Fulltone - Secret Freq  [traced]

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beedotman
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Post by beedotman »

Incoming new shit from Fulltone to trace :blackeye

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http://www.fulltone.com/products/secret-freq
Yet another overdrive distortion. Oh joy! And such a silly name… Secret Freq.

Another touch-sensitive, dynamic, natural sounding overdrive/distortion to confuse the marketplace filled with RC's, AC's, Tim's, and about a hundred others made by one-man-shows with the word tone in their names. Yes it does the TS-thing” and the Clean boost thing, but the ‘Freq has more tricks in its bag.

With soft clipping for the lower OD sounds, something else happens as you turn up the Distortion knob and/or hit the strings harder… the secondary clipping kicks in, which has a rich flavor and feel thanks to the character its Germanium Diodes impart. Nothing like the PlimSoul, nothing like the OCD, in fact nothing like any other pedal on the market.

But wait…what's this "Freq." knob?

Turn it and a gyrator circuit located in the first stage clipping-loop ads as much as 12db of active narrow band MIDRANGE right where it does the most good, like installing a wah wah right where the distortion is generated. But unlike turning on your wah wah along with your distortion pedal, the bass and treble frequencies don't disappear... Very unique, and not to be confused with a simple blasé midrange control tacked on to the end of the circuit, as is the case with any other pedal with a Midrange control you’ve seen or heard of.

What's it sound like?

Along with a slew of basic great OD/Distortion pedal, it allows you to replicate a very, very wide range of your favorite guitar & amp sounds.

At low overdrive settings it simply allows you to shape the pedal to cut through any mix and replaces a few of your pedals on the 'board, and perhaps even an amp or two.

At more extreme (clockwise) "Freq settings?

Brings a smile to your face an evokes the coolest Jimmy Page, Michael Schenker, Robin Trower, Tom Scholz tones that you just couldn’t previously get without a bunch of studio trickery, EQ, mic-placement, and amps.

$225 (US Retail)

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Post by Dirk_Hendrik »

buy an Ibanez Cyberdrive. Same trick for a fraction of what this will cost.
Sorry. Plain out of planes.

http://www.dirk-hendrik.com

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Post by okgb »

maybe hard to get the right inductor ,[ oh wait not even an inductor ] like how he pretends to bash himself, before laying claim
to it's said , greatness , no worse than mesa boogie though , if it doesn't cash my cheques AND wash the dishes Meh , I say .
................the germanium diodes kick in ? must be some power auto sensing , very sophisticated
should work for the military they could sent him somewhere

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Post by roseblood11 »

Another touch-sensitive, dynamic, natural sounding overdrive/distortion to confuse the marketplace filled with RC's, AC's, Tim's, and about a hundred others made by one-man-shows with the word tone in their names.
Maybe he should name it "arrogant sucker"?

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Post by sinner »

beedotman wrote:Incoming new shit from Fulltone to trace :blackeye

Pfff... it's just an overdrive dude :mrgreen:

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Post by DrNomis »

Hmmmmm....I'm just wondering what those two knurled thumbscrews on the left-hand side of the enclosure do, bet it's something blatantly obvious cause I can't figure it out.... :hmmm: :scratch:
Genius is not all about 99% perspiration, and 1% inspiration - sometimes the solution is staring you right in the face.-Frequencycentral.

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Post by beedotman »

DrNomis wrote:Hmmmmm....I'm just wondering what those two knurled thumbscrews on the left-hand side of the enclosure do, bet it's something blatantly obvious cause I can't figure it out.... :hmmm: :scratch:
Those just holding bottom lid :D

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Post by Nocentelli »

DrNomis wrote:Hmmmmm....I'm just wondering what those two knurled thumbscrews on the left-hand side of the enclosure do, bet it's something blatantly obvious cause I can't figure it out.... :hmmm: :scratch:
To open the enclosure?
modman wrote: Let's hope it's not a hit, because soldering up the same pedal everyday, is a sad life. It's that same ole devilish double bind again...

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Post by beedotman »

Nocentelli wrote:
DrNomis wrote:Hmmmmm....I'm just wondering what those two knurled thumbscrews on the left-hand side of the enclosure do, bet it's something blatantly obvious cause I can't figure it out.... :hmmm: :scratch:
To open the enclosure?
Yup! :thumbsup

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Post by DrNomis »

:lol:

See....I knew it'd be something blatantly obvious.... :lol:
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Post by beedotman »

:lol:

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Post by MoonWatcher »

beedotman wrote:
But wait…what's this "Freq." knob?

Turn it and a gyrator circuit located in the first stage clipping-loop ads as much as 12db of active narrow band MIDRANGE right where it does the most good, like installing a wah wah right where the distortion is generated. But unlike turning on your wah wah along with your distortion pedal, the bass and treble frequencies don't disappear... Very unique, and not to be confused with a simple blasé midrange control tacked on to the end of the circuit, as is the case with any other pedal with a Midrange control you’ve seen or heard of.
Yeah - so unique. While it might be hardwired, the Boss Metal Zone has a pre-gain mid emphasis gyrator, and that pedal has been around how long? And the Danelectro Fabtone almost copies it verbatim.

And it's "so good" that a lot of DIY folks simply disable the gyrator in the MT-2 and/or Fabtone.

I hate a "pedal designer" telling me when something is unique, or how a gyrator can sound "natural." To me, anything that is active EQ (as good as it might be) is usually the antithesis of "natural."

I think Fuller is hoping he can force his next big hit after the OCD has now eclipsed some time ago. The reason it was a success? None of this goofy crap with active EQ or clipping stages "kicking in," or whatever. The simple claims of amp-like response with the simple circuit in the OCD (whether you consider them to be bogus or not) was sufficient. So Mike should probably go back to doing what he does best - copying something else at least 70%, and adding enough appeal to the repackaging to get everyone to jump on the bandwagon. It worked for the '69, Fulldrive, and OCD. Why screw with this formula and end up with tepid results, like with the Catalyst and GT-500? Why does he have to show that he is a clever circuit designer? Most pedal users don't give a crap.

How much of a success is/was the Plimsoul? If he hopes to get "gadgety," that might be the most he could hope for.

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Post by okgb »

On one hand , you could understand someone doing whatever it took for successful marketing and I'd guess he has allot to pay for
these days , but the farther the claim the bigger the rip off I say , still the fellow who does his warrenty work speaks well of him
having a good ear and he himself [ john green ? ] seems pretty together . with this he seems to take a run at one man operations , perhaps
fuller is feeling the pinch of his pricing failing to attract enough people , It does , to me get as sickening as Mesa's ad wording , gives me diabetes just
reading it , but sell me a tube echo at cost and I'll swear this new pedal is the vanguard of all that is holy !

But that does seem a good slight , not worth copying ......................

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Post by soulsonic »

I'll keep my DOD Grunge, thank you.
"Analog electronics in music is dead. Analog effects pedal design is a dead art." - Fran

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Post by okgb »

Yeah , Maybe it's for Fuller Fans only .............never knew he had a club
well I guess he has to beat people with something for sales

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Post by Liquids »

MoonWatcher wrote: To me, anything that is active EQ (as good as it might be) is usually the antithesis of "natural."
Well, I guess all the pedals that use the tube screamer tone control (or a varation with different component values), the Xotic pedals, the Ampeg V-series and SVT amps, the whole Tech 21 character series of pedals, and Mesa boogie amps, all those studio records you've heard with EQ at the board are the antithesis of natural.

Maybe it's not natural. It's just everywhere but for pedals and amps that stick to passive frequency control. Passive is more natural? Hope you play mostly acoustic guitar...

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Post by MoonWatcher »

Liquids wrote:
MoonWatcher wrote: To me, anything that is active EQ (as good as it might be) is usually the antithesis of "natural."
Well, I guess all the pedals that use the tube screamer tone control (or a varation with different component values), the Xotic pedals, the Ampeg V-series and SVT amps, the whole Tech 21 character series of pedals, and Mesa boogie amps, all those studio records you've heard with EQ at the board are the antithesis of natural.
I would say that you are correct! Never liked the TS tone control for that reason. Never bonded with the Tech 21 boxes I used. Found no use in the graphic in the Boogies. Couldn't stand when Peavey put the active crap in their newer amps.

My favorite Bax-ish drive box would be the Colorsound Overdrive. The Xotics do nothing for me. I have an old Reverend Drivetrain II that is cool, but mostly sits.

As for all the studio recordings that aren't dry at the board, if it is done with a deft hand, then active is fine. And active for those uses is night and day different from poking up or sucking down frequencies in an OD or distortion. When you go beyond a 3dB boost with a tight enough Q, it's going to stick out like a sore thumb.

There are cool studio recordings that have about 15 seconds of material where an active EQ slider is all popped up like that, but otherwise it gets old fast.

Guitarists abuse wah pedals as it is.

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Post by darthoverdrive »

Is Fulltone known for gooping his pedals? I've been thinking about buying one of these for a while to trace out. I don't have any degooping skillz and would probably destroy it in the process though.

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Post by Bill_Mountain »

darthoverdrive wrote:Is Fulltone known for gooping his pedals? I've been thinking about buying one of these for a while to trace out. I don't have any degooping skillz and would probably destroy it in the process though.
I've owned a few and none of them were gooped.

They were tightly packed though.

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Post by MoonWatcher »

Sorry for the necro-post, but it dawned on me what this thing is most likely lifted from.

I bet it's based on the Pearl OD-05. They have the same number of controls, and the Pearl is another lost gem of sorts. So like back before anyone would have suspected that Fuller copied much of the Voodoo Lab OD, I could imagine the same thing happening here.

The Pearl had the EQ Gain and Frequency controls instead of a standard naming convention for the tone circuits. And it is a pre-gain type of midrange gyrator.

The clipping diodes gave softer and more dynamic tones than maybe other types of overdrives, which had more to do with the series resistance than actual diode type. So even if Fulltone is substituting diodes, the effect could be more from the series resistors (if Fuller copied the OD-05).

Has Fuller ever come up with anything that he didn't mostly copy from some existing design? I'm not saying that to be critical, but just bringing it up because it seems like he uses existing pedals as a starting point.

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