#170071  by wpmartin1979
 
The issue I’ve had with the SD1 is it makes it sound like a “blanket is covering the speaker.” I also had this issue, although less so with the OD2.
The OD3 was actually the most “transparent” Boss pedal I tried.
 #170103  by Jon S.
 
So, as I'm thinking about copping a new overdrive pedal, I think to myself, "Maybe I ought to check my gear cabinets first to remind myself what I already have." And sure enough, I pull out this pedal, that I haven't used for years, described by its designers, Naylor and Weil, in Reverend's Discontinued Products FAQ, as follows:

DOES THE DRIVETRAIN II SOUND LIKE A TUBE SCREAMER?
The Drivetrain II has smoother overdrive, more transparent midrange, more available clean boost, and treble and bass controls. This allows you to produce traditional Tube Screamer sounds or dial in your own tones with no bass loss or permanent mid hump. The Drivetrain II uses the JRC4558 IC chip as found in the original vintage TS 808 Tube Screamer.

DOES THE DRIVETRAIN II HAVE TRUE BYPASS?
No, we use what we call neutral bypass. This buffered bypass does not alter tone when the pedal is bypassed and does not pop loud like common true bypass switches. And because it is buffered it prevents signal and treble loss when using long cables or multiple pedals placed after the Drivetrain II. We feel this is superior to true bypass switching.

I power it up, plug in, play a bit with the controls, then riff through it for an hour on my Scarlet Fire Wolf and, damn, it sounds fine.

Perhaps I'll add a distortion pedal after all but for overdrive, I'm already a wealthy man.

Image
wpmartin1979, Searing75 liked this
 #170105  by PurpleTrails
 
FWIW, I picked up a Nobels ODR-1 mini last week. The originals have been used for decades by Nashville session guys, but it's not well known by the general public.

It's not a tubescreamer type that boosts midrange and cuts both high and low end. It can get a little fizzy at the top end if you turn the spectrum knob up too much, but overall it has a very flat response and sounds really good; very responsive to pick dynamics. I'm still in the figuring it out stage, and haven't plugged it into the rest of my board yet, but so far I like it as an option to get that "hair at the edge of breakup" tone without cranking your amp.

Oh yeah, it's also pretty cheap. Think it was $80 new. There's a slightly more capable model that runs around $120 that has a bass cut switch that people say helps the low end from getting too tubby if you're using humbuckers, but with my amp settings "Jerrysized" I don't think there's really a need for that.
wpmartin1979 liked this
 #170106  by TI4-1009
 
Jon S. wrote: Fri Feb 19, 2021 6:54 pm It’s more a defect in the forum hosting software here than anything else. I’m aware of no other guitar forum where, when you quote someone, the software drags along with his post all the others before his, too. It’s but a minor hassle, though, in the cosmic scheme.
You can always edit out the parts of the quote(s) you don't want to re-re-replicate before you push Submit. :wink:
 #170110  by Jon S.
 
TI4-1009 wrote: Fri Feb 26, 2021 1:21 pmYou can always edit out the parts of the quote(s) you don't want to re-re-replicate before you push Submit. :wink:
Many of us do that generally from our computers. I admit to being less regular about it from my cell phone.
 #170122  by Searing75
 
Jon S. wrote:So, as I'm thinking about copping a new overdrive pedal, I think to myself, "Maybe I ought to check my gear cabinets first to remind myself what I already have." And sure enough, I pull out this pedal, that I haven't used for years, described by its designers, Naylor and Weil, in Reverend's Discontinued Products FAQ, as follows:

DOES THE DRIVETRAIN II SOUND LIKE A TUBE SCREAMER?
The Drivetrain II has smoother overdrive, more transparent midrange, more available clean boost, and treble and bass controls. This allows you to produce traditional Tube Screamer sounds or dial in your own tones with no bass loss or permanent mid hump. The Drivetrain II uses the JRC4558 IC chip as found in the original vintage TS 808 Tube Screamer.

DOES THE DRIVETRAIN II HAVE TRUE BYPASS?
No, we use what we call neutral bypass. This buffered bypass does not alter tone when the pedal is bypassed and does not pop loud like common true bypass switches. And because it is buffered it prevents signal and treble loss when using long cables or multiple pedals placed after the Drivetrain II. We feel this is superior to true bypass switching.

I power it up, plug in, play a bit with the controls, then riff through it for an hour on my Scarlet Fire Wolf and, damn, it sounds fine.

Perhaps I'll add a distortion pedal after all but for overdrive, I'm already a wealthy man.

Image
But, everyone knows that our old stuff is lame. It has to be new and shiny! The excitement comes from adding to cart, and checking out!
 #170327  by wpmartin1979
 
Jon S. wrote: Fri Feb 26, 2021 11:56 am So, as I'm thinking about copping a new overdrive pedal, I think to myself, "Maybe I ought to check my gear cabinets first to remind myself what I already have." And sure enough, I pull out this pedal, that I haven't used for years, described by its designers, Naylor and Weil, in Reverend's Discontinued Products FAQ, as follows:

DOES THE DRIVETRAIN II SOUND LIKE A TUBE SCREAMER?
The Drivetrain II has smoother overdrive, more transparent midrange, more available clean boost, and treble and bass controls. This allows you to produce traditional Tube Screamer sounds or dial in your own tones with no bass loss or permanent mid hump. The Drivetrain II uses the JRC4558 IC chip as found in the original vintage TS 808 Tube Screamer.

DOES THE DRIVETRAIN II HAVE TRUE BYPASS?
No, we use what we call neutral bypass. This buffered bypass does not alter tone when the pedal is bypassed and does not pop loud like common true bypass switches. And because it is buffered it prevents signal and treble loss when using long cables or multiple pedals placed after the Drivetrain II. We feel this is superior to true bypass switching.

I power it up, plug in, play a bit with the controls, then riff through it for an hour on my Scarlet Fire Wolf and, damn, it sounds fine.

Perhaps I'll add a distortion pedal after all but for overdrive, I'm already a wealthy man.

Image
So I happened on this YouTube video called “9 overdrive pedals you forgot about” and at the 23 min mark guess which pedal pops up! Yes, the Reverend... Jon it’s like they read your mind!

https://youtu.be/ytr1n2UrB5E
 #170328  by Jon S.
 
>> So I happened on this YouTube video called “9 overdrive pedals you forgot about” and at the 23 min mark guess which pedal pops up! Yes, the Reverend... Jon it’s like they read your mind!

Had they truly read my mind the title would have been, "9 overdrive pedals you remember!" :-?

P.S. They review the first gen Drivetrain. Mine is the Drivetrain II. I used to own both but sold the former. The former is much closer to an actual vintage TubeScreamer. It's nice but the trad Tubescreamer tone isn't my personal fave. The II, in contrast, has some significant mods that make it my keeper. In particular, it's capable of:

- more overall boost,
- a significant amount of which can be from almost entirely clean to mostly clean,
- and the tone controls are expanded in a way that you can still get the trad mid-heavy TubeScreamer tones but you can also dial out those extra mids for a screaming, slicing, cutting tone beyond the typical TubeScreamer's abilities.
 #170334  by wpmartin1979
 
Jon S. wrote: Fri Mar 19, 2021 6:54 am >> So I happened on this YouTube video called “9 overdrive pedals you forgot about” and at the 23 min mark guess which pedal pops up! Yes, the Reverend... Jon it’s like they read your mind!

Had they truly read my mind the title would have been, "9 overdrive pedals you remember!" :-?
Lol you didn’t remember until you found it laying around in a stash for many years. I’d say that qualifies as forgotten!
Jon S. liked this
 #170338  by wpmartin1979
 
Jon S. wrote: Fri Mar 19, 2021 6:54 am >> So I happened on this YouTube video called “9 overdrive pedals you forgot about” and at the 23 min mark guess which pedal pops up! Yes, the Reverend... Jon it’s like they read your mind!

Had they truly read my mind the title would have been, "9 overdrive pedals you remember!" :-?

P.S. They review the first gen Drivetrain. Mine is the Drivetrain II. I used to own both but sold the former. The former is much closer to an actual vintage TubeScreamer. It's nice but the trad Tubescreamer tone isn't my personal fave. The II, in contrast, has some significant mods that make it my keeper. In particular, it's capable of:

- more overall boost,
- a significant amount of which can be from almost entirely clean to mostly clean,
- and the tone controls are expanded in a way that you can still get the trad mid-heavy TubeScreamer tones but you can also dial out those extra mids for a screaming, slicing, cutting tone beyond the typical TubeScreamer's abilities.
BTW - your pedal is now worth 5X what it was before that video aired :rockon:
Jon S. liked this