Tonedexter effects loop thread.

Ken Carr · #1 08-05-2020, 10:32 AM

I have owned a Tonedexter for about a year and a half now, but I didn't own a guitar with a piezo pickup, so I have not been using the Tonedexter. Last week I bought a guitar that has a K&K installed, so I have made some good wavemaps for this guitar. So yesterday I set up my signal chain going from guitar > delay pedal > reverb pedal > Tonedexter input > Soundcraft Notepad EF12 mixer input > QSC CP-8 powered speaker. This daisychain approach is what I am used to doing with my other guitar equipped with a LR Baggs Lyric without the Tonedexter. I always get a clean sound with little noise. This time, using my new K&K equipped guitar, going through the Tonedexter, I was getting a lot of high frequency hiss. I had a very good amplified tone, but the high end hissing noise is too obvious to ignore. After spending time taking the effects pedals out of the chain one by one, the signal was very clean with no effects in the chain. I was perplexed at why I had this noise. I decided to try to run the effects pedals through the effects loop of the Tonedexter. I already had a Hosea "Y" splitter cable. Voila! The hiss went away. I had an excellent sound on my new used Langejans RGC-6. Before this, I never understood what the purpose of having a dedicated effects loop was for. Questions: do any of you who use a Tonedexter have the same experience? Do you use the effects loop, or daisychain your effects through the Tonedexter?

buzzardwhiskey · #2 08-05-2020, 11:04 AM

Yes. I too have had this exact issue. I attribute it to some kind of impedance thing.

Going directly into the Tonedexter first works far better.

Ken Carr · #3 08-05-2020, 12:30 PM

So buzzard, you are saying you use the Tonedexter first in your signal chain. Have you tried using the built-in effects loop? If so, did you notice a difference?

buzzardwhiskey · #4 08-05-2020, 12:40 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ken Carr

So buzzard, you are saying you use the Tonedexter first in your signal chain. Have you tried using the built-in effects loop? If so, did you notice a difference?

Yes. I have run both my tuner and my reverb pedal in the effects loop since discovering that this sounds better.

shufflebeat · #5 08-05-2020, 01:43 PM

With any luck Mr May will drop in and put some numbers to this but I found some units worked well in the FX loop and others didn't. At one point I was using both the TD and an AG Stomp for different instruments. The ideal hookup would have been into the TD, through the loop to and from the AG, then out of the TD XLR, bypassing whatever I wasn't using at the time.

If memory serves I had to turn down the input on the AG to stop the line level (I assume) signal in the loop overdriving the AG input. I then had to set the AG output to max which still wasn't quite enough to satisfy the expectations of the TD return.

It was noisy and didn't make use of either of the boxes so I ended up keeping them separate, eventually the AG dropped an output and is now retired.

shufflebeat · #6 08-05-2020, 01:46 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by buzzardwhiskey

Yes. I have run both my tuner and my reverb pedal in the effects loop since discovering that this sounds better.

Also, you present the pickup with a very good input circuit and have a good DI out last in your chain. Everyone's happy.

BW, have you never come to terms with the TD tuner? It took me a little while but it's now my favourite tuner, and I have many.

Ken Carr · #7 08-05-2020, 02:49 PM

Hijacking my own thread, I initially didn't like the tuner function that much, but my son helped me to update the firmware in my TD. Now the tuner seems more stable and easier to use. I like it just fine. It works better than my cheap clip-on tuner.

James May · #8 08-05-2020, 03:01 PM

The ToneDexter effects loop operates on the higher side of the distribution curve of effect pedal levels that you will find out there. This is deliberate because it keeps the noise level down (SNR up).

Most effects pedals won't have a problem, but we are aware that some may not be quiet enough, or have quite enough headroom and/or gain to be fully optimal in the effects loop. BTW, Mute and Boost don't affect the FX send, they come in after the return.

If all you need is a tuner, one trick you can do is feed it from effects send by pushing a mono plug part way into the FX jack. This will keep the signal normalled through so you'll just be getting a tuner feed that is always alive. Mute and Boost won't affect it as mentioned.

I'm glad that some of you have become friends with ToneDexter's tuner. We acknowledge that the display takes a little getting used to, but once you do you'll find that it really is a highly accurate tuning algorithm. Since we had a lot of horsepower under the hood, we used it.

buzzardwhiskey · #9 08-05-2020, 04:10 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by shufflebeat

Also, you present the pickup with a very good input circuit and have a good DI out last in your chain. Everyone's happy.

BW, have you never come to terms with the TD tuner? It took me a little while but it's now my favourite tuner, and I have many.

As it happens, I stopped using reverb and the tuner. I use the built-in feature exclusively.

Marshall · #10 08-06-2020, 08:29 PM

]I finally upgraded from 1.33 to the latest OS. I'll give the tuner another try. The spinning wheels were too confusing to me before.

But I've been using the effects loop for a while. I run the "out" into a delay pedal with just a little bit of delay, and back into the TDx. It's a stunning combination. - Love it.

Here's a recent little video.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JoxN...P&index=2&t=0s

shufflebeat · #11 08-07-2020, 02:25 AM

Enjoyed that, nice setup and song.

I see a lot of vids with just a room mic and it becomes distracting after a while because in real life our ears "filter out" the room to some extent which doesn't happen on video.

If you also recorded the mixer stereo out and mixed that with the room mics to taste you might get something more akin to the live experience.

Also, Marilyn Monroe on my right should wear longer shorts.

Marshall · #12 08-07-2020, 05:50 PM

Sex sells !

One fun part of the video was my first video with my new Sony a6600 camera and the Sony stereo mic. It was sitting on the first table out in the room.

Ken Carr · #13 08-07-2020, 07:57 PM

Ok. I'm thoroughly impressed with the sound now running my effects through the Tonedexter effects loop. I have my set-up now with my Tech 21 Q-strip in the loop. I have a Huss and Dalton TOM-R with the Lyric. I can put the Tonedexter in bypass, and engage the Tech 21 EQ pedal. That sounds fantastic with the Lyric. Or I can play my Langejans grand concert with the K&K, engage the Tonedexter and turn off the Tech 21. I don't have to change out pedals or rearrange my setup to accommodate the two guitars with two entirely different amplification systems. The only thing I have to do is roll the bass completely off at the Tonedexter when using the K&K equipped guitar. I might try making some more wavemaps while using my mixer to EQ out the bass of the microphone input to the Tonedexter. But what I already have now sounds excellent.

poopsidoo · #14 08-09-2020, 02:50 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ken Carr

Ok. I'm thoroughly impressed with the sound now running my effects through the Tonedexter effects loop. I have my set-up now with my Tech 21 Q-strip in the loop. I have a Huss and Dalton TOM-R with the Lyric. I can put the Tonedexter in bypass, and engage the Tech 21 EQ pedal. That sounds fantastic with the Lyric. Or I can play my Langejans grand concert with the K&K, engage the Tonedexter and turn off the Tech 21. I don't have to change out pedals or rearrange my setup to accommodate the two guitars with two entirely different amplification systems. The only thing I have to do is roll the bass completely off at the Tonedexter when using the K&K equipped guitar. I might try making some more wavemaps while using my mixer to EQ out the bass of the microphone input to the Tonedexter. But what I already have now sounds excellent.

I’m real interested in this. So I could plug my ES2 into my venue and run it into the effects send? Then I can play my mando thru my TD amd when I want to play my Taylor I mute the TD and unmute my venue? Is that all I need to do?

Ken Carr · #15 08-09-2020, 09:20 PM

Poopsidoo, no. You can put the Venue D.I. into the Tonedexter effects loop. To do this, you have to have a 1/4" stereo-to-dual mono splitter cable. This would be a "y" configuration. TRS splitting of to two TS plugs. The TRS plug goes into the Tonedexter effects jack. One plug is the tip and it goes into the input of the Venue. The other plug is the ring and it goes into the output of the Venue. When you want to play the Taylor, put the Tonedexter in bypass mode. Plug your guitar into the Tonedexter. Connect the output of the Tonedexter into your amp or p.a. and use your Venue like you normally do. When you want to play the mandolin through the Tonedexter, just use the wavemap and bypass the Venue.