Thanks for the praise!
I suppose the demo comparing it to a bunch of famous pedals was gimmicky. And calling it "The Crown Jewel" may be a bit hyperbolic. But my intentions for the Crown Jewel were really utilitarian. After years of building, modding and thoroughly dissecting just about every form of op amp-based distortion and overdrive on the planet, I've come to the conclusion that they are all really the same. They just have variations in 3 different areas: Gain, Clipping, and EQ. And I tried to make controlling these parameters as straight forward as possible.
For the gain, you see either two types of controls in op amp-based drive pedals. You'll either have a knob that controls the actual gain of the op amp. This is the most common. This is the "drive" knob on the Crown Jewel. Or you'll have a passive volume that controls the amount of pregain boost that pushes another op-amp into overdrive. This isn't as common. This is done by using the boost module in the "first" position and then using the boost level to control the gain. In a lot of "distortion" pedals, you will see a pregain boost that is hardwired to "full turn clockwise" and then the gain is controlled with the actual gain knob. There is also the presence control, which just like the presence control on a Marshall or Bassman amp, it controls the cut off frequency of the negative feedback loop. So it's like having a fine treble and gain control. Those 3 parameters along with the 9/18V mode operation should provide you with almost every possible gain configuration.
For the clipping, it's pretty straight forward....that is if you know about clipping. If you don't, I'm not going to get into it, but pretty much everything you want is there. I think the only thing that is really missing is hard LED clipping like you'd find in the Marshall Gov'nor or Turbo RAT.
And the last major area that distinguishes one op amp-based dirt pedal from the next is EQ. Even if it's a pedal like the DOD250 that doesn't even have a tone knob, it has still been hardwire "voiced". IMHO, EQ is the most important area. Most people think it's gain that separates overdrives from distortions, but I think it's EQ. Overdrives have a lot of midrange. The Klon and Tubescreamer are quintessential overdrives. But if you play with their voicing and scoop out their midrange, they make a pretty good metal distortion. So a 3-band EQ can't perfectly mimic everything, even with a parametric midrange. But for the pedals that it can't mimic perfectly, it can come very very close.
Anyhow...sorry for the long winded post. The hardest part about designing the Crown Jewel was deciding what features to leave off so that it wasn't too overwhelming, but still being able to make all the sounds it needed to make. So I guess this post is an analogy for that.
_________________ *patience is a virtue* Please do not PM me. email is prefered. keith@buildyourownclone.com
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