Ibanez DE-7 Delay/Echo

Nice and simple, 3 knobs - effect level, repeat, delay and two swtiches - one for delay time with 3 positions and the other isthe key - choose either ECHO for a nice analog-ish or tape sound or Delay for more digital delay sound.

Sound qulaity is excellent; i bought this sight unseen and unheard off ebay for $50 + shipping and I am very impressed - it is exactly what I was looking for. Sold my Boss DD-3 because I was unhappy with several spects of that pedal - dealy time not long enough for wild effects, controls hard to figure out and it has the uselss Hold function that is too short for anything resembling real sound on sound effetcs. This one has everything I could want - AND it sounds remarkably similar to my old Re-201 Space Echo minus the constants sound of the tape loop and motor in the background. Note: This peadal is VERY QUIET. i use it in-line behind my Dunolp 535 Wah, DS-1, SD-1 and CH-1 and it is the quietest of them all. I am using it with the battery since my Daisy Chain AC does seem to add some noise - but that is fine with me. I am recording to DAW so prefer the quiestest possible signal path.

I just got it a few days ago but it seems very well built. Solid and all steel. I've had Ibanez effects in the pst that held up very well. Switch seems solid enough.

No idea. VNever used them but no reason to doubtthe supoort.

Overall I give it a 9 beacue nothing is a 10 - but this comes clsoe. It is exactly what I was looking for in a delay pedal. I compose and play original Alternative Goth punk, think the Cure, Bauhaus, Love and Rockets, Chameleons, Echo and Bunnymen etc. If you want a Fintage Echo feel in a solid Delay pedal - this is great. Can even get some of those RadioHead tones with the Wet/Dry Stereo split if you know how to record with it. I am very happy with this pedal so far.

piece of cake. everything works that way you would expect. some weird sounds if you overdo the echo. still sounds good. manual is worthless, but if you can't figure this one out, you shouldn't be using delay or echo to begin with.

I use a 2001 Gibson SG Special into the following effects- boss ns-2, boss tu-2, budda wah, keeley mod ibanez ts9-808+, line 6 DL-4 modeler and the ibanez de-7 last in the line. use a Mesa Tremoverb combo for my lead and "saturated clean" sounds with a second DE-7 in the loop. for my dirty rhythm and main clean I run an Orange AD30TC head.


First, I love this pedal. I owned a Boss DD-3, but it sounded way sterile to me. Didn't dig the delay at all. Sounded way processed. Picked one of these off a friend who was moving to a rack system. The Echo is amazing, just what i was looking for. it's muddy enough to get really saturated with, but depending on the settings it can be cleaned up nicely. The delay is pretty good. nothing to write home about I guess.

Its a low-end Ibanez, so gotta expect some issues. I've never had an issue, but the switch didnt look too sturdy when I dissected one of these things. I've been touring and gigging my first one on my board for over 2 years now. No problems yet.

I don't have any experience with this, but its a low end pedal so I don't know if I'd expect much out of them.

I've been playing guitar for 5 years, which isn't much, but I've been gigging and touring the east coast for the last 3.5 of those years. I play a mix of indie ambient rock with harder stuff. kinda like Thursday but alot more complex and technical and with more music than emo-crap.

I listed my gear already, and I tested this against the Boss DD-3 and I and own a Line 6 DL-4 (which i use for more spaced out and weirder delays). I own two of these little gems and I use them more than anything else. They're cheap little buggers but they have held up to the test of touring so far and they still sound sweeeet.

wery easy to use like pencil

good

no that is what i dont like , i hawe bought it used 4 day ago and its not working with my ac 9v dc adaptor not ibanez (i think its not so important i have like 9v dc adaptor 800 Ma and correct polarity) ,light only blinks and nothing happening .arrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrgh
batteries are for few ours

maybe u have such problem and help me somehow

noi don't think that i would go to them and repair it for f-king lot off money

if it worked how i wish i placed 10

It's quite easy,a led,three knobs-delay time,repetitions,level.A switch for the range of delay time( and one for the mode delay/echo),input and stereo output.Just if you need precision on a delay time you can't set it perfectly(like many others pedals)in fact you can operate through a range of time but the knob doesn't let you fix a perfect time.However if you don't need a specific time it's ok.good manual.

I'm using it with a fender stratocaster and tele,deville 4x10,cry-baby,ns2,ts9,proco rat,small stone,vibratrem,univibe,boss vol pedal.I bought it for its echo mode:it's the best!sounds like a tape echo,specially if u set a high level and many repetitions.If you move the time knob while playing u can obtain a great effect,turning up or down(depending on the direction where you move it)the note(s)you're playing.It's fantastic,great with the other effects,no problem,no noise.If u use the distorsion of the ampli(obviously) u'll have to keep a very low level of the pedal.If u know pink floyd's Astronomy domine,u'll remember the note(E) with the echo,in the mid part of the song:ok you can obtain this sound with the de-7.

Never had a problem,I've used it for 3 years,very solid and strong.

Never had occasions.

I love rock and psychedelia,I play original songs in two bands:Hush and TerzaCorsia(www.terzacorsia.it) and with this one we also play a pink floyd tribute,so what better pedal?I'playng 50-60 times a year so I can well test my instruments,and the de-7 It's been my first pedal,its warm sound is very important for me.I preferred it to a cold rack system.I had a yamaha rack,I tried a boss dd6(good),a digitech delay.its best charateristic is the Echo mode,if it had a reverse mode too it would be the best,and the price is very affordable.

Manual is useless (just a folded sheet with 7 or so languages on it), but so-what: it is a very easy to use pedal. My only problem: the delay level knob doesn't handle subtle use of the effect well. I mean, most of what I want is below the first "click", so moving it a millimeter down there "doubles" or "halves" the intensity that I want. I wish the settings I'd like had the knob at 12 oclock, so I could control it better. My sense is that Ibanez favored "gimmick" use of the pedal over serious use. Because at settings below the second click, you can get some really surprisingly good musical use out of this cheap pedal; over the third click, and it's too cheezy for my taste.

Guitar: I play a strat, tele, and rick, through home-made, self-designed amps. sound is sort of like Byrds meets Velvet Underground; the band gets described as a cross of those two, and frankly, I consider it apt, since that hybrid was (now that I think of it!) exactly the sound in my head all those years I was trying to design the sound I wanted.

In that context, this delay pedal is extremely good. "Delay" does essentially perfect replication (and that is what I want), while "Echo" does the job it was intended to do (muddier, decaying repeats). "Echo" is where you can get some bizarre UFO sounds, if that is what you want. Echo also *increases* in volume on the higher Repeat settings -- the selling point for our bassist. He loves the bizarre sounds. I just want clean.

I don't find it noisy for a gigging pedal. I mean, it isn't a studio effect. It does pick up hum from the power supply I used, though. Can't blame it, but just thought I'd mention. More on the power supply later.

I give it a "9" because the delay is essentially a perfect replication of the input, and I hear virtually no switching sound. What more do I want from a delay pedal? I dont' really want much color from it; I just want delay. With reverb, I need a *really* good reverb or I can't bear it (I use a quadraverb GT rack-mounted)... but with delay, it just needs to perfectly replicate the sound and I am happy.

The unit gave me a scare initially, because it didn't like my power supply. Sure, they say you must use an Ibanez pedal... well, I'm not going to buy more power supplies, I have 10 around the house. The ZOOM 9-volt (negative-tip, positive exterior) power supply worked, but there was a two-day period where the unit wouldn't play the guitar's original sound, just the echo! I found it would work again with the battery -- but I don't use batteries for anything I gig with.

I think this was the problem: the ZOOM, like all cheap adapters, actually was running 3 or 4 volts too-high, expecting the pedal to lower the voltage when it draws current (i.e., provides load). By plugging the adapter in to the delay pedal while the voltage was still so high, it seemed to zap the pedal (thankfully, in a non-permanent way -- As if it merely mis-biased an internal pre-amp, which takes time to "come back down" even after I take the supply away).

So I pulled out my volt meter, checked all my other adapters, and ended up using the adapter with the lowest voltage (a Radio shack one, running at maybe 10.5 volts without load). But frankly, I think the ZOOM one would have worked too -- so long as I stick to my new rule: only plug the adapter in to the wall-current when the other end is already firmly and conductively inserted in the Delay pedal. This way, there is always a load -- so the adapter doesn't develop a high voltage to zap the pedal with. Seems to work.

I was sure I'd blown my $70 at first, though. Kudos to Ibanez for intentionally or unintentionally having inherent recovery for my misuse in this case...

Note: the recessed knobs are pretty cool; I imagine they will extend the life of my pedal -- by avoiding knob decapitation! The echo/delay and time-range switches are pretty cheapo, though. Can't say they've broken yet, but I also intend not to use them much.

N/A

I joke with my band that every time I hit a short-duration chord when playing alone, I expect to hear some rastafarian singer to jump in. I imagine if you are in a ska or reggae sort of band, that might be exactly what you are looking for. It isn't what I want, though --- BUT once the whole band is playing together, all the "loose ends" of the echo (the "wa-wa-wa-wa-wa" and "clack-clack-clack-clack" stuff you hear on short chords alone) gets totally lost in the overall band roar, and this thing just makes my guitar sound fuller, and basically better in every way, essentially sounding like a decent reverb.

Put it this way: it ends up sounding like a reverb in the overall band sound -- much better than a cheap Reverb (like on the Fender Hot Rod or Blues Junior, which I found appaling), but without the thickness of a real reverb, because of the crystal clarity inherent in the exact duplication that the Delay does. All in all, I've sort of found echo is the perfect gigging effect -- even though it sounds funny solo!

it's easy. no problems.
set it any way you want within seconds.

I play an Ibanez artcore semi-acoustic through a fender 60W tube amp (super 112, with the red knobs).
IMHO the Ibanez "7" series in general tends to sound a bit too electronic and crunched.
technically - I've had some hiss problems with it at times. not happy about that.
THAT said...

sound-wise, there are 2 sound modes, echo and delay.
the delay mode is clear, can go on (repeat) for quite a while and remain clean, but it doesn't have a sampler mode like boss delay, so... thats not very functional as it masks everything and generates a mess after a few seconds.
in more resonable settings, the delay mode is very good and has a long range (up to 2.6 sec).
the echo mode is very nice. the sound repeats and grows dim and reverbed with each repetition, and has a lot of impact in both long and short delay times, very nice for thickening the sound.

I got some highly cool sounds recording flute and cello with the DE-7 pluged into the mixer send, and playing around with it while recording. it can generate pad-like harmonies or short oscilating phrases. very dreamy.

I've seen this peddal on stage in the rig of a rock guitarist I like, but only that once.

had it for about 2 years, and apart from "the hiss episode", when it was making an anoying hiss in delay mode (that problem went away and hasn't come back since - but should never have happend), well, apart from that it's ok...

if I lost this peddal, I'd try something else. why? it's a good peddal, but I can't say it's the delay of my dreams.
I do love the echo feature, though.
I've been playing for ... about 11 years, but only 2 or 3 years on electric, so I'm not a world authority.

Easy as long as you're not an idiot.

Great.

Sound quality is almost perfect.


Makes a little noise though... not really noticable and nothing an NS-2 can't handle.


I usually use the "Echo" because it sounds more analog. It has a nice decaying warmth to it. Delay is just delay like you'd find on a boss.

It has an enormous delay/echo range 30ms to 2.6s


You can do some weird oscillating stuff with this pedal if you get some feedback turning the "repeat" and "delay level" up... then mess with the delay time and you can control the pitch(speed) of what is being echoed/delayed.

Kinda like some Radiohead, end of Karma Police?

Hasn't let me down.


I've found the -7 tone-lok series of Ibanez to be more reliable than boss.

A couple Boss pedals of mine have failed... including a very expensive NS-2, damnit... and they're new even now.

Then again I have a "crappy" Arion plastic pedal that has outlived some boss.

Haven't needed it.

This is a great pedal with great sound and certainly beats out competition in price.

I think this sounds far better than the Boss delays.



Great value.

nice and easy, like normal delay pedal shoul be. one thing: repeats will go crazy in echo mode if you set it after 2 o'clock.

I did compare to DD6 and I like both for their different qualities. if I had one choice, I'd keep DD6.

delay:
it's normal digital delay, nice time ranges, level works normally but repeats fade away in a sec. it's not infinite repeats! OUCH! the sound is crisp but not crystal clear IMO. it gets a tad darker each repeat, but it's not a problem or anything that would annoy you.

echo:
echo is tricky! same time and level settings as delay but repeats are ompletely different. at 12 o'clock you have pretty long repeats. they decay as well, nice and neat. but after that it's uncontrolable! at 1 o'clock it's almost infinite, at 2 it's infinite and will turn into mud in a moment after 2 repeats start to be louder than the original signal. at 3 o'clock or more you're in trouble.
the trails are muddy, terribly muddy and there's no note definition here, everything will sound same. not like an echo at all.

I found some little useful reverb sort of setting in it.
echo mode
time: 9 o'clock in the shortest setting
repeats: 1 o'clock
level: 11 o'clock

very nice construction. solid pedal, never had problems. it eats up batteries (all delays do), so use an adaptor.

if you need a cheap and neat delay, this is it. as I said before I prefer DD6 because it has reverse and better repeats. Actually you won't need an 'echo' in a live setting. in live everything gets muddy, specially high gain stuff. so what you need is a crisp delay that would be heard. echo setting on this pedal would just make a consert sound bad muddier. DE7 is ok for studio practice sessions, though.
it's not true-bypass, but not painful like big muff.

Controls are very obvious and incredibly easy to use. I never even bothered with the manual.

This pedal is very noisy. Almost to the point of being unusableso on the Echo setting, which is supposed to simulate the distorting, trailing-off effect that naturally happens with analog delay, but it just ends up feeding back on itself badly. The Delay setting is a little more managable, and granted when you are playing the noise reduces considerably, but the playbacks are distorted and don't sound good, and when you stop playing, it's an infernal buzz! Overall it is passable as a starting pedal, but for anyone wanting to record or even play live, I wouldn't recommend it.

I've had some troubles with it. It caved on me live once, let me down practicing a few times. DO NOT use this thing with a battery, it will eat it up quickly and isn't reliable at all when the battery is even slightly depleted. The on/off switch can be unreliable. Mine is still working and still usable, but I'm definitely seeking something else with similar features and better sound quality.

I play rock. Have been for 8 years. I am looking to replace this pedal as soon as I can. It does have an incredible range of delay time and has been there for a few good jams. It is also capable of some really cool experimental sounds, and keeps up, albeit noisily, with anything you can conceive of for delay. Overall I would say that as a starter pedal it might be worth it for its affordability, but for anyone who is concerned about a quality sound it is useless.

I find it very easy to get the right delay times/levels even without a tap tempo function. I didn't get a manual. If you can't figure it out, you aren't ready for delay pedals.

Guitar:Westone Thunder 1A>
Effects:
DE-7>Morley AB-Y>clean
>Digitech HotRod>Ibanez TS-7>60s Crybaby
Amp: Laney PL-100 2x12

It sounds good enough for me but I'm not very demanding of it. I've never gone for any of those radio friendly shimmers or anything. I've used it for ska, and for noise. It does some great noise.

Try this setup:
range: shortest
D/E: echo
time: 5
repeat: 10
level: 5ish
(activate the pedal and immediately a note, such as the open b string. A feedback loop will start immediately. Now move the time knob around. Instant theremin!)

Its doing fine so far, however I have know the switch in tone-lok pedals to go sour.

Would you use it on a gig without a backup?
Can anyone really afford to backup all their gear!?

I've become pretty dependant on how this pedal responds to generally stupid settings. I like it.