M-Audio Black Box

The noise gate is adjustable.
There is an FAQ on the M-Audio website explaining how to use it.
http://www.m-audio.com/index.php?do=support.faq&ID=db4a134ffef4845f56c24a5fd19a1ed0

It's certainly easy to use. I have no complaints about that. The controls and knobs are clearly marked and function as advertised. I would say the ergomics are excellent.

The "Sound Quality" is poor to fair. Being that it's advertised with such a wide variety of amps and effects, you soon learn that there's little variation in tone between the amp models and effects are very limited. Why no reverb ??????? This is the first box I've ever owned that didn't come with reverb? The drum sounds seem to have little variety and there's no Latin sounds. The "lo-fi" to me are basically useless. It seems to clip and distort rather easily even though the clip LED doesn't light.

I'm guessing it's pretty reliable. It seems to be well built.

This is the clincher. I noticed that my LCD could not be viewed at a 90 deg. angle and I could find no mention of a angle or contrast adjustment in the 300 page manual they give you (ha ha). I e-mailed Tech support and got the usual " We will respond within 24 to 36 hours". Well a week later and no response !!!!! Why even bother with advertised e-mail support if you blow the customer off??

Is this the same support that Linn provides? If so, I wouldn't consider buying any other of his products.

I bought the unit because I wanted drum sounds in addition to effects for my downstairs studio - which consists of a XP computer next to my Lazy Boy. I guess it does offer that , but the fact that I can't view the screen at all from where I'm sitting , it's conmpletely useless. Maybe my LCD is bad or there is an "angle" or "contrast adjustment". Either way, Tech support should have had the decency to answer my e-mail.

This unit was very easy to use right out of the box, plug in the power cord, guitar input, and headphones and you're off to the races. As someone who's just getting back into music, after taking the last 5-8 years off, the sound is much better than my previous effects unit, the Yamaha FX500, but that's to be expected. I haven't tried editing patches yet, I was more distracted by getting it to properly interface with the computer, recording software, and getting sound out of my monitors. The manual was a pretty easy read, described what the unit does pretty well, specifically in bold print - "Operation of the Blzck Box is primarily accomplished by changing presets and drumbeats". The software, Ableton's "Live Lite 4 GTR" installed easily, and after reading about 5 pages of the 298 page pdf file manual, I was able to record drums and processed guitar within 5 minutes. I'm actually looking forward to reading more of the manual and learning more about how it all works.

I am using a fairly simple setup. I put my previous effects unit away, and use my Schecter C-1 Floyd Rose into the unit. I'm using it with my Dell 4600 PC, Windows XP Media Center edition, integrated sound card (so I'm following the directions on the unit, and using it's sound card), with Dell A425 speakers (2 satellites w/a subwoofer) and achieve fair quality sound, it's certainly not loud (If you want huge sound, buy a powerful amp!). I only need it to play at home, and be able to take the next step of recording directly into the computer - I won't be playing in a band, nor live. For me, it's a very useful toy/distraction, so basic sound is all I need.

I've primarily played bass in the past, with my 89 Fender Jazz Special, thru the Yamaha FX500, a BOSS wireless unit thru a Hartke Systems 350 watt 210 combo. I was playing with others, recording and in live situations, so it's hard to compare. Sound quality thru the headphones is fine, more than what I need.

Some of the presets are pretty cool. In addition to the amp models, it has settings named "Queen", "Who", and a nice clean "Hendrix" patch. I've also found what sounds a lot like the Edge's sound from "Achtung, Baby". Drum beats sound pretty dry, but you can sweeten them up (I think) when recording.

I've had it for less than a week so far, no problems reliability-wise. I'll follow up if I have any issues with it.

Since I was attempting to not follow it's directions (which say to plug in your powered speakers to the unit's outputs), I was having great difficulty plugging the USB into the computer, and getting sound from the line-out from the CPU. I emailed the company with the form on their website, then got impatient and called them the next day. I received different answers from each contact, but they were responsive, courteous (despite my not following directions, and only skimming the manual) and it ended up the emailed response actually worked, and helped my out a good deal.

I first started piano lessons at age 5, have played flute, saxaphone and bassoon in band/orchestra while in high school, learned how to play bass and guitar in college in the late 80's, and even played with a couple live bands here in Los Angeles, and put out a CD in the late 90's, but that's as far as it went. I hadn't even picked up the bass nor guitar between 99 and 03, the got the musical itch, and scrathed it by buying my Schecter, but after the initial novelty, it started collecting dust.

I'm not sure what sparked it, but I got the itch again. I was thinking of just getting a practice amp when I came across this unit. I just wanted to be able to hear myself play without headphones, but I know myself, and I know I'd want to do some recording the more I get into it. Due to time constraints of being a husband and father with a full time job, I don't anticipate playing live, nor in a band, so I wanted something that I could entertain myself with, and this really fits the bill.

Once I did get it working with the computer, I can now not only record, but I can very easily play along with CD's - the unit has a know that mixes the processed guitar signal with CD playback, a very nice convenience. I had my 3 year old dancing within seconds of starting the drum beat. It does what I want and need it to, other than amplify the sound, but then again, for $250, I'll deal with hearing it thru my monitors. If it were lost or stolen, I'd definitely buy another. I'm still learning the recording software, but the unit itself is fun to play around with.

Mine is the first edition, 5.10.0.0018.
Fairly intuitive interface. There are a lot more knobs and a lot less scroll screens than something like a Pandora PRX4. Editing patches is reminiscent of the Zoom 505 days. Yes, it's that easy. The manual is very strait forward.

First off, you have to understand this;
I believe that people are way to critical of units like this (and most everything else for that matter) on Harmony Central. People write reviews of $150 units and say things like "It's not an Eventide". That much is obvious. If you want an Eventide, buy an Eventide. You have to review a product for what it is. For what category it falls into. This falls into the ranks of products like the aforementioned Pandora PRX4, PODS, Digitech RPX400 and so on. So that's what i'll be reviewing it as. A budget priced way to get your guitar into a computer sounding decent. So with that out of the way...
I haven't been exceedingly impressed with the sounds. It has models of some good sounding amps, and the models do sound decent, but it has a few problems. For example; on the higher gain models there's a noise gate that you can't control at all. It is simply on. And if you do any kind of quick palm muting then stopping (like Fear Factory-ish for example) there's an audible few milliseconds of hiss then dead silence. And even with the hottest of inputs, you can hit a chord and it will be cut off in ten seconds. I just wish you could turn it off when you wanted it off.
There are only a few amp models to choose from and i've found myself sticking with just a few of them. The effects aren't very good. Which is strange considering this is an effects driven unit. The whole "Roger Linn time based effects" thing. True, you can set the tempo of the effects very effectively, but they still don't sound so hot. They're either grainy and digital, or they're so "out there" that they're un-useable. Sure a randomized filter combined with an arpeggiatior combined with an auto wah sounds kind of interesting, but try using it in a song.

It has a hard plastic casing. And believe it or not, the pots are very good quality. Smooth and linear. The input looks a little flimsy so if you step on it with a cable plugged in, i could see it breaking. Other than that, seems fine.

I've only had this unit around 2 weeks, so this is a "first impression" review. Maybe later on i'll post another.
I play modern Black Metal in the vein of Old Man's Child, Dimmu Borgir etc. I've been playing for 9 years.
For those interested in using it to record demos and such, i've yet to make the software work. It installed just fine and it recognizes the unit but i haven't played with it enough to figure out how to record with it. I'm not a huge software buff but i know my way around the popular stuff. This software is not user friendly in my opinion. Maybe it's just because i've never played with Ableton's stuff before, who knows.
The thing about this unit is that it's one of the very few products that has modeling and connectivity. I bought it because it's built better than the Pandora and it sounds better than the digitech. It doesn't sound great. But it does it's job. Which is to serve as a scratch pad. An "all in one wonder" to get my ideas out and into my computer. I wish that there was something out there that's better for the price range, but as far as i know there isn't.