and Amp will reveal it will produce a decent sound just don???t Dime the thing and expect it to sound good.

Metal construction and through the board circuit, I see the cheap stomp switch will most likely **** the bed first but all in all you never know these things can fool you and last for years?
I don???t like the backwards in and out jacks, reminds me of the Budda Phatman and Zenman pedals frustrating for on the fly wiring as 99.9% of all stomp boxes input on right output on left not these!!!#$@#(#+

Why do people build something and overlook
A foreseeable issue as a little paint on the grounding surface.
Don't be stupid fix it!!

Been playing for over 30 years no need to cover what where and how!!
We build Custom amplifiers and pedals www.bonepickerguitaramps.com and like taking things apart to see if it can be fixed or improved on. This is a decent pedal for certain applications; this pedal is OK and will have a use for a good power cord ALA The Darkness.

3 knobs nothing to it

Got this in today. reviews here helped make my decision,since i can sample this nowhere. Exactly what I was looking for, my digi deathmetal broke.My taste has matured over the years and i loved the deathmetal pedal but it was thin and artificial,more so at higher volume. I Wanted a high gain,true amp sounding distortion that i could play metal with and not have to buy another digital sounding pedal. Ive yet to turn up the bass on my amp with this thing,well enough turn that switch on while cranked.i live in an apt.Low end for days and then some,im not kidding.I thought my digitech pushed this kills it.I play on a fender fm212,and a practice marshall 12".Sounds great on both and sounds just as good if you crank it,i did for a minute :). I'm playing some shadows fall,lamb of god etc and loving the sound.raunchy and rectified.I've been wanting this distortion tone a long time so im gonna give it a 10 without a second thought

Heavy,looks as though it'll hold up.I'm gonna hit the inside of the switch with some locktight like someone mentioned here. The switch doesn't seem weak to me it just doesn't click when engaging it like a normal stomp switch,dunno..The jack inputs,knobs and the one switch feel of good quality,but i'm gonna knock off some points for the switch i've heard others have had trouble with,and that makes me feel the switch is unreliable.shame cause the rest of this thing is like a tank

dunno

40 bucks with ac adapter included wtf. I played with the other metalcore ,metal distortions down at guitar center and took a gamble on this pedal i just stumble across on the net(i didn't even know H&K made pedals!)because im sick of flat fake sounding distortion killing my enthusiasm to play some metal which i love to do. I am soooo not disappointed.Its so there,the gain and the geniune distortion sound. I would buy this again, off to jam and thx for everyone elses review on this.

See the other reviews for the features. Think you know them by now. Very easy to use.

Got it as a bargain from a friend. I wanted a good OD in front of my DSL 100 watt tube head. Didn't really know what to expect. It turned out to be heck of a lousy booster but as a stand-alone pedal i think it's pretty good. With the right tweaking in my amp's clean channel eq i can get wherever i want in 'the heavy territory'. The only drawback is that it lacks separate eq section (the warp knob isn't really an eq section). However with a little time you can find the right settings in your amp so as to make it sound heavy as hell. Mark my words: NOT A BOOSTER IN ANY WAY (but you probably knew that by now, didn't you?).

Everything in order til now. Would use it without a backup.

Never had any experience with those german guys.

For the price i paid i think it's unique. I mostly play hard rock but i have surely found 'the' sound for any numetal, death metal breaks.

The pedal has 3 pots controlling gain, level and warp. Warp is like mid-cut/boost. All the way to right it scoops the sound and all the way left it gives a more Marshall sound. Gain above 3/4 is almost the same though it is already enough. Level isn't just volume. It changes the overall effect. So you have to find the right balance between level and the volume of your amp. Has sub button which is like a deep switch - adds massive low end.

What i really like about this pedal is its tightness and heavyness. Palm mutes and harmonics are just huge with just a slight touch of darkness within them. I think soundwise the pedal is somewhere between Mesa Boogie Rectifier and heavy heavy Marshall JCM 900. I really like it. Works almost equally well with both SS and Tube amps.

Had it for 2 years now, never had a single problem. Very well built. My bandmate also has one and neither his ever had any problems

Emailed them for a couple of useful hints - replied within 2 days time.

For a solid state pedal i think it replicates the sound of a tube amp surprisingly well. You can find it used in pretty decent price too.

How difficult could tweaking 3 knobs and a button be??

That's where this thing shines. My setup is Gibson Les Paul Custom -> H&K Warp Factor -> Crate Blue Voodoo Tube Head into Marshall 4x12' loaded with V30's (or Marshall 15 watt for practice). Well i can't say that the Blue Voodoo lacked punch or depth in any way. But with the pedal in front of the clean channel i now have access to a whole new channel - much heavier and with low end than previously. I can play easily anything from KoRn to As I Lay Dying. This thing has all the bottom you will ever need.

Till now i surely can't complain (had it roughly 10 months)

Don't know

If you are into heavy music and tired of Metal Zone etc that's the one. Period.

Most sounds you get out of this is real good it's hard to get bad sounds.

The manual is only needed to figure out what that warp knob does, and i think i know now after reading it.

It' a very heavy sound with a lot of bottom end.

I'm using it wih a gibson sg and a peavey bandit 112.
And I realy come out as a monster with this thing.

It seems ruged and it's a hell of a lot heavier than it looks.

The switch is to light and has no real tactal feel, so you don't know when it's on or off.

Newer needed

Great for everything from heavy rock to metal not good for blues or classic rock it's to much modern voiced for those.

Easy to get a good sound. You have to dial in the "Warp" knob very secure, because this is a Mid-Control.

This pedal has it all !! From Dirty Blues-Rock to Nu-Metal.
My Set up = PRS Custom 24 into the Warp factor into a Boogie F-30 All Tube Amp.
This is impotrant!! : Only use a good quality Tube amp, and a good guitar in combination with tis superior pedal.
A bit noisy when you dial up the gain at almost max.
I 've tried almost every dist.- or overdrive pedal on the market (Boss - Ibanez - maxon - Fulltone - and so many others...), and believe me, the Warp is the very best !
This = "the" sound !!

You can always depend on it, I use this without a backup.

Never had problems.

Buy !!!

This is easy stuff here. It's pretty much the same three controls on most distortion units. The manual.... who needs that for this, after all its not some banked up rack mount unit. Look at the knobs, read the words, and turn.

This thing is really fun to play with, you can get such a fat, saturated tone. I like bands like Ministry and The Revolting Cocks and you can totally get tones that that with this pedal. The warp button is an ok idea, but the overall character of this thing is already so dark that it really becomes over-shadowing and can easily turn your sound into a wall of wet mud. It runs quiet without a bunch of noise. Unless you have an amp with a decent effects loop it can override other effects, like a tremolo or a phaser. I use this mostly at home with my practice amp, which is a Hughes and Kettner 15watt job. I have used it on my Mesa Tremo-Verb, but just for laughs and not a whole lot. The Mesa's gain channel is far better. I will say that it has a really poor footswitch. It turns on, or off, too easily. Sounds crazy, but I assure you that that is a problem.

Seems to be built to the hilt, other than that footswitch. Don't really gig with it, but if I did, I'd be confident in it working.

Haven't had any issues with any of Hughes equipment. Everything I have from them still works like the day I got it.

I'd say that if you like super saturated sounding distortion that this thing will make you smile(evilly). I've used many different distortion and overdrive pedals in the last 25 years and this one is pretty cool. It was CHEAP at musicians friend. I only have two complaints on this pedal. 1. That footswitch. 2. I wish that it had a more standard housing so it would fit in a pedal board better. Other than that I have had a blast with this pedal, its like, this one goes to eleven!