Boss Super Octave and Acoustic Sim

[Conroyfootball]

I was at GC this weekend messing around and I sat down at the Boss pedal setup. I played with the Super Ovtave OC-3 and the Acoustic Simulator AC-3. I have never even thought about having anything like these on my board but I was intrigued. Maybe I was just bored. Anyway, I'd like to know what you guys think of these or any other comparable effects.

Rock on.

 

[baritone]

Re: Boss Super Octave and Acoustic Sim

I have the older AC-2, which was recently discontinued and replaced by the AC-3. The only difference I can see is that the AC-3 has built-in reverb, but I already have a few reverb pedals. Having an acoustic simulator effect is fun since it gives you a totally new tone from your electric guitar. But if you already own a solid equalizer, you can get acoustic tones which are more customizable.

The OC-3 is a really awesome octaver. People insist that the older OC-2 sounds more natural, especially the older models which were made in Japan. I haven't had the opportunity to compare the Japan version, but I didn't notice much of a difference between an OC-2 and an OC-3 on "OC-2" mode. In addition, the OC-3 has a polyphonic mode, which makes it a lot of fun to use, especially for that price. It works well with a single output to my guitar amp, but the extra output lets me send the processed low octave sound to my bass amp and get EQed separately from the dry sound, to which I can apply different effects.

 

[GuitarStv]

Re: Boss Super Octave and Acoustic Sim

I tried desperately hard to like the acoustic simulator that I bought about 4 years ago . . . tried every setting possible with my 335, and it just never sounded right. I also didn't like the way that it cut a lot of volume out of your guitar as soon as you kicked it on. It sounded very strange with a little distortion. After about a year of fiddling with it and never being happy, I ended up trading the pedal for a cheap acoustic . . . which ended up sounding far far better in the long run. I've heard that it works better with single coils than humbuckers though.

 

[baritone]

Re: Boss Super Octave and Acoustic Sim

The acoustic simulator doesn't sound great with most distortions. For a satisfying sound, it either has to be a light overdrive or a really heavy distortion, since the acoustic sim filters out a lot of midrange. Between single coils and humbuckers and neck and bridge pickups, the knobs can be tweaked a little to find the right setting for each, but it takes some time. I am not too picky about acoustic tones, so I just keep all the knobs pointing in the same direction but adjust them to match the bypassed sound, regardless of which pickups I am using. The sound ends up being good enough for me. But for those who are interested in creating acoustic tones from an electric guitar, I think an equalizer can be more convincing with the right settings.