Accidentally bought a Boss GT100 (albeit cheaply)

thecolourbox

... Whoops. £140 in Cash Generator in Birmingham city centre today, setting as they are £330 new and routinely selling for £200 on eBay I thought it worth a punt to see if a good quality multi fx with good routing options might fulfill my bedroom setup in 4cm with one of my valve preamps. It came with the power supply and a Gator case carry bag thing. If nothing else I could always flip it on for the same money or trade it against something else I suppose.

So, once I've made sure it's on version 2 of the firmware, what have I got to look forward to?

Any problems I need to be aware of?

I'm looking forward to using dual signal paths as well (with or without my preamp) and some of the "accelerator switch" things sound intriguing.  

timmysoft

get the v2.3 update, great units with some really good effects and at that price you've done well! 

professorben

Avoid the amp and cab modelling ands it's a solid versatile great sounding multi. 

timmysoft

professorben said:

Avoid the amp and cab modelling ands it's a solid versatile great sounding multi. 

some of the amps are ok when used in conjunction with the 4CM and an actual real life power section and speaker, the amps and cabs do sound half decent into headphones too. 

siraxeman

Some of the models sound good straight into my HS7's....spesh the dual amps. Said it before, whilst I do think there are better amp models out there the Pod HD when compared A/B against a GT-100 (search on youtube for direct A/B's) shows that there's not a lot in it between them at the end of the day....trust your own ears over perceived internet wisdom. As for FX few would argue its a great unit. I really should use mine a lot more...4cm for live use.

thomasw88

My opinion was itso OK but really nothing special. 

Voxman

As a gigging player I always look at gear from a gigging rather than home/recording perspective.  I have mixed feelings about the GT100.  I love the 2 LCD display, the switching & parameter control you get, the connectivity options, wonderful effects, and that they are built like tanks - but I just couldn't get on with the amp modelling which is what I'd mainly use it for - it's a lot better than any other Boss MFX I've heard but I just couldn't get it to sound warm & organic.

For gigging I think the GT100 is a much nicer and quieter unit to use than the Pod HD500/500X which I really disliked (far too many menu's and a small display) - the HD500X amp/cab modelling was arguably a little better (but not a huge difference & very subjective - I didn't like that either) but it was awkward to use and it picked up too much noise on higher gain amp models or when adding a distortion pedal model - I tried adjusting the noise-gate, but it then 'deadened' the tone.  The GT100 was much better here.

If I had to choose between the two for live use, I'd go with the GT100.     

longi

timmysoft said:

professorben said:

Avoid the amp and cab modelling ands it's a solid versatile great sounding multi. 

some of the amps are ok when used in conjunction with the 4CM and an actual real life power section and speaker, the amps and cabs do sound half decent into headphones too. 

I think some of the amps aren't so bad either, especially the cleans which I think it excels at. It's the high gain amps that really suck! I think the AC30 models aren't so good either. For the record I use my amps overdrive channel and the GT-100 for cleans. It's plenty good enough for that.

It has a few "dud" effects such as the sitar model which is shockingly bad compared to the sitar model on my AX3000G.

Routing is pretty good, very similar to the HD500's.

I thought the accel function is quite odd, it's fun for 20 seconds then you get bored, that said I really only used it for about that much before I thought "No!"

Harmonizer is a bit patchy but useable (I use it a lot)

The buffer is very good for 4cm - make sure the patch levels are at unity otherwise it will colour the sound.

Overall it's a great unit