Lexicon MPX G2

I work as a sound guy. So I should know how to handle this one. The manual doesn't tell you everything, especially the MIDI details. Overall, the G2 even in combination with a R1 is not user friendly at all. It takes so much time to dial in that you might forget what instrument your supposed to play. But I knew all that before I bought it.

I use mine before the Amp (Marshall 6100) and in the serial FX-Loop. The preamp is the shittiest I've ever heard! Even my Boss GX700 is better. Noisy, harsh, lifeless. Forget it! The preamp loop has one more disadvantage: the buffer amp. It definitly muddies up my tone at low frequencies and adds some harsh highend. I put the blame on my Wireless first. But without the wireless it was the same. Standard FX are ok, but the harmonizer sucks, esp. because it has only one voice. The wah sounds boring. The MIDI controlling is incredible slow. I exspected some whammy effects. Forget about it unless you wait 30 secs for the tone shift. The internal levelling sucks. Even if you put everything on +6 db it isn't louder than the dry level!

Never left me alone. Even generator powered. No probs so far

Never needed. Distributor in Germany is quite o.k. COntacted them once for the software update.

I really regret my decision to buy the G2 and sell my GX700 for it. I could have bought a new MAC for the difference. Gonna go out for a used GX700 again

it's good but not worth $1500, more like $400.anytime you buy a processor the presets are never good so you'll have to ajust them yourself witch is a on going task and by the time you master it it's time to sell it and get the newest gadget. i do like the sound over all i just wish some things were more clear cut like storing programs and tweaking tones can be quite touchy but there is no perfect world and we'll never be happy with gear

like it

don't know yet

I consider myself a pretty smart guy and I had the worst time dealing with this thing. I figured I could just plug and play.. NOT SO FAST!! After reading the novel of a manual they give you. I connected it to my rig.. 2 months later I got my sound dialed in. But god help you if you have to change things on the fly.. you are screwed. It is good for set it and forget it... as in never touch it again. I owned a digitech 2112 before this and that thing was as easy as a microwave. The only more un-user friendly then the Lexicon was my Eventide Harmonizer. Great units... but not fun to use!!

the sounds are great.. if you ever get that far. They factory presets have a lot to be desired. They didn't give you any creative sounds off the bat. I like delays/ reverbs and choruses.. most of the patches are single effect sounds with a little reverb added. But again, you can create your own if you get that far.

I only had the unit for a few months and it never left my studio. It seems to be built well.

I play mostly rock, jazz and blues. I am a huge Dream Theater and SRV fan so I like both tone and crunch. I play a bonger XTC 101A and i tried the unit in both the loop and before the amp.. it didn't sound what I was looking for. My Bogner is great and I just wanted something to add a little fx hear and there. Like I said, delay, reverb, chorus, phaser..just a touch here and there is all I ask!!
I sold the unit on ebay a few weeks ago and just bought a TC Electronics G Major. I am SO MUCH HAPPIER WITH THIS UNIT!! It compliments my Bogner to a tee.
FYI.. don't buy the Lexicon without playing it first for a few hrs. Take your time with the unit. Make sure it fits your style before you drop the coin. It is one hell of a unit if you have the patience.

I've owned it since 99'. This thing is woderfully deep but I found a flaw in the preset programming that I fixed after a few torturous days of re-programming.
It has to do with the R1 foot controller or any pedal assigned to the preset patches. The R1 controls the MIX (wet/dry) parameter by default on many of the programs. So, if you increased the reverb mix, your dry volume would decrease which made it impossible for me to use live as I need to dynamically change how much verb I use in a song.
I found that if I saved the preset to a user patch, I could change the pedal patch assignment from MIX (dry/wet)to reverb level only. This way, the dry volume would remain unaffected. I would also assign the A/B switch to jack up my post level 2 db for solos.
It works great this way.

This thing still sounds great! I'm not crazy about the preamp and the diatonic harmonizer is useless. I have a feeling that they changed the front end buffers on some units because I don't get a stiff sound like some of the reviews state. I would check the cabling. I have a monster cable that just doesn't sound good as an insert send cable. I use a cheapy that sounds good. I use a Strat+ with Joe Barden pups, a Reverend with stock and Barden pups, and a PRS. I plug in the front end and run the insert send into a Rivera TBR rackmount stereo tube head. Then I send out of the Rivera to the G2 in stereo.
I use a Boss TU-2 tuner( what else is there?)so I don't use the G2 tuner.

I've had a crash a few times while using the compare feature and the unit sometimes doesn't find or loses the insert status which means your preamp is bypassed. A reboot fixes that.
I have had small volume jumps before. It might be the amp, but I doubt it.

They were very fast with the software upgrade.

I play for a fairly popular singer/guitarist/songwriter with whom we have had the privilege to open for some great national acts. I had a Strat/Marshall/Univibe setup back in 1973(Jimi fan). I play jazz, blues, rock, acoustic, and classical and whatever comes to mind.
I've been playing for 35 years and I've always been very critical about my tone. I also use a Reverend Hellhound and a stomp setup for most shows because the Rivera can be a beast to lug around.
It was easier for me to purchase this unit in 1999. Things are tight but I would like to replace it if it got stolen or lost.
MY UNIT is transparent and sounds fantastic. I was fortunate to have had prior experience programming fx units so I was able to discover the aforementioned programming flaw on Lexicon's part.
The gentleman that I play for, loves it when I bring the Rivera/Lexicon though the Reverend setup sounds great too.
I've recently been taking out the Rivera/Lex/R1 and the stomp setup for a fun toe tapping time.

its easy to pan through the presets, thats about all i had time to do since i spent most of my short lived relationship with the unit trying to get it to stop fucking up my tone

the effects sound good enough, but the problem is that if you plug your guitar into the g2 and your preamp into the g2's "effects loop" as you are recommended to do to get the fuzz compression wah and envelope functions before the preamp, you have radically shittified your tone. And it is unavoidable. I tried everything. Too bad, because conceptually, this multi-effects processor is great - and one would think that someone would have noticed this lameness before it left the factory. Therefore the only effective way to use this product is after your preamp, as you would the mpx1 which is great, except then the g2 may as well not exist

not an issue although the buttons on the r1 suck - i opened it up to try to figure out why and its pretty obvious - inside the switch is a spring loaded plastic pin that pushes down indenting a soft rubbery pad on a flexible circuit board to make the connection - however, when the weight of your foot comes down on the r1, the whole thing flexes in response and the connection fails to occur. yet another r&d blunder

WHen i called they were relocating from Massachusetts to Utah and all the gear was en route and the staff was bitter and not about to help out, what could they do anyway?

its a really expensive unit and if you get one you will be disappointed, unless they've changed it lately - mine was made in 2001

The presets are bobbins, so you need to do a lot of tweaking. This however is a daunting task, so unless you are a 'Tech-Head' forget it!

Lexicon reverb is excellent - Full Stop. The rest of the effects in this unit suck Big Time! Noisy! Almost impossible to get rid of digital distortion and retain a decent line level!

I have tried the G2 in every mode, i.e effects loop, stand alone and amp input only. I have tried it with and without pre-amps, with 4x12s, 2x12s power amps, combo's etc. It still sucks!

Crap! I have had all sorts of problems with the G2 and the R1. This is the 4th unit I have had and this one is faulty also!

Long story! The UK distributors take forever to do anything and send it back exactly the same as it was when you returned it!

After 2 years of frustration, sending faulty units back and forth, losing all of the value in depreciation while I was actually left without anything to use - They gave me a demo unit for about a month, the 3rd time i sent mine back for repair! As you may imagine, I kicked up a fuss and asked for compensation. They offered me a cheap mic - Wow!

My advice is to spend your money on something that works and actually sounds like it's worth this sort of dosh!

Buying the G2 is the worst mistake I ever made. It has almost made me feel like giving up playing a guitar! You can't get any practical advice on using the thing, or find anyone with decent patches to share!

The unit requires some skill in tweaking the knob but when you've got a hold on it you'll get a sound you'll never forget.
The patches are easy to edit, but there are some hidden options you'll find back in the manual.
The manual tells you everything you want(and that's a lot !!!)

I'm playing on an Ibanez RG-series which goes directly into the lexicon.
The lexicon goes (stereo) into a Peavey 50/50 classic tubedriven poweramplifier.
Allthe noises come from a marshall 1969A cabinet (also stereo)
The unit becomesnoisy when you put a lot of gain in the pre-amp section.
This can be solved by using the great noise-gate.
All the effects on the unit are outstanding.
I've read a lot of negative comments of the pre-amp section but those guys are not capable of tweaking the knob right.
After reading the negative comments, I thought my sound would be better with another pre-amp.
So I tried peavey,marshall,rocktron,digitech,ada,and soldano, but none of these had better sounds than the pre-amp from the lexicon.
So all that talk about a bad pre-amp section is BULLSHIT !
They have a very bad setup or they can't turn the knobs the right way.
If you only put on the pre-amp with a little reverb you'll get a great sound.
Not like those plastic boxes who'll kick your guitarsound to the back.

Reliability is good but the only thing that has occurred was that a thing leg of the memory-battery broke and I lost all my programs.
I've put in a new one with a little bit of foam between the battery and the chassis and the problem was solved.
I've never used a backup, when it breaks, the gig is over.

Customer support is great.
All my programs can be dumped in my computer thanks to a dump-program Lexicon send me by e-mail.
All my other questions were answered correctly within two days.

I play mostly rock/metal covers with my current band and sideways I'm playing a lot of blues like rory gallagher and stevie ray vaughn.
Even with the Ibanez guitar I can get an amazing stevie ray sound.
I'm playing for about 16 years and this is the best setup I've ever had.
I don't know if I buy another one if stolen because there are some new products I've never tried.
If I don't find something better it's gonna be a mpx g2 again.
The thing I really like is that the unit is only one rackspace and the mpx R1 controller only needs one midi cable so everything is very small with only one wire on the floor two for the cabinet and one for the mains.
Very easy and quick to plug in and very reliable.
This thing is not compareable to floorpedals like zoom or digitech.
People who say they got a better sound out of a floorpedal must come over and hear the lexicon with the programs i'm using.
The only thing that is a minor point is the price.
Lexicon is great but the price is a bit too high, especially the controller.

it's easy to get started with it, but it gets trickier when you come to realize the endless possibilities that you have with this bad ass machine!!!

I used to use the G2 in my old live set up. It was in the fx loop of a mesa boogie triaxis, and I mostly play les pauls and a tom anderson.
First of all, I'd like to make clear that I hate everything that's supposed to emulate classic sounds (i.e. line 6 should be crucified). The lexicon has a couple of fx that are supposed to emulate different stomp boxes. They don't, nothing can emulate the real thing, but sometimes, if you stop thinking of your "orange phaser" as an mxr 90, it becomes a pretty cool phaser on its own!
Lately I've only used the G2 for home recording. I switched to a more basic stomp box oriented setup.
I record everything through the lexicon at home.
The preamp doesnt sound like a real amp, but it's still better than any of the pods and similar.
I've had it for 4 years, and at this point i can say that I'm able to get any sound i want.
I've used it to record some U2 songs for a U2 egroup, and nobody believes me when I say that I've only used a lexicon mpx g2 and I got this close to the Edge's sounds.
It's a great processor.

never had a problem in 4 years.

dont know....

The only thing that bothers me about this processor is the delay when you switch presets. You get these 20ms of silence between 2 sounds that are quite usetting coming out of a unit with such great features.....other than that, I think it's the ultimate processor!

Quite easy. Manual is nice to have, but you dont need. The "Soft Row" is a neat feature.

The effects in this unit are pretty decient, but the preamp is horrible. Use the effects, it is worth that much, but by pass its built in preamp. I was actually let down by this product's sound.

No reason why it should break.

Very responsive to any question you might have.

Id recommend this to a guitar player looking for something fun to play with, but not to perform with. If you want effects, get the lexicon's multieffects processor - it is the only thing you will use out of this unit, cause you will search for ages trying to get a good preamp sound out of it.

I don't have the r-1 controller yet, but w/ its addition, should be even easier, I like how it stays on the page you're editing, w/ you go to another, actually seems easy to me, but I come from a sound design background, so most interfaces become familiar fairly quick for me.

Using an Ibanez guitar,and a hafler hellraiser pre-amp, the fx are very high quality, except for the pitch-shifting, w/ for a unit in this price range is very disapointing..Some features I like that are not in the promo literature are: the delay feedback allows you to feed in the pitch shifter or flange chorus, whatever.....makes it interesting..Best feature that you don't see as often as you should; in addition to putting fx in any order, you can set up a parallel signal path, but it can go back to seriel, then back to parallel, very flexible, I was able to set it up so the guitar signal w/ go straight to the reverb,while branching off the pitch-shifter, and delay, so the original note is not pitch shifted, but 2 different delayed versions are, one, say an octave down, another a fifth down/ up whatever, the effect is like playing with 2 other guitars ,who stay in rhythm, and pitch, but syncopate, with your original note, absolutely trippy, and an enormous creative tool for improv, and composing...

so far, so good,and Mine was an old demo,

Mine came w/ older rom, I sent them an e-mail, they had the new rom in the mail, before I could give them the alternate address I wanted it sent to. How many times can you complain about a co. being too fast in their resonse!!!!(I'm not complaining)The installation went fine, and I'd never done anything like that before

with this,I do a kind of experimental solo guitar thing, but it could do most anything, By the way, the factory presets were not very useful for playing music with, but did provide insights into, 'some' of the programming power..For my own deranged purposes, I had the thing making whale sounds, sitar sounds, etc, almost immediately, the chorus section is very powerful, and this unit has internal real time modulation capabilities that many others don't, (notable exceptions, t.c. fireworx, eventide eclipse, but they cost more) Better pitch,shifter, and more delay lines are on my wish list, but as a central guitar" brain" for your system it is rivalled only by roland's discontinued gp100, I find this unit musically inspireing