Zoom TM-01 Tri Metal

this is an update of my review below:
if just realized that they lowered the prices for the tri-metal also down to 59 $. Now, that's what they should have done right from the start: For 59 $ this is a good deal!
so don't let them get you rip you of and shop around a little.

Fairly easy to use, but it takes a lot of tweaking.

Desite its many knobs, it has basically only one sound: Super high gain, scooped metal. It has a tight bottom and there is a slight compression, which isn't bad at all.
The cons:
No internal noise gate, no hardware bypass (Zoom is lying about that!!!), buzzy treble that can't be dialed out and it doesn't react to the guitar volume knob, which means it is not very dynamic and lifely.
I'd say this is a good one after all, but the price is ridiculous. Zoom has lowered the prices for all of their analog range of pedals already (from 99 $ to 59 $), but not for the tri-metal, which is a shame!

Seems reliable, time will tell...

Not available

It is ok, but not that great. The biggest con is the buzzy treble IMO. I prefer the Ibanez Smash Box, which has a better range of sounds and is more dynamic and lifely for a lower price.

Fairly easy to use. The trick being getting used to the range control for the midrange. Along with undertsanding that the bass, mid & treble act like active tone controls. Which means you wont be maxing them out. Has a good basic manual. The the basic settings I ended up with for myself arent exampled. The Tri metal works very well for the main purpose I got it for. As an excellent overdrive/distortion pedal for bass guitar. Had used a Marshall Jackhammer before, but the tri metal is much easier to get great tone from & handles bass better then the Marshall pedal.

I use a BC Rich NJ series Mockingbird with active electronics & an ESP LTD B104 passive bass. Amp is an SWR LA15. With the tweeter disconnected. The tri metl is very quite. Is fairly easy to get great sound from. Lets me get my own tone well. I set the SWR tone controls with bass at about noon to 1 oclock; mids to allmost all the way down & no higher then 7-8 oclock, treble to about 1 oclock. On the tri metal I put treble at about 1 oclock or slightly less. Mids at around 9 oclock or slightly higher. Range at about 3:30. And bass at about 10 oclock. Gain at 9-11 oclock, level around noon to 1 oclock. This gets me great tone both with the Trimetal on and off. Can get a great moderate overdrive to all out heavy distortion with it.

Build is excellent. Should hold up with no problem. Also likes the easy access batery compartment. When not useing the Tri metal I use a Zoom Player 3000B.

No experience with the company except thru thir website & haveing gotten other gear made by them. Never had a problem with any Zoom gear.

Plays a blend of electronica & thrash, black & death metal. Would replace the Tri metal with same unit if lost or stolen. Adds well to music making. Compared it to prev used Marshall unit allready mentioned. The Zoom works better for bass. Has a heavier, more driven sound then the od settings I use with my Zoom Player 3000B. Loves the tri-metal for when just wanting to use a seperate distortion/overdrive pedal by itself. Got it on sale thru americanmusical.com so was excellent value.

There a lots of knobs to tweak and fumble, but at the end of the day it's all the same.

This is your typical scooped mids 80's poser metal sound. As it lacks mids, you'll never get close to that Recto thing. This might impress the "inexperienced ear" at the start (mine too!), but use it in a band and you'll get lost in the mix everytime you step on it.

Seems reliable, time will tell...

Don't know...

I was impressed enough to buy it, but had a hard time setting it up with my amp (Marshall JCM 800) and dial out the superficial fizzy treble. But when I got to the gig last night and hit that baby for the fist time, my sound disappeared completely!!! It was impossible to set it up so I could cut through the noise my band is making. I'm sure the boys are still laughing!

Good layout, but the range of the knobs is a bit too muh, so you need lot's of tweaking.

I used it with a Plexi 100, Hiwatt DR-103 and a Fender Dual Showman. For the amount of gain, the unit is not very noisy (but there is some noise, of course. Contrary to popular believe, it does NOT have an integral noisegate, like the Smash Box!). This is a high gain metal pedal that can be compared to the Tech 21 GT-2, Ibanez Smash Box or Boss Metal Zone (do not compare it to the MD-2, whole different animal). To put it short, the TriMetal is a great unit. Heavy dense distortion with a tight bottom, scooped mids and blistering highs. Not unlike Rammstein or Pantera. I think it's a little to processed and superficial to get a Rectifier or Triaxis (Metallica) sound out of it. Which brings us to the weak points of this unit:
1.The midrange. It is a parametrical one, but not a real broadband range (more like a narrow wah-wah range). You can't boost the mids to a natural level, you'll only get a honky telephone sound. Besides, boosting the mids increases the noise to an unbearable amount. I would have liked a more natural broadband midrange.
2. The treble is very very fizzy. Turn up the gain and it becomes even more fizzy. This is way too much. You can't tame these highs with the treble pot wich is in the wrong frequenzy range either, too sad.
3. The gain is an all or nothing thing. If you turn the gain down, the sound becomes dull, strangled and choked, not very pleasing.
4. As others have already explained, there is a kind of overload, unmusical distortion if you turn the bass or the mid knobs past 3 o'clock. As this baby has enough bass, this is not a major concern.
5. The palm muting problem. Some folks complained about an unnatural sound when palm muting, not unlike a string buzzing on the frets. I noticed this effect, too, when using guitars with low output PU's (Fender Single Coils or Vintage Humbuckers), whereas I had no problem with EMG's or Duncans Jeff Beck, Dimebucker and Screamin Deamon. I think it is a design flaw. This unit has 3 gain stages in series that need to be pushed a little. If you turn down the gain or use low output PU's you may get some problems.

Overall, this is one of the best high gain pedals on the market, that's hard to beat for the price. But be warned: There are lots of controls, but there's just minor usable sound changes because the range of the knob isn't very well chosen. If you don't like the pedal from the start, don't buy it.

This seems very reliable. I ususally give Boss pedals a 10 in this rating, but this one is even better. Very heavy and tough construction.

Grat pedal, that has only one sound (metal with scooped mids) but this sound is one of the best in teh non boutique area (if you're looking for a more convincing tube like high gain sound you should look for the Tonebone Hot British or the BJF Dyna Red). If the treble wouldn't be so fizzy and the mids had a more usable range, then this thing would be almost perfect.
Keep in mind the amps you're gonna use it with:
Because it has so much gain, it almost begs for a strong and clean stack with lot's of headroom. With my Marshall it got too mushy for my liking, the Dual Showman was ok, but the Hiwatt delivered (with a little tweakin I could almost nail Pantera's Far Beyond Driven sound). But then again, everything sound wonderful in front of that unmatched king of amps, doesn't it ;-)

Don't confuse this pedal with Zoom's plastic digital multi-effects units. This is one of Zoom's new analog range and it's made out of solid metal. Very tough and very heavy. Six control knobs are laid out in an easy to understand pattern and as they have been described so many times in previous reviews I'lll leave that for now.This pedal looks like it's been designed from basic principles rather than being just another Boss/DOD clone. It has a broad and flat profile which gives excellent stability. Battery access is very quick, the best I've seen, but I'd be even happier if the cover was captive rather than loose.The jack sockets are on the top edge rather than the usual side edge arrangement, which seems like a pointless feature, but that's just a minor quibble.

To get straight to the point this is the best distortion pedal I've ever used for heavy metal.The only one that can compete with this is the Sansamp GT-2 wwhich is a lot more expensive and I marginally prefer the sound of the Tri-metal anyway. There may be expensive boutique units which are even better but this one is in competition with the Boss/DOD/Ibanez sector of the market.At the time I bought the Tri-metal, I compared it with a Boss MD-2 Megadistortion and comparisons with that pedal are revealing.If anyone should think that this is an unfair comparison , let me quote from the Boss Effects Guide Book, Vol 16, page 18: "...perfect for crushing 'new school ' metal sounds." and here's another one from the Boss website: "Produces extreme low-end distortion for modern metal and hard rock." I think it's plain from these descriptions what Boss's intentions are for this pedal so I think the comparison is both fair and appropriate.
The first thing that you notice about the Tri-metal is that it has absolutely outrageous levels of gain. Even at zero setting it's still pretty high and unless you have very weak pickups, I can't see that you would need to have it up higher than a 9-10 Oclock position(Thankfully the integral noisegate means that it's also hiss-free).Likewise with the Bass control. The sheer amount of bottom end power means that you'll probably never need to have it set anywhere near to max. Two knobs give parametric control over the midrange, one to select the center frequency and one to emphasise the level of cut or boost and although I read somewhere on another review page that the Trimetal "has" scooped mids as if that was a fixed tonal parameter, this is actually only one option among the multitude of settings you can select. I guess that guy hadn't actually used one which is a shame .It's very like the midband eq section of a Metalzone but with an even wider degree flexibility. This is a mixed blessing because although the tonal options are huge, it does need a good bit of experimenting to nail the exact sound you want.The Bottom end is tight, deep and powerful and seems to have a natural roll-off characteristic which contributes to more tubelike sound. In comparison the MD-2 has a softer, slightly distant bottom end which sounds like it's been designed with a sharp cut-off point making it sound more processed, less natural though perhaps superficially impressive to the inexperienced ear. The Trimetal achieves the seemingly contradictory feat of sounding both smoother and more aggressive than the MD-2 at the same time. Put simply, it's a more cohesive,unified sound whereas the MD-2 tends to blur the individual notes of a distorted chord. Unlike other reviewers I haven't had any problems with palm muting. If you're used to the artificially enhanced palm-mute sound of a Metalzone where the pedal seems to do the work for you it's probably just a case of spending a few hours sharpening up your technique, although you'll never get that same processed,percussive snap that is a Metalzone trademark due to it's inbuilt compression.
So is this a "rectifier in a small solid-state box" prospect. Well, not exactly. I don't think thatANY solid-state pedal can reproduce the true sound of an overdriven tube amp. What the best of them can do though is to offer credible alternatives and the Tri-metal manages that feat with considerable presence and authority. Like the Boss MD-2 it's recognisably an attempt to create a rectifier-ish type of sound, but ironically The MD-2 falls short in those key areas where the Tri-metal excels. It has a genuine high-gain characteristic, taut and extended low-end performance, tremendous tonal flexibility and is equally at home with rhythm or lead duties. It seems as if Boss have been content to rest on their laurels here, while Zoom have definitely raised the bar for distortion pedals at this price level. The usual question that comes up about distorti

It's one of the toughest pedals you will ever see. The build quality is beyond reproach.

It's a real shame that these new range of Zoom pedals are probably going to be disregarded by a lot of those very people who would appreciate them most, just because of the association of the Zoom name with cheap plastic multi units. I feel that if these pedals had the Boss logo on them they would easily outsell any other metal distortion pedal out there. They really are that good. I can't imagine many guys who want a heavy metal distortion pedal trying one of these out in a store and not wanting to take it home.So don't be put off by the name.

This pedal has six different knobs, for Gain, Level, Treble, Mid, Range, and Bass. Once you start messing with it you should be able to get a sound you like within a short amount of time, assuming that you are going for a saturated metal sound.

My setup is as follows: Fender 70's reissue Strat w/ Vintage Noiseless pickups and a Seymour Duncan JB Jr. in the bridge position->Boss Tuner->Tri Metal->Vox Wah Pedal->Mesa Boogie Nomad 45 (4x10). my effects loop includes a Boss Chorus, EH Small Stone, Boss Tremolo, and Boss DD5 Delay, for now.

My amp is very versatile and with my guitar and my spares I can get a wide variety of clean, pushed, dirty, and overdriven sounds, but the only thing that i need that i could not get was a saturated distortion, which i use a lot. my pickups are not very high output, even the humbucker, so the amp's distortion wasnt cutting it for the high gain stuff. i mean, i have a mesa boogie, and while it's very versatile, it's no triple rectifier when it comes to pure distortion.

you have to mess with this pedal a bit, but once you do the sound you are looking for is in there somewhere. i would say that you could use an EQ very well with this pedal. there are some drawbacks to the bass and treble that other people mentioned, but it is damn quiet and with some tweaking it really rocks.

There is nothing about this pedal that i dont trust.

I play a HUGE variety of music, and my influences when i write (regardless of whether or not im writing for my band) are radiohead, foo fighters, smashing pumpkins, soundgarden, tool, death cab for cutie, jawbox, at the drive-in and a lot of other varied stuff.
for my purposes in my band i plan on using this pedal a lot. it works well, even though i dont play what you would consider metal. it's just too much of a mutant baby of a bunch of different kinds of rock, but i love having a really heavy distortion.

I've been playing for about ten years, and through all the problems i've had with getting the sound i've been looking for out of my gear i have a feeling my days of searching for a good high gain distortion are over, and the timing couldn't be better. If someone stole this pedal I would definitely buy a new one or steal it from someone else. If you are into playing metal (just please tell me it's not nu metal) or you just want a really high gain for your own purposes like me, you should definitely check it out, and compare it to other pedals so you can see for yourself how decent it is.

Very easy to get any sort of heavy metal/Hard Rock sound out of this baby . . .

Holy cow . . . this pedal turned my Fender Twin into a Mesa Boogie Triple Recto . . . really! I can't believe the sound this thing produces through my tube amp . . . and all with no noise! I also put a Tube Screamer in front of it and turned the gain down on the Tri-Metal and the level and tone up on the TS9 and WOW classic crunch ala Marshall! Everything from Pantera to Black Sabbath.

Like other reviewers . . . I have already dropped it onto a basment floor . . . nada . . . not even a paint chip!

can't say

This beats any Boss pedal hands down! If someone were to try and steal it . . . I would grab my EH-Small Stone and chuck it at them boom'o'rang style, they would not get far! From what I can tell, this is the best analog METAL/HardROck pedal you can buy, next to having a mesa boogie triple!

Easy as cake.

I love this pedal. I'm primarily a keyboard player, but I play guitar too. I needed a distortion pedal so I got this one. It is very very nice. I've played it with different guitars and different amps, and it always sounds pretty good. It's noiseless, and has more gain than you will ever need.

I dropped this thing from about 3 or 4 feet on concrete. The bass knob came off and so did the rubber bottom of the pedal. I just put the knob back on and glued the bottom back on. The pedal still works fine, and it's made of metal like a lot of others. If you take care of it, you won't have any problems.

I haven't tried the other pedals in this line from Zoom, but they've all gotten good reviews. If you play metal or are looking for something really powerful, go ahead and get this. Every guitar-playing friend I have is jealous of this little box.

I could understand what the six knobs but it took me a while to get used to the mid controls. Theres a lot of fine tuning available but it takes a little while to get it just right.

First of all there's no noise because of the built in noisegate unless you turn the gain full on, and theres no way you could ever use that much gain. Take note this is a very high gain pedal, no good at all for smooth overdrive. It's made for metal, no doubt about that.It's a bit of a shock coming to this after using a Boss metalzone MT-2 for iver a year. This is like a Metalzone on steroids. No need to us a seperate EQ pedal because this handsome brute has masses of bass power, so much that I can' turn it up beyond 2 O'clock, also have to take care not to use too much treble either.This pedal sounds much more like a real powerful amp than the Metalzone. I'd say that this is a metal pedal for grownups and the MT-2 is for kids. Just be careful not to dial out too much of the midtones.

All those brainwashed morons who say stuff like *It's a Boss so it gets 10/10 on reliability* are in for a shock when they see this thing.if Boss pedals rate 10 then this thing rates about 25. No fooling.Excellent battery access too.

This is the premier heavy metal pedal on the market at the moment IMHO and I recommend everyone who plays metal to give it a try.