MXR DD-11 Dime Distortion

Pretty basic pedal, it does take some time to get the right sound tough...

I only know it with my Les Paul into a nice tube amp with 4x12 cab. almost no noise (for the amount of gain). it delivers a nice rock "played through radio" sound. with little knob on it becomes 'walk' and 'master of puppets' -ish.

HINT use it with a booster behind it!!!!!!!!!!! it makes it a WAAAAYYY better pedal. I liked in on it's own and after that grabbed my booster and put it behind it....... It was a whole new pedal! and when I turned my booster off i didn't want to play no more becouse the dime alone sounded weak. don't worry that the boost will cost you even more, the EHX LPB-1 (???40) works as good as any other boost:D:D

PS no 'standard' OD/dist sounds though but they're on your amp so who caress?

build like a tank and I got a MXR dist + (original) sice the '70 so and still works so I'll have no backup

dunno, never needed them

I play blues, rock, punk, classic rock and metal and i'll abmit it won't do everything. only get's you a standard rock, bit punky sound and a very (almost compressed-ish) mid/low cut metal sound. also doesn't like a crunchy sound.

with BOOSTER however it changes completely and you can get even some nu-metal tones and good solid rock/punk tones:D:D

just try it with a BOOST (don't go BSing that it get's ???100 more expensive becouse you want a MXR micro amp, just try the EHX) and enjoy

HEY GUYS IF YOU LIKE DIMES SOUND THIS PETAL FUCKING ROCKS... THE BOOK THAT IT COMES WITH GIVES YOU A BASS MARK SETTING THAT IS KICK***... VERY EASY TO TWEEK FROM THERE... BUT YOU NEED A REAL AMP TO GET THE SOUND.. I PLAY OUT OF A OLD SCOOL CRATE 100 WATT HEAD WITH 4 12 CAB. AND ITS THE BEST PEDAL FOR PANTERA SOUND.. MORE OF A COWBOYS FROM HELL TONE... RIGHT FROM THE BOOK....

DIME ALL THE WAY... I AM ALSO USEING A DIME O FLAME ML... WITH DIMEBUCKER WICH HELPS OUT ALOT....

KICK *** GETCHA PULL!!!

Difficult to get a good sound out of it. I saw a band playing live with this and that triggered me to purchase one.
However I never could approach that thick sound I heard during the concert. The Bass knob is waaaaayyyyy too strong and has a huge influence on volume and distorsion.

Harsh. Noisy. Un-natural sounding. Can't recognise your guitar pick-up: all guitars sound the same mud. I prefer from far the Zombie or the MT-2.

You need a special MXR adapter !!

I blew my DD1 in one ms the day I used the wrong adapter with it: very fragile. You cannot open it to try to fix. Rubbish !.

MXR told me they only handle boxes running under warranty.

Give me one and I submit it for sale the next day on eBay: 1$, no limit. If I get 10 $, that will make my day. One of the worst deal in my life.

I also think it is frankly insane to use the name & image of Dime on this machine. God bless him.

Quite simple to use. Let's say standard knobs - very sensitive, even with a minimum change.

The distorion of this box i great, the thing about it is that is realy versatile distortion. @ distortion modes are available. With the button pushed You get a Dime sound, and with the one un-pushed its a rock distorion (that's what te manual sad). Personaly i like the un-pushed mode. Solid distortion with keeping up the sound of Your guitar. On a crappy gear it might sound crappy.

It's a brig, build to last. I think it'll survive more than boss unit. I thing no backup is needed. The power adapter could be a 9V one - i think tis is the only thing that could brakedown ... hope not :) but still very dependable.

Don;t have to deal with dunlop

Solid built, solid distorition pedal. Worth to buy, or just to try it out. I've been looking for a long time for a realy versatile and unprocessed-sounding distortion pedal that will keep a good ballance between distorted sound and distortion amount. THIS ONE IS ABSOLUTELY GREAT!!!

very easy to use.

but the bass knob is imperfect.

i hate the sound when the button is on , no punch,cold,plan,weary dis.

but when the button is off , you can get a marshall-like sound,

very descent drive!

a green metal brick

18v and the button have to be press on and off only by hands,these are the only disadvantage DD11 have.

I give it just an 8 in a positive way. The range of the controls is very huge so that gives you a lot of possebillities. So if you turn one control just a little it already changes the sound a lot. That means you have to spent some time working with that pedal to figure out in what ways the controls effect each other. So you can find a really good tone but you also have hundreds of "bad" combinations available as well. It is like with a good tube amp --> you need to spent some time and learn how the controls respond and react to the sound. More possebillities means more dead end streets as well. That brings me to the 8 in this category even the pedal is easy to use.

First of all if you like a sound it is a question to taste and depends on the gear it is used with. I`m using this pedal in front of the clean channel of a Marshall DSL 401 all tube combo. I play a Zakk Wylde Custom Les Paul (Epiphone) which has EMG 81&85 pick ups. So my sound description refers to that set up.

I wasn`t looking to match the sound with famous artists. I was looking for an agressive metal sound that is defined and cuts through in the mix. I was pointing in the direction of somewhere in between Rammstein and Black Label Society but not looking for an Rectifier sound. I used a Boss MD-2 which gave me good results but the sound and especially the tone was too muddy and not well defined enough for my taste (even I like the MD-2 a lot).

The DD-11 delivers a well defined clear and agressive tone that cuts through really well. It has fare less distortion than you would think. But it definitly has enough distortion to do the job. Any good known guitar tone is defined by the right amount of distortion which always means too much distortion kills the tone. That seems to be the concept behind that pedal IMO. It delivers a straight well defined agressive metal tone from where you can work it (just like it happened at any great sound in a recording studio).

It is perfect for a band with two guitars. If you are just on guitar player in your band you might wonna add a little compression to it. The pedal points more towards a Marshall sound than in a direction of a very compressed Rectifier sound.

No need to add amp distortion to it, that pedal sounds great in front of an clean amp. But it also shows your playing abillities like they are. If you have no control over your playing this pedal will show that everybody cause the sound cuts really through and there is nothing to hide. If you are a good player you sound great but if you didn`t spent enough time and years with your instrument you are in trouble.

I don`t like the scoop function cause it kills the natural tube tone feel of this pedal. It sounds too clinical with the scoop function. But you don`t need that anyway in my oppinion.

Forgot to mention: Almost no noise for a distortion pedal (played before the clean channel of an amp).

MXR is known for it`s reliability. I only have this pedal for a week now, but if you hold it in your hand you think a tank could run over it without causing any damage. Due to my experiences with other MXR pedals I give it a ten.

can`t tell didn`t need it so fare

I`m playing for almost 20 years now, and toured with a professional band for a few years (power metal style). The style I`m playing right now, is somewhere in between Rammstein and Black Label Society.

I believe that this is one of the best distortion pedals built ever!!!! It sounds more natural and more tube like than the Boss MT-2 and cuts much better through the mix than the MT-2 does(that also means it tsounds totally different than the MT-2). It has a much more defined and straight tone the MD-2 and kills the Rocktron Zombie which sounds just to synthetic.

If you want an honest agressive distortion sound which doesn`t hide anything this is the pedal. If stolen? I`d definitly by another one. In fact I already got a double shot distortion (channel one is the same as the DD-11) in order to use it for the lead tone as well.

This Pedal is made for people who rock hard and really love to rock hard. It is nothing for single coil players who play a lot of blues or Jazz or Pop (and believe they rock) and want their Fender Hot Rod or their Boutique Nice Sound Amp to sound mean and evil once in a while(it is not what either the DD-11 nor the amps were built for). The tone comes from your playing skills and your character of playing. This pedal is just for people whose musical work and life is dedicated to agressive playing. They will love this pedal cause they get the right tone out of it. Boutique collectors (emphasize is on collectors)and any wonnabees who spent more time on talking about stuff they use rather than actually playing their instrument will be lost within a second if they go for this pedal.

You don`t feel it you shouldn`t deal with it. The sound comes from your fingers and not from just from one pedal!!!!!(sorry for my english I`m german but I hope you can understand what I`m trying to point out here)

Really easy,

I can't underdstand why so many reviewers find it so hard to use the bass, middle, treble, volume and gain knobs to achieve a great sound. It's just like using a mini-amp head!

The adjustable parameters are very effective with a huge range.

I won't bore you with my full rig. It's basically a Laney Valve amp and high output humbuckers.

Great, great sound. I find the gain (distortion) is more than adequate (if playing at a decent volume). If playing in a bedroom then I would suggest cranking your amp a bit.

The EQ section is very versatile allowing you to dial in a large array of tones. The small 'scoop' button effectively removes the mid range and slightly boosts the treble and bass functions, giving you an effective 'modern metal' sound if required.

The pedal can get noisy, but it's a DISTORTION pedal, it ADDS GAIN to your signal in order to DISTORT it!!!
I cannot understand reviewers winging about 'hiss' and 'noise'.....!
If you play with a suitable distance between you and your amp and have a decent set of pickups etc then this can help reduce the 'ambient noise'
I'd suggest using a noise gate if you want a silent signal path when you're not playing!

Overall the pedal gives a lovely 'gritty' distortion tone that's easily adjustable and cuts through any mix easily (if required). Just spend a bit of time with it!

Built to last! As per usual with Dunlop/MXR pedals.

N/A

By far one of the most versatile and organic sounding high gain distortion pedals I've used.

It makes my Keeley modded Boss MT-2 sound processed and drab.

As previously suggested, you can only get decent sounds from effect pedals if your gear is up to scratch!

Highly recommended.

It is a relatively simple pedal, but the EQ is touchy. Just moving the knobs slightly can completely change the sound. Can take time to tweak it.

Okay. Sounds similar to Pantera. Really doesn't have a great tone.

It is built well and seems like it would last.

Not the best sound. Spend some time playing on it before you buy one. I don't know why this is being compared to the Boss Metal Zone because they do not sound similar at all.

Pretty Easy to use !

Guitar: I own a Fender Fat Strat USA (w/Seymour Duncan JB pickup on bridge) and a Jackson King-V USA.

Amp: Tech 21 Trademark 60

Effects: (Amp) to --- BOSS Chorus Ensemble - BOSS Digital delay DD-3 - MXR 10 BAnd EQ - Dime Distortion - BOSS Distortion DS-1 or MXR Zakk Wylde Overdrive - Boss Noise Supressor - Boss Chromatic Tuner - to (Guitars).


I bought the original version (the green one) not the reissue with the army painting stuff.

This pedal sounds better with my Jackson guitar, but still sounds great with my Fender (but lack of heavyness but that's normal !).

I purchase this pedal to have that Dimebag Razor shaped/"trebely" sound. And it's perfect for this !!! But you have to use it with your amp distortion. the gain should not be over 12 o' clock or just a little bit over 12. Unless you'll have a tones of feedbacks because of too much distortion output.

But without your amp distortion it's a cool distortion/overdrive. Not noisy at all.

I like the "Dime channel" better (with little button pushed on).
But the other channel is really great for rock overdrive or that "radio sounding distortion".

With this pedal you can have a Dimebag & Randy Rhoads sound and that's why I bought this thing !

Along with the Zakk Wylde overdrive on, it has a cool sounding distortion (without your amp distortion).

So, the distortion pedal is mostly for metal, but without your amp distortion, you can acheive some great sounding overdrive and distortion for rock/pop/punk style music.

If you want that Dime sound and you have a great amplifier and a great guitar this will sound really close to that Pantera, 80's heavy distortion sound... and if you have exactly the same guitar setup of Dimebag... you'll sound exactly like Pantera !

A MUST HAVE IN YOUR PEDALBOARD !!!

For a heavy metal show totally rely on it !!!

and it's built like a tank... no backup needed !

4 words.... Built like a tank !


Never had to deal with customer support and I own a bunch of MXR pedals !!!

I play Rock, Blues, Heavy Metal (Megadeth, Pantera, Ozzy, Iron Maiden, etc.), Jazz and Jazz Fusion. And for my Metal gigs it's my ultimate weapon for Pantera and Ozzy (Rhandy Rhoads era) !

I've been playing for 11 years, I studied in Jazz music. I've played mostly in rock/progressive/metal bands.

I was always searching for a great sounding metal distortion for shows... that's the DIME DISTORTION !!! It's really natural sounding it rips off all the other metal distortion on the market !!!

BUT YOU HAVE TO USE IT ALONG WITH YOUR AMP DISTORTION FOR THAT HEAVY SOUNDING DISTORTION !!!

so you got to have a great amp distortion !


SO the overall... if you're a Metal Head and want that Pantera sound... GO BUY THIS THING !!!

currently, i am running a fender 72 deluxe tele into Tu-2> EH Whitefinger comp> Boss BD-2> DIme Distortion> EH-2 Enhancer Pedal> DD-3 all into a fender blues deville 4x10 and a 70's silverface Push/pull vol. twin reverb.

this thing can get a bit noisy, but hey, its a distortion pedal, it's made to make noise. the surprising thing is though, when you crank up the gain on the pedal and roll back the volume on your guitar, you can get some seriously good tones!!! the noise backs off, but the sustain and distortion stay.

this pedal is very versatile...i find that with the mid/scoop engaged i can get awesome lead sounds and gobbs of sustain in my neck position...with it disengaged and in my bridge position pick-up this thing really becomes a rhythm machine. it can cover all styles, from punk, classic rock, worship music, prog, indie, you name it.

this pedal is so underrated, and discontinued. i was shocked at how good this pedal was, and even more so when i found out that they were no longer being made. im glad that i was able to get my hands on one of these puppies. if you can find one snatch it up, you wont regret it, and more importantly, you may not be able to find one again.

This pedal has a very good eq section, it gives you a lot of control, and because of this I found myself spending quite a bit of time fine-tuning the sound. I am very picky, so I had to spend some time with this unit. Overall, a straight - forward no nonsense pedal, easy enough to use.

Im using vintage (70's and early 80's) Fender tube amps with a Les Paul Standard. I purchased this pedal because I play live a lot, and have been using a Visual Sound Ultimate Overdrive along with my trusty Proco Rat 2. I boost all of my pedals with a TS-9 tubescreamer, to add some extra sustain and snap to my sound.
To make a long story short, the Ultimate Overdrive just would not cut through the band live, and the Rat cut through but was too fuzzy at high gain settings. I needed a high-gain pedal that would cut through the mix, and remain clear and precise. Thats why I chose the Dime Distortion. I basically have two moods, one where I want to play classic blues influenced rock (Led Zep, ZZ Top, Gary Moore, just to name a few) and another mood where I want to play hard shreddy stuff (Zakk Wylde, Steve Vai, Yngwie Malmsteen, to name a few). The Dime Distortion does a pretty good job of covering the shred moods. I use the Rat for the classic rock moods.
The Dime Distortion has replaced my Visual Sound Ultimate Overdrive on my pedal board. Visual Sound makes a great pedal, but it just will not cut through live. The Dime Distortion cuts like a razor, and with the three band eq, I can fine tune my sound to just about any environment. The Dime Distortion sounds pretty good on its own, but I use my TS-9 to boost it for some extra kick and sustain. Without the boost, I would give it an 8. With the boost, I would give it a 9.
Some have given this pedal a bad review, and if your using it with unreal expectations I can see why. I did not buy this pedal to sound like anyone in particular, I bought it because it suits my style and allows me to play fast runs under high-gain situations without being muddy or lost in the mix. It could maybe use a little more saturation, but the boost from the TS-9 kind of makes up for that. I find the sound to be clear, smooth, and crunchy. It does not sound like a fizzy AM radio like a Boss Metal Zone. Overall, its not real "natural" sounding, but thats really not what I purchased it for. I wanted an agressive tone that would cut through, and still maintain clarity with lots of single notes. Power chords are crunchy, defined, and aggressive.
This pedal works well with my Boss DD-3 and reacts well to the boost from my TS-9. The Dime is very quiet for a distortion pedal, even while being boosted. Its not a tube amp, but it is a good pedal, much better than a Boss, Digitech, or others. Im giving it an 8.

No problems, built like a brick.

This pedal suits my need for high gain shred style music and hard rock. I have been playing for over 10 years now and have owned most pedals worth talking about. I like clean sounding amps, and prefer to use pedals when I need distortion/overdrive. If it were lost or stolen I would buy another one.
I like the combination of punch and clarity. It could use a little more distortion (so I wouldnt have to boost it) and a 9 volt adapter instead of an 18 volt. I dont care for the scoop button, so I dont use it. Its not perfect, but I feel that my ability as a player makes up the difference.
Death/Nu Metal players probably would not like this pedal, I know it was designed in conjunction with Dimebag himself, but the pedal just doesnt sound that "heavy" to me. It works great for me when Im in the "shred" mood, and has just enough gain/distortion to suit my style. All in all, a pretty solid unit.

It's pretty simple. Some knobs, and stuff, you know...it's got bass mid treb and output, which is volume, which is level. It's got one button. BUT THAT BUTTON DOES TWO THINGS, on AND off. It's awesome. Yeah it's also got a miniauture little button off to the side that scoops your mids of you want to be a totaly bad assed rythmn AND lead player, i don't know why they put it off to the side of the buttons, if you were gonna reach down and press it while playing you might as well just turn your mids down, but i guess you might be able to tap that bitch with your foot. The pedal used to be all green and say DIME and it was totaly cartoony and bad ass, not it's a crappy kind of camo (unlike dimes washburn or rg or warheads which had cool camo) and has his face. But who cares it's still good. Also it has an input and an out put, which is awesome cause those are pretty important. Oh and there is alight to indicate the scoopage of mids nad the oness of the effect. It is, like all mxr and dunlop pedals, TOTALY KICK ASS, and true bipass, which is really imporant. for you fools out there that means if the battery dies, (like that baby i dropped) the effect won't go CHREAACHCHHHHCHHHHHHHEISHEUCHHHHH and make those pissing me off noises that those stupid dan electro peices of cheap shit make. The only good thing dan electro ever did was make that guitar jimmy page used for slide.

It sound's like a Randall Rg 75 G2. If you read my review of that amp you would realise that this effect is AWESOME. If it could power a cab it would be a sweet head.

I dropped it, stomped on it as hard as I could and hurt my foot, Yelled at it, Threw it through a wall, Broke a guitar over it, Spilled beer on it, Threw it through a drum kit, Swung it around by the cable and whipped it into the floor as hard as I could, Bit it and tried to flush it down the toilet and it didn't break, this was all at the guitar store, i don't actually own one.

I never talked to them, is jim dunlop alive still?

This is good for people who like good tone.

Stomp Pedal. Four knobs, five switches, all said. Editing is manual, and talking about firmware revision is crazy. Is a stomp pedal for **** sake! I just read about somebody trying to press the "mid cut" switch with his foot! C'mon guys!

Hard specs are as follows: Not true bypass / 3 band EQ of huge spectrum / Scoop Switch that notches mid frequencies / High Gain (probably over 20db!) / Die-cast Zinc Housing, meaning this is STRONG / Made in the USA.

I understand fully the debate that is going on here, since IMHO the life of the electric guitar rock player could be described as the endless pursuit of the perfect distortion. From the so called ?boutique? noise generators in the US and Japan to the massive, oppressive gain of the Mesa Boogie Dual Rectifier and Krank heads, everyone of us had been looking for that sound in our heads at, in, on, towards and from unimaginable places. The funny thing about that is that ?the? sound we?re after evolves with our own selves. It becomes impossible to describe it after a while, and we realize that we don?t know what we want? yet we positively know. Enter distortion boxes. The choice is so vast that is impossible to choose. The methods of obtaining simulated or genuine distortion range wild. Tubes, transistors, FET transistors, interference? just to saw a couple of waves. The amount of resources placed on getting it is endless. What is undisputable, although, is that distortion defines the electric guitar.

If I confessed that I had my share of experimentation with compression, that is nothing in comparison with what I did to achieve a satisfying distorted tone. No stone was left unturned. That introduced me to all time classics and to an endless menu of timbres. At one point, I decided that the core of the solution resided in the head. In the amplifier head, that is.

Notwithstanding the aforesaid, every now and then the need for a distortion box resurrects, as happened a few weeks ago. What I needed in a distortion box now was something mild, yet with defined character and enough gain to boost up a little bit my Mesa Boogie Dual Caliber DC3. I get my distortion from the amplifier every time, but I felt that the DC3 needed an ?extra push?. I went out to check some preamplifier (or ?booster?) stomp boxes, but finally decided that a powerful overdrive or (better yet), a distortion will do just fine. To get this going, I started the hunt with an old usual classic: the MXR Distortion +. I really don?t know what happened since the late 70?s, but the modern reissues have no resemblance whatsoever to the ones I remember. Since I was already into that (and I hate DOD, ART, Zoom, DigiTech, Ibanez and Boss? distortion) the ZW44 (MXR Zakk Wyle signature) was presented to me. What a rip off! I discarded that as fast as I?m capable of unplugging an electric guitar. I dug into more serious stuff (Buddha, Mesa V-Twin, etc.) but that was not what I was looking for. Never seriously though about checking this camouflage box, but I was running out of options. I finally get it because of the radical EQ and considerable gain levels. Since the camouflage is already there, I threw it in the jungle of my home studio and we?ll see if this got what it takes to survive?

With identical specs, this pedal was manufactured in two different versions. The first runs of production presented a rectangular metal box finished in a discrete military green and the following runs, finished it in some high profile camouflage paint, together with an ugly portrait of Dime?s stenciled face (see picture). I?ve got one of the latter specimens, and I?m becoming famous for my lack of good taste. Every single time a popular player dies (the goriest and youngest the better) some manufacturer manages to pull out a ?signature? product at a ridiculously high price tag (this pedal is well over 100 USD! and compares modestly to similar stomp boxes costing half of that figure), so I guess I?m not alone in my quest for bad taste. BTW, Dime?s signature DB01 Wah from Dunlop is also available at the time of this release.

Going back to how this sounds, you'll be just right if you know what you're doing (which is not harder that getting distortion out of a distortion unit). If you're a purist about slighly crunch tones, I'm sure you'll never get this pedal... or reading this for that matter. If you want to sound e-xac-tly like Darrell (or any other) you'll learn sooner or later that the search is hopeless, and some 100 bucks stomp box will not be a magic potion. If you're after some brutal distortion (which could alternatively could scoop mids nastily) this is the one.

Looks like a stomp pedal, feels like a stomp pedal. Dependability could not be an issue. I felt that older pedals (e.g. Japanese Boss or a DA Fuzz) were somewhat more reliable, but that's nothing I can prove with hard facts. Die-cast Zinc housing is probably the highest quality (int erms of reliability) you can get today, so no complaints whatsoever.

Gigging without a backup is ALWAYS a bad idea, and I never did that when I was at the professional level. Nowadays I couldn't care less about that, but I suspect this box might survive regular abuse.

Never dealt with them. I was impressed about how much Dunlop changed over the years (just checking at their website)...

No upgrade possible, and never needed repairs. On the other hand never broke, so that's ggod news.

I mostly play shred, so this one is an arguable choice. Notwithstanding, I do experiment a LOT with tones and colors, so this pedal always come handy. I own more than 100 guitars and several amplifiers and I've been playing for more than 30 years now. I fail to see the use of this, but was in the question.

No loves or hates in particular, I will just state that this pedal is an interesting addition to anybody in the market for intense distortion. You might want to have some other pedals, but this sounds with a strong character and you'll find room for it in years to come.

The DD-11 is a very easy pedal to use. Basic nobs and a scoop button which gets rid of all the mids.
If you don't understand this pedal than i don't know why you bother useing effects at all.

Gibson Les Paul Classic, Ibanez RG 570, Vantage (don't know what model) -> sennhieser evolution 300 wireless -> morley bad horsie wah -> dime distortion -> ernie ball 6166 volume pedal -> line 6 digital delay modeler -> marshall tsl 100 head -> custom made quad
This pedal has the most raw sound i've ever heard out of a distortion pedal. It absolutely kicks the shit out of anything i've ever heard. If ur into hardcore death metal don't bother with this pedal. If u want rock, blues, heavy metal, punk and probably even jazz then this is for you. WIth the scoop button in it sounds exactly like dime (i don't really like that sound.) U can get a better Zakk Wylde kinda sound out of this pedal than using the zz-44.
I absoluetly love this pedal
It's kinda like the boss metal zone but doesn't have the digital, super fake sound.

So far so good. I've had it for 3 or 4 months now no complaints. The only thing was my power plug is a little dodgy. Every time i plug it in i'd have to fiddle a bit so it would work but after that little fiddle it's fine untill i unplug it. I've never heard of this happening before so i wouldn't worry about it.

None. Too good a pedal to need customer support i recon

I play rock, blues and alot of heavy metal (godsmack, metallica and anthrax, acdc ...) I've been playing for 14 years and this pedal has done me prowed. If this pedal was taken away from me i'd buy another. Even if it would costs me double the amount.
FUCKEN KILLER!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Anyone who says this pedal is week, or sucks the quality out or anything like that is fucked in the head. They just gotta know how to use it and YOU NEED A GOOD SET UP TO SOUND GOOD. GOOD PEDAL + CRAP AMP = SHIT
remember that folks

No worries at all, not exactly rocket science! I will say like previous reviewers, that the controls really do change the tones drastically with minimal adjustment. If you don't get your esired sound straight away, dont panic! With a few minutes spent messing around you'll soon find it.

Manual is very clear too, A+

This thing hangs! Im playing a Les Paul Custom through a Boss V- Wah, MXR ZW-44, Dime Distortion, Boss Super Chorus into a JCM 800 hooked up to a 4x12 1960B and the earth literally does move!

I run my amp on a nice crunchy dirty classic Marshall tone, anduse the Wylde overdrive to get a real nice high gain (Lizzy esq) classic rock tone, then swith to the Dime distortion for the heavy stuff. Like the previous reviewers here, i too have had a love hate relationship with my Metalzone for a few years now, but trust me this thing blows it out of the water! Massive bottom end and ear-piercing highs combined to give you that textbook Pantera, Corrosion, Down, Black Label tone without sounding artifical or too processed. The scoop switch is awesome too for cutting the mids. I hear Zakk also used it for the real heavy tunes on the Mafia album..

Looks and feels totally bomb proof like an airline Black Box flight recorder.

Cant wait to gig with it, if the internals are half as well put together as the exterior, reliability issues wouldnt even cross my mind!

Have had my Wylde Overdrive for 6 or so months now and had no gripes with that at all.

No dealings as yet,

Red Diesel play all sorts of styles, from mellow as hell ambient tunes to classic rock to Heavy as hell arse-kicking tunes like 'Trample the Weak Hurdle the Dead'. This pedal does exactly what you'd expect it to, without totally raping the natural tones of your amp like said Metalzone! So if you want a great sounding, wonderfully manufactured metal pedal, buy it today! You can even get a nice Sabbath esq old school rock sound too with the gain wound down playing through a clean channel.

My only real gripes are the fact that you can't run the thing on batteries (to my knowledge), and that the scoop switch could have done with being wired up next to the main on/off button for ease of switching when playing live (as its a bit of a fine art otherwise). Overall though, the great tone more than makes up for these little niggles.

Bleed Red Diesel!!!

This pedal is so easy to get good sounds from. Anyone can use it. Level,Bass,Mid,Treble,and Gain knobs. A cool feature is the scoop switch that I use most of the time.It gives you that Pantera, metal tone.

This is my new favorite pedal.I was using a Metal Zone, but I came across this and immediately bought it since Dimebag Darrell just died. It's sound quality is just better than the Metal Zone. It is warmer and less processed. The lows are lower and the highs are higher. It cuts through like no other pedal.I love it.

This is so dependable. I would definitely gig without a backup. The letters glow in the dark too!No more searching around a dark stage. It is solid steel. I think you could run over it with a car.

Never speaked with them.

This is definitely the best distortion pedal that I have ever used. Don't think that this is just for metal. I can get this pedal to do anything. Buy one now before they cost 3 times as much as they do now.

Easy, just turn the knobs and spend some time with it.

Im using Les Pauls with tube amps, and this pedal has the metal tone I was looking for. I have been using a Boss Metal Zone, and grew tired of the thin-chainsaw like noise it produces. The Dime Distortion is what the Metal Zone will never be, it sounds more natural, and cuts through the mix well. I had tried all the other "metal" distortions, and until I found the Dime I thought the Metal Zone was as good as it was going to get. Now Im happy, and have the metal tone I wanted. As stated by MXR, this pedal is not "pretty" or "vintage", its raw and powerful, and does not overprocess my guitars like the Metal Zone.

If you like metal, hard rock, and heavy stuff, and have a Metal Zone that you love to hate, give the Dime a try. I am keeping my Metal Zone for a backup, in case the Dime malfunctions (Im sure it wont though). Now my tone sounds more "real" and cuts through much better when I play live. I almost went for the new Rocktron "Zombie" Rectified Distortion pedal, but I have owned two of their newer pedals and they both quit working after light use. The Dime is made in the USA and seems to be a quality pedal in both sound and construction. It helps me make music.

It's so easy the only people that will have problems are bugs.

It's raw and rips you ass off.

hell yeah it's realiable. I gig without a backup of anything. Any money for a backup is quickly used for something else.

MXR is like Maytag, repair what?

I think this is the pedal for me. It does take some tweaking to get your own sound, and as many days there are in a year, so are the sound possibilities from different guitar/amp setups. This is raw distortion, not a processed or modeled sound, so you will have to configure your other effects to sculpt your own sound, whatever it may be. If you run it into a tube amp on it's own it is bad ass. I run it into a ibanez tb100 solid state combo with a boss compressor in front of it and that's it. I'm currently getting Randy Bachman type lead sounds and Tony Iommi rythym and lead sounds from it, and the pinch harmonics come through no problem. This fucker is tits!

this thing is really easy to use. volume, bass, mid, treble, gain, and scoop switch. like the other reviews say, you must mess with it for a bit in order to get a sound that is to your liking.

i play a ibanez sa160 with a sd invader in the bridge. from the ibanez, there is the dime distortion, then a digitech multi-chorus, then my fender princeton chorus 2x10. i don't use the effects loop because it muddies up the distortion, on any box. this pedal has great sound quality. it really made my sound bigger and it gave me that razor distortion. although it does not sound just like dime, it comes close. if u tune down to B, u can get a damageplan like sound out of this thing. my settings are: scooped switch on, level at 9am, bass at 3pm, mids all the way down, treble all the way up, and the gain all the way up. after playing this thing yesterday for awhile, i will have to say that it is better in my opinion than the digitech metal master.

built solid. practically indestructible. its good stuff, thats what you get from mxr.

i am sure it is great, but from what i can tell, i will have no need from it. because of how well built this thing is.

if you want a different kind of heavy distortion. one with an attitude then this is your pedal.

This pedal IS easy to get a good sound out of, BUT, you MUST spend some time with it. This pedal has some of the most sensitive and comprehensive tone controls that I have ever seen/used. Very small tweaks DRASTICALLY change the sound, so you cant just set the knobs in one place and call it a bad sounding pedal, you have to play with it. The bass, mid, and treble knobs ALL have HUGE tone shaping power, so you must spend time dialing them in.

My setup is basic, Gibson Les Paul guitars through a silverface Deluxe Reverb. I use a Boss Delay/Reverb pedal and a Dime Custom Wah. Like the previous reviewer, I cant believe that this pedal has gotten so many bad reviews. When I first got this pedal, I didnt like it. Then, I started moving the tone knobs around and the pedal just opened up. This pedal has a ton of sounds in it, and the knobs give you more range and more sounds than knobs on other pedals. I think that some of the past reviewers probably did not give it enough time or adjustment. This pedal has TONS of sustain with my Les Pauls, and I love the mid-range presence in the sound. Its not mosquito like, or annoying like a Boss Metal Zone. Individual notes ring out clear, even on the neck pickup of my Les Paul. I can get really thick sustaining lead tones, or nice crunch tones out of this pedal. Sure, if you have bad equipment, this pedal wont do anything miraculous for your tone, nothing will. But, anyone with good gear and some REAL talent should be able to get some great sounds out of this unit. I play classic rock, hard rock, and blues. This pedal is a little over the top for blues, but I still make it work (just roll off the volume on your pickups). Artists I admire are Joe Perry, Jimmy Page, Zakk Wylde, EVH, Gary Moore, and the Edge from U2. My style is a combination of all of them, and this pedal suits me nicely. You can get some bad sounds out of this pedal, but the good ones are worth it, and give me a nice aggresive/nasty rock tone. Ill give it a 9 because nothing is perfect, but its close!!

Built like a tank, very solid, no problems.

Are you sick of cookie cutter distortion pedals? I was, which is why I purchased the Dime. I wanted a mean distortion sound that still sounded somewhat musical, and not buzzy or fizzy like a Metal Zone. This pedal does the trick for me, my Les Pauls love this pedal, they sound fantastic with it. Im not sure if single coils would sound that well with it, but it sounds great with humbuckers. I dont know why so many reviewers dislike this pedal, I suspect its a combination of poor gear, and no patience. No gripes, I like the pedal. Im going to purchase the new MXR Wylde Overdrive, then, Ill have a killer pair of pedals.

Easy to get many great sounds from this pedal. Great layout.

I use a Les Paul Standard w/EMG 81 & 85 pickups into a Marshall JCM900. I've been playing for 16 years, and play out every other weekend. I can't believe some of the bad reviews this pedal has gotten, but no pedal is going to make a Peavey Bandit sound good anyway. I play hard rock and metal, and this pedal is amazing, it replaced a Keeley Metal Zone on my board. The Keeley is great, but very processed sounding. The Dime has tons of distortion and sustain, and the most effective EQ section I have ever used in a pedal. It actually lets your guitar's tone shine through very well also. It has true-bypass and works great wit other pedals. Amazing for Leads and Rhytmn!!

Indestructable, it has survived heavy gigging without a problem. A tank!!

You'll probably never need it, but this is an American company, so contact is no problem. Try contacting Boss!

If I ever lost this, I'd buy another in a second, I love this pedal. I had thought the Keeley Zone was the ultimate Metal pedal, this one kicked it's butt, and it has true-bypass switching. Check one of these out through a nice setuo, you will not be dissappointed. It's meaner than the lead channel ofthe JCM900, exactly what I was looking for.

Its a pedal, how hard can it be? Just switch the knobs around and find the sounds that suits you.

I love this thing. I played it through a PRS 10 top custom 24 and a fender 100. The lows where a little dull for my liking but I can't say I spent a lot of time with the PRS (bros guitar). I also played it through a $160 Yamaha Pacifica and the trebs where great and it destroyed the feedback my cruddy ass thing gave. The lows where really muddy on the Yamaha (what can you expect with a cheap ass started) but the PRS had decent lows and incredible mids and highs. I also love the "Scoop" setting which is fun to solo in. Anyway, if this thing can make a pretty bad Yamaha and a fender 25 to a PRS and a fender 100 both sound pretty damn good, I'd fo for it.

This thing is a tank. You could shoot this thing and prolly couldnt break the casing. Solid metal, still awlays gig with a backup

Screw customer support, fix it on your own. (Unless MRX ripped you off of your money, then you can complain).

I can bust out almost any metallica song on this thing. I've been playing for about 2 1/2 years and played a good # of pedals before buying, loved this one from the start. I own a Jackson sl2h select ,fender 100, yamaha pacifica (very nice starter thing actually), and I've played it through a PRS ten top at a gig. They all sounded incredible. If it were lost or stolen, I would prolly buy another one if I had the money. Love the scoop and treb, dont like the bass. Very great pedal, recommeneded if you need to make your equipment sound better then it actually is.

How much easier do you want a pedal? This is extrememly easy to use, even for a primate at the zoo!

I've submitted this review because I think a lot of people dont understand THAT YOU NEED A GOOD AMP to have a pedal SOUND GOOD. Running this though my Carvin MTS (all tube) 212. This pedal is what a metalzone cant be. Hell, Dimebag doesnt even have this thing cranked at all. Once you turn up the output and distortion you have shearing tones. The bypass switch is rad, gets you that Euro Metal Tone I have always wanted. Any metal tone you want this pedal is able to achieve.

Go ahead and chuck this thing out the 3rd story window, probably only scratch it. It's a tank.

Never delt with MXR, but they included the power supply, how rad is that?

MXR even gave me a free t-shirt, woohoo! Overall this is probably the best distortion pedal on the market today unless you're running a very nice botique amp. For the rest of us sad saps this is a solid piece of equpiment you wont be selling in a few months because it stinks. Thats of course if you play metal, might have too much output for you classic/new age rock fellas.

simple, but not effective, at least for me.

I was totally embarassed with the sound of this pedal. I'm a hardcore metal/death freak. I even use the seymour duncan dimebag pickup. I bought the pedal because the distortion I use right now doesn't have a bypass feature so I can't click it off like a stomp box. Honestly, I think this pedal is a hunk of shit when compared to my Genesis-3. It's not very distinct or alive. I give MXR credit for the indestructable enclosure though. I can't dial in nearly as much metal on the dime as I do with the genesis-3(loud or studio). I tried it with a REAL guitar and several REAL amps. I don't care if the genesis-3 isn't a REAL pedal(I'll know someone will say that, and that doesn't matter since the tube amp makes up for it). Go ahead and buy the dime if you want, but I'm sticking to the genesis-3 for distortion. I guess I'll get a keeley looper and control it like a pedal that way. At any rate, you WILL NEED a noise supressor for the dime pedal!

should last past armageddon.

It's built very well. The only thing I could really milk out of it was a crazy mid lead sound, but I rarely play like that.

Hi there - got to admit, I got a little agitated redaing all those opinions posted earlier. Wanna know why? - Try the next coumn, please... thanx!

This is a piece of equipment that is completely bound to whatever you're using as Amp, is sounds as good as as it's "allowed be be": Try a good guitar and a valve amp (or some tansistor amp with the same qualities - there are some, don't let yourself get confused!!!), it's a matter of combining the right things...

Dunno..

It's got quite versatile EQ...