Ibanez CF-7 Chorus/Flanger

Pretty easy to use, despite the misnomer "WACKED" being used in place of "HI-SPEED", which is mostly what it does. WACKED doubles the max SPEED available, as well as increases the maximum DELAY TIME. If you find yourself lost when switching between NORMAL and WACKED, turn down the SPEED and DELAY TIME to get back to a more "normal" sound and tweak from there.

Once you figure that bit out, the pedal is as easy to use as any other chorus/flange pedal you'll come across.

Playing the CF7 with various custom Strat-copies into tube amps. Sounds good, pretty normal setup.

Effect is a little noisy when various controls are moved, but they settle down after a few seconds. There's a little hiss when the effect is engaged, but not much of a concern unless you're running it into a distortion or other gain-boosting stage.

There are two main contributors to the brittle sound the CF7 has in its stock configuration. The first is the op amps (other than the LFO op amp). Stock, they sound flat and brittle. I swapped IC1 with a Burr Brown OPA2134PA to get the high-impedance JFET input near the effect input, and then put two JRC4558D op amps in place of the JRC4580 chips for IC2 and IC3. This brought the much-needed mids back into the tone. After that, I replaced every 1.0uF electrolytic cap (including the tantalum in C7) and 0.47uF electrolytic cap with equivalent film caps. This brought the bass and life back into a rather flat, filtered-sounding tone.

The second issue is with the digital delay part of the circuit when used in chorus mode. The delay has a real hard "digital" edge to it that is difficult to subdue. I put a couple of 0.047uF capacitor shunts to ground on the outputs of the M50198D digital delay chip to darken the output of the chip, which helped. However, if you're looking for the sweet, mushy chorus you'll get with a vintage CE-2 or similar, you really can't get that out of the CF7. The chorus effect (with the aforementioned mods) sounds better, but still sounds digital. It's not a bad sound at the end, but is not really a great chorus effect either.

So the chorus can be made decent, but with the aforementioned mods, the flange part of the CF7 becomes quite good. For this reason, I use the CF7 primarily as a flanger and rely on my modded Daphon E20CH for its sweet, CE2-like-but-better chorus tones.

I can't split my rating in this category, so I'll break it out here.

Stock Chorus: 3
Modded Chorus: 6

Stock Flange: 5
Modded Flange: 8

Very well built. Everything inside is screwed to the chassis...no floating boards anywhere. Should last as long as the other ToneLok pedals I've had over the years, some of which I still have. Those pedals still play like they did when I got them years ago.

Ibanez has schematics/parts lists for the ToneLok series available on their website, which helps immensely when trying to mod these pedals. Given that, which is better than BOSS/Roland, I'd give them a strong thumbs-up on customer support.

As for warranty support, I'll never get the chance to use it, as I usually mod my pedals in some way as soon as I play them for a few weeks.

If you're prepared to heat up your soldering iron, the Ibanez CF7 can be made into a nice little Flanger and reasonably-good Chorus. Stock, the CF7 is brittle and harsh and is of little use beyond using it for high-rate vibrato-like effects used for ambient fills.

So once again, I'll split my overall rating as follows:

Stock CF7: 5
Modded CF7: 7

Pretty simple; if you know how to read and
if you can use your ears, no problems at all.

I use mediocre to good guitars (good being '52. reissue telecaster in
my book). Current amp of choice is Roland Cube 60 for its great clean
tones.
The bypass isn't great, be warned. No tone suck, but a little digital
weirdness is perceived. The chorus is abysmally bad in my opinion.
Maybe the worst I've ever heard.
The flanger is polite and usable, and proper settings can produce
a much nicer chorus than the chorus setting itself.

Now the reason I'm writing this review is a fabulous ringmod sound
I was able to get: the settings are flanger/krazy switch on;
all knobs on 10, but the delay time can be adjusted to taste.
A warm, fuzzy, gonky ringmod sound that's allways in tune.

I've also got the de7 delay (great, great pedal, incredible for
the money). They've both been kicked around and/or dropped plenty
of times, and the worst I've been able to inflict on them is
light scratches across the knobs (no, being "hidden" inside the
box didn't help). So, pretty reliable, but the tiny switch looks
flimsy. For the money, though...

No idea.

Hmm, usable flanger and a fab ring mod.
Pretty robust and reliable. Good times for the bucks.
The crappening of the overall sound is a bit of a let-down.

I'm thinking I'll be getting a true bypass loop, something
small and cheap like the one mr. Keeley makes.

Not really easy to find out what the knobs do.

Two effects rolled into one? Forget about it. The only usable sound i found was a vibrato (chorus in wack'd mode, I believe) that made my bottleneck/e-bow-efforts sound like a theremin. The flange is weak and only souns halfway decent if you put a RAT in front of it.
Worst thing about it: even if it's turned off your guitar sounds like Andy Summers going de-doo-doo-doo-de-da-da-da - bypass is no good.

The switch is most unreliable, like most tone lok stomps, so it seems.

No idea.

I gave it two years, kept tryin. No use for it. It's gotta go.

I bought it used, so there was no manual, but it's as easy as any other modulation effect. The Regeneration control doesn't effect the Chorus sound, only the flanger - that confuses some people I know. The only thing that really interferes with the ease of use is the footswitch, which is only slightly more reliable then the ones on my 80's DOD boxes.

I am an 80's DOD freak and buy and restore every one I can find. I usually find some good sounds with a modded Boss CS-3 - modded DS-1 - DOD Overdrive Preamp - Grunge - CS7 - and finally a DOD digital delay or Akai Headrush. I like Fender Telecasters combined with either a Peavey Bandit (for durability) or a Fender Bassman (for tone). The CS7 has a thin, digitized, brash tone that is easily offensive to the ear, but often fits in perfectly with the music. Guitarists sometimes forget that the guitar is not the one and only constituent to good music. A thicker sounding chorus could make the music feel too weighty when combined with the bass, but the CS7's thin crackle floats above a band mix in a very Radiohead sort of way. I still have it on the same arbitrary setting that I used in the store, and it does a good job of giving chord parts some movement. The Flanger makes the usual cool-but-useless sounds that a flanger makes, just not as cooly as most other flangers. I used the Wack'd mode to record one overdub part a while ago - it's OK, I guess. My DS-1 set to a slight Marshall-y snap and running into this pedal makes by far the best sound (remember the intro to Hell's Bells?)

The footswitch is iffy, as are the mode switches. So far, no problems, but I don't think this pedal is near as well made as a Boss (the internal stomp switch is the size of a grain of rice). This thing eats batteries for breakfast, and sometimes has seconds. It draws 85 milliamps, about ten times as much as must pedals. That being said, I'm used to 80's DODs, which usually stop working for no reason - at least this thing breaks for a reason. The Bucket Brigade chips in this thing are very sensitive to voltage spikes and there's no internal regulation, and I'm constantly aware that it is one surge away from death. Chorus is not an important part of my sound, so this pedal is the only one that isn't backed-up.

No opinion, but I'm not one to run whining to the company anyway. If something breaks, I can usually fix it myself.

I usually play laid-back jazzy rock with copious amounts of delay. I've come to really love the thin sound of this and other digital effects. My playing is very scruffy, and analog effects can make it sound like I don't know what I'm doing. It mixes well with a little bit of grind from the Overdrive Preamp or the DS-1, but is useless with high gain distortion. It is mostly religated to random noise-making when I play crazy dissonance with my Sonic Youth-esque band. I chose this over a EH Small Clone because it was $20 cheaper and I didn't want people to see me with my Fender Mustang, DS-1, Small Clone and think I was just another Kurt Cobain ripoff. Currently, it is filling the space on my pedal board until I can find a good DOD box to make my life complete.

Ease of use: 8: pretty easy, except getting good ring modulator sounds
when using the delay knob, with the flanger on "wacked".

The manual couldn't be any more minimal: one piece of paper with 4 languages expaining only the most basic characteristics.

Setup: Wormoth strat (SD hot rails in neck, and lace gold sensors in mid and bridge positions); Epiphone korina wood SG; old 1970'2 Hoyer(like a Fender Jaguar); and a Samick Telecaster ->Johnson J-station-> Ibanez CF7-> Crate 20 watt vintage club, tube amp.

Not that noisy.

The effects are strong but are very synthetic feeling. Definately "colors" your sound.

The Chorus: Gets deep but somehow doesn't get "lush", kind of synthetic, alot of options, though. I have gotten only a few useable sounds out of the "wacked" function.

I give the Chorus a 7.5

The Flanger: Also gets deep and has nice spread but doesn't leave the inherant sound of your guitar intact. The most annoying problem is, while trying to get some Jimi-sounds, I noticed this flanger sounds like crap with all of the distortions offered by the J-station, which is over 12 different kinds, with a wide range of personalities. The flanger gets this tinny-noise grain that sits on top of the sound when putting distortion through the flanger. Tried a few eq corrections and when I finally got rid of it, the tone was sucked right out of my signal.

I think this petal is suited for heavy distortion-type players who want the "chaosion option-package" offered by the "wacked" feature. Which I could, BTW, get some really interesting sounds that would be good for industrial music and the like.

My brother's girlfriend through this petal right through the wall, I pulled it out, covered with sheet-rock dust, plugged it in and went to town!

I play clean, jazzy, jam-style music; this petal is not a good match because it lack natural sound qualities

I've been playing for about 11 years.

If it were lost/stolen, I would get a much better petal than this one.

My favorite sound is a distortion into a deep chorus-pretty thick and sweet.

I wish it had better quality, more-transparent sound.

I don't even use this petal that often at all.

Petal searchers: Research the pedal, play the pedal, hang out with the pedal, if mail-order be ready to return the pedal, COMPARE THE PEDALS, and take home the one you like. There is no such thing as "best" there is only what is pleasing to you!

THis Pedal is as easy to use as most chorus or Flanger pedals. I never got the manual as I got it new from the store and the Clerk was looking at it and nicked it. I've had it for about a yaer now and am just dissapointed.

I use either a fender strat or an SG through a behringer GMX 212 there are pedals to but theis is the only one that sucks tone ( I've tested it) and it is only used by itself.

I bought this when I needed a Flanger or Chorus sound for live use and have yet to get a satifying sound out of it. First the wacked switch is useless as it just makes everything sound like crap and i can do that without a pedal if i wanted to sound like crap which i dont.

THe other guitarist in my band at the time chose this for me as an exceptional pedal. but since then i've played through countless better pedals. the sounds are usable but when engaged the pedal's sounds seem to say " HEY I"M AN EFFECT". This is not a good thing as my playing is based mostly on the tone i'm getting through my guitr and amp.

as solid as a BOSS

I play a mix of Rock Blues Ska Regae Jazz and of course Funk and Fusion.
This was bought for a Ska/ Psychodelic Jam style thing but just didn't work out well. the digital chorus on my amp was better and since that wasnt cutting the mustard ( the reason i got the pedal) i just dont think i'll ever use it again unless i have to which somehow I cant envision such a situation.

It easy to get an ok sound on the chorus. Every chorus effect pedal seems to be pretty easy to set up. Just mess with the knobs.
The flanger is easy enough to use as well but the sound always sucks. The settings in the manual made a decent flanger sound for a couple minutes until I realized there is an incredibly loud hiss that is at its worst point when you put it at what the manual calls the classic flanger setting.

My setup is a prs custom 24 to a vox wah-wah, another tone-lok pedal-- the TS-7 tubescreamer, a fulltone deja' vibe and then the CF-7, all going to a mesa boogie rectoverb.
The effect I use the most is the chorus. It's decent, but not a very lush chorus sound. It kinda has a sterile sound to it. I solve this problem by using the deja' vibe in conjunction with this which makes the sound VERY lush sounding. This is just a trick I found works, but it doesnt speak well for the ibanez.
The flanger sounds even more sterile, there seems to be no way to make it sound like a normal flanger pedal. The worst part with the flanger though is this loud rumbling hiss that comes as the the flange comes to its highest frequency. The stronger the flange, the longer and louder the hiss goes for. making the delay time longer helps, but then you get a reverb sound, and again, always sterile sounding.
In retrospect, I should have realized that a pedal this cheap is gonna sound really cheap. But when I bought this thing probably 4 or so years ago I was only 16. I read a review in Guitar World that said this thing was really great for chorus and flanger and that krazy switch made some cool sounds. It's true that it can get some cool ring modulator sounds, but to me that is no reason to buy a chorus/flanger pedal. Only if you play guitar to make stupid noises and you don't care about how to play guitar will the ring modulator effect be worth the cost of the pedal. Thanks for saying anything to make money and keep your sponsers Guitar World.
Actually, I love Eric Krasnos' and Scofield's guitar styles, and they get those ring modulator sounds alot, but this pedal's effect is kindof unusable in a real musical situation cause little turns of the knob throw all of the frequenceis out of whack.

It's dependable. I use it without a backup

I am not a fan of this pedal. If you really want a good chorus/flanger pedal, I really think you have to pay for the price of a chorus pedal and the price of a flanger. If you want to cut corner's and buy a cheap pedal ok good for you. It just isn't gonna sound good.
My goal is to buy a fulltone chorus/flanger I tried one out in a store and the thing was amazing. The flanger sounded like a real flange effect from slowing one reel when using 2 reel-to-reel recorders. This is how the true flange sound effect was invented. It wasn't as intense as alot of flangers, but the quality is what counts. And that pedal goes for $295.
It's alot of money but you can either do something half-assed or do it good. Who cares about the money, if you really can't afford it than practice without effects instead and you will become a really good guitarist first. Then you will make alot of money and you can get whatever the fuck effects pedals you want.

4 pretty self-explanitory knobs and 2 switches. One toggles between chorus and flanger, and the other between normal mode and useless mode. I haven't used the manual yet, but I have a pretty good understanding of effects.

I don't notice any signal loss when pedal isn't on, but my signal is usually heavily overdriven. When it's on, there is the normal light swooshing sound when not playing anything, but no noise. I haven't tried this in the effects loop of my amp, though.
The chorus can go from a very light, smooth sound to crazy ray gun blips. I'm not a big fan of flanging, so I haven't used the flanger side much.
The Wack'd mode is retarded, so I never use it.

I have never had any problems with this pedal, but I've heard that the switches can be flaky. So far, it's been very reliable and I'd probably gig with it without a backup. If I used it as much as, say, distortion, then I'd probably get a backup.

No idea.

This is a very versatile effect for those on a budget. I'd probably give it an 8 if it wasn't so cheap. You can get some decent modulation and some fun noisemaking from this pedal.

Seemed to be easy to use. didn't get a manual with it.
set it up in my fx chain in a live situation got one quick
chorus sound and waited to use it.

That one quick setting i dialed up sounded good. but as soon as i went to use it live it died! had to unplug and bypass it. tried to get it working after we finished playing and the only sounds i got out of it were the tapping noises of my fingers tapping the pedal trying to get it to work. icould drop it from about four inches and it sounded like a train wrecking!
finally got it working again! for bout two minutes
sounded good when it was working though.

not at all!!! dealer took it back and is getting me another one. i may have to pay him a visit and pick out another pedal first.

didn't mess with ibanez yet hope it doens't get that far
hope dealer will work it out

i will have to enter another review when i get the second one. after reading how this thing sucks batteries dry not sure i want one
may have to try and get him to fix me up with a boss super chorus!

I've chosen to post a review on the Tone-Lok pedal series instead on one pedal in particular. Not difficult to use, just spend some time on the controls and find the sound you like the most.

I've owned two, the CF7 (Chorus-Flanger) and the DS7 (distortion). Also if not the best sound around, for example like the CS-505 or CS 9, the sound of the pedals I've owned is pretty good. On the DS7 you have to keep the tone control to zero to have a sound closer to the real one you have bypassing the effect. It only cuts some little low frequency.

I've got a used CS 505 lately, and I think it's the better Chorus around, no matter what. But the CF7 is not that far to the old pedal. If you have the chance to change the latter for the old one, do it. If not, keep this one. It has a great sound, expecially for the price you pay for it.

This is not on the customer support, but on the overall quality of the Tone-Lok serie. I really don't know how Ibanez might had put these pedals on the market. The quality is close to zero. In 41 years of life I've never, and say never seen so many units going back to the customer support because of the defects. I've bought the CF7 first, and changed it three times because it didn't work mehanically or electronically. It's really a shame. Maybe the people at Ibanez put on the market again the 9 serie because of the great, great lack of quality of the Tone-Loks. I really hope they'll improve the quality because the pedals on sale right now are aweful.
Anyways I've got the chance to have the pedal changed three times. In the end I gave it back and partially traded with a guitar.

Good sound but aweful overall quality. Even if "cheap", also if I don't know why they call 50 euros a cheap price, the construction sucks completely. I don't think they have a quality control at all. I really can tell on... say 10 pedals, 7 came back because of the defects.