Re: Short review of the Boss RC-20

[Tim Nelson <tnelson@metrocast.net>]

At 09:12 PM 11/2/01 -0800, you wrote:
>What did you guy's think of the hiss on the created loop.
>it realy turned me off the whole thing,

I really didn't notice all that much hiss with mine; for me, the perception
of lower fidelity has more to do with the high frequency roll-off, which I
thought was pretty close to the older (nonplussed?) version of the 
Boomerang.

>I would'nt be supprised if the sample rate was far below
>the headrush,

Absolutely. Mine's sitting right next to my Headrush, so it's pretty easy
to a/b them  for instant comparison. A friend of mine has a similar setup
with a Headrush and a DL-4, and of the three, the Headrush has by far the
highest audio fidelity but probably the most limited functionality. They
all have their pros and cons; I actually use the RC-20 quite a bit because
of the long loop time, but I've learned that it's not so good for building
up too many massed layers as it overloads way earlier than do my other
loopers. And having to hold that button for two seconds to clear the
previous loop is a pain.

As for the undo, neither of them really have the flexibility to undo just
the most recent of several layers; the Headrush can take you back to the
base layer which is useful, but you can't undo ONLY the last cycle like you
could with a more sophisticated box (EDP, et al). I don't consider the
RC-20's so-called "undo" to be all that useful for real-time use, because
unless you've saved a loop into one of the canned memory locations (a
little bit impractical in real time) and are playing on top of it, it
really doesn't HAVE an undo. Again, they both have their own strengths AND
weaknesses, and I'm finding that they work pretty well in tandem.

>As with the ARSY-20
>that thing is $850 in australia, what a waste of money!

Ouch. (Just for comparison's sake, what's the going rate down under for the
other loopers on the market? EDP, Repeater, 'Rang, DL-4, Headrush...)

-t-