Morley JD-10

Very easy to get great sounds. I have no manual for either of mine.

Using this with various instruments (mostly Fenders and Reverends)into Rera nd Budda amps. A little noisy when pushing the high gain channel, but that's to be expected. Not interested in sounding like anyone else, but it can get a very raw distortion or drive my OD channels into endless sustain.

I don't really need this unit, but it makes a few things easier. I'd rely on it. I regularly gig with no backup for this.

No customer support. Can't find the manual anywhere (although you really don't need it...).

I play anything from country to progressive rock. I've been playing since the early '70s and have used a LOT of stuff. Wanted a device to give me intermediate distortion between the channels of my Budda Super Drive 30, but was suprised to hear how well it worked with the high gain channel engaged. Gives an added level of sustain without turning the tone into flutey, compressed mush like every other box I've tried. Also fattens up single coils and gives a great crunch when you really dig into your strings. Gives any Tele that great steely Donahue meets Don Rich tone. I bought a second one, and now put one in the back of my SD30 and one in the back of my Jake. I AB'd this and a Fulldrive II and sent the FDII back to my chum with the advice that he should find a JD10. Better yet, sell the Fulltone and buy three of these. The cool thing is that if you fry your amp at a gig, you pop this into your PA, push the right button into "Rock" and the other button into the cab simulation mode, and you have a passable rock tone that will get you through. Reason enough to have a couple of these handy!

Like an amp. it can use almost any AC adaptor.

You can get any sound you like, from classic blues to death metal

I had two problems with it:

1. After playing a while it turned it self of. I opened the box, and it loked like one of the condensators (if thats what you call it) was broken. I replaced this my self, with a 100v instead of a 63v and now it worked great.

2. I got both the distortion and clean chanel while it was active. Once again i opened the box, and after some serching, i found it to be the switch. I opened the switch, and cleaned it properly inside.

I havent had any problems after these two operations.

Don`t know. I live in Norway and bought it used and out of order.

I love this pedal. I use it for recording direct to my PC. It can be used for any type of music.

Extremely easy to use. Maunual gives some good starting points.

This thing really is amazing. I once owned the infamous Pod 2 and quickly became bored with knob twiddling. This gets right to the tone. I also own a SansAmp GT2. It's a close match but the nod goes to the JD-10 for the most authentic tone. Why this was discontinued is beyond me.

I can depend on it. I have my GT2 and a couple of amps anyway.

Are you kidding? I bought it used and they don't make them anymore.

I play classic rock and blues, a little metal and whatever suits my fancy. I can cover the bases with my rig. If it were lost, I would seek out another--somewhere. If you find one of these on the used market--get it!

Like using a guitar amp.

I use mine in a home studio, going direct to a small PA (there's not enough room for a guitar amp at one gig I do), and I use it to bypass the preamp in my Peavey Bandit because it sounds better and is less noisy. Works great every time.

Mine has the same noisy pots.

N/A

Why did they discontinue it? I understand there's a JD 20, but where?

Knobs and buttons, what could be easier?

I use it with amps and direct. The most versitile overdrive/preamp I've used. Every setting sounds good, and there is a wide range of tonal variations of settings. Very good at emulating Fender, Marshall and Vox sounds as well as getting most common heard guitar tones.
I dare anyone to get a bad tone from this pedal!

Sturdy and dependable. The only complaint is the pots aren't sealed and pick up dirt rather fast. Regular cleaning is a must, but after some time, the pots wear. I thought about replacing them with sealed ones, but that will cost me as much as I paid for it used ($50)

It's discontinued, I would buy another used one if it wasn't a simple repair.

This is a good pedal for someone who needs a wide range of tones and doesn't want a bunch of one trick pony pedals. To sum up, its going to give you amp tones, not pedal tones that can't be produced by just a guitar and amp.

I've also only played single coil pickups through it, so there will be differences with humbuckers.

This box has to be the best-kept secret in the stompbox world. Not a distortion pedal, but a preamp/line driver/speaker emulator. This box can make just about ANY decent clean-sounding solid-state amp sound exactly like a tube amp. DI'd through a PA sounds like you'd miked up. The EQ uses the standard tweed calibration, and combined with the drive control and the classic/rock and Celestion speaker emulator it can nail just about anything you'd want. To get you started the manual (really a pamphlet with some tips) shows 10 settings for studio (DI) use, and 10 using an amp. If you got it w/o the manual it'll take you a few minutes to dial in what you like, but it's really not difficult. 9v battery lasts for at least 8 hours, or use just about any wall wart.

I'm running the JD-10 into a 80's-vintage Randall RG80-112SC. This particular amp has a wonderful clean channel and an awful distortion channel, but that's fine for this box as you want to run it into as clean a setup as possible (it sounds fantastic through a decent home stereo with good speakers, for example). An Alesis Nanoverb is between the JD-10 and the amp and works great with it. Fav guitar is a Gibson Les Paul Studio Lite with the now-discontinued M3 electronics, which enables any pickup selection of either the LP or Stratocaster. The output potentiometer got a little noisy after a few months, but a little spray of tuner cleaner inside fixed that. Very easy to get a good classic metal or hard rock sound on the "rock" setting. The "classic" setting is very good for the blues - touch sensitive, lots of dynamics and responds to your technique. Really just about any style, with proper adjustments.

Never failed me yet, except a teeny bit of noise in the pot as mentioned above, easily fixed. Built like a brick, very heavy steel case, and the knobs are protected by the steel case. I believe in two of everything at any gig so I have a spare JD-10, but wouldn't worry much if I had but the one.

Morley was very helpful and friendly when I called while looking for my second unit, but they had stopped importing it by mid-2000. They offered to put me in touch with Sessions in the UK who actually manufactured the unit if I couldn't find one. Turns out they show up used quite a bit, so I had no trouble getting one. If it needed repair I don't think Morley could help, although Sesions might be able to - I never did contact them, though.

I play mostly classic and hard rock, classic metal and the blues - this box fills the bill wonderfully. I don't need to haul a tube amp around to gigs, with all the worry that entails, and I still get great tone, which of course makes anyone play better! On bigger gigs I can just DI it into the PA along with the Nanoverb and don't bother with an amp at all. I'd buy it again if it were lost or stolen. The sound is much better than any other similar product I've heard.

Setup is exactly like setting up an amp. Very easy to get great tones out of it. I bought it primarily as a cheap alternative to a POD for direct recording, and feel that it delivers tones superior to both the POD and SansAmp devices for this purpose. The manual is pretty basic and really is not needed.

Using various Teles, Strats, and an occasional 335, it sounds fantastic on all my recordings. I've even used it straight into a PA for some small gigs with great results. Seems that I really have to crank the output though to get the volume up to the desired level. I usually stay on the clean channel and crank the drive, but I just recently turned the drive way down and hit the distortion button and was amazed at how smooth sounding it is. Still, I get the best tone on the clean side with the drive up, and maybe use a stompbox compressor in front of it. With just a touch of compression, it makes it feel even more tube-like.

I liked it so much that I bought another one, since they're longer being made. One of them was knocked off of a table to the floor, and still works fine. The treble control is a little scratchy on that one.

No experience with this

I'm playing mostly rootsy rock and blues stuff. This device excells at getting that hard to nail low gain tube sound. Far more realistic than the SansAmp products that I've tried. It also sounds great through a guitar amp, or bass amp, where the SansAmp and POD fails here. I can't help but wonder why Morley discontinued this product. It's simply the most versatile, best sounding guitar based device that I've ever come across.

No manual. Pretty self explanatory. Requires minimal tweaking. Much easier than any other emulator devices that I've tried.

This is an update of my review below. I've picked up a used Peavey Bandit 65 for $10 (!), and have been running this unit into the Bandits clean channel with excellent results. The Bandit has an excellent reverb allowing me to retire my external devices. The clean channel of the JD-10 is perfect with the gain control set near maximum, and using the guitars volume pot to control the amount of distortion, although it doesn't seem to clean up quite as well as a real tube amp. Nonetheless, it works great, and I've been using this setup for fill in gigs with other bands playing classic rock, oldies, and country, where I don't really want to burn up my tubes. I'll use the tube amps for the blues gigs, and anything important. For just regular bar gigs, I'll use this setup. I haven't noticed any extra noise. I tried it with a compressor pedal in front, with some good results, but with some extra noise. I like it better straight through. It reacted fine with my Alesis Nanoverb after the JD-10, and before the Bandit, but I prefer the onboard reverb of the Bandit. I like this setup so much that I've bought a second Bandit 65 for $125 - much cleaner condition than the $10 Bandit. So, now I can run both simultaneously, if I need more volume, although one Bandit has been plenty loud for the bar gigs that I've played. My original idea, as stated below, was to buy two of the Tech 21 Power Engine 60 powered speaker cabinets to use with the JD-10, but decided to use the two Bandits instead (lots cheaper, and onboard reverb). It's very easy to forget that there's no tubes in your rig while playing this setup. It's the closest that I've heard in solid state gear to mimicking a tube amp sound. I'll be looking for another JD-10 as a backup for this unit if anything were to go wrong on a gig. My current backup would be a SansAmp GT2, which doesn't even come close to sounding good, much less sounding like any kind of tube amp.

So far so good, but I'm still keeping my fingers crossed on this one because of the experiences of others below.

I emailed them for a manual, info, etc. and never heard nothing back. Until I hear otherwise, I'll give them the lowest rating.

An excellent backup system for your main amp, or as a main amp for low budget bar gigs. I haven't tried it for recording yet, but will soon. After recording with the SansAmp GT2, I can't see how this would be any be any worse - it should be LOADS better. I'm sure it'll be fine. Feel free to email me for any questions, or if you have and ideas, suggestions, etc.

This is EXTREMELY easy to use, and dial in good tones instantly, as opposed to the SansAmp GT2 that I also own. The difference between those two pedals regarding ease of use, and tones is like night and day.

I've only just bought it, and have only tried it out in the store thus far, although I'll be using it on the bandstand tonight. I tried it out first through the clean channel of the newfangled Fender "Twin" amps - not the "Twin Reverb". With the JD-10 on its clean channel and its drive maxed, it sounds amazingly like a good tube amp just barely breaking up. That's a tone that's almost impossible to dial in on the SansAmp GT2. The high gain mode sounded great as well, but I doubt that I will use it. The clean side with the drive maxed is enough for me. I also tried it into some transistor combos set clean with the same results. It's the best sounding amp emulation device that I've ever tried - better than the POD IMO, but with no effects, or special features other than a Celestion speaker simulation switch. There's TONS of bottom end here, and not flabby either. Very tight sounding. Through a guitar amp, I found myself turning the bass control down substantially. My ultimate goal with this device is to mate it with a couple of Tech 21 Power Engine 60 powered cabinets for stage use. I don't think anyone will notice that I'm not using tubes. As a matter of ethics, I probably shouldn't give this product a 10, but here goes anyway

Can't say

I just emailed them for an owners manual, so we'll see.

I'm playing in a couple of blues bands, and I'll occasionally take side jobs with country, oldies, or classic rock bands. I don't see any reason why I couldn't use this for all of those applications. Other reviewers have mention some reliability problems. I hope such is not the case with me. I'll give 'er a spin on the bandstand and report back. If it holds up, I'd definately buy another if lost or stolen. It's the most tube-like sound in a small box that I've ever heard.

The Morley JD-10 is made by Award in England. The company is dedicated to making good sounding solid state equipment. They make the Sessions amps. My criteria was simple when I was looking of an overdrive unit; it had to sound, as much as possible, like a tube amp turned up loud. Not many pedals do that. This one does. The pedal does a lot of things. It's a preamp with speaker simulation for recording direct to the mixing board. It has three band eq (that is tailored for guitar). It has lo Z output (to minimize the bad effects of complicated signal chains and long cable runs). One of the attractive features of this unit for me is that in case of an amp failure, I can run it directly into the PA. It's not going to sound just like your favorite blackface Deluxe, but it will get you through the gig. The manual helps you to get started. It has suggestions for direct-to-the-board and for use with an amp. They are pretty good starting points. Some of the sounds aren't usable for me - but I just want it for overdrive and not for chaotic, buzzsaw distortion.

I have this right after the tuner in my pedalboard. It's followed by a PRO Co Rat, a Cry Baby Wah, a volume pedal, a Danelectro Chorus and a Boss digital delay. It's a really quiet pedal, as long as you stay away from the extreme settings. I don't mess with it much on stage. I find that 'amp on seven' setting and pretty much leave it. It cleans up well when you roll your guitar volume back. It seems to be designed more for single coil than humbuckers - all of the manuals settings are clearly for Strats. It really does fatten up single coils. A lot of the guitarists I like are amp purists - Keith Richards, Waddy Wachtel, David Hidalgo, Jay Farrar of Son Volt - and this pedal can get you close to that ideal. David Hidalgo used one to record the basic guitar tracks for the Latin Playboys CD.

I've had one failure with the pedal. The switch died and I sent it back to Morley for repair. When it was being shipped back, the box got crushed and killed the new switch. Luckily, they sent three additional switches when they returned the unit. It was easy to do the repair myself - and I'm not very handy. Otherwise, it's been reliable - better than a Tubescreamer, not as good as a Boss.

Morley was very good to deal with - supportive, casual, knowledgeable.

I bought the JD-10 from JK Lutherie in Harrison, OH. He let me live with it for a week to see if would work for me. I looked at a lot of overdrive pedals before I settled on this one. Of all of them, I thought this was the smoothest, most natural sounding. If I needed to replace it I would shop for something else (just to know for sure) but wouldn't be at all dissapointed to end up with the JD-10.