Rocktron VooDu Valve On-Line

This unit only has a few nobs and switches, so I cant see how anyone couldn't use it. Editing patches are fairly simple if you can have a basic to good understanding of guitar FX.

Right now I'm using 2 Marshall 1960's and I ran it through a 2400 watt (solid state) power amp. I will be switching to tube shortly. Ibanez and ESP 6-7 string guitars and thats it. The sound quality is good although the presets are a bit unrefined, you may need to spend a good deal of time tweeking this guy, there is a good amount of parimeters to adjust so I'm sure you can find the sound you looking for. And for those who say it has an over saturated sound or lacks crunch, try setting the Variac level to the top, not in the minuses, and then adjust the gain to your preference. Pre and Post EQ's are a good thing.

Not sure about reliability yet, I havent had it long enough (In my opinion) to give an answer.

Again N/A

I play a blend of classical and intricate metal, the effects are good for my all around sound. I run my rhythm preset dry with only gain and I like it. I'm hoping the tube amp will give it a bit more body. I can't say if there is a better unit in it's price range but what I do know is stacked up against other processors in its class, and floor units at high volumes (if you take time and adjust it) sounds pretty damn good.

Easy? Ok, I guess if you have been to sound engineering school and know all about EQ and Octave bandwidths you might think it was easy. The manual is real long winded and short on practical applications for the EQ and what not. Secondly if you want to factory reset or re-initialize or any of roughly 200 different utilities then you have to look up some secret "code" number in your manual. If you don't have have fun negotiating the Rocktron website. Lots of fanfare about all the people that use the HUSH and NOTHING ELSE from Rocktron. Horrible to use. I'll give it a 2 because at least the input jack was easy to find.

Uggh. Don't get me started here. When looking at this unit take the word "tube" very lightly. By lightly I mean as in a pilot light because that is all the tube circuit is good for. Sure looks cool to see that thing glowing through the vent doing nothing. I have tried this with 4 different tube power amps and 3 cabinets and nothing helps it. My Crate GX-900H has a better "tube" tone than this thing. Save yourself the money and get anything but this unit. Recently I was using it with 2 Randall 4X12 cabs with Celestion G12t-75's and a Peavey 60/60 power amp. The effects are great but if you want that get a friggin' Lexicon or a TC Electronic for what I paid for this thing new 5 years ago. If you want to sound like Eddie Van Halen playing through a late 80's Crate combo then knock yourself out and get one of these.

Oh boy! Well, after 5 years the buttons on the front began to stick so, since it was past warranty, I opened it up only to find that the way these jacka$$es mounted all the encoder knobs causes the PCB to warp over time. Too much pressure on one side of the board. The thing has never overheated so go figure. I wouldn't use this AS my backup. I'll plug my guitar into my dirthole first.I'll give it a 2 because it made it out of the friggin' store I bought it from. I have ADA MP-1 that not only sounds better than this thing but it was made in 1988 and other than new tubes every now and again and changing the filter caps after 12 years (standard maintenance for caps) it still works and sounds as good as the day I bought it.

I imagine it could be repaired but you know what? Screw that. Why should I pay for shipping and handling and whatever they want to charge me to fix their engineering SNAFU's. The bottom line is Rocktron things their crap don't stink and that's why you hear of SO many pro's using this thing live and in the studio ( That's sarcasm- no-one uses this damn thing). I'll give it a 2 because essentially I was so pissed and frustrated that I won't even bother to follow this thing to the end. I have another (WAY better) amp and don't need this POS. They could be most helpful by stgicking to making the HUSH unit and making NOTHING else.

I play melodic rock and metal and this thing sucks for it. Anyone who says this compares with a Triaxis or something like that has no clue what they are talking about. MY $125 MP-1 SOUNDS BETTER THAN THIS THING. If it were stolen I would thank that person if I could find them. Let's see, anything I wish it had? Oh yeah, I wish it had never been manufactured. Yes, it helps make music sound bad.

I have had the Voodu Online for about 2 weeks. I am still having trouble with all the parameter settings. I have however purchased a USB to MIDI connector and I am currently downloading patches from www.rocktron.com and testing them. This is a pretty simple proceedure to download and upload patches to my unit. The manual is pretty extensive so I am trying to learn as much on my own without it.

I am using playing a Fender USA Strat with stock pickups and a Les Paul Standard with the original pickups as well. I use the Rocktron Velocity 120, Rocktron Midi Mate with a Marshall 1960 lead cabinet. I like the distortion extremely well for the types of music we play ie. STP, Alice in Chains, more grunge. I did download the Chameleon patches and found there are more settings I like than there are in the Voodu as shipped from the factory. I have found that I have to almost max out the HUSH before I get any quiet, this is more so when I play my Strat, maybe a pickup problem with the guitar and not so much the unit.

I would depend on this unit and will gig without a backup. I haven't had the unit long enough to rate it's reliability.

I play mostly Alternative music and I think the Voodu Online and I are a good match. I have been playing for about 15 years and this is the first processor I have really liked. There is a popular band in my area who uses the Voodu and I really like the sound they have and the ability to completely change in a moments notice. I only wish the Voodu had more artist presets or the ability to download more from their website. If anyone has more artist specific patches to let loose of, I would very grateful. I plan to upload and trade presets when I get more familiar with this unit.

I'm the world's worst techno-phobe, so I read the manual cover to cover before I even plugged it in - it's very detailed & took me a while! Actually the VooduValve is quite easy to use - logically layed out - I could've probably dived straight in & kept the manual to hand for when I got stuck. Changing patches is quite easy, but not quick - you have to turn a lot of knobs to accomplish simple tasks - so I wouldn't like to try making "on the fly" changes mid-performance, but surely that's not the point of a programmable unit? After some experimentation, I've got a range of sounds that I'm very happy with (see below).

The VooduValve has 256 presets, 1-126 (127 is a "mute") duplicated 128-253 (254 is also a "mute") with the speaker sim on. Any can be modified. The presets are a good starting point for making your own sounds, however the person who made them must've been wearing earplugs, needed his/her ears syringing or had some very bassy speakers because almost ALL the presets have FAR too much treble. Having said that, once I'd turned the treble & presence down a bit, then experimented with other settings, the sounds are FANTASTIC. I run this through the power section of my Mesa Rectifier & since I got the VooduValve I haven't used the rectifier preamp stage at all - the VooduValve really is THAT good! The variety of sounds available is huge, the effects are very nice, there is a LOT of flexibility - I've not even touched the advanced pre & post EQs (just use the simple one in the gain section) & already have all the sounds I want. I don't have much use for the flange, phase & trem effects (though they sound good), but the Chorus, Reverb, Delays are gorgeous. In particular the speaker sim is superb - as well as sounding great, it can be assigned to just one of the two outputs so you can record direct while still using the amp as normal out of the other output. That's basically my setup - a variety of guitars, VooduValve, R-out plugged into FX return of the Mesa (to just use its power amp stage), Mesa 2x12", L-out with Speaker Sim plugged into my multitrack.

It's not broken yet, or shown any worrying signs. Seems fairly sturdy. I guess I already have a built in backup from the preamp stage of my Mesa (until I buy a rack power amp) - albeit not as versatile. I'd probably take the risk until it bit me :-)

Never called them, or had any cause to - let's hope it stays that way.

I play rock/metal & have all the sounds I could want from this: Brutal, BRUTAL distortions, some mid-overdrives, crunches, shimmering warm cleans - the whole lot. I've played for nearly 20 years & this is my first programmable unit - wish I'd got one years ago. For me, the VooduValve is a FANTASTIC recording tool - whether direct, or into a miked cab. It's perfectly useable live, as long as you don't need/want to tweak your settings. I'd buy another one without any hesitation.

It's kind of a pain in the ass to use... THREE eq sections gives a lot of flexibility, but DAMN you have to turn a lot of knobs to find it.

I have a replifex that I use in my rack (since I didn't keep this thing) and I really like it, but it too suffers from the ease-of-use factor.

For this, it would have been nice if (like on a POD Pro) they would have put knobs for the initial tone control stage of the preamp, and still allow it to be fully MIDI controllable.

Oh the Hush... it SUCKS TOTAL ASS.

My gear: Jackson USA Soloist (SL1) and Warrior (WR1) w/ EMG 81's wired at 18V. Running through VHT 2-90-2 power amp into two Marshall 4x12 Mode Four cabs (purchased after I ditched my Mesa Rectifier cabs).

Well, it's just ok. The guitar preamp sections uses a tube for initial gain stages and adds digital clipping on top. The digital clipping helps keep things clean, but you can't dial out enough of the tube to get it to sounds as clean as, say, their old MAXE preampe (which I use to this day). The clean tones, however, are pretty good.

The *HUSH* TOTALLY SUCKS ASS! Big ole piece of *crap*! When you have the gain high enough, it barely works at all. (By comparison, the active hush-type system on the old MAXE works GREAT, and it's a bazillion years old). This makes the thing almost unusable for me.

The effects... well, they're so so. Nothing spectacular. The reverb sounds kinda hollow, the chorus and flange aren't great. No pitch shift at all.

This thing has a number of factory settings but, by and large, most of the sounds seem too similar. This isn't the best example of a "preamp for all seasons"... though, that's not why I wanted it.

Depending on your style of music, it may work ok. If I couldn't find another MAXE if mine died, I might consider using this one. In the mean time, I sent this back.

dunno.

N/A

I play intricate, usually fast, death'ish metal. I love the set up I have (Rocktron MAXE->Rocktron Replifex->VHT 2-90-2->Marshall Mode Fours). I've been trying things out, and still haven't found anything to best this setup.

This VooDoo Valve is ok, but the fact that its HUSH sucks terribly, the effects are so so, and the preamp just sounds "decent", makes this thing not worth the price paid, even used.

I've tried everything from 5150s, to all Marshall Heads, Mesa Heads, VHT Valvulator, Mesa TriAxis... none of them I like, all because they're based on Tubes. Tubes preamps don't do it for me, and too much of the tube characteristic comes through on this preamp.

Ugh...Been using effect processors for years and while the Voodu Valve relies on a quite intuitive interface (twist knobs, a few buttons) it is hard to dial in the exact tone you want. The PRE-EQ and POST-EQ settings can be confusing at first, particularly because they do different things soundwise for distortion and clean settings. After a bit of playing you'll get the hang of it though.

Setup: Jackson USA King V 2 >> VooDu Valve >> Rocktron Velocity 100 >> Crate 4 X 12
What the fuck?
The thing sounds awesome at quieter settings. The more you crank the bastard the more noise feedback you'll get - the HUSH absolutely sucks. It does work nicely to a certain degree but beyond a certain volume it just doesn't do its job well. You MUST stand pretty far away from your amp to not get your ears sawed off by the feedback. Even my guitar tech couldn't dial in a better HUSH setting.
NOTE: my processor might have a defect because everybody else seems to love the HUSH system.

The clean sounds are wonderful, with or without effects they come out quite sweet. The Speaker/Cab simulator helps a lot!

Distortion wise (my pet peeve. It's gotta be perfect) the Voodu Valve disappoints in several areas.
Despite utilizing a real tube to get the kick-ass gain we all want, the unit's aggressiveness seems to have its limits.
Even using my monster death metal guitar (USA BC Rich ST Custom with Invader humbuckers), the unit would not present me with the smooth UNGODLY distortion sound I wanted. Meh! :(

A fucking tank!
When the Voodu Valve was delivered, some smart UPS delivery guy decided to THROW THE UNIT OVER A SIX FOOT FENCE onto my stoney yard instead of having me sign for it.
Of course I was outraged and was sure the unit was broken.

Upon unpacking the Voodu Valve I noticed absolutely no dings, scratches or anything like that. When I plugged it in I found the tube to be in perfect condition as well.
Overall the unit seems to work nicely, except for the HUSH system but that may have other causes.
VERY well done!

BAD:
HUSH screwed up; Distortion no fat enough
Manual does not show how to download sound settings from Rocktron website
Good:
Built like a tank
very sweet clean sound
only useful effects (less playing with sound, more actual guitar playing)

OK... easy? Well, I program robots and C -language for living. Nothing else here but getting used to dialing the effects. Plus you'd HAVE to tweak some of the presets, to get to where you want... You could find yourself more tweaking than actually playing... =D

I use ESP LTD MH-301 and Washburn N-2. LTD is customized with EMG81/60 and Schaller Bridge (FR II). Washburn has stock PU in neck position and Bill Lawrence L-500 (stock assembled PU!) in bridge position. SETUP: Guitar-->VooDu Valve Online==>BBE362==>PA (left) and Combo Slave (right). Sometimes the VooDu is noisy (guitar near monitors) on stage, but HUSH Offset fixes that (crackling effect near treshold). Effects are actually quite conventional (and too "wet" right out of the box) but outshine any multieffect floorpedalsystemfactorycrap in any quality (not as many effects though...), except for the wah... (NOT nearly as good as my Crybaby, propably because of the log vs. lin stuff). To get the best out of this one would get anyone hours of tweaking. Although I'm using this thing with a 2x12 combo and cab sim locked on for mixing desk, this baby cries as it weeps - clean, mean and perfect. Creativity is the only boundary! =D Okay... the 12AX7 TUBE is the only boundary! (a change to a different pre-amp tube perhaps? =D)

Dialing manually seems to be a little problem... oops... skipped some presets in a single step, hmmm... ???? No problems at the gigs though...

well... there are patches in the internet...

I play everything and anything... I DO need the gear to be inspiring and versatile. Altough I don't play much on stage these days, I actually do have fun with this gadget! I have played guitar over 15 years and the only thing I can actually compare this rack "witch" are an old Intellifex and Peavey 5150 head - because those are the only ones ,prior to this one, ever made me hungry for more to play. I've used and tested a lot of gear recently, mostly Marshall (all chiep crap is cheap crap and all expensive crap is too adequate), Digitech (RP7,RP2000), a Line6 POD rack model, Mesa TriAxis (through an old Mesa poweramp (new tubes, I heard) and Marshall 1960 cab)<---Overprized POS!!! (get an ENGL homie!!!), propably all Behringer Amps and combos and a ADA MP-1, definetely would buy this one again, if stolen (even in jail... after killing the thief =D). I'm a distortion addict and this baby gets me everywhere... plus it's got a beautiful Fender TWIN clean sound as a "bonus" preset (not kidding, it is so BEAUTIFUL!!!). Now I can be all... Mark Knopfler OR Joe Satriani OR Slayer OR Angus Young OR Carlos Santana OR Stevie Ray =D. Could've paid LESS though... (833?=TOO MUCH!!!NO TEN for overall!!!) Pay attention folks - real picking dynamics here, NOT for beginner players: REAL tube preamp, not some bogus shit!

Read the manual. Easy to use once you understand it. Rocktron makes some of the most intuitive products in my opinion. Easy to edit patches though some parameter are very involved and require some prior understanding about effects and how to work with them. That goes for any unit. Good manual overall.

I was using this with a Mesa/Boogie 50/50 power amp into Mesa/Boogie 2x12 cabs. Les Pauls and Jackson Dinky. The effects sound good for the most part though I thought the flange was a little weak. Great cabinet emulation and noise control.

Problem: If I could have bypassed the preamp I would still have the unit. The preamp is fun to use in your bedroom but most patches need to be modified to play live. Tends to be too heavy with the effects and so much overdrive that there isn't any definition when playing with a band. The overall tone sucks if you like a good brown, round sound from a tube amp or clearly defined notes with a warm overdrive sound. If you like tube amp sound and expect to get it from the Voodu Valve save yourself the time and agravation and just go buy a good amp and seperate effects processor. I like Rocktron. After getting rid of the Voodu Valve I bought the Rocktron Xpression to use with my Mesa/Boogie rig and couldn't be happier. Well, I could be happier but not from anything my equipment could provide.

Never had a problem with regarding reliability.

Good customer support. I like Rocktron in general.

I play in variety bands in the rock/dance music arena. I hoped this would have given me the tone and sounds needed to play several styles of music. Na-da. Been playing 25+ years. If stolen before I sold it I would have been forced to do what took me too long to do. Buy a good preamp.

I love playing with it at my house or with headphones for fun. Hate it for anything else. I wish you could bypass the preamp and use just the effects. Or even better, make it a real tube amp with good tone. For as much money as this thing sells for new I don't know why they could have done better.

If you're a pro who lives and dies by a good tube amp, stay away! If you like heavily processed sound and are not as picky about tone then you will probably love this.

Very easy and simple to use ... Excellent instruction manual (very well written). Editing patches is easy and presents no problem. There's a GREAT "compare" feature which allows you to make a change to a particular setting and with the push of a button - COMPARE the sound between the original setting and your change. Storing changes is simple and easy ... Overall, making changes to dial-in your particular sound is as easy-as-pie.

I use my Rocktron Voodu-Valve Online as a (pre-amp) for my distortion, tone, equalization, effects, etc. and run it into a cleanly-driven Marshall (JCM 50/25W) 2550 model amplifier and JCM 800 (LEAD 1982) four-speaker cabinet. There is absolutely NO noise or artificial hum due to the built-in (Rocktron Trademark) "HUSH" feature ... This works wonderfully to reduce erroneous noises and outside interference. To put it in perspective, I used to be able to hear my neighbor's radio -or- T.V. whenever I turned on my Roland GP8 Guitar Effects Processor (which in all fairness - is 18 years old). Now, with me Rocktron Voodu Valve Online, I only hear my guitar and that's as it should be. The effects are well thought out, which is to say they come pre-arranged in varying combinations that are useful and not just there for the sake of the effect. You can quite literally get any of your favorite guitar hero or band sounds from the unit. But that's not half as COOL as the fact that you can modify any of your favorite guitar hero or band sounds to DEVELOP YOUR OWN SPECIAL & UNIQUE GUITAR SOUND. In otherwords, this unit will give you that special and unique sound you've been searching for your whole life - it's in there and you just have to experiment to bring it out. The other really, REALLY COOL thing about the unit is the SPEAKER SIMULATION. This is the like chocolate fudge topping on your favorite ice cream flavor, e.g. it makes it go down even better than you ever imagined. I MEAN WOW !!! The SPEAKER SIMULATION enables you to dial-in your sound like a PRO. You'll experiment and never go anywhere without it again (this I know). They say that the speaker simulation is GREAT for direct recording, but for me - I get a very different sound going direct into my Yamaha AW16G than when I go into my Marshall. So to put it in perspective, if the SPEAKER SIMULATION is the chocolate fudge on-top of you favorite ice cream flavor, then the MARSHALL STACK is the cherry and nut topping on top of the fudge. In other words, it just doesn't get any sweeter than that people. So I've decided to mike the cabinet instead of direct recording since this is just infinately better.

Ha ... Bet you thought this writing would be full of 10's ... Well, nope !!! When I got the unit (shipped overseas via the mail) there was a rattling sound coming from the inside. So fine (I was pissed) because at $645.00 dollars purchased "new" it wasn't hardly cheap. So I had two choices, send it back or pop-the-cover and take a look inside. I opted to pop-the-cover and therein, found a screw that had broken off from somewhere. I never could find out from where. And now you're thinking this guy (me) must be stupid to have done the above. Well, I've been custom building PC's for over 18 years and when I say that I couldn't find where the screw came from - I mean, "I couldn't find where the screw came from". No problem, in the industry I work in, we call these SPARE PARTS. So I put the cover back on and proceeded to demo the unit to make sure everything worked. It did and I was a happy camper. After two weeks of playing and enjoying the features, I unplugged the unit and to my surprise heard another rattling sound from inside the unit (no kidding). So damn, this time I took the whole thing apart and discovered some little white, plastic screw type of tube just rolling around inside the thing. SHIT !!! Once again, I couldn't find where this was supposed to go either. Trust me - I'm not half the idiot you may be thinking. So what the fudge ... Another SPARE PART. I put the unit back together and it's been working perfectly ever since. BUT I MEAN DAMN, if this keeps happening, then I'll be left with nothing but spare parts. SO I'M KIND OF THINKING THE UNIT IS NOT SO WELL MADE. But wait, let me put that in perspective. It's not that there's any moving parts to break down - it's a computer board with some chips and a tube. Nothing more ... Therein, it should last a lifetime. Sure the company has a one year unlimited guarantee and three year parts & labor (better than some cars). But, who wants to send it through the mail <again> only to have it take 3 to 4 months before you get it back. Not me ... Especially if you live overseas. So I'm keeping my fingers crossed and hoping the unit is half as solid as my Roland GP8 which has lasted for over 18 years without even having to change the battery. YES, I would (and will) take the unit "live" with the band. It's an intricate part of my sound and like I said, (what more could possible break ??) it's a computer board in a metal box with a 12ax7 tube. And "yes" I would buy another ... The sound is just AWESOME.

I haven't had to deal with customer support. I hope I never have to. The web site is nice and fucntional. The patches are very nice and useful ... I honestly lost a lot of faith in Rocktron as a company because of the loose screw and white, plastic tube that somehow came loose. Considering the product is supposed to have been made in the U.S. - it sucks insofar as quality control. Someone had a hang-over or was having drug withdrawal shakes when they assembled the unit. I doubt ROCKTRON can make it good for me. The real thing is here is the product is AWESOME insofar as it's sound and what it can do. So why did they have to ruin what could've been a "10" all the way around.

Well, the sound is amazing !!! The features are rich !!! The functionality is awesome !!! Unfortunately, the quality is less than perfect. However since having seen the inside - it appears to have been well made. How can you go wrong, it's a processor board with some circuits and chips and a 12ax7 vacuum tube. If it were stolen, I would cash in the insurance and replace the unit. It is an intricate part of my musical sound and has enabled me to dial in a sweetness of TONE that I thought was previously impossible to obtain. I love the "HUSH" feature ... And the SPEAKER SIMULATION is just out-of-this world GREAT !!! In the right combination, this thing will make you sound like a PRO (absolutely). It goes without saying, that you need to know how to play though (right). For me, it's been over 20 years and I know a thing or two. My music runs across various styles as diverse as country, rock, jazz, and even latin ... The Rocktron Voodu Valve Online has something to suite every style, from brilliantly clean to absolutely in-your-face dirty.

I would like to follow up on my review posted below. I have since contacted Rocktron about the Hum. As I am a repairer they were able to send me info for the repair of the unit. It seems there was a small
amount of units with a circuit board fault which is a very simple repair. This kind of fault would be hard to find unless you
were able to compare with another working unit. I am very impressed
with Roctron and the backup service and advice.