Maxon OD-808 Reissue

The maxon has a variety of good sounds readily available. The three controls are very easy to use and have a good range of sound within them. 10 for ease of use.

Great sound quality. There are a decently wide variety of sounds at one's fingertips. And by "decently wide", i mean "awesome". My setup is a Fender strat>>maxon OD808>>line 6 modulation modeler (mostly used for tremelo)>>dunlop crybaby>>fender '59 bassman reissue. I originally used the maxon as an amp driver (low drive setting, high volume setting) to drive the front end of my bassman. It did that thing well, although I could use a bit more volume boost. Now I use it as a heavy overdrive, with the drive knob all the way up. It does this very well, too. Don't look to use it as a heavy metal distortion box, even with the gain all the way up, it still sounds like overdrive...like the TS 808. I'll dock a point here for not having quite as much clean boost as I'd like.

I have owned it for less than a year, and have played half a dozen gigs with it. It seems remarkably solid, although it is fairly lightweight. The case is pretty narrow, so that makes for good structural support. I could imagine that the knobs could get a bit messed up after a few years of stomping, as they are not structurally protected (as boss and some other pedals are). But that's not worth taking any points away. 10 out of 10.

I have never dealt with Maxon.

Overall, I'll give it a 10. If the maxon got stolen, I'd either get it again or try one of Analogman's TS9 modded pedals--i've heard those are good. I definately adore the TS 808 sound, though. I play jazz, mostly, but am making ventures into rock and blues. The maxon is excellent for both those styles. I wouldn't call myself a distortion or overdrive expert. The only other distortions i've used are: overdrive channel on Fender Hotrods, the overdrive from cranking my Bassman up above 7, the overdrive on a marshall 30W Solid state combo (the amp of my junior high years), and a boss super overdrive. I personally prefer the maxon to all of the above. Well, i've also played my friend's original TS 808 which he got from his dad, who is an LA studio guitar player for porn soundtracks (Ha!). I couldn't tell the difference between the maxon and the TS 808. Overall, 10 out of 10.

3 knobs. if you think the ease of use for this is less than 10, you're a moron.

this is actually a follow-up review. I still use my Les Paul, but it go straight into this then into a Fender Blues Jr or a Fender Hot Rod Deluxe. I play jazz and blues and i fuse it with rock (not nu-rock, but more like english 90s rock). It cuts through the mix with ease. Its wonderful. its versatile cos it reacts well to how hard your attack is. i dont require much gain. it can be smooth for my blues or jazz lead playing, or very cut-through for rock.

with my fender blues jr already overdriven, it produces a killer sound. its just the perfect live sound, IMO. sustain, clarity, yet there's crunch. flip to the neck pup and its smooth as butter. i've gone through two different dist pedals since i got this (and about 20 before) and this is the only one i'm keeping. in fact i want a Maxon D&SII since its supposed to be a hopped up OD808. I could use a lil more gain for some of the covers i do. but for what i bought this thing for, its awesome.

for those who says it doesnt have enough balls... you need to step in front of a truck or something. of course not, ITS AN OVERDRIVE PEDAL, NOT A DISTORTION PEDAL. if you want to play your crappy Nickelback garbage, get a worthless Boss Mega Distortion. If you want a smooth, transparent overdrive with clarity and versatility. get this. my only complaint is the lack of true bypass and it should have easier battery accessibility. oh well.

Very simple to use. Three knobs do the trick: Balance, Overdrive and Tone. You do need a screwdriver, however, to access the battery.

Over the years I've used an Ibanez TS9, a Boss Blues Driver, and a Boss OD-3, and a Digitech Tone Driver. The Maxon OD808 is my favorite overdrive pedal. It gives you a mild warm and grainy sounding distortion that's perfect for classic rock and blues.

It hasn't failed me yet!

For blues and classic rock tones this pedal is perfect. I've been playing guitar for 15 years, and I'm always searching for equipment to compliment my tone. I have owned this pedal for a year now and am especially pleased with the results. After shows I've had guitar hounds come up and check out my pedal board to see what all I'm using. People have all been very complimentary on the sound I get from this pedal. I turn my Fender tube amp up just to the point where it's getting a little dirty (on the clean channel) and kick this pedal on. The gain dial is set all the way up, and the little tone dial is set around 10 o'clock. My guitar is an American Strat loaded with "Texas Special" pickups. This combination is perfect for the styles of music I play. If you play a strat style guitar through a fender tube amp, you'll love this overdrive. Don't think you're automatically going to sound like Stevie Ray Vaughan though!

super easy. three knobs.

yuck. i ran it through a '71 twin with a sg, epi dot with rio grande p90's and a fender jazzmaster reissue with craptastic results. no balls or bottom end anywhere to be seen. even with humbuckers the tone was too thin. i wont even get into what the jazzmaster sounded like. yes, i realize these twins are notoriously bright but this overdrive was "almost" close with the tone turned all the way down. i ran an original maestro fuzztone next to it and the lack of a true bypass affected the tone of that as well. this pedal came highly recommended and im still trying to figure out why.

did not have it more than a week but this thing is chintzy as hell. i thought it was going to be in a mxr style box. it looked like an mxr box but it weighed in at about 4oz... i could have smashed this thing with my foot if i wanted to. no where near mxr, ts9, or fulldrive construction. the switch was super loose and did not look very well made either.

never used it.

no bueno for this one. perhaps with a beefier sounding amp this would be different but whats the point in that? i love a fender twin tone and a good overdrive should be able to boost the volume and give it a more transparent overdrive. in my experience here it did not do the job. i sold this pedal and bought a reissue ts9 for less $$$ and sent it to the analogman. for 60.00 extra $$$ my overdrive problems are solved. what a world of difference.

This overdrive is very easy to use and get a good sound out of it. You have tone, the amount of overdrive, and the volume level to play with. Either wanting extra boost, or extra overdrive as well, it's pretty easy to get.

I owned a Boss OD-1 for years and wished it didn't alter my amps tone, mainly it's bass loss. When I plugged in the Maxon, my amp's tone stays the same and so does the bass response! I always loved to do a lead scale from low E to high E and emphasize the low to high in the scale and now the Maxon can do it for me!

I use it with a Dr. Z Max 38 2-12 combo and an Acoustic G60T. On both amps it adds the extra overdrive I desire and keeps the tone the same. I only use the overdrive on lead's and prefer the amp's natural tone for rythm. For the tone knob, I keep it cranked all the way at 5pm to emphasize the high strings.

For higher gain, I crank the overdrive all the way up. Usually, I'll keep the overdrive knob at 2pm or so. It just depends whether the song is rocking out or not.

I bought it over the holidays, so I can't give an accurate answer. However, it's all metal encased and looks as solidly built and my MXR distortion+ that I've had for 22 years.

There's a 1 year warranty on the pedal. They require you pay postage though which would be lame should the pedal crap out on me. I'll assume that the stuff I read about it is true and that it'll serve me flawlessly.

I've been playing for 22 years and now love to play blues and classic rock type of stuff. If I want to rock out, this pedal provides plenty of balls to my lead's. I love that this pedal doesn't jeopardize my amps tone. I'd buy another one should it get stolen or lost because in most of my blues jam situations, I'm up on stage with another guitarist and their amp, so the extra overdrive or boost helps me during my lead's. Especially when I play my Strat!

Try out this pedal because I think it's a good deal. By the way, I in no way started sounding like SRV. This pedal provides great overdrive tone to YOUR playing. It be like saying you'll sound like Jimmy Page if you buy his signature Les Paul model.

Bottom line, it provides me the overdrive and tone characteristics that I like.

Pretty much as easy as it gets. Overdrive, Tone, and Balance (Level) knobs and a footswitch.

Here is where it gets wierd: I bought the pedal on eBay and I was pretty excited to try it. Like I do with all new pedals, I stuck all the knobs at the 12 o'clock position so I could tweak from there. As I rolled counter-clockwise from center on the tone knob, an extra "tick" of noise kicked from my amp. I thought to myself, "damn, I got a bad unit." I kept tweaking and tweaking, and I realized that the first half of the space on the tone knob had a little bit of extra gain and extra upper-mids and highs to it, and even a little noisy. The latter half of the space on the tone knob seemed to be the "regular" space and had that warm, smooth kick to it that everybody talks about with these units.

Is this a two-stage tone knob? Is there such a thing? Seller claims it isn't modded, so maybe it's a lucky flaw? I just don't know.

Anyway, it is almost like having two pedals in one: 1 thru 5 on the tone knob being very akin to my Boss SD-1 Overdrive, and 6 thru 10 being like an original 808.

Strange? Yes! Am I happy with it? Yes!

Thought I got ripped off at first but now I feel like I got double for my money!

If anyone knows anything about a possible mod like this, let me know.

I've only had it for about 8 hours as of this writing, so I don't know how reliable it is. And being the piss-poor musician/working stiff that I am, I've ALWAYS gigged without back-ups. Now that I have this baby, I'm kicking my SD-1 to back-up status and this is now my main OD.

Don't know much about this category either. I just got the unit!

I like everything from AC/DC, SDRE, Foo Fighters, SRV, The Clash, Wilco, Blur, Teenage Fanclub, and Sloan. It's a great match for the mish-mash of music I like. I'd definitely buy another if it was stolen or lost. Tone is great, and my unit seems to be unique, which is a kick.

I A/B'd this unit to my Boss SD-1 and its smoothness and clarity where apparent right away. Definitely going to be playing with this one for a while.

Very simple to use. It has three controls: Overdrive, Tone, and Balance (output). There's a manual but... you don't really need to use it. Its pretty self explanatory. Unless you're a beginner, the manual is practically useless.

I'm using a Gibson Les Paul---->Maxon OD808---->Boss Tremolo---->Vox wah---->Fender Blues Junior. This thing is not noisey at all. It couldnt be even if your amp was up all the way and the drive on the pedal was maxed out as well while you stood directly in front of your amp. Its VERY quiet.

I got this because I wanted a boost for leads and i wanted a very transparent overdrive sound. Something that'd be very natural sounding and light for blues, something that'd add a little spice to arpeggios and something that'd just give me that ol' cranked tube amp sound without the headache! I just sold my old distortion pedal and wanted to upgrade. I decided I need an overdrive pedal (such as this) and a medium gain distortion pedal. I've only gotten the overdrive pedal and this thing is about as perfect as i had dreamt. Its sooo smoothe and natural sounding. In the store I had tried an Ibanez ts9, Ibanez ts9dx, and voodoo labs sparkle drive as well as the maxon. the maxon was MUCH better sounding than any of the other three. I used to own a Boss Super Overdrive pedal and that thing BLOWS compared to this.

Don't get this expecting a Metallica tone or even an ACDC crunch. Get it to boost your already overdriven amp or get it to color your sound to get something similar to SRV. Personally, I like to push the tubes on my Fender so they distort then turn this thing on to give it an extra KICK!

dont really know. i've not had a band in awhile. i doubt this thing is gonna die here at my house. the on/off switch seems kinda questionable though...

never dealt with them.

I play blues, jazz, and 90s rock. I've been playing for four years so i kinda know my stuff, but at the same time i'm still learnin. I also have a marshall halfstack but i don't really use that now since i'm not in the band so i didnt include it in the "sound quality" section. if it were stolen i'd definitely replace it. Or get the maxon od9. I've not checked it out yet, the local store didn't have one. Its supposed to be a modded version of this pedal. but its also about $30 or so more expensive so i may just get htis again. i love the sound of this thing, its perfect IMO. I hate the on/off switch. It feels like its gonna break on me! This pedal seems to me that it will be in my rig for years and years to come.

Easy to use. I'm reviewing this because unlike most of the other reviewers and readers out there, I have a very good original TS808 with which to compare it.

Here goes. The original TS808 was made for Ibanez by Maxon between 1979 and 1983. It sold for about $49. Now beat ones go for $350 and pristine ones go for $500 to $650. There are numerous 808-style clones out there.

I have a TS808 that I got for nothing, but comparing it to two other originals it is the best sounding. These had some variation in sound, all the way from basic TS9 to great. Mine's great.

So in brutal A/B testing, I compared my TS to the OD. There is no difference. The tone, gain and output are identical. The one made in 2003 is a clone of the one made in the early 80s. You can't tell the difference playing by yourself, and you won't be able to with your band.

I give it a 9 only because the Fulldrive--best of all overdrive pedals, ever--gets a perfect 10. The FD just has a bit less mid and a tad creamer tone. For all purposes, the Maxon OD9 IS a good TS808.

This pedal is built better than the original 808 and better than the reissue Ibanez and Maxon 9 series. It's cast aluminum, not zinc. Switch is beefier, too. I'd expect it to last a long time.

Don't know.

Here's the point: For about $150 out the door you can get something that's brand new, sounds identical to a great old TS808, and is in production. It's light and small, and won't take up much space in a guitar case or on a pedal board. Do not buy a TS9 and have it modded to 808 specs, get this brand new in the box for the same or less instead.

Do NOT spend any money on the original TS808. Get one of these instead and save big bucks. For the price, it's a steal, and blows away almost all the boutique overdrive pedals.

For about $30 more, you can get the Keely modded Maxon OD9, modded to 808 specs, brand new. This is true bypass and has exactly the same tone as a TS808, but a little more gain. Another awesome overdrive pedal.


For $50 more, you can get a Fulldrive 2. This overdrive pedal sounds a tad better than any 808 or clone, is true bypass, has a boost (higher gain) channel, is made of heavy sheet steel, and is made in America. I personally think the Fulldrive is the best of all in sound, features and construction.

These are probably the best overdrive pedals out there now. Pick your price and go for it.

Pretty darn simple. Input, Output, Gain, Level and Tone. There is a good manual that gives you some sample settings to start with.

I was never a member of the Tube Screamer bandwagon. I used to require a ton of gain for the stuff I played, but I have since changed many things about my taste and playing, and I needed a good overdrive pedal. This pedal does a great job of providing moderate overdrive that is very transparent and touch sensative. I compared this with Maxons TS9, which looks exactly like the Ibanez Tube Screamer, and while the tones were very similar, I thought the 808 was more transparent and dynamic. I tried the Fulltone FD2 (old and new versions) and I just can't make the FD work for me. I have other Fulltone effects and love them dearly, but the FD2 just doesn't do it for me. The Maxon OD808 sits in my pedalboard, which goes into a Fender Super Reverb. I have a Tech21 Double Drive for the over-the top gain stuff and a Sparkle Drive for the very slight, hair-around-the-edges semi clean tone. My 808 gives me everything in between...and it works nicely in front of the DoubleDrive to give me that over-the-top gain (like an OD into a Marshall) when I want it. If I had to say one negative thing about it, this pedal can at times sound a little bit harsh - especially with higher gain pickups, like a humbucker, so I need to back off the guitar volume a little to compensate. It really shines with my Strat's Texas Special single coils. R&B tones are just killer, and if you are into the SRV thing, this combination is as close as I have heard/felt.

I have a Maxon Chorus of similar construction, and that has been very relaible. I'm willing to judge this one based on my expreience with their other products. Its not built like a Fulltone, but is is still very well built.

No experience.

Overall, this pedal is fantastic. For me, this gives me exactly what I need in an overdrive (though what I really want is the overdirve that oozes from a Two-Rock amp...but that's another $4000 conversation). Very transparent and touche sensative - especially for a Solid State pedal. I really enjoy playing through this.

Very easy to use. Nothing fancy here. Just a straight forward overdrive good for pushing a tube amp.

I'm a big fan of Maxon pedals because they do their job without excessively coloring the guitar tone. My setup is a 1982 Ibanez AR-300 and 1996 Les Paul Studio through a Vox AC-15 (tube) and Fender Deluxe 90 (solid state). I use the OD-808 for light overdrive, a Boss SD-1 for heavier overdrive and a Marshall Shredmaster for big distortion. The OD-808 never leaves my rig.

The little metal button on top of the footswitch post popped off (it is glued on). Other than that, pretty rugged. No other problems.

Never needed to contact support.

One of my favorite pedals. Nearly identical to the Ibanez TS-9. Great for blues. Also great for any music where you want just a hint of overdrive. You will not get a heavy metal sound from this thing even if the overdrive is full on. Also great for classic rock.