Zoom BFX-708

It has some good sounds, and it's fun as hell to play.
Editing the patches aren't too easy, they seem sort of complex, but you'll get the hang of it. The manual is tricky, but again, spend some time and you'll be fine.

I am using the processor w/ a Fender P-Bass and a Fender BXR 100 amp. It sounds fine. The effects sound pretty clean. I like the Octave effects. With the right tweaking you can get a Stanley Clarke or Jaco Pastorius sound out of it.

It seems dependable so far, it's sturdy. I'd feel comforatable using it w/o a backup @ a gig.

The customer support sucks. I pre-judging this one because they're located in Tokyo and the unit didn't come w/ an AC adapter and won't let you use any other adapter except one from Zoom. I like the pedal anyhow, the price was great.

I've been playing for 2 years, and I play alternative rock w/ a funk edge (incubus style i guess) the price I got it for was great, I wouldn't pay over $200 new for it though. I like the different effects and the drum machine it came w/, but I don't like the fact that it took me a while to figure out how to use the damn thing. It's a good purchase, go for it if you like to have fun with your music and play a lot of lead parts.

A few months ago I submitted a review, and would like to further elaborate.The Manual is the stupidist thing you will ever find on the face of the earth. The presets give you an idea of what you want but you'll definately want to tailor them to your style. Which isn't hard at all. (It only took me a few months to get the sounds I wanted!)

As before I'm running with an esp 5 string through a kustom 3-15, the only difference is I got a classic ampeg amp which is far quiter than anything. I haven't noticed noise I don't know what the hell people are taking about. Perhaps there Noise gates are turned off.Anything that uses the compressor is good, also the flanger is very excellent. Anything that uses distortion will suck unbelievably. Over the years I have come to a conclusion. ALL BASS MULTI EFFECT PROCESSORS SUCK!!! But this is porbably my favorite, even over the DOD, and Digitech models.

I wouldn't use a back up, but I would still hang on to the box to store it in, just to transport otherwise itll be fine.

I have never dealt with the company, and I dont thik I will ever need to. The reason Im giving it a review is because you want to use a universal adapter forget it. Zoom plotted against the bassist here. On 4 point multi adapters if one of the metal arms not in use touches the metal of your guitar cable. the machine will turn completely off.A feature that pisses me off.

Overall its better than anything else short of Individual stomp boxes. Here's my opinion save your mmoney and get rack mountable preamp, They will fatten your sound. Another possibility would to get an amp with a descent preamp built into it. There are some nice ones such as the Mo' bass, and clasic ampegs. The unit is superb for the price, but save your money you'll be thankful in a year or so.

This unit is the easiest floor processor I have ever used.

I use a Ibanez SR 800 bass with a Hartke 3500 head and a Peavey TXF 4x10. I also have a Peavey 115 BW cab. The sounds on this unit just plain suck. I bought this for some quick cheap effects. I really wish I had looked into this buy more. With the equipment I have you would think it would sound alright but not at all. One day I wanted to make a simple ditortion patch. Good luck this thing has no crunch at all it just fuzzes the fuck out of everthing. The only thing that might actually sound Ok is the flange on it. The thing is also really noisy Any thing you do to it doesn't quiet it down. There are many factory presets and they all suck ass. I couldnt get any of the sounds that I wanted out of it. I play music like Pantera, Deftones, Dream Theater, Sevendust, Tool, and Fear Factory. The only reason I have this is around is to use it as a tuner. That works fine.

Its plastic but no problems.

THIS JUST PLAIN SUCKS ASS. DON'T EVER BUY THIS UNIT!!!!!!

It is taking some getting used but I'm sure I'll get the hang of it. On the same hand I can't help but think it could have been at least somewhat easier to use ya know.

For practice, at lower volumes there is some hum on certain patches but when you start jammin it is a non-factor. I love the pedal wah, in my opinion it is better than a Cry Baby. The comp is good too, lends itself to the bass all the way down to the basement.

Like everyone else i have to say that it is plastic ya know, but outside from individual stomp boxes what effects units are made of iron anyway. Seems rigid if you dont abuse it. Having said that I do question the ex. pedal.might sound better than a Cry Baby but isn't quite built to the same specs if you know what I mean. I still carry mine in the box but thats me.

I've been playing for six years now. I'm playing a Fender P-bass Spec. through a Crate BX-100 however some time I'll play through the 708 straight in to the effects loop return. That more or less eliminates the amp all together and just give the unit a big speaker, this works well with the amp sim. I play my own type of thing but I use fingers picks and slap (whatever the song needs you know) it help all of these I like slapping through it though.
It would be replace right away if stolen or lost.
I always wanted a zoom 506 but never got around to it, now I'm so glad I didn't. This thing blows that away with the drum mach. the sampler and the built in ex. pedal. The only thing I miss from the 506 is the buttons being close together sometimes the 708 can be a bitte to get into bypass mode. I love being able to plug headphones in and play anywhere plus it sure beats lugging home a huge amp from school for weekend trips.

- manual included, but needs some more detail
- you can name your patches with ENGLISH (or other languages, too) names -- they are displayed on the 5 character LED display
- editing patches not too difficult, but not all settings fully explained -- for example, what does the flashing pedal light mean?
- Patch selection done with two foot switches. If you press both at the same time, it goes into bypass mode, which turns off all patches and engages the tuner. I have trouble hitting both at the same time (size 12 shoes) I step on both, but on actually press one of them. Will take some getting used to.
- includes a foot pedal that can be assiged as a volume pedal -- a very big plus over the cheaper Zoom box.
- drum machine volume on lowest setting still overwhelms the sound of my bass

- using this with Carvin PB200 15 and Peavey T-40
- in a quiet room, some of the patches are noisy, but I try them in a live setting, I cannot here the noise anymore.
- some of the phasing patches have some residual noise
- octaver sounds good down to G, but starts to cut out below that
- the JACOP patch doesn't sound just like you know who (what did you expect?), but sounds very good nonetheless with the bridge pickup on the T-40.
- quite a variety of present patches, but many not useful to me due to the types of music I play. Some more appropriate to industrial/ambient music.
- drum machine sounds in it are cheesy, but usable.

- the body is plastic, and some criticize it for this, but the unit is very rigid. You cannot jump up and down on it, but will take normal wear well

na

- My band plays praise music, but I like all types - funk, fusion, rock, etc. Playing for 3 yrs
- Good cheap, introduction to many different types of effects. This was cheaper than a single Boss pedal! I am really having fun with this and figuring out how to use this in my music.
- Considered getting a Boss-MB6(?) on e-bay, but was outbid!
- Some of the settings are a little noisy. I tried adjusting the noise gate on the Carvin amplifier, but couldn't find a good compromise -- might make this difficult to record with.

DO NOT PAY OVER $129 for this new!

It's very simple to use the unit , i think Zoom people have take many time thinking how to make the operation easy.
Edit a patch isn't so simple , you have to put Zoom's concept in your mind , first you have a "patch" , in there you have effect modules , inside the effects modules you have too many effects , finally three parameters for each effect. To edit or create a patch may result very complicated but any way its very instintive.
The manual dont cover all , you have to discover how to "assign" the expression pedal or how to use the jam play or sampler.
One thing bad in the console is that the parameters that can be controled in real time with the knobs are not always the most important parameters in the effect , same for the assign to the expression pedal. And that cant be edited.

Very good , but not great.
I have a pasive hyundai bass and create bass amp (but i have probed the unit whit better equipment and is all the same)
It has very good patches , for example the stereo sinth sound or the fuzz distortion , but there're patches that make you ask why did this guys build this thing with this inexpressive settings.
Another bad things is when you hear the patches using a guitar , some effects show much more color and clean sound. That makes me angry : i cant accept a guitar sound better than a bass in a unit build for a bass
Anyway the bass sound fine , the chorus is very good , the wha sound too. The comp/dist module have a great compression and fuzz.
The delay is OK but it has difficult acces to change parameters like feedback.
Not traditional effects like ring modulator , time or pitch control works better with guitar but i cant complaint , its sounds good anyway

The noise reduction WORKS

Its plastic , but hard one. I think it can resist foot operations. I think i would buy new one if i lost my unit.
Never used in a gig but it has strong red characters , i dont think some one cant read it.

I play many styles of music in bass , from Bach Celo suites to Magma kobaian music and the unit works perfect. I have been playing for 6 years and the unit has things that like very much to me.
The think i hate about the unit , AND THIS IS SOMETHING YOU HAVE TO READ IF YOU PLAN TO BUY ONE , is how the pedal control the expression of the effects. Let me explain it, for similar distances of step in the pedal you dont get similar variations in one effect , near the fully down poit of the pedal , your move cause huge variations in the effect, but near the fully raised point , movements in the pedal causes low perceptible changes. If you had not understood think in the delay parameter "time" controlled by the pedal : for 1 cm of pedal variation in raised point you change the parameter form 50 mlseg to 100 , but for the same distance of movement in the pedal , when this one is near fully down poit , the change in the parameter will be at 300 to 500 mlseg. Hope you understand me :)
I would like the unit had more freedom when you want to edit parameters with the knobs , i would like you can assign the parameter like to knob that i want.
Anyway i think i cant live with out the effect console.

The unit defaults to "power A1", a good patch and very clean. Editing patches are a little on the "you have to fool around with the unit and read the manual" side but when you have finally put your patch together, it's worht the labor.

I use a 72 jazz bass and an ampeg 50R for practice and small to medium gigs and a yorkville 400 with an SWR 4x8 for bigger venues.
The unit can be highly praised for being quiet and (though i haven't yet) may be used for recordings. there are a lot of effects but most admirable are the fretless, power settings which complement the jazz and R&B sounds, and the automatic wah for the "bootsy" effect.

I beleive this unit is dependable as long as you don't stomp on it. Sorry, but I always use a Backup. I use it as my primary effects unit now.

I have not had a chance to use customer support but do beleive that they would be OK.

I have been playing for more than 18 yrs now and play almost anything from standards to the blues and rock and roll ; mostly jazz and R&B. i also play in church. This unit fits fits itself into anything I play. I have owned almost every brand of bass there is but came back to the Fender Jazz. (for the new bass players, "you'll come back to the fender jazz") been there, done that !! I have researched a lot before I got the unit.

C'est tres facile a utiliser, le mode d'emploi entant efficace, on personnalise facilement les patches

Le son est tres bon, il donne du punch a mon ampli (marshall 8015 - 150w)
vraiment bon

jamais eu besoin !!

Je joue de la basse depuis un an, stle rock, rock alternatif, voire psychedelique, une peu de reggae..
ma basse "vantage 225b", peu connu, ce n'est pas du haut de gamme, mais le modele vieilli bien !

I would have to say it is fairly easy to use. I too had trouble finding out how to remove a module (press both module keys at the same time) but that is a minor gripe. The manual is ok.

I first used this with a crappy squier j-bass, but i recently updated to a musicman sterling. it kicked with the sterling. the amp sim is ok, but the 'warm' setting is shit and the 'edge' setting kills the distortion and wahs, and some other effects as well. the auto wah is absoloutly crap, I don't think i ever used it, the pedal wah is much better. the distortions are very weak. they sound sort of ok by themselves but get killed in a band, as they are very fuzzy and not growly enough unless you eq them every heavily and even then they suck. everything else was pretty good except the synth which was really soft and weird, sort of like a screwed up auto wah/yah sort of thing

o dear. this is where i had many problems. i know noone else has had problems, but mine has broken THREE times, yes three, and they were all differant pedals, as i got them replaced when they broke. the first time, the exp. pedal broke on the left hand side and came clean off that side, the second time the input jack broke and it was totally unusable, and the third time the exact same thing happened as the first time, except half and hour after i got it home from when it broke the second time. i swear this is all true. i have had it for about 3 months

they were very slow and crap, it took literally weeks the first time and then the shop keeper gave up and gave me a new pedal because it took so long

the pedal was ok but it was just too damn unreliable, so i am now selling it.

This thing isn't too complicated. A week or so is enough to master it. Editing patches is pretty easy, but because there's so many different effects it can get complicated. The manual is fairly straight forward, except for a few very annoying parts. It doesn't tell you have to turn off a module (I learned that from an above review) and more than once they put the wrong parameter knob #).
The only thing I wish this thing had was more room to make your own patches (to make one if you have to erase one of the existing factory patches).

I have a real simple setup because I only got my guitar a year ago and I'm saving up for a car so I don't have too much money. Anyway, I can't remember what amp I have (it's a Peavey with 65 watts if that helps anyone) and I have a GSR 200 from Ibanez. With this thing that's all I need.
This unit has every reasonable kind of effect I can think of: Compresoor/limiter, fuzz, flange, reverb, chorus, delay, 5-band equalizer, wah, auto-wah, ring modulator, etc., etc. The drum machine is fantastic for practice and the sampler is interesting. The jam thing is pretty useless with just 2 seconds.
As soon as I first plugged this thing in I was amazed at the sound quality. I've been running effects from my brother's guitar amp and this was a welcome change. I'm not an expert in effects, but as far as I can tell it sounds great.
I have had trouble perfectly imitating my favorite artists. But for some this works very well. For example, I can finally play Rage Against the Machine and Red Hot Chili Peppers.
Almost all of the effects sound good, some better than others. The fuzz, delay, chorus, and ring are outstanding. The wah is better than any of those effect systems for the same price. The synthesizer is cool. I don't like the fretless or the violin effects at all.

It's plastic so I don't expect much. I'm careful with it. I've never really had it give me any problems but I've only had it for 2 months.

?

I play lots of different stuff.(I'm in 3 bands) In one I play a kind of death metal alternative hybrid (kinda like the deftones) as well as some softer stuff. In the others I play grunge/ alternative, Metallica, and classic rock (Beatles, Doors, Zeppelin,Clapton). This unit adds to each of those styles.
If it were stolen I would not have enough money to replace it, but if I did I'd probably replace it.
The reason I got this is to save money, and I succeded. I originally was going to buy a distortion pedal: 40$. Then I realized I needed a compressor: $30. Plus a wah: 65$. You get the point. The effects on this thing sound great and if you bought all the effects separately (even if it was just the good ones) it would probably be almost twice as expensive.
End note: If you are just starting out, or even if you've been playing for awhile, this unit is great for either gigging or practicing or both.