Zoom GFX-1

Update to 2007 review

The more I use this thing the easier it is to program. I have learned to program the functions I use on this pedal. I have come with with some really good sounding patches. It is worth the time to tweak this thing, you can get some really good sounds if you have patience. Goes from just Ok out of the box to excllent.

Like I said in my previous review, The models sound good (Love the Fender clean and Marshall, Peavy is not bad either) and most of the FX sound good. Still not happy with the reverb. I use the delay on 2 and it works fine for me. Just don't expect to get an echoplex sound from it. I have stared messing around playing some Nu Metal and the pitch shift works good. Like 3 and 7 best. Sounds good in C or D tuning (think Korn) Still not using the ring mod (useless). One thing I found that is interesting is I was experimenting and used a universal mutli voltage power adaptor and found I can get a nice brown sound (Think Van Halen) by dropping the votlage. It did not harm the pedal and I did not electrocute myself with a EVIAC. I was able to drop down to like 5.5 volts before the pedal would not work. Got the idea because I liked the way the unit sounded when the batteries got low from use. I also aquired a vintage Virbochamp tube amp and this pedal sounds fantastic thru it. The OD sounds OK thru my soild state but rocks when I use the tube amp. The Key for me to getting a good sound from this is pedal was learing how to use the EQ and level settings. Read the manual because the EQ is kind of funky and using the cab sims.

I have several other pedals and use this one most along with my Boss CS-3 and Boss MD-2. For all this pedal is worth the money for the sounds you can get. Gave it 9 because the Reverb sucks but the Chrous sounds great ! (use Stereo)

2 years and still going strong. am now looking for a 2nd one just to keep as a backup, though I am doubtful I will need it. This ***** is as sturdy as a tank. Gets used almost every day. Good for marital Harmony ! The wife does not like to listen to the 130 Fender ! LOL
Use it with a Stereo head phone adapter from Radio Shaft. Sounds great and good for quiet solo practice.

No issues so have not had to call support.

I would buy another one in a NY minute if this one was ever lost or stolen. I love this pedal and it it easy to use/hookup.

Nice sounds right out of the box, easy to edit the basic functions, LOTS of other perameters alter the final sounds, can take a lot of twaeking to get it perfect, even better than it first seems. Really decent manual

frankenstrat and Peavey Classic, nice and quiet, noise gate adjustable, capable of just about anything BUT it needs a bit of time and the manual to get the best out of it. 7 out of the box, 9 when tweaked

very well made, dont jump on it and it will last. compact size and battery option make it gret for putting in the front flap of your gigbag.

Never contacted Zoom UK with this, previous experience with a Zoom 9002 was exemplary.

I play 70`s classic rock (clapton, zeppelin, lizzy) and modern blues. Ive been playing 35 years, this is a bit of an enigma, i bought mine as a stop gap between two expensive processors but ive still got it, everytime i tweak it i find something else and it just gets better. great into a valve amp. unless you are talking expensive analogue units this is difficult to beat.

Really small four button unit, metal construction, looks like a toy but........
Sounds ok out of the box, takes a long time to tweak and re-tweak, ive had mine about six months, into the clean channel of a valve amp side by side against some of the best analogue effects on the market this is brilliant. wont be able to emulate the sound of the top twenty best amps in the world BUT you can get half a dozen world class sounds out of it. I paid the sterling equivelent of $35 for mine. fits in the front pocket of a gig bag, will run off four AA batteries for 24 hours. I love it. rated 7 because its not easy to get the best from it.

Out of the box its a seven, its MUCH better into a valve amp than a transistor. after MUCH tweaking i can get perfect jangly chorus clean, nice spanky full fender type clean, nice smooth or gritty blues, malcolm young to a tee and a close to lukather type lead sound. it will do a decent rectifier type metal sound too. all the effects are quality HOWEVER tweaking the EQ on each patch requires the patience of a saint. Its worth it though. seven out of the box, nine with all the tweaking.

If youre 200lbs+ and stand on the switches they WILL break, if you press them like your car accelerator they wont. if you look after it is nicely built and reliable.

Havent had to contact zoom UK on this BUT i bought a used zoom 9002 and needed a new cover for it and they were spot on.

I play blues (travellin` riverside all the way to Gary Moore) and all the classic rock from clapton to lizzy to zeppelin to satriani. been playing 35 years, this is very, very good BUT it needs some patience to get the best out of it. I would rather have this and a laney vc30 or peavey classic 30 than ANY current modelling amp. I`m looking for another to have another play with the factory presets. Very compact and versatile. makes individual analogue boxes seem VERY expensive and limited. If i were Zoom i would revisit the format and update the amp modelling, its perfect at what it does for very little money.

Just got this cheap on an auktion and can just say WOW!
The 40 patches it comes with is very useable for all kinds of styles.
After trying out the patches for an hour I started to do some of my
own settings and then it hit me!! This little pedal is awsome and SO easy
to use. I play mostly blues/rock and for that kind of style this little baby just ROCK!
the manual was very easy to use as well. A retarded blind chimp can read it and
understand it.

I have tried several diffrent sounds and cant say any negative things about it. The chorus wwith the clean sound is quite warm. Since I don??t use flanger/phaser that much I cant say anything about it.
I use it with Xaviere XV-700 and out through a LINE6 Spider II 30w with some reverb
on the clean channel. Bass on 6 , midlle on 4 and treable on 6.

The metall the pedal is made of seems like it can take some pounding.

I have use several diffrent multieffects and stompboxes. (Korg, Ibanez and BOSS)
and I can honestly say that this little honey can do magic if youre looking for a easy-of-use and rugged pedal to use both live and in the studio.
Since it??s a few years old, you can get it real cheap.

This Pedal Is very easy to use and program. (I have the red one). The foot switches give instant access to 4 patches. I fooled with this pedal when I first got it for a couple of days to get the feel of it and then started tweaking away. Once I read the manual it was pretty easy to program. My only gripe is the lack of flexablity with some of the settings like rate and depth for chrous which is why I own a couple of other pedals in addition to this one.

I Like the idea also that I can play with just headphones and no amp which keeps my wife and 10 year old daughter happy. LOL

I own a Fender Ulimate Chrous 2-12 (120 Watts) and a Gorilla TC-35 pactice amp I use to play an Epi Les Paul Special II with a Duncan 59 at the neck and Duncan JB at the bridge through them. I also own a Morely power wah and a Boss BF-2 flanger as well as a Danelctro fab echo. I like the amp modeling on this pedal a lot. The Fender clean sounds very comparable to the clean channel on my Fender amp. Having also played through a lot of Peavy amps I like the Peavy modeling on this as well (great for 80's metal). To me it sounds like the Peavy 5150. The Marshall Amp modeling also sounds very good, though it is more a solid state sound than a tube sound. The Metal MT-2 Kicks Butt ! One thing I have found is try messing with the speaker cabs (Stack, Combo, Bright Combo) on the ZNR makes a big difference ! I like the distortion also on the GFX1 but don't care for the overdrive (sounds OK) or the fuzz (sucks). The acoustic sim sounds pretty good ! Ok now for the effects. I like the flanger even though there is a lack of settings and you can not get some sounds (Why I have the Boss BF-2). Try using F1 (Preset) with delay set on about 2 for playing Zep's Nobodys Fault But Mine. The Chrous Sounds really good and I can get it to sound very close to either of the built in chrous on my Fender amp (I use it when I play through the Gorilla).
I thought it sounded just O.K. until I listened to it in Stero with headphones. The reverb is complete garbage (There is nothing like Fender reverb). I use my Fender Reverb or use the delay set on 2 to achieve the sound I want. The Echo is OK as well as the Tremelo. The Doubling is also nice and the delay is not bad for a mutli pedal. I susually leave it set on 2. I do not really use the pitch shift, slow attack (though fun to play with) or ring mod. The Cry is fun and have been able to get the Dunlap sound for Bon jovi's Living on a prayer with it. The wah sound alirght, pretty good for funk ! I use my Morely most of the time instead.

My only big complaint is that no matter what I do I can not get this pedal to work with my ultimate Chrous ! I sounds like crap through either channel or either input or either effcts loop (stereo/mono)
(and yes I turned off the DSP). I think it may just be something with the amp itself (incompatibilty) as I have used the pedal on other Fender amps as well as Peav, Marshall, Vox and my Goriila and it sounds fine. If anyone has a found a cure. Please email me.

Built Like a Tank ! I have dropped mine several time and even kicked once on accident still works ! I know I will have this pedal for a long time. Metal Case is great !

Bought used, Was able to download manual on line ! :) Thanks Zoom !

Great for what I paid for it ! Wish some of the effects were a little better (Like Reverb)and greater effect control. Still better than sepnding a left arm on stomp boxes and easier to tote. Good work Zoom ! I am going to check out some their newer pedals. I would bu this again or another Zoom product if this one were lost/stolen.

This Pedal is very easy in use! When you first learn how to controll the patches and insert your own configurations, The fun can begin! All the effects can be Greatly adjusted. There is also a contour option on this board, which is quite cool.

When you learn the basics, You figure out the rest very quickly!

I play this board through a VOX AD30VT with a Epiphone Les Paul 100.
The first time i ever played with this pedal, I liked its RAW and Crushing Distortion which is great for soloing.

When i first fired up this Board with the "distortion" amp moddeling and some reverb (wich is quite basic for this pedal) I thought it was frigging awesome.

But As i got too learn the pedal better, I found out that: This pedal has a total lack of feel! You will not get close to any Tube Sound!

The reverb is really bad, And fades way too quick! All of the distortion amp moddelings are too stiff and it is hard to make them sound fine!

The eq is simply stupid, So you might want to buy a extra eq pedal or simply turn the inbound eq off.

Now this board is fit for some soloing, But ultimate riffing. But For its price, You get much cool stuff too. The Clean sound is awesome, and the aucostic simulation is ok. Loads and Loads of clean effects and many different pitch effects.

In all: This board will make a $100 guitar sound like a $250 guitar, Though it will make a $900 guitar sound the same! This Pedal is not fit for me as im getting better at guitar. When i first got it, i would give it a 10 without a doubt. But it aint fit for my style, but it rocks for clean!

I lost it down the stears once, worked just as good afterwards.
I would not use this on a gig since it doesnt warn you if the nbattery is low. It beggins acting weird and showing all theese weird numbers counting down. After this, it wont respond. It also locks up sometimes making it impossible to switch patches, banks and effects.


But theese problems doesnt occur often. For a small Clean gig, its up!

No big problems!

I play Metallica, Carcass, Acdc and Thin lizzy. This will get you some early Metallica, No carcass but much ACDC and Thin Lizzy.

I have been playing for about a year on electric guitar and a year on aucostic.

This Pedal has a good amount of moddelings and VERY big ammount of effects. But its lack of good distortion for riffs makes a bad for Metallica. Though its crunch, tweed and clean sounds is good!

its respectable ammount of programmable patches and effects as well as other values makes this a good pedal for the starters, But it is too little in the end!

This is my second review now that I have a year under my belt with this unit. Editing patches has become second nature, and the ability to adjust levels on the fly for the situation are priceless. The manual makes more sense if you take the block diagram into consideration and become intimate with what each of the effects, especially the amp modeling, actually does to your sound. My unit is one of the red ones, FYI. The more I use this unit the more I couldn't play without it. You can't get an easier to use or easier to configure device, in my opinion.

I hear and read some of the complaints and I'm not sure what the picky aspects are. I play a customized Strat using a combination of Seymour Duncan Hot Rails and Lace Sensor Holy Grail pickups running through a 120w tube Peavey Duel 212 amp. While the hot channel in the amp might produce the cool edge that only tube can produce, I spend 99% in the clean channel using the GFX-1 because of the variety in sounds. From Billy Idol to Judas Priest the edge is there especially if you tweak the amp modeling and EQ settings to get sounds that make you sound like you're switching guitars between songs!

The only sound quality that ISN'T present in the unit is an effective echoic delay. Since we were covering some 80's songs like Flock of Seagulls' "I Ran", there was a need so the only other pedal I use with the GFX is a DOD Delay.

I would disagree with the claims below that there is a tonal/EQ issue with this unit. I let another guitarist try it out and it became readily apparent that it was his axe that sounded like crap tonally, not the unit. This box responds well to a wide range of pickups and exemplifies the ability of better quality ones. With my Hot Rails pickup in the bridge position I can get some ear shredding sustain and high multiple overtones with the unit and the tube amp. If you've never tried this with a tube amp, you're missing out. I tried with my second amp, a Crate GFx-120 half stack and it doesn't make FET's sound anything more like a tube than their P-N junctions will allow.

Playing 80's-90's Alternative Pop Rock takes a plethora of sounds from strident Fixx sounds to metal. This unit allows me to program a full bank of 4 patches for each genre needed. Everything from "You've Got Another Thing Coming" to Issac's "Wicked Game" to "Message In A Bottle" can all be dialed in (thanks again BigJan!) right on the money.

Dependable? No doubt. I've had mine for over a year now and use only the AA batteries (red case unit) and they typically last about 30 hours of playing time.(that's using Duracells). The ONLY problem I've ever had was getting too active and toed one of the smaller programming buttons by mistake. The button got physically stuck down by the rubber being misaligned, fixed it and never another problem.

While no opinion, it was easy to d/l an owner's manual PDF from work so that I could work on some of the functions memorization, directly from their website.

I've played bass for 40 years and dinked with guitar on the side. 3 years ago I switched full time to guitar playing 80's to current Alternative/Indie/Ska Music. This unit allows me to minimize the floor clutter and to cover all of the multitude of guitar sounds, drastically different from each other, that I need to cover. Prior to this unit I tried to suffice with the 3 channel DSP in my Crate GFX-120 head, and it was like a huge load and handcuffs removed to use this unit. Asked if I would replace it, I already have. When the price dropped to $69 I picked up a second one and put it away should this one fail. I keep all of my patches logged into an Excel spreadsheet for easy recall should I need to enlist the second unit into action. Back up is a Red unit as well, lucky me.

I wasn't too keen on being effect dependent and toyed with several other options, none as easy and as convenient as the GFX-1. There isn't a style this thing can't duplicate with the only exception of a solid repeating echoic effect.

I got this after i have been using the ZOOM 505II for quite some time.
You will get used to the tweaking very quickly once you run thru the manual for about half an hour or so.

This baby has all the same sounds as the Zoom 505II. The only difference is it has more foot knobs or whatever you call it so you can access your patches very quickly. Definately meant for stage use. But one thing really gives me that slight disatisfaction...I find that the overall output and sound color and feel from this baby seems to be a bit lesser than my ZOOM 505II. Im not sure why..it's just that feeling you know...?

Very Reliable. Built like a Tank. Your 4 AA batteries could last more than 2 weeks on regular usage.

I've sent them an e mail once. They replied after 1 day or so. Pretty ok dudes I guess. I havent ask them some serious questions yet so we'll see

Value for money. You have all your basic needs to play for gigs, practice and stuff. Only set back is you can't really tweak into the micro details. And the Chorus sucks. But hey. for a very affordable price, you get what ypu pay for.

Generally easy to use. But editing the effect parameters is somewhat irritating. You have to push the "value" buttons back and forth many times to apply a change. You cannot use reverb and delay simultaneously. And you cannot set the delay time more than 37 miliseconds. That's a huge defect. And you cannot edit the feedback reverb or delay feedback levels either. You cannot edit many of the parameters as you like, there are just presets.

Sound quality is really good. Of course, it's not like an analog setup but i'm pretty sure the sound of gfx-1 would make happy many guitar player. it doesn't suck your guitar's characteristics too much. Overdrives and acoustic simulator are somewhat "not bad". I use fender strat and peavey amp. I can say i'm satisfied with the sound quality. Effect quality is ok.

Looks quite dependable. It has a metal foundation.

I play many kinds of music, from thrash to soft stuff. When playing hard material, then this pedal will work. But if you want to play progressive rock for example, then you will feel gfx-1 is inadequate for you. It's somewhat uneditable, and i hate that. But if i would compare this with a rp80 or rp100, these two cannot even get close to the gfx-1. but i wish it was more subtle. But considering the price, gfx-1 is one of the best pedals of its range, maybe the best one.

Easy to use. Easy to edit. The manual explains basic operation and effect type but the manual does not give any real depth on how to set up effects. This model does what it is designed to do... provide a modest range of effects at a entry level price.

I bought this for jamming after hours at work, practice at home and recording into a laptop with Cakewalk Sonar and M-Audio equipment. There are several decent sounds IMHO. Does it sound like a real amp in a live room? No. Does it sound good mixed with drums and keyboards? Not bad. Does it sound good in a pick up jam after work? Works for me. Excellent tone for me is Larry Carlton, Phil Keaggy and Duane Allman. I play a Washburn HB 35 or a Fender Strat through a 1963 or my 1964 Fender Champs. I can get close to those sounds with the GFX-1 in a recording mix. Can a musician with a critical ear tell the difference? Yep, without a doubt. Can the average listener while driving down the road listening to a recorded mix burned on a CD? Usually not.

The unit comes in two colors, red or purple. I have not A/B'd the two but I imagine some fidelity fanatics can tell the difference between the red GFX-1 and the purple GFX-1. I've been told that the red one has a more metallic edge to the distortions. I have not A/B'd this with batteries vs. a power supply either. I've been told by some that half used AA batteries sound best in the red GFX-1 while the purple GFX-1 gets a better tone with a wall wart power supply. Thank God I'm tone deaf enough to not have to worry about these critical aspects of my guitar sound. I can play guitar through the GFX-1 and have fun doing it.

This unit has some noise but the ZNR is adequate. There is some uneven volume changes at the tail end of sustained notes but generally it is not noticeable during normal playing. The GFX-1 does process the basic guitar tone. To get your guitar to sound like your guitar when running the GFX-1 takes some tweaking and in the end it still will not completely sound like your guitar when run through a good amp in a nice room without the GFX-1 in the signal path. So the GFX-1 does "color" your tone. This does not mean that you can't get a good tone, even a tone close to your guitar straight into a good amp. My experience with the GFX-1 is that there is some compromise. Perhaps the tone is a little "boomy" on the low end or a little "tinny" on the high end. The dynamics are not quite there either. But, I can get a good clean tone and then set up another patch for a crunchier sound. Exactly the same as my guitar straight into a good amp? No, but close enough.

I use a standard volume pedal (250K ohm audio taper potentiometer) wired into the "control" jack. I can not comment on how effective the Zoom model expression pedal is with the GFX-1. With my set up I can control the parameters assigned to the pedal but the range of sensitivity is very narrow. It would be nice if you could program or calibrate the pedal to the GFX-1 but you can't. The wah is weak and the narrow range I experience causes most pedal assigned parameters to be almost "all or nothing". My bigest gripe with the pedal is that it appears to control the volume after the delay. SO you can not get the nice volume sweels using the tails of the delay. My remedy is to use another volume pedal in front of the GFX-1. I do like the ability to control the amount of amplifier gain with the pedal. So I generally use it for that purpose only.

At this price point you get a fair amount of effects but limited "tweakability". For example, you can have a chorus effect. Your options are some chorus all the way to a lot of chorus. You do not get to tweak the chorus tone, or feedback or regeneration or mix level... just chorus, more chorus and a lot of chorus. Same for most of the other effects. This is not necessarily a bad thing. It is easy to use and somewhere between a little and a lot most people will find something they can use.

For my needs and playing situations it is fine. This unit is in a metal housing with metal 1/4 inch jacks bolted to the chassis. Nice. At this price most competitor's units are in some type of plastic case.

Never used Owned for 1 month.

I "grew up" in the 1970's. I live in Georgia so my playing is clearly influenced by the "capricorn sound" produced by the late Phil Walden. Allman Brothers lead me to the roots of blues, jazz and country. Dixie Dregs kicked it up a notch and exposed me to Mahavishnu, Di Meola and others. My taste runs to any style and instrument if the artist can write a song that conveys feeling, melody and musicianship. (Musicianship includes knowing when NOT to play)

I have owned or still own a J station, a Pod, a Korg AX1500 and a Tech 21 GT2. All of these units have good qualities and different price ranges. Each one does something better than the others.

The GFX-1 is not perfect but there are good sounds for the price and metal construction too.

The one thing I wish the GFX-1 had, and I would pay about $30.00 more for, is a MIDI or USB port so the effects could be tweaked in more depth using a software interface. This is not technically impossible and could be done and the unit would still be in the low cost tier.

The GFX-1 is a sturdy low cost multi-effects unit that is capable of getting good sound. It has limitations but if understood the unit can be used effectively either live or in a studio.

Intuitive interface to modify/program your own patches. Manual easy to understand.

Using with a Peavey XXL amp and usually a Fender Cyclone axe. Noise gate can be set to make unit quite even when amp is in very high gain mode. The only effects I find useful are chorus, flanger, echo/delay. I use the amps reverb and distortion and run this through the effects loop. The headphone jack keeps my wife happy when practicing riffs at home; you don't even need the amp to use this feature.

Built like a tank. If you break this thing, nothing would withstand your abuse. I use this with a power supply I got at Walmart for about $10 and take batteries with me in case it would fail or some knothead rips out the wire.

Chinese made so I imagine you can forgoet about support, but it's only 100 bucks, so if it would quit (which I doubt), get another.

I have been playing country, rock, and blues for 30+ years. This effects box does okay considering the cost. It's not going to be all things for all people, but most will be able to get some sounds to their liking at a reasonable price. I like being able to have 4 sounds set up and ready to instantly use with the push of any of the 4 buttons. The tuner has also proved useful. Capable of 40 presets which you can adjust as you wish. With that many, you can set up groups of patches for each style of music or guitar you may be playing.

I just got this unit online - I'm a bit different from my colleagues who have written reviews in that my bag is country. For a number of years I have used a Korg Toneworks unit through a Peavey Nashville 400 - through our board. Lately I've found that the newer country needs a bit more edge and I needed something that could be controlled with footswitches. I set it up the other night, wondering if I would be able to get the patches I wanted set up before our next gig Friday. I was impressed with how easy it is to modify and store custom patches. In a matter of about 2 hours I had programmed 6 patches that will cover most of my needs - including one killer acoustic guitar sound.

Before purchasing this unit I had bought a Behringer tube distortion unit, thinkin I could combine it with the Korg unit and cover my bases. I used it once - but it set up a horrible noise level that I couldn't seem to squelch. By contrast the GFX1 is very quiet. I agree with some of the other reviewers that some of the preset patches are pretty cheesy - especially the "metal" distortion ones - but I don't use them anyway, and I agree with the person who said that this is typically the case with any effects unit - you only need a few of them. As I noted above I run through a Nashville 400 - with a - you guessed it - American Standard Tele. I reprogrammed A1 to the sort of clean/edgy sound often used in neo-classic country (think Alan Jackson's Chattahoochie or Dwight Yoakam's Guitars, Cadillacs). A2 is set up to give me a full-bodied acoustic sound (saves me carrying an extra guitar!), A3 is a fairly clean distortion that works for a lot of the new country (think Toby Keith). I do agree with those who said it is difficult to get the "tube" sound in here. A4 is a great thick chorus sound that I used for things like Brooks & Dunn Neon Moon. B1 I set up with a reverb/echo sound that works well with Johnny Cash type stuff (think Folsom Prison Blues). I set up one other one, but I forgot what I did with it. I agree with those who singled out the EQ setting for criticism - It mystified me - as I flipped through the different settings I heard little difference. That could stand serious improvement. For example - on the acoustic patch there is a low end rumble that the EQ did nothing to correct. I may take the advice of the reviewer who puts a Behringer EQ unit in the line.

It's too new to me to really comment on it - but it does seem to be built solidly.

Haven't used it.

I think I got a pretty decent deal on this. I bought it on eBay for $99 with free shipping and an AC adapter thrown in! I've been playing for 40 years - I've played most kinds of music at one time or another and have owned pretty much every guitar and amp that has come along. I always come back to the Tele though. Folks - when I started playing if you wanted distortion you poked some holes in your speaker cone (unless you had lots of money to buy a Marshall). Amplifiers had reverb and tremolo on them - something I wish they'd bring back! I'm damned if I can find an effects unit that has a decent tremolo effect on it. If you wanted echo, you had to find some whiz kid that could wire two tape decks together and run them out of phase. As for the other questions - perhaps I'll come back and weigh in after this weekend - we've got three gigs so it'll get a good workout.

Very easy to use, except for the EQ module, which is almost impossible to operate. The EQ offers 50 different presets to browse through. Better just leave it off.
Editing, storing and deleting patches is not intuitive, but very easy once you have a look at the manual.

I have used tis with a Fender Strat and strat-type guitars, and an Epiphone Dot Studio. I mostly use a Fender Twin Reverb, but I have also used it on Marshall and Peavey amps.
My playing sound is somewhere in the classic rock landscape, mostly rythm work.
The unit steals a bit too much sound when bypassed.
The drive souds are not very good. Might be good for metal (gets extremely distorted), but you can't get a dynamic and crisp drive from it.
The fx modules are all set up in presets (you have 4-6 different presets to choose from within each module). So tweaking possibilities are close to none.
Basically, the fx sound ok, especially considering the affordability of the unit. But if you are looking for great sound, you will be disappointed. It might be a cool gizmo to have if you want to fool around with it, but with the limited tweaking possibilities, and no on-the-fly editing features, you'll get tired of it pretty quickly.

It's a sturdy piece of gear, and it can certainly take a good bashing. Definately built to last. It runs at a surprisingly long time on batteries. Have had it for almost a year now, even used it on a couple of gigs, and never had the slightest problem.
EXCEPT: The featured tuner is not at all reliable. When I've tuned with the Zoom, I can plug into the Korg DTR 1000, and every string is slightly high.

N/A

In my regular band I play rythm guitar with a slightly distorted sound. I also have a lot of side projects, and play everything from heavy rock to qute pop music. My most used setup is the Dot through a Marshall Bluesbreaker II and a Boss chorus, into the Twin. It would be nice to have some delay and wah along with some other fx I could play with, but the Zoom is not very useable at those fx. Because of the sound it steals, I have left it out of the loop for good.
Have been playing guitar for 16 years.
If it was stolen or lost, I probably wouldn't care too much since I don't use it anymore. But then again, I don't think I would get any other multi-effect. I normally don't use too many effects, and I much prefer the feel and possibillities of stomp-boxes.
Limited as it is, the Zoom is ok for fooling around and experimenting a bit with. And at that price, I guess you do get what you pay for.
If it had true bypass I would probably keep it in my setup for rehearsals and jam sessions.

Well I have to concur with some of the other reviewers here. You don't need a manual nor do you need a degree in physics to figure this beast out. Simple interface makes for intuitive programming. It just does not get any easier than this device even if you want to hook up a controller.

Excellent sound quality...and I mean when compared to units such as the V-AMP Pro and POD units. This little box holds it own from a sound perspective. The programming of patches is somewhat limited, which is likley why this unit is so inexpensive, but if you get past wanting to tweak eveything to death, you will be pleased with what you hear. All of my guitars are custoimized with Duncan pickups but gig with a '76 Strat, A Wormoth custom built Strat and a Jackson Soloist guitar. I go from my Cry Baby into an MXR phase 90 in to the GFX-1 and out to BBE Sonic Stomp. My amps range from a Crate Power Block(what a wicked package that is) to a Fender Bassman and a Peavey classic 50/50 power amp. My cabinets vary from single 12's to a couple of 4X12 Fender cabinets.

Built like a tank. If I wait for this unit to fail before I upgrade it, I think I'll be waiting for a very very long time. I would definitely gig without a backup unit but in fact this unit is my backup unit. I have had my entire (rather expensive) rack system go down on me at a gig once. I plugged this unit directly into my poweramp and no one was the wiser of my misfortune. By the way the bateries make it ultra convenient to use as a back up, just make sure that you have spare batteries or an appropriate power supply;-) Any Boss 9V powersupply will work, way cheaper than running next door to the convenience store to buy 4 AA batteris for $7.00. Good that it has a power switch as well to help save those batteries.

I did send off a couple of emails to them and never did get a response. Not impressed.

Great sound but a little restrictive in terms of EQ programming, delay programming and the fact that you can not get delays and reverbs at the same time but in terms of bang for the buck, this unit is great. Going to a quick jam some friends, throw this into your case and off you go. Great back up at a gig for you basic sounds. Great form factor as well with instant access to 4 different sounds without having to scroll up an down. I am looking forward to auditioning the G7.1ut box but the GFX-1 will be a hard act to follow. I'm giving it an overall rating of 8 mainly because of the limited programming capabilites.

1.)sorry for my english(i'm italian)
2.)I'd say it's quite easy to use.If you've used zoom before it shouldn't be a problem.Just got to get used to the thing. Manual is ok.Presets suck!

It has got all the effects you need to play even serious stuff.BUT YOU HAVE TO USE IT WITH AN EQ!Put something like a boss pedal-eq (i use a behringer eq700... 19Euro, does the job)after the gfx1 and you will get good sound for an unbeatable price!But use it without eq and it will sound really digital and not nice at all!
I've been playing for about10years,used single coils,humbuckers,cheap guitars,expensive pro guitars,15W combos,big stuff from marshall,fender,laney,mesa and a lot more I can't remember. I've always tried to spend less money possible but have highest quality for the money I paid!You can have nice,clean,warm (even nearly-studio-quality) sounds with cheap gear and you can sound like shit with gear worth 2 cars!It depends on you, on what you want and how many time you invest in doing researches in terms of sound quality.
This is a nice multieffects-pedal but incomplete if not used with aditional stuff!But great value for the price!!

You can depend on it.It's build VERY well.Metal is always better than plastic!!I've used it life/in studio/in my "little" home-studio/on the road/and so on. As I'm traveling a lot and NEVER travel without a guitar one of my concerns while I was trying to get myself a multieff.pedal was (beside the price) that it had to deal with the "i'll take that thing with me anywhere-factor". And it did well. I bought less than a year ago and it's still doing a good job!I'm actually using it (with lots of other gear)for recording sessions. If you search you will find stuff that costs less and has the same effects BUT I HAVEN'T FOUND ANOTHER ONE(from another brand)that is built better than this one!
But as I always say: Treat your gear good and it will sound/work good for quite a while!
And if you have the possibility make sure to have ALWAYS backup gear.

DOn't know.Everything's still working...Never dealt with the company

So this is the overall rating.Well,I play 80%metal, 10%Rock and 10%whatever comes to my mind.I mean give me any guitar, tell me what to play and if it's not solos from Vai or Satriani I'll play it(or at least i'll try).Yes ,it's a good match for my style! I like this little 4-pedal thing 'cause it's small,works long enough in battery mode,has a nice sound(used together with an eq as I've explained before),it's very resistent,has a stereo output(you can use it with headphones/cool for me as I travel a lot)or use it with a stereo jack going directly into a mixer,a stereo eq or 2 amps,it's quite cheap,you can buy an aditional expression pedal and so on... I like this thing! Hope my review is usefull for some of you as some of your reviews where very usefull 4 me!!!

It doesn't get much easier than this. Although punching through dozens of presets, especially on the eq can be a pain, it is still very easy. The manual is small for a reason. You almost don't need it to get going. The only thing I would recommend for the manual is to outline the individual settings for the presets so you could see what combinations were being used without physically going through the patches.

American Strat through a Hot Rod Deluxe. I'm sure a tube amp will enhance any set up but I can get any sound I need in live situations while covering everything from Rock, Blues, Southern Rock and Country. You can really hear the compression and noise limiter kick in without any negative effect on the sound. The delay time is not the longest but fine for most situations, same with the chorus. I will likely get a separate wah pedal. Check out the suggested settings from "bigjan", they were great, thanks!

Kicked around this metal chassis with no problem. Runs great on batteries which is very convenient. Never had any problems with other Zoom products I've owned.

This is a great unit for live sitiutions and especially for someone who does not want to carry a pile of pedals. I've been playing for 20 years and have owned other pedals and effects but given the total package (price, number of effects, portability) this is by far the best deal around. The 4 pedals are worth the price alone. This unit will likely make all other "2 pedal" options obsolete. Separate on/off switch will save batteries. For the money, its hard to complain about not having more control over delay and eq settings. If it were lost or stolen I would pick one up on the way to my next gig and have it set to go before soundcheck.

If you are a tone junkie like me, do not buy this thing. First of all, let me explain what kind of a tone junkie I am. I like classic vintage tones, mainly from tube amplification. Think Angus Young, Alex Lifeson, Glen Tipton and KK Downing (70's era Judas Priest), David Gilmour, Tony Iommi, Duane Allman, etc.

Editing patches is really easy, in fact, one of the few positive things I can say about this unit is it is really easy to use. You don't have to be a guitar tech or sound engineer to figure it out. The manual is fairly straight forward. Editing patches is quite simple.

If you like that wide open tube tone, the GFX-1 will compress it. There is a compression setting built into the unit, but by default this thing completely eliminates that godly tube tone, even on it's lowest compression setting.

Trying to get any vintage tones, a la Classic Rock disortion is futile. I've played this thing through several tube amps and I get better tone playing straight through rather than hooking up to this thing.

There are few good things about this unit. If you like Metal, this thing has some killer Death Metal crunch. I was quite surprised by how tight and focused the Metal patch is. Also, I was able to customize a clean channel with a dash of delay and chorus that sounds pretty good too, but again, it's compressed and not open sounding how I prefer.

It's built like a brick, nice thick metal body, should last a while. The footswitches are not that great though. Unlike a stomp box, there is a millisecond or two delay after depressing the footswitch which sucks when you want to change tones on the fly. If you don't do it just right, like in the middle of the song, it sounds lame. Stomp boxes are the way to go.

N/A

I got this thing as a gift and I've played around with it for a few months. It's just not my cup of tea. It's got good Death Metal distortion, but that's it. Everything else sounds flat and boring. Oh well.

if you want a good sound, it's not hard to get a good sound. there are effects that are useless because of poor quality, but that exists for every pedal model and varies from musician to musician. you spend $1000 on a pedal and you will find flaws, so there's no big deal. the important thing is you get 4-5 excellent quality sounds from this thing, because essentially there's only 4 pedals. trust me, you will find more than 4 quality sounds out of this multi effects processor. there's 40 different types and each are distinct. ther may be a few you won't use, but you can fool around with it.

editing patches are quite tricky for a beginner. behringer is a good example for beginners and i used to have a heavy metal distortion pedal. okay, it's not bad, but i refunded it 20 days later and bought this instead. not surprisingly, this gave better effects and more effects. editing shouldn't be a problem if you read the manual, just like a video game. read instructions before you complain. chances are everything you ask will be written in the manual. if not, ask someone, but don't cry about it. this isn't rocket science, just a guitar pedal.

i was a bassist at first, and i plug my esp ltd ec-50 into a yorkville xm100c. say what you want about not getting a variety of sounds through a bass amp, but it's not like you'll use every single effect. however, after hooking this gfx1 to the bass amp, wow, i was amazed. all these different sweet sounds from good distortion to glass clear cleans. makes me consider why i even bought an acoustic when my electric produced such sweet cleans through a bass amp. if you're using a guitar combo, there shouldn't be any problem whatsoever. you'll get more effects than me, but it's not a huge difference. i have a 100 watt amp and didn't want to waste money on a cheap guitar 30 watt combo, so i used this money to buy an effects processor and i'm glad i did.

noisy? i don't think zoom manufactures know what 'noisy' is in english, because there is no noise at all! when it comes to distortion, there may be a bit of hum, but come on, it's $135! again, there will be flaws, but for $135, nothing comes close. besides, the hum isn't irritating yet anyway, so don't worry about that. if you're asking about cleans, then it's fine too. i thought i turned off my amp when the gfx1 was on clean. it was so quiet. it seems like a noise gate is included, but i may be wrong. it's quiet.

again, each pedal has flaws and you won't use every single effect because there's so many. there are effects that are as good as 10/10 and as bad as 1/10, but for the bulk of it, i am happy with the nice effects and most of them i can have fun with.

there's 5 different 'good' distortion where you can pick out the note you are playing. good sound, it deserves a 9 for overall quality.

if you're using 4aa batteries, then you might need a back up, but i bought an expensive power supply ($26), so that shouldn't be a problem when it comes to power outage. i'd gig with this without a back up, because it's built like a rock. it's made of metal and behringer is made out of plastic. go figure.

why am i comparing behringer to zoom, you might ask? well i want to compre products i used to have and the price range is in that range. zoom > behringer.

never dealt with it, hopefully i don't have to.

but i give a 10 for the refund of behringer. i lost the package and they still refund me full price. excellent service from long and mcquade. very nice. i ended up going to tom lee music for the gfx1.

the 10/10 goes to long and mcquade.

zoom has excellent effect products. they cost more than behringer's, but that extra money will give you extra quality. the pedal itself is only 135, but i also bought a seperate power supply for 26 and after tax it comes to around 185. not a bad deal, and i'm not unhappy because it didn't include a power supply, since many other products did, but it's fine. for 135, youy can't really argue it when it comes to effects.

if you're on a tight budget, this is one thing you don't want to miss out on. live or recording, it'll sound cool and can mimic some artists as well. how well? you can be the judge of that, because effects aren't the only thing that mimics. it's also your rig, guitar, etc.

if it was lost or stolen, i'd probably buy another zoom product. i don't know if i will buy the same one, but i like to try out different things. nonethless i'd probably spend more money if it's stolen and upgrade for something expensive if i save up. but yeah, say no new models are coming out, i'd get another purple gfx1.

there's other modelers out there, but preamps and such give you lerss effects. if you're budget is from 100-300. you really need to try it. i was planning on buying the zoom g2.1u, but there was no stock and there was only one pedal. i usually change effects within one song, so that wasn't a cool feature. i heard the sound quality is the same with the g2 and gfx1, so save moiney and buy something cheaper.

if you have 300, you don't need to spend everything. buy what's suitable and spend the rest on your girlfriend or something.

i'd reccomend this one for sure.

This thing is fairly easy to use. There isn't a lot of tweakability (is that a word?) for the effects, amp models, etc, but the presets for them are useable. I'm using this mainly for the doubling effect, phaser, flanger, chorus and the echo set fairly low. I'm not using the amp models in a live situation, but I plug it in to the PA for rehearsal, and the sound aren't mind blowing, but it gets the job done, and it beats lugging my amp to rehearsal. I use mainly the MS Drive model, which I think is supposed to be a Marshall JCM800, and it sounds pretty decent through the PA. Editing patches is very easy, and the manual is concise and doesn't wade around in bulls**t. Very well laid out.

I was quite impressed with the sound quality. The built in noise reduction is nice to have, as I've only run it in front of my amp so far. I will try in the effects loop to see how the sound quality compares, but the effects I'm using sound very good. They don't sound as good as individual pedals, but I use the effects very subtley anyway, so for what I want it's very good. The flanger setting is actually my favorite, and it did the 'Unchained' thing quite well. The other guys in rehearsal were quite impressed with that one. The doubling effect is very good, and it thickens my sound the way I want and doesn't sound electronic.

Nice casing, and the footswitches seem nice and heavy. I don't forsee a problem using it live.

Never had to contact them, and if it's as good as I think it is, I never will.

I play in a Rock cover band. I really only have one sound to begin with. I use a 50 Watt Marshall SL-X and Avatar 2x12 cab. I really only bought it for the above mentioned effects, and the built in tuner (I sold a Boss TU-2 to pay for this, and I had enough left over for a couple of other goodies). It will certainly do the trick for me. Seems sturdy, sounds pretty good, and I imagine it will be on my pedalboard for a long time. Unless I receive a cash windfall and buy all the effects pedals I want. But for now this will keep me happy.

AS easy as ABC... Just need to refer to the menu for any little problems. I give it an 8 because there is no display screen to show the name of the patch... but for S$130... what can you ask for?!!

As another Singaporean had submitted a review, I totally agree that the metal distortion (in fact, most of the distortion are good) blew right into my face. I cannot get enough of it. However, the EQ is more of like a set of pre-made pattern. It is unable to edit individual settings. At least, zoom did have this "Contour" thing to add abit of colours for the tone. I should say that EQ is not a problem, as I can just get an individual EQ pedal from BOSS or MXR or Behringer....

I own Korg AX1000G and Digitech RP2000, what I realize is that this ZOOM pedal lacks is extra setting for each effects/mods.... perhaps something like - Chorus can be set with depth, shape or colour. The ZNR is good. At times, there can be hissing sounds, as long as you set the ZNR right, it kills off the hissing sound.

As for me, I am looking for cabinet simulation, distortion types, EQ and small little effects. I use little of delays and reverbs. I like this ZOOM pedal. I'll just get an individual EQ pedal to control the tone.

I hope that ZOOM can add in a new feature such as Pickup Simulator. I was also looking for Multi FX with such features and in my area, I only can find Digitech and Korg Pandora 4.

I give a 8.5 to 9 because it is good enough for me, and i like the distortion.

I recommend that buyers get an adaptor. You never know what will happen during performace. I think many this ZOOM pedal can last long.

I look at the website and download pictures of it. I thought that it is longer. However, when I saw it, it is like smaller than I thought.

No comments.

I play Sevendust, Siam Shade, Pop, Funk, some Black Metal...
Quite a range.... So this pedal is alright for me.

I have been playing for 12 years since 14 years old.
I wish ZOOM can add Pickup Simulator for their next series.

For beginners, you can try this product rather than investing on individual pedals.

I've never been a big stomp box advocate, but I jammed with a guy that had the older version of this. I saw the potential and bought one. The block diagram out of the manual shows it all, how all 9 patches are in series and where you're injecting a particular effect into the mix, literally. The manual is good about explaining the effects for each knob including the different effect parameter ranges. At first, I ran through all 32 stock patches and wrote down a few to keep. Then to learn programming, I took the information that Bigjan in the post down a couple recommended, and he was right on for the sounds he claims, nice work man. I took several of those and made some alterations to come up with other keepers. This thing reminds of me the old Juno 60 synth where you can call up a patch and edit it on the fly with total ease.

I use two amp configurations depending on gigs, one is a Fender Princeton 60w DPS and the other is a Crate GHX-120 half stack. My main guitar is a Custom shop American Strat and a CS-780 Washburn for floyd rose use. Except for the DPS on both amps setup for clean reverb, the Zoom is my only effect. The Strat is setup with a Seymour Duncan Hot Rails in the bridge, Lace Sensor Holy Grail in mid, and a stock Fender Lace Sensor in the neck position. The two Lace Sensors are phase reversed.

The effects are pretty strong and talk about tailorable, I don't get where a couple of people have complained about adjustability. A single unit that has this much versatility is a dream for a pedal reluctant player. Switching patches is a snap, and the bypass mode for instant tuning covers me when I'm using the Fender, since the Crate has a built in chrono tuner. Like I said, adding the sounds from the post down a couple and then working on some songs I was able to produce some really choice sounds. I was able to nail a patch that emulates the guitar in Flock of Seagulls - I Ran..including the muted tapping seagull sounds in the beginning..great effects easily found and created.

With a set of Alkaline batteries, I don't even mess with an AC adapter. I have been averaging about 35+ hours of play at 4 hour intervals per set of batteries. If something crapped out, I'd revert to the DPS I have built into each amp. The switches are solid and responsive. While the knobs feel like you could easily reef on them too hard, they hold up. I had only one problem with mine, which was my own fault. I attempted to adjust the +/- level adjustments under the effects switch with my shoe toe once, and tweaked the rubber enough to get the - key to stick. I couldn't do anything with it until I figured out the issue, pulled the button back into shape and it's been problem free ever since.

not even needed yet.

Dude I was playing with had a collection of cheap Danelectro pedals, always one of them breaking into ear shattering oscillations or no effect, etc.. I didn't want to go the pedal route and saw a couple RP units, was not impressed.

The sturdy construction, size of pedals, the way the functions are laid out, stellar operations. This unit rocks, in about every possible flavor of the word. Except for the Wah effect which is only good with a pedal(I didn't by the optional expression pedal myself) and doesn't fit my styles of 80's to present alternative/pop rock. If someone lifted it, I'd replace it without thinking twice. A steal for the price and so far - very dependable. With this combination of effects and amp modeling you can go to any sound you want, regardless of your gear.

I will say this though, if you're not using a quality guitar to play through with, it can only do so much. But that isn't the fault of this unit..

muy facil de usar, y de conveniente tama?o, esto es lo que andaba buscando, pues tuve hace algunos a?os la 505 y sonaba bien dentro de lo que cabe de precio, pero la apariencia y los materiales dejaban mucho que desear....despues tuve un gt3 y no quede satisfecho, pues estaba muy grande y traia demasiadas cosas que no esan necesarias......este zoom gfx es un belleza en practicidad y calidad de sonido

suena muy bien a traves de mi ampli traynor de bulbos (12AX7 y 58881) con celestio vintage 30 y con mi ernieball axis....los que esperen que una guitarra economica y un ampli de transistores hagan maravillas.....pues no lo van a lograr......ahora con mi godin LG P90 suena muy bien tambien.....

no dependeria de el, pero es bueno obtener muchas configuraciones y mezclas de efectos de un solo aparato (por el otro, lado el tener demasiados pedales en el suelo es muy molesto), quiza probaria otros similares, pero este multiefectos esta construido resistente (por eso me agrado) y ya se me ha caido de las manos cuando lo estoy moviendo o guardando en dos ocasiones y sigue funcionando de maravilla...

no la he usado y no creo que en mexico se de soporte tecnico... :)

gran calidad de ensamble, gran variedad de sonidos, gran facilidad de uso (ni he leido el manual).......gran precio

Try these patches, copy these to a notepad, save file and then open with excel (tab delimited) try them on practically any guitar! then you'll say it is worth every cent.
name level comp wah drive gain EQ contour znr mod delrev time COMMENT
SCOFIELD! 26 C3 OF OD 12 10 9 7 C4 OF OF Use neckpickups!
CLEANTUBE 25 C3 OF Fd 15 25 0 3 OF OF OF
Standard Clean Sound CHORUS 25 C3 OF Fd 15 25 0 3 C4 H2/d3 6/37
CHO+Flange 25 C3 OF Fd 15 25 0 3 F7 H2 3 ChorusFlanger Series...
RotaryJaz 25 C3 OF Fd 16 28 10 9 C9 H6 10 Use Neckpickup Tone Off
ACOUSTIK! 30 OF OF Ac 30 16 0 7 OF H2 6 5 or 4 position pickup
SurfCntry 25 C3 Of Fd 15 25 0 5 t5 E4 28 Brige pickup!
POLICE 25 C3 OF Fd 15 25 0 3 C3 d8 37 Everybreath/message
Marshall 25 C3 OF Ms 18 28 -3 9 OF OF OF ROCK & ROLL!
Light 25 C3 OF Ms 3 28 0 6 OF OF OF Rock Rhthyms!
Rectifier 25 OF OF Mt 23 31 0 9 OF r3 6 Modern Heavy Rock!
M.Zone 25 C3 OF dt 23 25 0 9 OF OF OF Metalzone? chug! hehe..
Slash 25 C3 OF Ms 20 25 -3 9 C1 OF/d3 OF/37 Great for lickswith delay
SANATANA 25 c3 of Bg 18 28 10 9 OF H2 3 Carlos'Boogie! Use humbuckers!

You can plug this in straight out of the box and get some good sounds out of it within minutes. Editing patches is childsplay, just twiddle the knob to desired parameter, adjust value keys, save patch, done. The manual is ok, although it does make it sound more complicated than it actually is.

Cort G250 (single coils) thru Marshall MG250 amp. The pedal is not noisy, and doesn't colour or suck too much tone from the guitar. Some of the effects aren't that great, although you will quickly work out which ones are worth keeping, and which ones to write over. The majority of the presets can be discounted, and with tweaking, there are several good tones that can be had out of this. A lot of the effects sound very similar, some are totally useless, others just don't appeal to me, are far too digital sounding (maybe a good thing for all you industrial fans out there)
That aside, this does have some excellent features, and once you're familiar with it, you can dial in some excellent tones. The noise gate is quite good and does limit the hum from my pups, the compressor is also quite good. In total there are 4 effects that I have dialed in that are great-you can find a good acoustic simulator, a decent overdrive, and a great boosted lead sound, but my favourite so far is a real raunchy, jangly bluesy sound, you can nail some real classic tones if you just spend some time messing about with it.

I could depend on this, it has a fairly heavy looking metal casing (in a pretty nice purple colour) and it's great for me, as I mostly use it to dial in a blues sound for my rhythm playing and leave it there-be warned that there is a noticeable delay between stomping the pedal and the patch being activated, so for switching between tones, this is possibly a problem in live playing.

Overall, this is a good pedal for the money, and given the time, you can dial in some great tones, and it is a great value little package-just be aware that this isn't a guitar multi effects board-you do get what you pay for. I would never want to lose this, as it has created the ultimate tone for my playing, and my band has crafted a new kind of sound around what this pedal has done to my guitar. I just bought this cause it was on super special offer, and did everything I wanted at the time (compression, noise gate, chromatic tuner, various effects, amp simulation) for a fraction of the price I could have bought individual stompboxes. The sturdy metal casing is a great addition too, making this a very reliable little box.

Bought it, unboxed it, plugged it in and was editing my own patches within moments. I usually don't read manuals (I hear it's a "guy" thing) but decided to have a read through the english version of the vast amount of volumes it comes with, just to get aquainted with my new little purple friend. Editing is extremely simple and sounds can be dialed in and saved easily. Clever thinking. As for all those who complain the parameters are too few, I can only say, if you need more room to colour your sound you need to get real! Play the guitar- don't try and be an orchestra. Agreed, the delay times could be a little longer but hey, you can't buy a decent delay pedal for the same price as this box of tricks. Nuff said!

I run a customised strat copy with Reflex Red active pickups into a lovely old H&H Musician Amp and Peavey 2x12 speaker cab. The amp on its own has a great warm tone which I try to keep as intact as possible. I went through the phase of flooding my sound with effects and now have come out the other side looking for a great tone with a little colour to make it jump out a bit. The GFX1 does a great job without loss of natural guitar/amp tone and allows me more flexability than I'll ever need. Its only downfall is that the four footswitches cannot be assigned to a particular effect and bypass the "patch" it is assigned to. My previous effects unit was the Boss GT5 which contained a crazy amount of options but allowed the user to switch to Manual mode and turn effects on or off individually with the assignes footswitch. Just a little complaint cause I just have to set my sounds out better to suit live situations.

Well, I have only had it for a month or so and I treat my gear carefully. The build quality surpasses its pricetag- you just don't expect something so affordable to be so well constructed. But it is. I would feel comfortable gigging without a backup unless I was playing in an arena setting (unlikely). But as a guitarist, there are so many links in the chain that could fail, we should all have three rigs!! (again, unlikely). I expect the Zoom would be the last link in my chain to go- and with the backup batteries, you can't go wrong.

No idea. Hope I never need to find out.

Anything from Stevie Ray Vaughan, Dire Straits, Mettalica and other styles I don't think I'll mention. I have been playing for 22 years and have owned mainly Boss gear till now. I started with a collection of pedals, sold them all to buy an ME 5 which was stolen and replaced with the GT 5 which was then sold due to poverty (yeah I hear ya brother!). I can't believe so much money was spent on these pedals that, truth be told, the Zoom GFX1 can replicate just as well. I know players get precious about their gear- especially when they have forked out their hard earned bucks for it- but great tone is much more than how many parameters you have on a particular effect. Just shut up and play yer guitar! I would definately replace it if it were stolen, lost or killed and I would have a hard time replacing it with a different make of unit- I don't know if it can be topped for value for money (unless they threw in a power supply). I am a convert.