PAiA Roctave Divider

Amazing that the first reviewer -- who paid $1 for his unit at a flea market, and admits he didn't even know what it was -- gave this box such a bad review.

This is the best, most economical, most easily modifiable octave divider unit on the market. The four original knobs are straight forward, obvious, and effective controls that adjust the level for
1) your straight ('dry') sound; 2) a smooth fuzzed sound; 3) one octave below the dry sound; and 4) two octaves below the dry sound.

One input/one output/stomp button to turn on and off -- couldn't be simpler. I added a hi/lo filter circuit on a 2-position toggle, and a second output, so I can split the signal into a dry output and the dry+octaves output.

I've used this with various guitars and amps, including a Les Paul Custom; SG; Strat; RD Artist Bass; and even a Washburn acoustic with built-in preamp. Have gone into Ampeg; Peavey; Acoustic; Traynor; and Carvin amps.

The sound is great. It does take a little practice to get the best out of this box -- as with any harmonizing unit, tracking accuracy varies with playing style. Works best with the electric guitars, and with neck pickups, but it /works/ in all positions, and even with amplified acoustic guitar.

Virtually noiseless.

Now the octave sounds don't sound like a guitar, but they're not meant to. With appropriate mix between octave and dry sounds you can convincingly get anything from Wes Montgomery-like parallel octaves, to the dirty 8-string bass sound on some early Zappa recordings.

(I've also played around with this circuit and developed a box that allows me to add octaves -- and other intervals -- below /and/ above the dry note, and use several simultaneously -- this one's a little more complex, and lives in a rack-mount.)

One word of warning: two octaves below guitar pitch is damned LOW, and if you use this on a bass it's subterranean. This box kicks out a lot of gain: make sure your amp and speakers can handle it before cutting it in with the volume cranked.

I built it; it's reliable. :-)

Never had to service it, and I've had it for over 10 years. Case and
switch are solid; I put some rubber pads on the bottom to keep it from sliding around.

I would and do use this on gigs, including one time, when the bass player wigged out, I covered bass lines on the guitar using this box.
People danced, and we got paid -- what more do you need?

PAiA's customer support is legendary and excellent. You can contact them by mail, phone, e-mail, and you get a direct response, often from one of the guys who designed the circuit. I've never had to have them fix a box, but they will, and they'll also walk you through doing it yourself, if that's your inclination.

I play all styles, from classical to thrash to good ol' '****-kickin' country rock; been playing now for -- oh my Ghod! -- over 30 years.

Have a ****load of gear; going to have to start unloading to make room for new stuff. I've especially likes some of the Ibanez "tone-lok" stomp boxes, and own a bunch of them.

I would really miss this box if it disappeared, especially since I don't think you can get the kits from PAiA anymore, but I believe you can still get the plans and do it yourself.

Great box for the price; musically useful; and if you're into electronic tinkering, fun to mod.

Lots of knobs -- 2 on each side. Their purpose is hard to determine. Lots of division signs and things. Some of the knobs don't seem to do anything.

Absolute crud. These are apparently kit pedals and the guy who made mine must have been all thumbs. That or the thing just dried up and wore out over all these years. The lowest octave (4 down?) is so low it just farts out into super low gutteral belches in seconds. Notes sustain for about 2 seconds and then just abruptly drop off into static. Absolutely bizarre, unpredictable and completely lacking in musicality. Nearly useless. Not even heavy enough to make a nice paper weight.

Like I said, unpredictable as all hell. If this thing ever worked properly, it certainly doesn't now, so what's that say about reliability?

This company apparently still exists but I've never contacted them.

I got this for $1 at a flea market not having any idea what it was. After much experimentation I discovered it was some sort of octave fuzz but it's complete shite. Thought maybe I was the only unfortunate soul on earth to own one of these, and then I saw a little write up about them in Guitar Player magazine. The mystery was solved at last! If you get one that was put together properly maybe it's great.

Knobs a straight-forward.

I have had trouble with the tracking (and I'm used to the Digitech Whammy pedal), but it's decent. Can't get a decent clean tone at all so it's not in the current rig; need to have clean inputs to my amp.

Email support has been incredibly helpful and quite timely compared to other companies' attempts.

If it were sparkling clean I would love it. Since it's not, it isn't (currently) useful to me and I don't use it. Construction was straight forward enough; I had a problem with assembly at first but all of the components were good. If I lost it or it was stolen I wouldn't replace it; I use a Digitech Whammy (that cost four times what this did) for the pitch effects that I need. I was hoping for a straight octave divider, but this didn't work out.

That said, the sound is incredibly modifiable. Each of the knobs does something obvious, and it's fun to hack around with and make noises. It's unfortunate that I can't usefully put it into my rig.

This is an octave-lower fuzz unit. There are level knobs for one octave lower and two octaves lower as well as a tone knob and an intensity knob. It's easy to dial in a wide range of sounds by mixing the octaves. Lower levels produce a relatively clean octave.

This is definitely a specialty effect. You wouldn't use it while playing rhythm unless the octave settings were very low. The fuzz is smooth and musical and the tracking is excellent. I added a second output jack (outlined in the instructions) to make the effect stereo. The second jack produces a clean tone; you can get some really interesting sounds if you put a wah or some other effect on that output.

I have no reason to doubt the reliability, but I wouldn't compare my construction to some factory-made products that I own.

These kits are made as foolproof as possible, but it isn't hard to make a small mistake and there's nothing more irritating than plugging an effect in for the first time and it doesn't work. Anyone who has not built a few of these projects should read the directions carefully and go slow. If you aren't experienced in working on electronics, you'll probably spend about 5-10 hours putting the project together. If a problem should arise, the tech people are excellent; they can usually tell you how to easily fix it if you email them a good description of the problem.

The person who recommended this effect to me said that it was similar to the Blue Box, but sounded 10 times better. I have been very happy with this effect. You can get all kinds of unique sounds out of this thing and they all sound good. I'm sure if it were made by Ibanez it would retail for $150.